Passing fair is Venice, but she sits in lonely widowhood in the deserted Adriatic. Amalfi crouches under her cliffs in the shame of her poverty. The harbors of Tyre and Carthage are lonesome pools. They tell their own story. When the men of the sea no longer find a home or a welcome on the shore,--when they are driven to become the mere hirelings who fight the battles of commerce, like other hirelings they will serve beneath the flag where the pay and the provant are most abundant. The vicissitudes of traffic are passing swift in these latter days; and it does not lie beyond the reach of a possible future that the great commercial capitals of the Atlantic coast may be called to pause in their giddy race, even before they have rebuilded the Quarantine Hospital, or laid the capstone of the pharos of Minot's Ledge.
The song-sparrow has a joyous note, The brown thrush whistles bold and free; But my little singing-bird at home Sings a sweeter song to me.
The cat-bird, at morn or evening, sings With liquid tones like gurgling water; But sweeter by far, to my fond ear, Is the voice of my little daughter.
Four years and a half since she was born, The blackcaps piping cheerily,-- And so, as she came in winter with them, She is called our Chicadee.
She sings to her dolls, she sings alone, And singing round the house she goes,-- Out-doors or within, her happy heart With a childlike song o'erflows.
Her mother and I, though busy, hear,-- With mingled pride and pleasure listening,-- And thank the inspiring Giver of song, While a tear in our eye is glistening.
Oh! many a bird of sweetest song I hear, when in woods or meads I roam; But sweeter by far than all, to me, Is my Chicadee at home.
A SECOND LETTER FROM PAUL POTTER, OF NEW YORK, TO THE DON ROBERTO WAGONERO, COMMORANT OF WASHINGTON, IN THE DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA.
22,728, Five Hundred and Fifty-First St., } New York, June 1, 1858. }
Dear Don Bobus,--I see that you have been Christian enough to send my last letter to "The Atlantic Monthly," and that the editors of that famous work have confirmed my opinion of their high taste by printing it. Your disposition of my MSS. I do not quarrel with; although it must be regarded in law as an illegal liberty, inasmuch as the Court of Chancery has decided that a man does not part with property in his own letters merely by sending them; but I ask permission to hint that your conduct will acquire a certain graceful rotundity, if you will remit to me in current funds the munificent sum of money which the whole-souled and gentlemanly proprietors--pardon the verbal habits of my humble calling!--have without doubt already remitted to you. _Pecunia prima quaerenda, virtus post nummos_. Mind you, I do not expect to be as well paid as Sannazarius.