only stopping-place between Abel Crawford's In 1826 this house was occupied by Samuel Willey, his wife. five children, and two hired men. During the summer a drought of unusual severity dried the streams and parched the thin soil of the mountains. On the 28th of August, at dusk, a storm burst upon the mountains, and raged with indescribable fury throughout the night. The rain fell in sheets. Innumerable torrents suddenly broke forth on all sides, deluging the narrow valley, and bearing with them forests that had covered the mountains for ages. The turbid and swollen Saco rose over its banks, flooding the intervales, and spreading destruction in its course. Two days afterward a traveller succeeded in forcing his way through the Notch. He found the Willey house standing uninjured in MOUNT WILLARD, FROM LEDGE OF WILLEY BROOK. the midst of woful desolation. A land-slide descending from Mount Willey had buried the little vale beneath its ruins. The traveller reported at the nearest house what he had seen. Assistance was dispatched to the scene of disaster. The rescuers came too late to render aid to the living, but they found, and buried on the spot, the bodies of Mr. and Mrs. Willey and the two hired men. The children were never found. We passed by the beautiful brook Kedron, flung down from the utmost heights of Willey, between banks mottled with color. Then, high up on our right, two airy water-falls hung, suspended from the summit of Mount Webster. These dancing sprites, called respectively the Silver Cascade and the Flume, withdrew our attention from every other object, until a sharp turn to the right brought the overhanging precipices of Mount Willard full upon us. Here the railway seems fairly stopped, but with a graceful sweep it eludes the mountain, and glides around its massive shoulder, giving, as it does so, a hand to the high-road, which comes straggling up the sharp ascent. Now and here we entered a close dark defile hewn down between cliffs ascending on the right in regular terraces, on the left in ruptured masses. For a few rods this narrow cleft continues, then, on a sudden, the rocks, which lift themselves on either side, shut together. An enormous mass has tumbled from its ancient location on the left side, and taking a position within twenty feet of the opposite precipice, forms the natural gate of the Notch, through which a way was made for the common road with great labor, through which the river frays a passage, but where no one would imagine there was room for either. Passing now the crag which so curiously resembles an elephant's head and trunk, all three emerge from the gloom of the pass into the cheerful sunshine of a little prairie, at the extremity of which are seen the white walls of a hotel. The whole route we have traversed is full of contrasts, full of surprises, but this sudden transition is the most picturesque, the most startling of all. We seemed to have reached the end of the world. THE DEAD CHILD AND THE MOCKING-BIRD. [The following poem is in no sense a mere fancy. On the contrary, the strange, pathetic incident it commemorates actually occurred, not long ago, in the neighborhood of Jacksonville, Florida.] ONCE, in a land of balm and flowers, Of rich fruit-laden trees, Where the wild wreaths from jasmine bowers We marked our Jeannie's footsteps run She seemed a Hebe in the sun, And all day long her winsome song, What strange voice blends with hers? It blends with hers, which soon is stilled- It chilled her drooping curls of brown, And like an awful cloud crept down From vague, mysterious skies. At last one day our Jeannie lay The sole sweet breath on lips of death When just beyond the o'er-curtained room (How tender, yet how strong!) Rose through the misty morning gloom Dear Christ! those notes of golden peal Is it an angel's voice that throbs The fancy passed-but came once more The fire of that transcendent strain OUR RUBY-THROAT. My window, in the genial months of ANY times a day, as I sit at work by! summer, there breaks in on my ear from the garden outside a series of quick, faint, sweet chirps, not louder than the notes of a cricket, yet far more musical, and turning swiftly-for I know the sounds well -I descry a humming-bird floating like a live emerald amid my flowers. As it plunges its bill into their dainty beakers it murmurs its happy content in soft, satisfied tones like the cooing of a babe at its mother's breast. I snatch the opera-glass always standing ready for such occasions, and make a study of my fairy visitor as long as it remains in sight. Hovering in the air on wings vibrating so rapidly that we hear rather than see their marvellous motion, the bird pauses in front of each inviting blossom a moment or more in a keenly searching attitude, as if to prove the full promise enticing it forward ere yielding itself up to the warm allurement. Probing this cup of nectar and passing by that, its choice among the flowers appears to be dictated by a purely capricious fancy. Yet it is really intent on an errand somewhat different from what is generally suspected, the tiny insects which rifle the flowers of their honeyed treasures forming the chief charm which attracts it toward them. It is fond of the perfumed syrup distilled in their painted laboratories, but takes it in the way of a relish, or a dressing for the fleshy morsels hidden in their deep recesses, which it seizes with the delicate forceps tipping its tubular tongue. Thus that which seems to be mere wayward coquetry with a bevy of beautiful blossoms is in truth the exercise of a wise selection, the nature of the humming-bird demanding a more substantial diet than the banquet of sweets served up in the heart of a fragrant corolla. As a rule, the nimble sylph depends entirely upon its pinions for support while gleaning its food from floral repositories, yet I often observe it resting on its slender feet when the chance is offered. For instance, if a leaf happens to project directly under a seductive blossom, it accepts of the vantage-ground, though with the air of an unaccustomed proceeding. It drops its slim legs, usually tucked out of sight in billows of down, and stands perfectly still on the green pedestal, with SUN GEM (HELIACTIN CORNUTI). wings quiet and even folded, until the quick repast is over. I have especially noticed this interesting performance with plants of the balsam family (Balsamina), where the flowers spring from the axils, and one or two in every group, resting just over a leaf, prove awkward to reach unless the bird interrupts its flight and takes their enticing tidbits standing. These feathered sun-flakes which make a hunting ground of my garden are in the habit of taking a rest from their elfin courses on the dry twigs stretching out here and there beyond the green boughs of an oak in view of my window. Here they perch for varying intervals, sometimes for many minutes, perhaps a halfhour altogether. On first alighting, they busy themselves with affairs of the toilet, combing their glossy plumes with their diminutive claws, and drawing the wing feathers one by one through the narrowly opened beak, which is afterward cleaned and polished by rubbing it back and forth vigorously against the perch. This careful process finally accomplished, the glistening atomies sit for a while in a beatific state of contemplation, now motionless and dreamy, and again peering about from side to side, with their long |