death? Does not all that inspires us bear the colors of Night? Night bears thee gently like a mother; to her thou owest all thy glory. Thou wouldst have sunk into endless space had not Night upheld thee, and bound thee, till earth arose. Truly I existed long ere thou wert: I and my sisters were sent to dwell in thy world, and hallow it with love, to make it an enduring memorial; to plant it with unfading flowers. Not yet have these blossoms opened, few are the traces which mark our way. But the end of time is at hand; then thou wilt rejoin us, and gently fade away, full of longing and fervent desire. All thy busy restlessness will end in heavenly freedom, a blessed home-coming. With bitter grief I acknowledge thy forsaking of our home, thine unconquered hatred to the old glorious heaven. But in vain is thy wrath and fury. The Cross stands firm for ever, the banner of our race. THE many scattered races of mankind lay bound for ages in the grasp of an iron fate. Light was hidden from their weary souls. The eternal world was the home and dwelling of the Gods. Its mysterious form had existed from eternity. Over the glowing mountains of the East abode the Sun, with its allpervading heat and light. An aged Giant bore the Earth on his shoulders. The Titans, the first children of Mother Earth,-who had waged impious war against the new glorious race of Gods and their kinsfolk, the merry race of men,-lay fast bound under the mountains. The dark green depths of Ocean was the lap of a Goddess. A gay, luxurious race dwelt in the crystal grottoes. Beasts, trees, flowers, and animals had the gift of speech. Richer was the flavor of the grapes, for a God dwelt in the luxuriant vine; the golden sheaves took their birth from a loving motherly Goddess; and love was the sweet service rendered to the deities. Age followed age, a ceaseless spring; and the happy life of Earth's children was ever enlivened by celestial presences. All races honored the flashing, many-hued flame, as the highest manifestation in life. Only one shadow obscured the common joy-the cruel spectre of Death. This mysterious decree-separation from all that was loved and lovely-weighed heavy on the hearts of all; even the Gods could find no remedy for this evil. Unable to overcome the menacing fate, man strove to cast a glamour of beauty over the ghastly phantom, and pictured him as a lovely youth extinguishing a torch, and sinking to rest. Still the cruel enigma remained unsolved, and spoke of the irresistible might of some unknown power. The old world waned; the flowers of the first Paradise faded away; and the race of men, casting off their early innocence, strayed into a wild, uncultivated desert. The Gods and their retinues vanished from earth. Nature stood lonely and lifeless, bound in the iron chains of custom and laws. The bloom was brushed from life. Faith took flight from the dreary scene; and with her fled her heavenly companion Fancy, who could cast over all things her magic vesture. A cruel north wind swept over the barren waste, and the devastated wonder-home was blown into space. Heaven's blue ocean showed new dazzling spheres, and the Spirit of the World withdrew to higher regions to await the dawn of a renewed earth. Light ceased to be the abode and the symbol of the Gods; they covered themselves with the veil of Night. Night was the cradle of the coming age; in it the Gods took refuge, and sleep came upon them, until a new era should call them forth in new and more glorious forms. The new era arose at last amidst a nation scorned and despised, a people who had cast off their native innocence. In poverty was born the son of the first Virgin Mother, mysterious offspring of heavenly origin. The wise sons of the East were first to acknowledge the commencement of the strange new epoch, and humbly bent their way to worship the King in his lowly cradle; a mystic star guided their wandering steps. They did him homage, offering him the sweetness and brightness of the earth, the gold and the perfume, both miracles of nature. The Heavenly Heart unfolded slowly-a flower chalice of Almighty love, with eyes upturned to a Divine Father, while his head rested on the tender bosom of a loving earthly mother. With prophetic eye and godlike zeal, the blooming Child, despising the cruel days of earthly conflict before him, looked far ahead to the future of his beloved race, the offshoots of a divine root. Soon he gathered around him a loving band of childlike hearts. A strange new life arose, like that of the flowers of the field; unceasing words of wisdom and utterances of deepest love fell from his lips, like sparks of divine fire. From the far shores of Hellas and her sunny skies, a poet came to Palestine, and laid his heart at the feet of the WonderChild. 10732 Oh! thou art he who from unending years And thou wilt bring our higher manhood home. For thou art death, and thou our life hast given. Full of joy, his heart beating with new love and hope, the singer bent his way to Hindustan, pouring out under its cloudless sky such burning songs that myriads of hearts turned to him, and the joyful news spread far and near. Soon after the poet left, the precious Life fell a sacrifice to fallen man: he died young, torn away from the much-loved earth, his weeping mother, and his faint-hearted friends. The moment of anguish, the birth of the new world was at hand. He fought with the old dreaded form of death; struggled hard to shake off the clutch of the old world; his sweet lips drained the bitter chalice of unspeakable anguish. Once more he cast a loving glance at his mother; then came the delivering hand of Mighty Love, and he fell asleep. For many days a thick mist lay on the raging waters and the quaking earth; countless were the tears shed by those who loved him; the secret of the grave was made clear, and heavenly spirits rolled away the heavy stone from the tomb. Angels watched by the slumbering Form: rising in new godlike glory, he soared to the heights of the newly made world, buried the old earthly shape in the depths of a cavern, and laid his mighty hand on it, so that no power might ever move it. The loving ones still wept by his grave, but they wept tears of emotion and gratitude. Again they see thee and rejoice at thy resurrection; they see thee weeping on thy mother's sacred bosom; they walk once more as friends, listening to words like leaves fluttering from the Tree of Life; they behold thee hasten with untold longing to the Father's arms, bearing aloft the new manhood and the victorious chalice. The mother soon hastened to join thy triumph; she was the first to enter the New Home. Long years have passed since then, and thy new creation soars to higher powers; thousands and thousands drawn by thee from bitter grief and pain now roam with thee and the heavenly Virgin in the Kingdom of Love, serve in the Temple of Divine Death, and are thine eternally. FITZ-JAMES O'BRIEN (1828-1862) F THAT Company of brilliant if not always prosperous fellows who kept the echoes of "Bohemia" busy with the laughter and the sighs of spendthrift wit in the New York of the decade of '50, Fitz-James O'Brien was a fascinating and admired comrade. This restless Gaelic spirit was like the Irish river beside which he was born: sometimes turbulent in flashing cascades, beating and bullying the stolid rocks; again spreading under the sun through bright and placid lakes, or dancing gayly by the low and roseperfumed meadows. In the power of this lad from Shannon side, Thomond's bardic birthright infused its bold and tender soul into a facile pen, and with drama, song, and story lifted up the weary soul of the workaday world. O'Brien was of that strangely endowed race which furnished Lever with the heroes of his military novels, - the Englished Irishmen. He was born in the County Limerick, Ireland, about the year 1828. Educated at Dublin University, he went to London, where he amused himself for a time with the easy task of making "ducks and drakes" of a comfortable patrimony. About 1851 he sought relief from the importunities of declining fortune in a sea voyage, which landed him in New York with a few purse-burning shillings and some letters of introduction to distinguished Americans in his pocket. He soon became a favorite with the gay and gifted autocrats of the New World Grub Street, and strolled along the fashionable side of Broadway, and about the nooks of Printing-House Square, with the confidence of vested rights. From 1853 to 1858 O'Brien was one of the most valued contributors to Harper's Magazine and Harper's Weekly. He wrote for the stage several pretty comediettas, which are numbered in that exclusive list called the Standard Drama. With his story 'The Diamond Lens,' published in the Atlantic Monthly in 1858-9, a new and dashing pace was set in the fiction of the period. O'Brien was neither prosperous nor thrifty, and lived with splendid and careless irregularity, sometimes in great want and hardship; but keeping always a seemingly exhaustless buoyancy of heart. The Civil War sent him, in April 1861, with the ranks of the New York Seventh Regiment, to the defense of Washington. The war spirit took possession of him; and after his term of enlistment with that regiment had expired, he sought eagerly for a chance to return to the army. He was appointed to the staff of General Lander in January 1862, and immediately thereafter went through a gallant action at Bloomery Gap. In a skirmish on the morning of February 16th, 1862, he was in a desperate hand-to-hand encounter with the Confederate Colonel Ashley, and received a shot in the left shoulder. He rode twenty-four miles with a shattered scapular, and lay two months in battle for life at the house of George A. Thurston, in Cumberland, Maryland. Unskillful surgery, rather than the original wound, was the cause of his death. It was not until the 20th of March, too late, that he came into the charge of an able surgeon. In spite of a successful operation, by which the arm was removed at the shoulder, he succumbed to lockjaw, and died suddenly on the morning of Sunday, the 6th of April, 1862. His ashes were laid in the earth of Greenwood in November 1874. O'Brien's only real monument is a limited edition, now scarce, of his collected works, edited by William Winter, and published in 1881 at Boston. THE GREAT DIAMOND IS OBTAINED AND USED From The Diamond Lens, with other Stories. Copyright 1881, by James R. Osgood & Co.; 1885, by Charles Scribner's Sons WITH an uneasy look in his eyes, and hands unsteady with drink and nervousness, Simon drew a small case from his breast and opened it. Heavens! how the mild lamplight was shivered into a thousand prismatic arrows, as it fell upon a vast rose diamond that glittered in the case! I was no judge of diamonds, but I saw at a glance that this was a gem of rare size and purity. I looked at Simon with wonder, and— must I confess it?-with envy. How could he have obtained this treasure? In reply to my questions, I could just gather from his drunken statements (of which, I fancy, half the incoherence was affected) that he had been superintending a gang of slaves engaged in diamond-washing in Brazil; that he had seen one of them secrete a diamond, but instead of informing his employers, had quietly watched the negro until he saw him. bury his treasure; that he had dug it up and fled with it, but that as yet he was afraid to attempt to dispose of it publicly,— so valuable a gem being almost certain to attract too much attention to its owner's antecedents,—and he had not been able to discover any of those obscure channels by which such matters are |