tumns of unrivaled beauty, magnificence and abundance. The most of our poets have sung the charms of this season, all varying from each other, and all beautiful, like the many-tinted hues of the foliage of the groves. The pensive, sentimental, moralizing Bryant says: "The melancholy days are come, the saddest of the year;" but his exquisite lines are so well known that we must resist the temptation to quote them. The blithe, jocund, light-hearted Halleck sings in quite a different strain in describing the country at this period. Who would not know these lines to be his? "In the autumn time Earth has no holier nor no lovelier clime." But we must not quote him, either, for the same reason. It is pleasant to ramble at this season along the upland heights and through the forest walks, surveying the landscapes and contemplating the decay of nature! Like the consumptive, she is most beautiful when the tide of vitality begins to run low. There is instruction to be gathered from the fading of earth's gay foliage. "There is a tongue in every leaf," which declares that we, too, must fall, anon, and admonishes us to be in readiness for the frosts of death. "A world there is eternal, Where, merging from the sod, From the Vermont Family Gazette. RELIEF FOR IRELAND. BY A. B. F. HILDRETH. The great staple product of Ireland-the potato -has been cut off by the disease which has been gradually infesting that root, and it has been out of the power of the people to raise their provisions. An oppressive government has crippled their resources, and has in various ways deprived them of employment, whereby they could earn a livelihood. Their parliament has been wrenched from them by a haughty and tyranizing government; their manufactories have diminished; their internal improvements are suspended; and there is no alternative left them but to depend on charity, or-starve! Reader! have you been accustomed to look upon an Irishman with contempt? Have you despised him for his poverty and ignorance and degradation? Then look to the causes which have led to this state of things. Read them in England's history of tyranny and oppression. Yes, that proud, haughty, cold and selfish people. who pride themselves on being the greatest and best; who boast of their national strength and national glory; on whose dominions the sun never ceases to shine; this great and mighty nation are responsible for this wo! Great, England may be, but her greatness is written in tyranny, in slaughter, in blood! "Man's inhumanity to man Makes countless thousands mourn." Do you despise Ireland for her wretchedness? Think what she might have been; think what she has been. Where do you find better or nobler blood than that which courses Irish veins? Is the cold, calculating Englishman to occupy a higher place in your estimation than the warm-hearted. devoted, affectionate Irishman? Where, on this broad earth, do you find such generosity of heart, such ardent and enduring affection, as you find in the Irish breast? Have you no respect for Irish character? Think of her historians, and minstrels, and poets, and statesmen, and philanthropists. Tom Moore wrote the history of Ireland; and though much of her history may be in song, where do you find metered verse like that of Erin's bard? What statesman stands higher in the world's annals than Daniel O'Connell? Where is there philanthropy to match that of Father Matthew? Must it be said of such a people, in the language of one of her poets: "Weep on, weep on, your hour is past; In vain the hero's heart hath bled; The sage's tongue hath warned in vain; Nay, nay-we would rather rejoin: "Weep on. Perhaps in after days Then, people of America, for humanity's sake, give, give. Twill not make you poorer, but 'twill make the Irish, if not richer, certainly happier. They are the children of one common parent with yourselves. Their blood may course through your own veins. Your relations and friends, perchance, are in want and are dying in that stricken land; then do not for a moment hesitate to give them succor. "They who give to the poor lend to the Lord;" and, although you have the promise that if you "cast your bread upon the waters it will return to you after many days," still you do not ask it. Your own approving conscience is your greatest reward; and when you offer daily thanks to God for the blessings that surround you, you will render Him heart-felt gratitude that your lot is cast in this glorious land of liberty; this great asylum of the suffering and oppressed of all nations, flowing with abundant harvests and innumerable earthly blessings. Fathers and mothers! Brothers and sisters! When you are gathered around the domestic fireside, surrounded with your comforts and pleasures; when you behold each other's smiling faces, and cheeks flushed with health; will you not cast your eyes, in imagination, to the family groups in Ireland, and mark, oh, mark the contrast? There are hearts as tender, as sympathising, as affectionate as your own. But there you witness no smiling faces; no rosy cheeks; but, on the contrary, forlorn and haggard countenances, and cheeks with the flesh shriveled and dried, and the skin cleaving to the bones! Oh, it is awful that this island which the good God had made the most beautiful of all the isles of the sea, should present such a spectacle! Let every man, woman and child contribute something for this woful people. If it is but a shilling, a sixpence, a penny, it will be so much in the scale of humanity. *Let your united contributions load the vessel with provisions and clothing, and say to her: "Sail on, sail on, thou fearless bark, Whenever blows the welcome wind; Bradford, Vt., March, 1847. *Mrs. Hildreth was very active and very successful in gathering up charitable contributions for Ireland, at this time, and the steamer which conveyed them across the ocean was chartered by Vice President Morton, then a merchant in Hanover, N. H. From the Green Mountain Gem. TO MY MOTHER. BY A. B. F. HILDRETH. Tired of the world's bewild'ring maze-to thee, My childhood was a term of brief delight; If any purer, more ennobling thought Hath e'er, 'mid grosser cares, my spirit swayed, 'Twas from thy high-toned precepts early caught, The homage still, by thee, to virtue paid. The simplest flower I brought, to thee was bright; Thy energy, thy patience, half divine; Thy long enduring love's perpetual bow; These are the things that to my heart have grown; I weep that, of thy dear ones, some are gone, Thy quiet days on earth be blest and long; I may not turn, that downward path to cheer. Yet from afar I bless thee; and I feel, (Rememb'ring still what thou wouldst have me be,) A sweet and soothing influence o'er me steal, Making me worthier of myself and thee. May 10, 1847. |