terest and his happiness, thus seduced from the paths of innocence and peace, thus confounded in the toils that were deliberately spread for him, and overwhelmed by the mas tering spirit and genius of another-this man, thus ruined and undone, and made to play a subordinate part in this grand drama of guilt and treason, this man is to be called the principal offender, while he, by whom he was thus plunged in misery, is comparatively innocent, a mere accessory!

7. Is this reason? Is it law? Is it humanity? Neither the human heart nor the human understanding, will bear a perversion so monstrous and absurd! so shocking to the soul! so revolting to reason! Let Aaron Burr, then, not shrink from the high destination which he has courted; and having already ruined Blannerhassett, in fortune, character, and happiness, forever, let him not attempt to finish the tragedy, by thrusting that ill-fated man between himself' and punishment.

LXXXIII.-ON THE TRIAL OF A MURDERER.

DANIEL WEBSTER.

1. AN aged man, without an enemy in the world, in his own house, and in his own bed, is made the victim of butcherly murder for mere pay. Truly, here is a new lesson for painters and poets. Whoever shall hereafter draw the portrait of murder, if he will show it, as it has been exhibited in an example, where such example was least to have been looked for, in the very bosom of our New England society, let him not give it the grim visage of Moloch, the brow knitted by revenge, the face black with settled hate, and the blood-shot eye emitting livid fires of malice : let him draw, rather, a decorous, smooth-faced, bloodless demon: a picture in repose, rather than in action; not so much an example of human nature in its depravity and in its paroxysms of crime, as an infernal nature, a fiend in the ordinary display and development of his character.

2. The deed was executed with a degree of self-posses sion and steadiness, equal to the wickedness with which it was planned. The circumstances now clearly in evidence, spread out the whole scene before us. Deep sleep had fallen on the destined victim, and on all beneath his roof. A healthful old man, to whom sleep was sweet; the first sound slumbers of the night held him in their soft but strong embrace. The assassin enters through the window, already prepared, into an unoccupied apartment. With noiseless foot he paces the lonely hall, half lighted by the moon: he winds up the ascent of the stairs, and reaches the door of the chamber. Of this, he moves the lock, by soft and continued pressure, till it turns on its hinges; and he enters, and beholds his victim before him. The room was uncommonly open to the admission of light. The face of the innocent sleeper was turned from the murderer, and the beams of the moon, resting on the gray locks of his aged temple, showed him where to strike. The fatal blow is given! and the victim passes without a struggle or a motion, from the repose of sleep to the repose of death!

3. It is the assassin's purpose to make sure work; and he yet plies the dagger, though it was obvious that life had been destroyed by the blow of the bludgeon. He even raises the aged arm, that he may not fail in his aim at the heart; and replaces it again over the wounds of the poniard! To finish the picture, he explores the wrist for the pulse! He feels it, and ascertains that it beats no longer! It is accomplished. The deed is done. He retreats, retraces his steps to the window, passes out through it as he came in, and escapes. He has done the murder: no eye has seen him, no ear has heard him. The secret is his own, and it is safe!

4. Ah! gentlemen, that was a dreadful mistake. Such a secret can be safe nowhere. The whole creation of God has neither nook nor corner, where the guilty can bestow it, and say it is safe. Not to speak of that eye which glances through all disguises, and beholds every thing as in

the splendor of noon: such secrets of guilt are never safe from detection, even by men. True, it is, generally speaking, that "murder will out.' True it is, that Providence hath so ordained, and doth so govern things, that those who break the great law of heaven, by shedding men's blood, seldom succeed in avoiding discovery. Especially, in a case exciting so much attention as this, discovery must come, and will come, sooner or later. A thousand eyes turn at once to explore every man, every thing, every circumstance connected with the time and place: a thousand ears catch every whisper: a thousand excited minds intensely. dwell on the scene,-shedding all their light, and ready to kiudle, at the slightest circumstance, into a blaze of discovery.

5. Meantime, the guilty soul cannot keep its own secret. It is false to itself, or rather, it feels an irresistible impulse to be true to itself. It labors under its guilty possession, and knows not what to do with it. The human heart was not made for the residence of such an inhabitant. It finds itself preyed on by a torment, which it does not acknowledge to God nor man. A vulture is devouring it, and it can ask no sympathy nor assistance, either from heaven or earth. The secret which the murderer possesses, soon comes to possess him; and like the evil spirits of which we read, it overcomes him, and leads him whithersoever it will. He feels it beating at his heart, rising to his throat, and demanding disclosure. He thinks the whole world sees it in his face, reads it in his eyes, and almost hears its workings in the very silence of his thoughts. It has become his master. It betrays his discretion, it breaks down his courage, it conquers his prudence. When suspicions from without begin to embarrass him, and the net of circumstances to entangle him, the fatal secret struggles with still greater violence to burst forth. It must be confessed, it will be confessed: there is no refuge from confession but suicide, and suicide is confession.

LXXXIV.-CHARGE OF THE LIGHT BRIGADE.

1. HALF a league, half a league,
Half a league onward,

All in the valley of death

Rode the six hundred.
"Forward, the Light Brigade:
Charge for the guns!" he said.
Into the valley of death,

Rode the six hundred.

2. “Forward, the Light Brigade!"
Was there a man dismayed?
Not though the soldiers knew

Some one had blundered:
Theirs not to make reply,
Theirs not to reason why,
Theirs but to do and die:
Into the valley of death
Rode the six hundred.

8. Cannon to right of them,
Cannon to left of them,
Cannon in front of them

Volleyed and thundered:

Stormed at with shot and shell,

Boldly they rode and well:

Into the jaws of death,
Into the mouth of hell,

Rode the six hundred.

4. Flashed all their sabers bare,
Flashed as they turned in air,
Sab'ring the gunners there,
Charging an army, while

All the world wondered:

Plunged in the battery smoke,

ALFRED TENNYSOK,

Right through the line they broke:

Cossack and Russian

Reeled from the saber-stroke,

Shattered and sundered.

Then they rode back, but not,

Not the six hundred.

8. Cannon to right of them,
Cannon to left of them,
Cannon behind them,

Volleyed and thundered:
Stormed at with shot and shell,
While horse and hero fell,
They that had fought so well,
Came through the jaws of death,
Back from the mouth of hell,
All that was left of them,
Left of six hundred.

6. When can their glory fade?
O, the wild charge they made!
All the world wondered.
Honor the charge they made!
Honor the Light Brigade,
Noble six hundred !

LXXXV.-" EXCELSIOR!"

1. THE shades of night were falling fast,
As through an Alpine village passed
A youth, who bore, 'mid snow and ice,
A banner with the strange device,
"Excelsior!"

2. His brow was sad: his eye, beneath,
Flashed like a falchion from its sheath:
And like a silver clarion rung

The accents of that unknown tongue,
"Excelsior!"

8. In happy homes he saw the light

Of household fires gleam warm and bright
Above, the spectral glaciers shone;
And from his lips escaped a groan,
"Excelsior!"

4. "Try not the pass!" the old man said,
'Dark lowers the tempest overhead:
The roaring torrent 's deep and wide!"
And loud that clarion voice replied,

"Excelsior! ”

LONGFELLOW.