Thin bad luck to the man who is sober to-night;
He's a could-hearted boddagh or sacret secesher,
Whose heart for the ould flag has never been right,
And who takes in the fame of his counthry no pleasure.
Och, murther! will none of yees hould me, my dears,
For it's out o' my shkin wid delight I'll be jumpin',
Wid my eyes shwimmin' round in the happiest tears,
And my heart in my breast like a piston-rod thumpin'.”
CHARLES G. HALPINE.

BROTHER JONATHAN'S LAMENT FOR SISTER CAROLINE.
"She has gone-she has left us in passion and pride-
Our stormy-browed sister, so long at our side!
She has torn her own star from our firmament's glow,
And turned on her brother the face of a foe!

"O Caroline, Caroline, child of the sun,

We can never forget that our hearts have been one-
Our foreheads both sprinkled in Liberty's name,
From the fountain of blood with the finger of flame!
"You were always too ready to fire at a touch;

But we said, 'She is hasty-she does not mean much.'
We have scowled when you uttered some turbulent threat;
But Friendship still whispered, 'Forgive and forget!'
"Has our love all died out? Have its altars grown cold?
Has the curse come at last which the fathers foretold?
Then Nature must teach us the strength of the chain
That her petulant children would sever in vain.

"They may fight till the buzzards are gorged with their spoil,
Till the harvest grows black as it rots in the soil,

Till the wolves and the catamounts troop from their caves,
And the shark tracks the pirate, the lord of the waves:

"In vain is the strife! When its fury is past,

Their fortunes must flow in one channel at last,

As the torrents that rush from the mountains of snow

Roll mingled in peace through the valleys below.

"Our Union is river, lake, ocean, and sky;

Man breaks not the medal when God cuts the die!
Though darkened with sulphur, though cloven with steel,

The blue arch will brighten, the waters will heal!

"O Caroline, Caroline, child of the sun,

There are battles with Fate that can never be won!
The star-flowering banner must never be furled,
For its blossoms of light are the hope of the world!

"Go, then, our rash sister! afar and aloof;

Run wild in the sunshine, away from our roof;

But when your heart aches and your feet have grown sore,
Remember the pathway that leads to our door!"

OLIVER WENDELL HOLMES.

The two last extracts, that of "Miles O'Reilly on the Downfall of Richmond" and "Brother Jonathan's Lament for Sister Caroline," are among the most beautiful productions in the English language; the first recalling the handsome features and royal gifts of Colonel Charles G. Halpine, who was endeared to so many during his life, and who is still so sincerely mourned; and the second the wonderful genius of Dr. Oliver Wendell Holmes, whose marvellous poetry, humorous and sentimental, so much resembles the extraordinary gifts of Tom Moore.

XLI.

CONFEDERATES ASSUMING THEIR PLACES IN CONGRESS.

A SPECTATOR in the British House of Commons looks down upon three types of men dominated by one. First, the English, with their unmistakable air and voice; next, the Scotch, with their broad accent; and, last, the Irish, with their brogue; but the English manner modifies and controls the whole. The last tries insensibly to imitate the first, but the first never copies the burr of the Caledonian or the brogue of the Hibernian. If that same spectator looks down upon the French Deputies, he realizes no such divisions. The Gaul is everywhere. Differing in face, form, and sometimes in idioms, the Frenchman is omnipresent. An excess of manner, shown in grimace, in

shrugs of the shoulder, in quick gestures of the hand, in rapid talk, and in sudden explosions of temper. The most decorous and solemn are subject to all these variations. Pass from Paris to Berne, and walk into the Swiss Congress, and there you meet three different nationalities, answering to the German, French, and Italian cantons, all generally speaking the language of each.

Now take your seat in the gallery of the American House or Senate, and the contrast is very curious. Before the war, the distinction between the North and the South was almost as plain as that between the Scotch and the Irish in the British Parliament; but new ingredients have since been introduced. The old leaders from the South have all gone. Their successors are moderate men of the same school-Northerners who came in with the Union Army and remained after it was disbanded, and former slaves now free. The result is a strange admixture. But the great ideas which beat the Rebellion permeate and leaven the whole. The new colored vote, equal to eight hundred thousand ballots, increases the Southern force in Congress and threatens to absorb old parties. This influence compels the whites to retire the former leaders and make way for another order of men, of whom Gordon of Georgia; Ransom, of North Carolina; Johnston, of Virginia; and Dr. George R. Dennis, of Maryland, in the Senate; and John Hancock, of Texas; and Waddell, of North Carolina, in the House-all Democrats are fair representatives.

These new Democrats are very different men from their predecessors. The most pronounced is General John B. Gordon, of Georgia, whose brilliant achievements as a Confederate officer, especially in the last stubborn defence of Richmond, are conceded by all the Union soldiers. His martial appearance, Southern accent, and frank manner make him a conspicuous Senatorial feature. He resembles General Sickles, and bears himself a good deal like John C. Breckinridge. His face indi

cates fixed and unalterable convictions, but his conversation is gentle and conciliatory. We shall hear of him in the future, and, I am sure, on the side of fair play. Gordon entered the Senate in March, 1873, in his forty-first year. He is a graduate of the University of Georgia. When the war broke out, he was mining coal in Dade County, in his State. He raised a company, and fought his way from captain through all the grades to the position of lieutenant-general, and was badly wounded several times. He is a consistent and strict member of the Methodist Church, and is said to be the most popular man in his State. Georgia sets a good example by elevating such material to her high representative positions. These Southern fighting-men are nearly always quiet fellows. They were never heard of in the North before the war. Most of the Secession talkers in the Senate and House made poor soldiers. I do not want to specify; but if you will run over the list of the violent volubilities in Congress who forced on the conflict, and follow them into the Rebellion, you will find that they were mostly conspicuous failures.

Gordon is one of the leaders of the new Democratic dispensation. To hold the hundred and four Southern electoral votes of the Democratic party in 1880, beginning at Delaware and ending at Texas, the old fire-eaters must stay in retirement, and men like the soldier-senator from Georgia must lead.

The black men, with 800,000 ballots, holding say five of the Southern States, and deciding the majority of several of the closer States North, will play a not less important part in that year. Seventeen years ago a negro was never seen in the halls of Congress, save as messenger or laborer, and never dared to show his face in the galleries. He could not ride in a public conveyance, or go to a place of amusement, or be seen on the streets after nine o'clock in the evening. He had no chance for education, or to learn a trade, and no place save as servant or slave. Now he sits in Congress, practises in all our courts,

is a physician and a college professor, mingles with the crowd of spectators in the galleries, rides on equal terms with the whites in the cars, even fills some of the most difficult offices in the departments, represents his country abroad, educates his children in the public schools, and is a power in elections. An experienced statesman at my side predicts that in a few years he will be a Cabinet Minister.

Next look down into the Senate, and first study the men who represent the pioneer element. There is William M. Stewart, born in New York in 1827, an educated man, with a frontier experience. Two years a poor workman in the California mines, and then rising rapidly from office to office, till he settled down, in 1865, Senator from the new State of Nevada, from which he will soon retire to his magnificent château in Washington city, independent by his lucky ventures in the silver-mines of his State, and at forty-seven in high health, with plenty of money to enjoy his books and his friends. A tall, fair-haired blond, with a bright blue eye, he looks like a Saxon chief who has just walked out of an ancient picture and put on American clothes. There, lounging on a sofa, is James W. Nye, his late colleague, who came into the Senate with him, in 1865, from the same new State of Nevada, and left last March to give way to the man who is the present Congressional curiosity, J. P. Jones. Nye was born in New York, June 10, 1815, and floated into Nevada as Mr. Lincoln's Governor, in 1861, when it was a Territory, after filling a large space in politics in his native State. Out of the Senate as he is, he is still the welcome guest of every intelligent circle. Nye has been described so often that I need only say that years seem rather to increase than to diminish his remarkably handsome features, and to add to the stores of his unequalled wit and hu

mor.

Everybody is asking for his successor, J. P. Jones. A single man, in his forty-fourth year, with a large head, broad brow,