THE SNOW STORM.

[This poem is founded upon the following touching incident: In the month of December, 1821, a Mr. Blake and his wife, and an infant, were passing over the Green Mountains, near the town of Arlington, Vt, in a sleigh with one horse. The drifting snow rendered it impossible for the horse to proceed. Mr. Blake set off on foot in search of assist ince, and perished in the storm before he could reach a human dwelling. The mother, alarmed, as is supposed, went in search of him with the infant in her arms. She was found in the morning dead, a short distance from the sleigh. The child was wrapped in her cloak which had been removed and survived the perils of the cold and the storm. A mother's love led Mrs. Blake to suffer the agonies of freezing to death, that her darling "little one" might continue to breathe the air of heaven.]

The cold winds swept the mountain's height,

And pathless was the dreary wild,
And 'mid the cheerless hours of night

A mother wandered with her child-
As through the drifted snow she pressed,
The babe was sleeping on her breast.

And colder still the winds did blow,

And darker hours of night came on,

And deeper grew the drifts of snow

Her limbs were chilled, her strength was gone,

"O God!" she cried in accents wild,

"If I must perish, save my child!"

She stripped her mantle from her breast,
And bared her bosom to the storm,
And round the child, she wrapped the vest,
And smiled to think her babe was warm.

With one cold kiss, one tear she shed,
And sunk upon a snowy bed.

At dawn a traveler passed by,

She lay beneath a snowy veil;

The frost of death was in her eye;

Her cheek was cold, and hard, and pale;

He moved the robe from off the child;

The babe looked up, ar 1 sweetly smiled.

PORTLAND (ME.) ARGUS.

THE BELLS.

Hear the sledges with the bells

Silver bells

What a world of merriment their melody foretells!
How they tinkle, tinkle, tinkle,

In the icy air of night!
While the stars that over-sprinkle
All the heavens, seem to twinkle
With a crystalline delight;
Keeping time, time, time,

In a sort of Runic rhyme,

To the tintinnabulation that so musically swells
From the bells, bells, bells, bells,
Bells, bells, bells-

From the jingling and the tinkling of the bells.
Hear the mellow wedding-bells,

Golden bells!

What a world of happiness their harmony foretells
Through the balmy air of night

How they ring out their delight,
From the molten-golden notes,

And all in tune,

What a liquid ditty floats

To the turtle-dove that listens, while she gloats On the moon!

O, from out the sounding cells,

What a gush of euphony voluminously wells!
How it swells!

How it dwells

On the Future! how it tells

Of the rapture that impels

To the swinging and the ringing
Of the bells, bells, bells,—

Bells, bells, bells

To the rhyming and the chiming of the bells!

Hear the loud alarum bells

Brazen bells!

What a tale of terror, now, their turbulency tells!

In the startled ear of night

How they scream out their affright!
Too much horrified to speak,

They can only shriek, shriek,

Out of tune,

In a clamorous appealing to the mercy of the fire,
In a mad expostulation with the deaf and frantic fire
Leaping higher, higher, higher,
With a desperate desire,

And a resolute endeavor,
Now-now to sit or never,
By the side of the pale-faced moon.
O the bells, bells, bells!

What a tale their terror tells

Of despair!

How they clang, and clash, and roar!
What a horror they outpour

On the bosom of the palpitating air!

Yet the ear, it fully knows,

By the twanging

And the clanging,

How the danger ebbs and flows;

Yet the ear distinctly tells,

In the jangling

And the wrangling,

How the danger sinks and swells,

By the sinking or the swelling in the anger of the bells,

Of the bells

Bells, bells, bells

In the clamor and the clangor of the bells!

Hear the tolling of the bells—
Iron bells!

What a world of solemn thought their monody compels
In the silence of the night,

How we shiver with affright

At the melancholy menace of their tone!

From every sound that floats

From the rust within their throats

Is a groan.

And the people--ah, the people —
They that dwell up in the steeple,
All alone,

And who tolling, tolling, tolling,

In t sat muffled monotone,
Feel a gory in so rolling

On the human heart a stone-→
They are neither man nor woman—
They are neither brute nor human-
They are Ghouls:

And their king it is who tolls;
And he rolls, rolls, rolls, rolls,
A pæan from the bells!
And his merry bosom swells

With the pean of the bells!
And he dances and he yells;
Keeping time, time, time,
In a sort of Runic rhyme,
To the tolling of the bells,

Bells, bell, bells,

To the moaning and the groaning of the bells.

EDGAR A. POE.

THE INFLUENCE OF WOMAN.

[This admirable speech was made to several thousand ladies at Richmond, Va., in the fall of 1840. Though nearly half a century has passed since its delivery, i contains sentiments of as immediate interest to Ladies and worthy the adoption of every patriot now as then. It is stated that when the speaker resumed his seat, James Barbour, the Governor of Virginia, arose and said: "I entirely accord with the views which have been so eloquently expressed by the highly distinguished gentleman who has addressed you. Albeit unused to the melting mood' I found, While he was expressing them, the tears involuntarily stealing down my cheeks; and I am persuaded that the heart of every lady here present more than responds to my own.]"

It is by the promulgation of sound morals in the community, and, more especially, by the training and instruction of the young, that woman performs her part toward the preservation of a free gov. ernment. It is now generally admitted that public liberty, the perpetuity of a free constitution, rests on the virtue aad intelligence of the community which enjoys it. How is that virtue to be inspired? and how is that intelligence to be communicated? Bonaparte once asked