5 a limit to your ambition, achieve it, and The first of September, and a frost! The farmers from the hills are mourning 30 over their buckwheat, but the river mist saves all which lay low enough for its white wreath to cover; and mine, though sown on the hillside, is at mist-mark, and so escaped. Nature seems to intend that 35 I shall take kindly to farming, and has spared my first crop even the usual calamities. I have lost but an acre of corn, I think, and that by the crows, who are privileged marauders, welcome at least to 40 build in the Omega and take their tithe without rent-day or molestation. I like their noise, though discordant. It is the minor in the anthem of nature making the gay song of the blackbird, and the 45 merry chirp of the robin and oriel, more gay and cheerier. Then there is a sentiment about the raven family, and for Shakspeare's lines and his dear sake I love them, 'Some say the ravens foster forlorn children The while their own birds famish in their nests.' The very name of a good deed shall protect them. Who shall say that poetry is a vain art, or that poets are irrespon 50 55 sible for the moral of their verse? For Burns's sake, not ten days since, I beat off my dog from the nest of a field-mouse, and forbade the mowers to cut the grass over her. She has had a poet for her friend, and her thatched roof is sacred. I should not like to hang about the neck of my soul all the evil that, by the last day, shall have had its seed in Byron's poem of the Corsair. It is truer of poetry than of most other matters, that 'More water glideth by the mill Than wots the miller of.' But I am slipping into a sermon. Speaking of music, some one said here the other day, that the mingled hum of the sounds of nature, and the distant murmur of a city, produce, invariably, the note F in music. The voices of all tune, the blacksmith's anvil and the wandering organ, the church-bells and the dustman's, the choir and the cart-wheel, the widow's cry and the bride's laugh, the prisoner's clanking chain and the schoolboy's noise at play at the height of the churchsteeple are one! It is all F, two hundred feet in air! The swallow can outsoar both our joys and miseries, and the larkwhat are they in his chamber of the sun! If you have any unhappiness at the moment of receiving this letter, dear Doctor, try this bit of philosophy. It's all F where the bird flies! You have no wings to get there, you say, but your mind has more than six of the cherubim, and in your mind lies the grief you would be rid of. As Cæsar says, 'By all the gods the Romans bow before I here discard my sickness.' I'll be above F, and let troubles hang be.. low. What a twopenny matter it makes of all our cares and vexations. I'll find a boy to climb to the top of a tall pine I have, and tie me up a white flag, which shall be above high-sorrow-mark henceforth. I will neither be elated or grieved without looking at it. It floats at where it is all one! Why, it will be a castle in the air, indeed - impregnable to unrest. Why not, dear Doctor! Why should we not set up a reminder that our sorrows are only so deep that the lees are but at the bottom, and there is good wine at the top-that there is an at F,' mosphere but a little above us where our sorrows melt into our joys! No man need be unhappy who can see a grasshopper on a church vane. It is surprising how mere a matter of 5 animal spirits is the generation of many of our bluest devils; and it is more surprising that we have neither the memory to recall the trifles that have put them to the flight, fear I should compound for a visit by the THE WHITE CHIP HAT nor the resolution to combat their ap-10 I pass'd her one day in a hurry, I have recovered my spirits ere now by a friend's asking me what was the matter. One seems to want but the suggestion, the presence of mind, the expressed wish, to be happy any day. My white flag 35 shall serve me that good end! 'Tut, man!' it shall say, 'your grief is not grief where I am! Send your imagination this high to be whitewashed!' Our weather to-day is a leaf out of Oc-40 tober's book, soft, yet invigorating. The harvest-moon seems to have forgotten her mantle last night, for there lies on the landscape a haze, that to be so delicate, should be born of moonlight. The boys 45 report plenty of deer-tracks in the woods close by us, and the neighbors tell me they browse in troops on my buckwheat by the light of the moon. Let them! I have neither trap nor gun on my premises, and 50 Shakspeare shall be their sentinel too. At least, no Robin or Diggory shall shoot them without complaint of damage; though if you were here, dear Doctor, I should most likely borrow a gun, and lie 55 down with you in the buckwheat to see you bring down the fattest. And so do our partialities modify our benevolence. I When late for the Post with a letter WILLIAM GILMORE SIMMS (1806-1870) The most voluminous and versatile of the writers of the South was William Gilmore Simms whom Trent in his biography credits with eighty volumes, eighteen of them books of poetry, thirty-five of them fiction, the rest miscellany ranging from Shakespearian criticism to local history and biography, and in addition upwards of two hundred and fifty contributions to magazines and annuals He was a native of Charleston, South Carolina, and except for a few visits to the North and the South-west, spent his life on a plantation near Midway, seventy-two miles from the city of his birth. Poverty molded his early years. His mother died in his childhood and his father, a sad, embittered man, plunged into the western wilderness leaving his son to relatives who could give him only the most meager education. He worked at length as a druggist, and then began the reading' of law, and for a time even practiced that profession, but in some unaccountable way his whole soul had early been turned to dreams of literature. He issued his first book of poems in 1825, his second, Lyrical and Other Poems,' in 1827, and from this last date for forty years he may be said to have given himself unreservedly to literature. He edited magazines, he wrote poetry and dramas, he poured out a profusion of novels and romances, visiting the North often to superintend their production, and his name was found in all the magazines and annuals. He became the leader of that little group,- Hayne, Timrod, and the rest, who are known as the Charleston School, and who in 1857, the initial year of The Atlantic Monthly, founded Russell's Magazine, the most distinctive literary periodical the South has yet given to American Literature. The last years of Simms's life were full of suffering and even tragedy. His sons and his wife died, his home and his magnificent library were swept away by the war, he was plunged into poverty and spent his last years at times in actual want. Of his enormous literary output little to-day survives. His poetry, which he fondly hoped was to live, is completely forgotten, and his long set of novels have been reduced to two little-read volumes, The Yemassee, a Cooper-like tale of Indian life, and The Partisan, a spirited narrative of the days of the Swamp fox' and of Tarleton's cruel attempt to subjugate the South. He wrote too much. He lacked patience and the power of self-criticism; his tales are improvisations, often graphic and stirring, but lacking reserve and the deeper notes that are evolved only by genius. He deserves praise for his insistence upon native themes for his work. While many were looking across the ocean for their backgrounds and their inspiration, Simms worked wholly with American materials, with the traditions and the history and the local color of his native South. THE PARTIAN CHAPTER XLIII 'Then came the cloud, the arrowy storm of The fatal stroke, the wild and whizzing shot, men; but they were tried soldiers, veterans in the British southern army, and familiar with their officers. The troops of Gates two thirds of them at least had 5 never once seen service; and the greater number only now for the first time knew and beheld their commander. They had heard of his renown, however, and this secured their confidence. It had an effect far more dangerous upon his officers; for, if it did not secure their confidence⚫also, it made them scrupulous in their suggestions of counsel to one who, from the outset, seemed to have gone forth with the If everything was doubtful and uncer- 10 tain in the camp of Gates, the state of things was very different in that of Cornwallis. That able commander knew his ground, his own men, and the confidence and the weakness alike of his enemy. 15 determination of rivaling the rapidity, as That weakness, that unhappy confidence, were his security and strength. His own force numbered little over two thousand well as the immensity, of Cæsar's victories. To come, to see, to conquer, was the aim of Gates; forgetting, that while Cæsar commanded the Roman legion, Horatio Gates was required first to teach the American militia. Cornwallis seems perfectly to have understood his man. They are said to have once seen foreign service together; if so, the earl had studied him with no little success. He now availed himself of the rashness of his opponent; and, though inferior in numbers, went forth to meet him. 10 We have seen their first encounter, where Gates, contrary to the advice of his best officers, commenced a march after nightfall; requiring of undrilled militia the most novel and difficult evolutions in the dark. 15 Having felt his enemy, and perceived, from the weight of Colonel Porterfield's infantry fire, that the whole force of the Americans was at hand, Cornwallis drew in his army, which had been in marching 20 order when the encounter began; and, changing his line to suit the new form of events, proceeded to make other arrangements for the dawning. The firing was still continued, in the 25 advance, though materially diminished and still diminishing, when Cornwallis gave the orders to recall his forces. The order was a timely one. In that moment the advance of Porterfield was pressing heav- 30 ily upon the British van, and driving it before them. The mutual orders of the two generals, both dreading to risk the controversy on a struggle so unexpectedly begun, closed the affair for the night. 35 Dismounting beneath a clump of trees, Cornwallis called around him a council of his officers. The tall, portly form of the earl rose loftily in the midst of all, with a cool, quiet dignity, that indicated 40 command. His face was one of much expression, and spoke a character of great firmness and quick resolve. His features were bold and imposing; his cheeks full and broad, nose prominent, forehead 45 rather broad than high, his lips not thin, but closely fitting. His eye had in it just enough of the kindling of battle to enliven features which otherwise would have appeared more imperious than intelligent. 50 His carriage was manly, and marked by all the ease of the courtier. Standing erect, with his hand lightly resting on the hilt of his sword, and looking earnestly around him on his several officers as they 55 made their appearance - a dozen lightwood torches flaming in the hands of the guards around him his presence was majestic and noble. Yet there was a something in his features, which, if not sanguinary, at least indicated well that indifference to human life, that atrocious 5 hardihood of deed, which a severe justice would describe as crime, and which marked too many of his doings in the South. His looks did not belie that callosity of soul which could doom his fellowmen, by dozens, to the gallows - the accusation unproven against them, and their own defense utterly unheard. though Besides him, conspicuous, neither tall nor commanding in person, stood one to whom the references of Cornwallis were made with a degree of familiarity not often manifested by the commander. His person was of the middle size, rather slender than full, but of figure well made, admirably set, and in its movements marked alike by ease and strength. He was muscular and bony - though not enough so to command particular attention on this account. The face alone spoke, and it was a face to be remembered. It was rather pale and thin, but well chiselled; and the mouth was particularly small and beautiful. Its expression was girlish in the extreme, and would have been held to indicate effeminancy as the characteristic of its owner, but for its even quiet, its immobility, its calm indifference of expression. The nose was good, but neither long nor large: it comported well with the expression of the mouth. But it was the eye that spoke; and its slightest look was earnestness. Every glance seemed sent forth upon some especial mission every look had its object. Its movements, unlike those of the lips, were rapid and irregular. His hair was light and unpowdered; worn, singularly enough, at that period, without the usual tie, and entirely free from the vile pomatum which disfigured the fashionable heads of the upper classes. His steel cap and waving plume were carried in his hand; and he stood, silent but observing, beside Cornwallis, as Lord Rawdon, followed by the brave Lieutenant-Colonel Webster, and other officers, came up to the conference. The warrior we have endeavored briefly to describe, was one whose name, for a time, was well calculated to awaken in the souls of the Southern whigs, an equal feeling of hate and dread. He was the notorious Colonel Tarleton, the very wing of the British invading army: a person, |