teeth disclosed, the long, slender tails straight and stiffened-testified to the joys and sorrows of the races that had flourished here.

On exploring this mass of ruins, I discovered here and there a file of letters eaten through, the hollow cavity evidently having been the happy and innocent cradle of childhood, to these destroyers. Sometimes I found a bed lined with paid bills, and sometimes the pathway of a gallery paved with liquidated accounts. What a mass of thoughts, of feelings, cares, anxieties, were thus made the plunder of these thoughtless creatures! In examining the papers, I found, for instance, letters from N. P. Willis, written five and twenty years ago, with only "Dear Sir" at the beginning and "Yours truly" at the end. I found epistles of nearly equal antiquity signed N. Hawthorne, Catharine M. Sedgwick, Maria L. Child, Lydia H. Sigourney, Willis Gaylord Clark, Grenville Mellen, William L. Stone, J. G. C. Brainard-sometimes only the heart eaten out, and sometimes the whole body gone.

For all purposes of record, these papers were destroyed. I was alone, for my family had not yet returned from Europe; it was the beginning of November, and I began to light my fire with these relics. For two whole days I pored over them, buried in the reflections which the reading of the fragments suggested. Absorbed in this dreary occupation, 1 forgot the world without, and was only conscious of

bygone scenes which came up in review before me. It was as if I had been in the tomb, and was reckoning with the past. How little was there in all that I was thus called to remember-save of care, and struggle, and anxiety; and how were all the thoughts, and feelings, and experiences, which seemed mountains in their day, leveled down to the merest grains of dust! A note of hand-perchance of a thousand dollars-what a history rose up in recollection as I looked over its scarcely legible fragments: what clouds of anxiety had its approaching day of maturity cast over my mind! How had I been with a trembling heart to some bank-president*—he a god, 'and I a craven worshiper-making my offering of some other note for a discount, which might deliver me from the wrath to come! With what anxiety have I watched the lips of the oracle-for my fate was in his hands! A simple monosyllable-yes or nomight save or ruin me. What a history was in that bit of paper-and yet it was destined only to serve as stuffing for the beds of vermin! Such are the agonies, the hopes, and fears of the human heart, put into the crucible of time!

Let no one say that I speak irreverently of bank-presidents. Ore of my best friends during many years of trial was Franklin Haven, president of the Merchants' Bank at Boston-who found it in his heart, while administering his office with signal ability and success, to collect a library, cultivate letters, learn languages, and cherish a respect for literary men. It must be one among other sources of gratification, arising from his liberal tastes, that he long enjoyed the confidence and friendship of Daniel Webster.

I ought, no doubt, to have smiled at all this-but I confess it made me serious. Nor was it the most humiliating part of my reflections. I have been too familiar with care, conflict, disappointment, to mourn over them very deeply, now that they were passed; the seeming fatuity of such a mass of labors as these papers indicated, compared with their poor resultshowever it might humble, it could not distress me. But there were many things suggested by these letters, all in rags as they were, that caused positive humiliation. They revived in my mind the vexations, misunderstandings, controversies of other days; and now, reviewed in the calm light of time, I could discover the mistakes of judgment, of temper, of policy, that I had made. I turned back to my letter-book; I reviewed my correspondence-and I came to the conclusion that in almost every difficulty which had arisen in my path, even if others were wrong, I was not altogether right: in most cases, prudence, conciliation, condescension, might have averted these evils. Thus the thorns which had wounded me and others too, as it seemed, had generally sprung up from the seeds I had sown, or had thriven upon the culture my own hands had unwisely, perhaps unwittingly bestowed.

At first I felt disturbed at the ruin which had been wrought in these files of papers. Hesitating and doubtful, I consigned them one by one to the flames At last the work was complete; all had perished, and

VOL. II-15

the feathery ashes had leaped up in the strong draft of the chimney and disappeared forever. I felt a relief at last; I smiled at what had happened; I warmed my chill fingers over the embers; I felt that a load was off my shoulders. "At least"-said I in

66.

now past; my reckon

my heart" these things are ing is completed, the account is balanced, the responsibilities of those bygone days are liquidated. Let me burden my bosom with them no more!" Alas, how fallacious my calculation! A few months only had passed, when I was called to contend with a formidable claim which came up from the midst of transactions, to which these extinct papers referred, and against which they constituted my defence. As it chanced, I was able to meet and repel it by documents which survived, but the event caused me deep reflection. I could not but remark that, however we may seek to cover our lives with forgetfulness, their records still exist, and these may come up against us when we have no vouchers to meet the charges which are thus presented. Who then will be our helper? "I will think of that-I will think of that!"

LETTER LII.

Speech at St. Albans-Lecture upon Ireland and the Irish-The Broadstreet Riot-Burning the Charlestown Convent--My Political CareerA. H. Everett-The Fifteen Gallon Jug-The Harrison Campaign of 1840-Hard Cider and Log Cabins-Universal Bankruptcy-Election of Harrison-His Death-Consequences—Anecdotes-The Small Tai! Movement A Model Candidate- William Cpp, or Shingling a Barn.

MY DEAR C*****

The first public speech I ever made was at St. Albans, England, in June, 1832, at a grand celebration of the passage of the Reform Bill,* having accompanied thither Sir Francis Vincent, the represen

*The Reform Bill was a popular measure, which swept away the rotten boroughs, and greatly extended the suffrage. After a long and violent struggle, it passed the House of Lords on the 4th of June, 1882, and received the royal sanction on the 7th. That day I arrived in Liverpool, amid a general feeling of joy and exhilaration. The Duke of Wellington had protested against the bill, though the king, William IV., and the ministry had favored it; in consequence, he was insulted by a mob, while passing on horseback through one of the streets of London, June 18th, the anniversary of the battle of Waterloo. A few days after this, there was a military review in Hyde Park, and King William being present, a large concourse of people assembled; among them was the Duke of Wellington. After the review was over, he was encircled by an immense mass of persons, indignant at the insult he had received, and desirous of testifying their respect and affection. Most of them condemned his opposition to the reform bill, but this could not extinguish or diminish their sense of his great merit. I was present, and moved on at the side of the old veteran, mounted on horseback and dressed as a citizen-his hat off, and testifying by his looks, his sensibility to these spontaneous marks of regard. He was conducted to the gate of the park, near his residence-Apsley House, and there he bade adieu to his shouting escort.

On this occasion, as well as on others, I saw King William IV., a large,