A NAME IN THE SAND.

Alone I walked the ocean strand;
A pearly shell was in my hand;
I stooped and wrote upon the sand
My name, the year, the day.
As onward from the spot I passed,
One ling'ring look behind I cast;
A wave came rolling high and fast,
And washed my lines away.

And so, methought, 't will shortly be
With every mark on earth from me;
A wave of dark oblivion's sea,

Will sweep across the place,
Where I have trod the sandy shore
Of time, and been to me no more,-
Of me, my day,- the name I bore,
To leave no track nor trace.

And yet with Him who counts the sands,
And holds the waters in His hands,
I know a lasting record stands,
Inscribed against my name,-

Of all this mortal part has wrought;
Of all this thinking soul has thought;
And, from these fleeting moments caught,
For glory or for shame.

Hannah F. Gould.

STARVED ROCK; OR, THE LAST OF THE ILLINOIS.

Starved Rock is the unpoetical name of a singular spot on the Illinois River, about eight miles west of Ottawa. It is a rocky bluff, rising from the margin of the stream to the height of more than a hundred feet, and is only separated from the main land by a narrow chasm. Its length might probably measure two hundred and fifty feet. Its sides are perpendicular, and there is only one point where it can be ascended, and that is by a narrow stair-like path. It is covered with many a cone-like evergreen, and, in summer, encircled by luxuriant grape and ivy vines, and clusters of richly colored flowers. It is, undoubtedly, the most conspicuous and beautiful pictorial feature of the sluggish and lone Illinois, and is associated with the final extinction of the Illinois tribe of Indians. The legend, to which I listened from the lips of a venerable Indian-trader, is as follows:

Many years ago, the whole region lying between Lake Michigan and the Mississippi was the home and dominion of the Illinois Indians. For them alone did the buffalo and antelope

range over its broad prairies; for them did the finest of rivers roll their waters into the lap of Mexico, and bear upon their bosoms the birchen canoe, as they sought to capture the wild waterfowl; and for them alone did the dense forest, crowding upon those streams, shelter their unnumbered denizens. In every direction might be seen the smoke of the wigwams, curling upward to mingle with the sunset clouds, which told them tales of the Spirit-land.

Years passed on, and they continued to be at ease in their possessions. But the white man from the far East, with the miseries that have ever accompanied him on his march of usurpation, began to wander into the wilderness, and trouble, to the poor red man, was the inevitable consequence. The baneful "fire-water," which was the gift of civilization, created dissensions among the savage tribes, until, in the process of time, and on account of purely imaginary evils, the Potawattamies from Michigan determined to make war upon the Indians of Illinois. Fortune smiled upon the oppressors, and the identical rock in question was the spot that witnessed the extinction of an aboriginal tribe.

It was the close of a long siege of cruel warfare, and the afternoon of a day in the delightful Indian summer. The sunshine threw mellow haze upon the prairies, and tinged the

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multitudinous flowers with deepest gold; while, in the shadow of the forest-islands, the doe and her fawn reposed in perfect quietness, lulled into contemporary slumber by the hum of the grasshopper and the wild bee. The wilderness world wore an aspect of a perfect Sabbath. But now, in the twinkling of an eye, the delightful solitude was broken by the shrill whoop, and dreadful struggle of bloody conflict, upon the prairies and in the woods. All over the country were seen the dead bodies of the ill-fated Illinois, when it was ordered by Providence that the concluding skirmish between the hostile parties, should take place in the vicinity of Starved Rock.

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The Potawattamies numbered near three hundred warriors, while the Illinois tribe was reduced to about one hundred, who were mostly aged chiefs and youthful heroes, the more desperate warriors having already perished, and the women and the children of the tribe having already been massacred and consumed in their wigwams. The battle was most desperate between the unequal parties. The Illinois were about to give up for lost, when, in their frenzy, they gave a defying shout, and retreated to the rocky bluff. From this, it was an easy matter to keep back their enemies, but alas! from that moment they were to endure unthought-of suf

fering, to the delight of their baffled, yet victorious enemies.

To describe in words the scene that now followed and was prolonged for several days, is utterly impossible. Those stout-hearted Indians, in whom a nation was about to become extinct, chose to die upon their strange fortress by starvation and thirst, rather than surrender themselves to the scalping knife of their exterminators. And, with a few exceptions, this was the manner in which they did perish. Now and then, indeed, a desperate man would lower himself, hoping thereby to escape, but a tomahawk would cleave his brain before he touched the water.

Day followed day, and those helpless captives sat in silence, and gazed imploringly upon their broad and beautiful lands, while hunger was gnawing into their very vitals. Night followed night, and they looked upon the silent stars, and toward the home of the Great Spirit, but they murmured not at His decree. And, if they slept, in their dreams they once more played with their little children, or roamed the woods and prairies in perfect freedom. When morning dawned, it was but the harbinger of another day of agony; but when the evening hour came, a smile would sometimes brighten up a haggard countenance, for the poor, unhappy soul, through