We sailed up the Hudson on a gloomy but beautiful evening. The air was quite calm; now and then a steamboat came thundering toward us with its flaming chimney, but the river was unusually quiet. From out the dark shadows which the lofty mountains threw upon the shores, gleamed here and there small red lights. "They are from the cottages of the laborers on the rail-way," said Mr. Downing.

"Not they," said I; "they are little dwarfs that are peeping out of the rocks, and that unclose the openings to the mountain halls within; we Scandinavians know all about it!"

Mr. Downing laughed, and allowed my explanation to pass. That which I seem to want here, if I think about a want at all, where so much new and affluent life presents itself, is that life of sagas and traditions which we possess every where in Sweden, and which converts it into a poetic soil full of symbolical runes, in forest, and mountain, and meadow, by the streams and the lakes, nay, which gives life to every stone, significance to every mound. In Sweden all these magnificent hills and mountains by the Hudson would have symbolical names and traditions. Here they have only historical traditions, mostly connected with the Indian times and wars, and the names are rather of a humorous than a poetic tendency. Thus a point of rock, somewhat nose-like in form, which runs out into the river, is called St. Anthony's Nose; and in sailing past it, I could not help thinking of a merry little poem which Mr. Downing read to me, in which St. Anthony is represented as preaching to the fishes, who came up out of the depths quite astonished and delighted to hear the zealous father of the Church preaching for their conversion. The end, however, is,

Much delighted were they,
But preferred the old way.

And thus continued in their natural vices; and St. Anthony got a long nose.

I spent yet a few Indian summer days with my friends by the Hudson-days rich in many things; intercourse with human beings, and with nature, and the enjoyment of beautiful paradisaical fruits: the new moon lit her torch, and gave a yet more highly romantic character to the summer veil on mountain and river-wonderfully beautiful days and scenes! and wonderfully beautiful was that day when, during a storm, I traveled with my friends down the Hudson to New York. Autumn had during its advance given uniformity of coloring to the woods. It varied now between copper and gold, and shone like an infinitely rich golden embroidery on the Indian veil of mist which rested upon the heights along the Hudson. The wind was so violent that at times the vessel was driven on the banks, and, as the evening advanced, the groups of people became more and more silent in the crowded saloon. Friend drew near to friend, husband to wife; mothers pressed their children closer to their breasts. My eye by chance fell on the tall figure of a man of energetic appearance; a little woman stood close beside him, and her hand was pressed to his heart. A speechless and passionate life prevailed there-prevailed throughout the atmosphere, that stormy, hot evening. This and some other scenes have inscribed themselves ineffaceably on my soul; thou shalt read them there some time-there or upon paper, for whatever I experience forcibly and deeply thou knowest that I must, sooner or later, give back either in word or form.

We arrived in storm and darkness at New York, but nevertheless reached the Astor House most comfortably, and very soon was I seated familiarly with my friends in a light and handsome room, drinking tea and the most delicious milk cooled with ice.

"In order that I may now show you proper respect," said Mr. Downing, "as we are about to part, I believe that I must beg from you-an autograph!"

ors.

Thus he often good-humoredly teazes me, knowing, as he does, my abhorrence of the American autograph collectWe spent the evening pleasantly reading by turns from our favorite poets, Lowell, Bryant, and Emerson. It was twelve o'clock when we separated, and I went to my room. But I remained up for some time, listening through the open window to the softly-plashing rain, drinking in the balsamic air, and allowing the breath of a new life. to penetrate my very being.

I remained yet a few days at the Astor House with the Downings. During these we visited the Exhibition of the American Art Union in New York. Among the paintings of native artists, I saw none which indicated peculiar genius, with the exception of a large historical painting from the first Mexican war between the Spaniards and the Indians. A few pieces of sculpture gave me great pleasure, from their delicacy of expression and mastership in execution. Among these, in particular, was a marble bust of Proserpine, and a fisher-boy listening to the sound of the sea in a conch-shell, both the works of the American artist, Hiram Powers. One could almost wish for something greater and more national in subject, but greater beauty or more perfection in form would be impossible. Just opposite to the room of the American Art Union they have placed, with good judgment, as it seemed to me, the socalled Düsseldorf Gallery, a collection of paintings, principally of the German school, which has been opened for the benefit and instruction of American artists and lovers of art. But the want of time prevented me from visiting this gallery at the present moment.

Among other good things which awaited me here was an offer from a much-esteemed publisher of New York, Mr. George P. Putnam, the same who is bringing out the works of Miss Sedgwick, to publish a new and handsome edition of my writings, which have hitherto been printed and circulated here at a low price, and to allow me the

same pecuniary advantage as a native author. Mr. Downing was pleased with the proposal, because he knows Mr. Putnam to be a thoroughly honorable and trustworthy

man.

It was not without pain that I parted from the Downings, with whom I had spent so richly intellectual and delightful a time (I will call it my honeymoon in the New World), and to whom I am really cordially attached. But ́I shall see them again; I have to thank Mr. Downing for many things; for the wisdom and the tact, as well as the brotherly earnestness with which he has assisted me to arrange my movements here in the New World, and as regarded invitations and other marks of friendliness which I have received. At parting, he admonished me with his beautiful smile, that I should on all occasions make use of a little inborn tact-(N.B., a thing which I was born without) so as to know what I ought to do and to permit. I think, in the mean while, that I made good use of his advice, by immediately afterward declining the proposal of a young gentleman to climb a lofty church tower with him. Nothing strikes me so much as the youthfulness of this people-I might almost say childish fervor and love of adventure. They hesitate at nothing, and regard nothing as impossible. But I know myself to be too old to climb up church towers with young gentlemen.

When the Downings left me, I was intrusted to the kind care of Mr. Putnam, who was to conduct me to his villa on Staten Island. It was with difficulty that we drove through the throng of vehicles of all kinds which filled the streets leading to the harbor, in order to reach the steamboat in time. I can not help admiring the way in which the drivers here manage to get out of the way, and twist about and shoot between and disentangle themselves, without any misadventure from the really Gordian knot of carts and carriages. It is extraordinary, but it is not excellent. I sat all the time in expectation of seeing the

head of a horse come through the carriage window, or of the carriage being smashed to pieces. In the mean while, all went well; we reached the steam-boat in time, had a beautiful sail upon the calm waters of the extensive bay, where large and small steam-boats are incessantly passing and winding their way among the sailing craft. That is a scene of life!

At Mr. Putnam's beautiful house on one of the heights of Staten Island, I saw a most charming, cheerful, and agreeable little hostess and three pretty children, and in the evening a whole crowd of people from the neighborhood. I played Swedish polkas and ballads for them. The best thing of the evening was a comic song, sung by an excellent elderly gentleman.

I was frozen in my bed-room, because the weather is now cold, and they do not heat the bed-rooms in this country. It is here as in England, not as in our good Sweden; and I can hardly accustom myself to these cold bed-chambers. It was to me particularly hard to get up and to dress myself in that chilly room, with my fingers benumbed with cold. But I forgot both the numbness and the frost when I went down to breakfast, and saw the bright sun, and the lovely and kind hostess in that cheerful room, with its prospect over the bay, the city, and the island. In the forenoon Mr. Putnam drove me in a covered carriage to see the island, and to call upon. various families. The rich, golden woods shone in their autumnal pomp of varied gold or brown-a coloring both warm and deep, like that of the soul's noblest sufferings. I indulged the emotion which it excited, and I drove through the woods as through a temple filled with symbolic inscriptions, and that which it presented to me I could read and decipher. Thus we advanced to the loftiest point of the island, whence the prospect was glorious, from its vast extent over land and water. The height was lost; and the eye hovered and circled, like the eagle,