stone, which he swallowed in a draught of pretended that these odes had not the Attic propriety. The latter does not seem to have intended any particular slight to the genius of Anacreon, as his slashing system of critical paradox equally proscribed Homer, Plato and Aristotle, the odes of Horace and the Eneid of Virgil as fabrications of the monks of the thirteenth century. Never had the cowled head been so overshadowed with laurels. left on record one solitary sentiment that JA might subserve the interests of virtue. The drinking-songs of Anacreon have all the gayety of their subject without any of its grossness. His assumed philosophy, however irrational in itself, gives a dignity to his manner, and there is a pathos in the thought of fleeting life which perhaps constitutes the secret charm of many of these effusions of voluptuousness. On this Anacreontic philosophy a practical comment is supplied by a modern sage and poet: "O'er the dread feast malignant Chemia scowls, Darwin. His amatory pieces are airy, graceful and delicately fanciful. His style is a model of classic simplicity elegant, not florid, without studied ornaments or ambitious figures, natural.in sentiment and pure from witty conceit.. The genuineness of Anacreon's odes has been singularly called in question by two men of learned celebrity-by Petrus Aleyonius, and by Father Hardouin. The former CHARLES ABRAHAM ELTON. JAMES GRAHAME. AMES GRAHAME, the author of “The Sabbath," was the son of a respectable attorney in Glasgow, and was born in that city on the 22d of April, 1765. He was educated at the excellent public schools of that city, and had a very early and strong desire to enter the clerical profession; but it was the long-cherished wish of his father that he should be bred to his own calling. Accordingly, our poet sacrificed his own wishes to those of his parent, and studied the law. Many irksome years-the best years of his life-were wasted in this to him most uncongenial pursuit, and it was finally abandoned. For many years, however, he toiled on in it, and, from a sense of what he owed his family, he gave it all the attention of which a mind devoted to higher purposes was capable. In 1804 he published anonymously his poem “The Sabbath." He had kept from all his friends, and even from his wife, who was possessed of a fine literary taste, all knowledge of what he had been engaged in, and laid a copy of his poem on his parlor-table as soon as it appeared. Mrs. Grahame was led by curiosity to examine it, and while doing so he was walking up and down the room await ing some remark from her. At length she | his age, most sincerely and deeply lamented burst into enthusiastic admiration of the by a large circle of friends. performance, and, well knowing her husband's weak side, very naturally added, "Ah, James, if you could produce a poem like this!" Longer concealment was impossible, and Mrs. Grahame, justly proud of her husband's genius, no longer checked its bent. The Sabbath" was warmly received throughout Scotland. It came from the heart, and it spoke to the heart of the nation. Grahame's vocation was now confirmed, and in the following two years, during the long recess of the Scottish courts, he retired with his family to a cottage at Kirkhill, on the classic banks of the Esk, and gave himself up to “Calm contemplation and poetic ease.” He now determined to abandon the law, and Of the character of Grahame's poetry there is now scarcely but one opinion. Its great charms are its elevated moral tone and its easy, simple and unaffected description. His "Sabbath" will always hold its place among those poems which are, and deserve to be, in the hands of the people. He exhibits great tenderness of sentiment, which runs through all his writings and sometimes deepens into true pathos. We do not know any poetry, indeed, that lets us in so directly to the heart of the writer and produces so full and pleasing a conviction that it is dictated by the genuine feelings which it aims at communicating to the reader. If there be less fire and elevation than in the strains of some of his contemporaries, there is more truth and tenderness than is commonly found along with those qualities. CHARLES D. CLEVELAND. THE LAST DAYS OF CYRUS. CYR YRUS spent the seven winter months at Babylon because that climate is warm, the three spring months at Susa and the two summer months at Ecbatana, by which means he is said to have enjoyed a perpetual spring with respect to heat and cold. And men stood so affected toward him that every nation thought they did themselves an injury if they did not send Cyrus the most valuable productions of their country, whether they were the fruits of the earth or creatures bred there or manufactures of their own; and every city did the same. And every private man thought himself rich if he could oblige Cyrus · for as Cyrus accepted from each of what they possessed in abundance, so in return he distributed to them what he observed they were in want of. After he had thus spent some considerable time, Cyrus, now in a very advanced age, takes a journey into Persia, which was the seventh from the acquisition of his empire, when his father and mother had probably been for some time dead. Cyrus made the usual sacrifices and danced the Persian dance, according to the custom of his country, and distributed to every one presents, as usual. Then, being asleep in the royal palace, he had the following dream: There seemed to advance toward him a person with a more than human majesty in his air and countenance, and to say to him, "Cyrus, prepare yourself, for you are now going to the gods." After this appearance in his dream he awaked, and seemed assured that his end drew near. Therefore, taking along with him the victims, he sacrificed on the summit of a mountain, as is the custom in Persia, to Jove Paternal, the Sun and the rest of the gods, accompanying the sacrifices with this prayer: "O Jove Paternal, Sun and all ye gods, receive these sacrifices as the completion of many worthy and handsome actions, and as grateful acknowledgments for having signified to me, both by the victims, by celestial eigns, by birds and by omens, what became me to do and not to do. And I abundantly return you thanks that I have been sensible of your care and protection, and that in the course of my prosperity I never was exalted above what became a man. I implore you now to bestow all happiness on my children, my wife, my friends and my country; and for myself, that I may die as I have always lived." When he had finished his sacrifices and prayer, he returned home, and, finding himself disposed to be quiet, he lay down. At a certain hour proper persons attended and offered him to wash. He told them that he had rested very well. Then, at another hour, proper officers brought him his supper; but Cyrus had no appetite to eat, but seemed thirsty, and drank with pleasure. And, continuing thus the second and third days, he sent for his sons, who, as it happened, had attended their father and were then in Persia. He summoned likewise his friends and the magistrates of Persia. When they were all met, he began in this manner : "Children, and all you, my friends, here present, the conclusion of my life is now at hand, which I certainly know from many symptoms. You ought when I am dead to act and speak of me in every thing as a happy man: for when I was a child I seemed to have received advantage from what is esteemed worthy and handsome in children; so likewise, when I was a youth, from what is esteemed so in young men; so, when I came to be a man, from what is esteemed worthy and handsome in men. And I have always seemed to observe myself increase with time in strength and vigor, so that I have not found myself weaker or more infirm in my old age than in my youth. Neither do I know that I have desired or undertaken anything in which I have not succeeded. By my means my friends have been made happy and my enemies enslaved, and my country, at first inconsiderable in Asia, I leave in great reputation and honor. Neither do I know that I have not preserved whatever I acquired. And though in time past all things you. have succeeded according to my wishes, yet an apprehension lest in process of time I should see, hear or suffer some difficulty has not suffered me to be too much elated or too extravagantly delighted. Now, if I die, I leave you, children, behind me (whom the gods have given me), and I leave my country and my friends happy. Ought not I, therefore, in justice, to be always remembered and mentioned as fortunate and happy? I must likewise declare to whom I leave my kingdom, lest that, being doubt ful, should hereafter raise dissensions among Now, children, I bear an equal affection to you both, but I direct that the elder should have the advising and conducting of affairs, as his age requires it and it is probable he has more experience. And as I have been instructed by my country and yours to give place to those older than myself, not only brothers, but fellow-citizens, both in walking, sitting and speak ing, so have I instructed you from your youth to show a regard to your elders, and to receive the like from such as were inferior to you in age: receive then this disposition as ancient, customary and legal. Do you, therefore, Cambyses, hold the kingdom, as allotted you by the gods, and by me so far as it is in my power. To you, Tanoaxares, I bequeath the satrapy of the Medes, Armenians and Cadusians; which when I allot you, I think I leave your elder brother a larger empire and the title of a kingdom, but to you a happiness freer from care and vexation, for I do not see what human satisfaction you can need; but you will enjoy whatever appears agreeable and pleasing to men. An affection for such things as are difficult to execute, a multitude of pains and an impossibility of being quiet, anxiety from an emulation of my actions, forming designs yourself and having designs formed against you,-these are things which must more necessarily attend a king than one in your station; and be assured these give many interruptions to pleasure and satisfaction. Know, therefore, Cambyses, that it is not the golden sceptre which can preserve your kingdom, but faithful friends are a prince's truest and securest sceptre. But do not imagine that men are naturally faithful, for then they would appear so to all, as other natural endowments do, but every one must render others faithful to himself; and they are not to be procured by violence, but rather by kindness and beneficence. If, therefore, you would constitute other joint-guardians with you of your kingdom, whom can you better begin with than him who is of the same blood with yourself? and fellow-citizens are nearer to us than strangers, and those who live and eat with us than those that do not. And those who have the same original, who have been nourished by the same mother and grown up in the same house. and beloved by the same parents, and who call on the same father and mother,—are not they, of all others, the nearest to us? Do not you, therefore, render those advantages fruitless by which the gods unite brothers in affinity and relation, but to those advantages add other friendly offices, and by that means your friendship will be reciprocally solid and lasting. The taking care of a brother is providing for one's self. To whom can the advancement of a brother be equally honorable as to a brother? Who can show a regard to a great and powerful man to me. equal to his brother? Who will fear to in- | probable that when the soul is separated it jure another so much as him whose brother becomes pure and entire, and is then more is in an exalted station? Be, therefore, sec- intelligent. It is evident that on man's disond to none in submission and good-will to solution every part of him returns to what your brother, since no one can be so partic- is of the same nature with itself, except the ularly serviceable or injurious to you. And soul; that alone is invisible, both during its I would have you consider how you can presence here and at its departure. And hope for greater advantages by obliging any you may have observed that nothing resemone so much as him? Or whom can you bles death so much as sleep, but then it is assist that will be so powerful an ally in that the human soul appears most divine and war? Or what is more infamous than want has a prospect of futurity; for then, it is of friendship between brothers? Who, of probable, the soul is most free and independall men, can we so handsomely pay regard ent. If, therefore, things are as I think, and to as a brother? In a word, Cambyses, that the soul leaves the body, having regard your brother is the only one you can ad- to my soul, comply with my request. But vance next to your person without the envy if it be otherwise, and that the soul, continuof others. Therefore, in the name of the ing in the body, perishes with it, let nothing gods, children, have regard for one another, appear in your thoughts or actions criminal if you are careful to do what is acceptable or impious, for fear of the gods, who are For you ought not to imagine-you eternal, whose power and inspection extend certainly know—that after I have closed this over all things, and who preserve the harperiod of human life I shall no longer exist; mony and order of the universe free from for neither do you now see my soul, but you decay or defect, whose greatness and beauty conclude from its operations that it does ex- is inexplicable. Next to the gods have regard to the whole race of mankind, in perpetual succession; for the gods have not concealed you in obscurity, but there. is a necessity that your actions should be conspicuous to the world. If they are virtuous and free from injustice, they will give you power and interest in all men; but if you project what is unjust against each other, no man will trust you, for no one can place a confidence in you, though his inclination to it be ever so great, when he sees you unjust where it most becomes you to be a friend. If, therefore, I have not rightly instructed you what you ought to be to one another, learn it from those who lived before our time; for that will be the best lesson. For there are many ist. And have you not observed what terrors and apprehensions murderers are inspired with by those who have suffered violence from them? What racks and torture do they convey to the guilty? Or how do you think honors should have continued to be paid to the deceased if their souls were destitute of all power and virtue? No, children; I can never be persuaded that the soul lives no longer than it dwells in this mortal body, and that it dies on its separation; for I see that the soul communicates vigor and motion to mortal bodies during its continuance in them. Neither can I be persuaded that the soul is divested of intelligence on its separation from this gross, senseless body, but it is |