"Every thing of the serpent kind he has a particular fancy for, and has always a number of them—that he has tamed—in his pockets or under his waistcoat. To loll back in his rocking-chair, to talk about geology, and pat the head of a large snake, when twining itself about his neck, is to him supreme felicity. Every year in the vacation he makes an excursion to the hills, and I was told that, upon one of these occasions, being taken up by the stage-coach, which had several members of Congress in it going to Washington, the learned Doctor took his seat on the top with a large basket, the lid of which was not over and above well secured. Near to this basket sat a Baptist preacher on his way to a great public immersion. His reverence, awakening from a reverie he had fallen into, beheld to his unutterable horror two rattlesnakes raise their fearful heads out of the basket, and immediately precipitated himself upon the driver, who, almost knocked off his seat, no sooner became apprised of the character of his ophidian outside passengers, than he jumped upon the ground with the reins in his hands, and was followed instanter by the preacher. The 'insides,' as soon as they learned what was going on, immediately became outsides, and nobody was left but the Doctor and his rattlesnakes on the top. But the Doctor, not entering into the general alarm, quietly placed his greatcoat over the basket, and tied it down with his handkerchief, which, when he had done, he said, 'Gendlemen, only don't let dese poor dings pite you, and day won't hoort you.'"
MADAME DACIER.
The husband of this celebrated woman (Andre Dacier) was born at Castres in 1651, and studied at Saumur, under Tanneguy le Fèvre, whose daughter Anne he married in 1683. Both the husband and wife became eminent among the classical scholars of the seventeenth century. They were employed with others to comment upon and edit a series of the ancient authors, for the Dauphin, which form the collection "Ad usum Delphini." Madame Dacier's commentaries are considered as superior to those of her husband. She edited "Callimachus," "Florus," "Aurelius Victor," "Etropius," and the history which goes by the name of "Dictys Cretensis," all of which have been repeatedly reprinted, with her notes. She published French translations of the "Amphitryon," "Rudens," and "Lepidicus," of Plautus, with a good preface, of the comedies of Terence, of the "Plutus," and "The Clouds," of Aristophanes, and of Anacreon and Sappho. She also translated the "Iliad" and the "Odyssey," with a preface and notes. This led to a controversy between her and La Motte, who had spoken slightingly of Homer. Madame Dacier wrote, in 1714, "Considérations sur les Causes de la Corruption du Goût," in which she defended the cause of Homer with great vivacity, as she did also against Father Hardouin, who had written an "Apology of Homer," which was more a censure than an apology. The warmth, however, with which both the Daciers resented any thing that was said against the ancient writers was carried to the extreme, and had, at times, something ludicrous in it. But Madame Dacier's enthusiasm was real, and unaccompanied by pedantry or conceit. She died in 1820.
Original Poetry.
DUTY.
BY ALFRED B. STREET.
In changeless green, and grasping close the rock,
Up towers the mountain pine. The Winter blast
May like an ocean surge be on it cast;
Proud doth it stand, and stern defy the shock,
Unchanged in verdure and unbroke in crest,
Although wild throes may agitate its breast,
And clinging closer when the storm is gone,
Tired, but unbent upon its granite throne,
Not always doth it wrestle with the storm!
Skies smile; spring flowers make soft its iron roots;
Its sturdy boughs are kissed by breezes warm;
And birds gleam in and out with joyous flutes.
Duty proves not its strength unless defied,
But pleasure has it, too, bright as have hearts untried.