Vermont phÅ“nix. [volume] (Brattleboro, Vt.) 1834-1955, 1856-09-20

A handsome house to lodge friend,
A river at my gardens end,
terrace walk, and half rood
OF land set out to plant wood"
Few indeed are the persons that in the course
Of their lives have not entertained wishes of the
like sort. Sometimes they have realized them !;
sometimes been disappointed by the realization
ITSELF In the latter case, the fault is neither
in the wish, nor in the things wished tor. The
wish is good if only as pleasure Of the i'm
aginalion and an encouragement to The means
for attaining its object and the things are
found to be very good indeed, by those whose
temperaments and habits qualify them for the
enjoyment. Stories of unhappy mllionaires
who retire only TO find the country tedious, of
tallow-chandlers who yearn for their melting
days, and even of poets disconieniod with their
groves" prove but the want OF previous fit
ness, or of sufficient good health. The allow-
chandler should have cultivated something be-
sides long skies, and the poet should not have
safe reading about his groves till the state of
his hillary vessels hindered his enjoyment when
he got them. There is, however, great deal
of difference in those cases. That OF the tai
low-chander, if he knows nothing but talow,
and is not in patient state Of health, is hope
less, for he is neither clever nor poor enough
10 be able TO go and help the village carpenter.
He mus, needs quit his roses Tor tho melting
tub, and in very desperation grows richer than
he was before. But the love of groves aud
gardens being habit of the poets mind, he
bears i'll health better with them than without
them; complaint itself comforts him more than
it does other men, for he complains in verse ;
and il is not TO be supposed that Shenstone,
with all his desire for visitors, and Cowley,
with all his childlike disapponlmenls as to "rls-
tic innocence" did not pass many happy, or at
least many soothing days, in their country
abodes. Shenslone, in particular, must have
largely partaken of the pleasures of creator,
for he invented the lovely scenes about his
house, and saw TO their execution.
1t would be good work in some writer to
collect instances Of this kind Of disappointment,
and the reverse, and show how entirely each
was to be attributed to particular circumstances,
and not to that universal doom so falsely pred
icaied of all human expectations. Great names
prove nothing against counter examples. Sol.
omon himself may have been disappointed, bul
il was not because he was the ''wisest of men -
it was because he had been too rich and luxu.
rious, and SO far one Of the foolishest. We dc
not find that his brother philosopher, Epicurus
was disappointed; for he was poor and TEN
perate, and thus was enabled 10 enjoy his gar
den TO the last, There have been abdcaieC
monarchs who wished TO resume their thrones
royal iallow-chandlers who could moi do with
out their melting levee-days but such was ,o
the case with Dioeleian, who had taste 70
gardening On the contrary, he told the am
bassadors who came to tempt him back 10 pow
er, that if they knew what pleasure he took il
his "cabbages," they would hale to go bacl
themselves. Swift, who initiated from Horace
the verses at the head of this article, woul'
never have been happy in retirement, for HI