Port Tobacco times, and Charles County advertiser. (Port Tobacco, Md.) 1845-1898, 1857-08-06
From the Southern Literary Messenger.
A LEAF FROM A DIARY.

From the Southern Literary Messenger.
A LEAF FROM A DIARY.
81 saw thee, lovely Ines,
Descend along the shore,
With bands Of noble gentlemen,
And banners waved before;
And gentle youth and maidens gay,
And snowy plumes they wore;
1t would have been beauteous dream,
Ii it had been no more. .'-THos. Hoop.
It had been three years since Paul de
Gourdon and myself parted, to become stu.
dents in colleges situated in different parts
of the country. During the years we were
at school we were close friends, nothing oc-
curing to interrupt for moment our friend
ship. The arrival of the day on which we
were to separate brought us no joy We
lost sight Of our college anticipations in the
pain of parting. We knew not that our
paths, henceforth divergent, would ever a.
gain meet; and heart once anchored firm
ly does not easily float off from its moorings.
Many ,fervent words were exchanged, many
strong pressures Of the hand given, ere we
went forth to fight our ways to the uncertain
honors Of college life.
After a three years. absence we met again.
It was beautiful stream by which we sat,
a stream of silvery whiteness, laving the
heart Of a country far-famed for beauty and
fertility, over whose pellucid bosom the
winged canoe of the Indian had often glided
in summers long gone. Mighty oaks, gnarl-
ed and ploughed by tempests, stood like
sentinels on the margin, and in summer
domed the winding path of waters. And
flowers were there, hiding in the soft grass
of the bank, Or STOPPING down to freshen
their beauties in the cool water In the quiet
summer afternoons, lying on the green bank,
you could hear the bees drowsily humming
around their sweet cups, and the amorous
ripple Of the stream wooing them to his own
embrace. What wonder that in the golden
twilight the Indian, as he foated slowly a.
long the stream, felt all the fountains ofhis
soul in commotion, and poured out his feel
ings in the name by which it is still known
S'the Stream of Song"
That night can never be forgotten by me
It is sweet song in the chapel of memory.
A .falrer | have never seen. Itna ha..
the pilgrim on Syrian soil, as he parts his
teH5>Cuf ra1Iro tLA-n:e ;e
bewildered by greater splendour, feeling the
shock of the past and present meeting like
two oceans in his soul; but the waters of
the Atlantic have seldom been charmed by
SO beautiful a night Where a wide-spread-
ing oak threw its shadow we found repose
on rustic seat The moonlight flashed in
silver sparkles on the stream, and the sky,
Of o1l cfo
dreamed over it's own sweet image in the
watery mirror. If to these gorgeous infu-
ences of time and scene be added the power
that comes from old associations and cher
ished recellections, it will not be wonder
that our hearts thrilled and murmured with
the music of love.
Our talk ran on old times; our memories,
like busy cleaners, were at work in the gol-
den fields Of the past. How could [ hope
to tell the varied discourse, the scraps of
rhyme, the bright-winged thoughts, the
strong purposes, the warm words there felt
and spoken. There were, enough such to
fill book, and [ am not writing book. -
1t is pleasant to talk to a good listener Care
you such y, and it is my intention now
simply to narrate a story which Paul then
and there delivered to the wardship of my
memory, and which, he said, lived in his
thoughts ''like the memory of joys that are
gone"
''You remember me, Harry, when first
came to school, was just in the summer
solstice of boyhood, and my affections were
as warm, as eager and as full Of noise as &
brook in July There are many heresies il
this world, but no one more pernicious thar
that which denies to boy, a passionate, un
selfish boy. the power of loving. It is weak
because it has not one principle Of truth te
rest upon, and pernicious, because if the boy
be convinced that all the sacred fire Of hi
heart is in reality will-o-wisp to delude, ht
will become an universal skeptic, holding
love, Of what kind soevcr, whether of Goo
or man, as base delusion, an old crone''
tale He who sneers at the passion, an(
contemptuously styles it ''boyish love" a
! if it were thing distinct in quantity ano
quality from the love of maturer years, doe
only prove his own inability to feel what il
most true and holy in life. There is an ole
proverb, that s'frst love is the only love,
which is, in its general use, testimony
from the heart of man to the existence anC
power of that so oft derided passion. Th'
difference between the love Of the boy ane
that of the man. is in quantity not in quail
ty the latter may be more strong and sym
metrical, the former is more impetuous ant
self-sacrifcing. It has, like everything
earthly, its antipodes, truth and falsehood
The true passion is an evergreen, the same
in winter as in summer. The false passion
is stripped of it's leaves by the first blast o
winter. have seen kind of love rise like
smoke-column on winter morning and b.
scattered as soon; but this evanescent pas
sion is only counterfeit, that which il
.deep-rooted in the being. The syrens once