The River Falls journal. (River Falls, Pierce County, Wis.) 1857-1861, 1859-10-05


and bronze hauA persisted, they shalf ''still
live in memory, $, long as men shall
reverence law, and honor Patriotism, and
love liberty. g saFfAs d@#' Lta iT.5.
A SKETCH BY DEQUINCEY.
The "Opium Eater" in onotof his I'M
rivalled chapters, speaks Of the reason
why death, other conditions remaining
the same, is more profoundly, affecting in
summer7than in other parts of the year -
so far at least, as it is liable to any moditi-
cation at al from accidents of scenery or
season; the reason Ling, as We have seen,
in the antagonism between the tropical
redundancy Of life in summer. and the
frozen sterilties Of tie grave. In di-
erosion Of surprising pathos and solemn
beauty, Mr.. DeQuincey then shows how
inextricabIy in early childhood, his own
feelings and images of death were en-
tangled with those of summer, rs con
nected with Palestine and Jeruslem, about
which he read with his three sisters in
the nursery, from pictured Bible, and
learned to associate the cIoudless3 sun
lights of Syria, and the pomps of Palm
Sunday, with the passion and death Of
the Lord of Life. And then he returns
to describe his visit to the room in which
bis dead sister lay. Let the reader read
and assent: e. #-aaf'<a a.d..fa"
Turning round, I sought my sisters
face. But the bed had been moved, and
the back was now turned to myself
Nothing met my eyes but one large win
dow, wide open, through which tic sun
of midsummer at midday was showcfing
down torrents of splendor. The weather
was dry, the sky WAS cloulless, the blue
depths seemed the expressed types of in
finity; and it was not possible for eye to
behold, or for heart to conceive. any sym
bols more pathetic of life and the glory
of life. ..,f....e. ...-v..-........f..~
!, From the gorgeous sunlight turned
round to the corpse. There lay the
sweet childish figure; there the q ,gel face.
x X | stood checked for a
moment; awe, not fear, fell upon mel
and whilst | stood, solemn wind began
to blow-the saddest that ear ever heard.
TWAS wind that might have swept the
fields of mortality for a thousand centuries.
Many times since, upon summer days,
when the sun is about the hottest, | have
remarked the same wind arising and ut
tering the same hollow, solemn, Mem
nonian, but sanity swell; it is in tbs
world the one great audible symbol of
eternity. And three times in my life
have happened to hear the same sound
in the same circumstances -ramely, when
standing between an open window and n
dead body, on summer day. -.
Instantly, when my ear eought this
vast Eolian information, when my eye
fiji. ed with the golden fullness of life, the
pomps of the heaven above, or the glory
Of the flo q ers below, and turning wien il
settled upon the frost which overspread
my sisters face, instantly q trance fell up
on me. A vault seemed to open in the
zenith Of the far blue sky, a shaft which
ran up forever. | in spirit rose as if on
pillows that also ran up the shaft forever;
and the pillows seemed to pursue the
throne of God; but that also ran before
us and fled away continually.
The flight and the pursuit seemed to GO
on for ever and ever. Frost, gathering
frost, some Sarsar wind of death seemed
to repel me some mighty relation between
God and death dimly struggled to evolve
itself from the dreadful antagonism be
tween them; shadowy meanings even vel
continued to exercise and torment, in
dreams, tho deciphering oracle within me-
l slept-for how long | cannot say; slow
ly recovered my selfpossession; and
when l woke, found myself standing, as
before, close to my sisters bed. s''A
The FAST YoUTH.-Smart Youth -
You are going it with rush-you are
outrunning your years. You have slip
ped your collar, wild colt, and broken
l.o-o f.or,, oil ,nnfarnol roafrns.t "