Middletown transcript., 1870-05-14

"Of sackcloth was thy wedding garment made
Thy bridal fruit is ashes in the dust
The iair-haired daughter Of the isle is laid,
The love Of Millions
The western horizon was rosplendent
with the beams of dying day, columned
sapphire, molten gold, ruby tints of shad-
owed glory; great thunder caps, broad at
the base, skirting earth, loomed up the
zenith arching brightness most supern-
al by their towering grandeur, as they
threw into bold relief, by the majesty of
their proportions, the Sunlit blazonry of
light.
Great ethereal caravans scuddcd silent
ly DER the perceptibe universe, while not
a breath below told of power to shift the
grotesque images across the azure dome.
Old ocean with moaning swell rippled a
line of PHOSPHORUS along the whitened
beach, cleaning as vivid as forest fire-hys
in the gathering gloom of twilight. The
Infinite artist had sketchcd on earth one
of his master efforts; sky, sea and air
glowcd with a radiance, for the time was
twilight and the season October's mellow
est.
A young girl, blonde in complexion
and very beautiful in feature, with that
inexpressble softIe's and repose of coun-
tenance, rested languidly on a rustic divan
which stood fronting one of those tasteful
cottages to be found on the margin of the
lakes and streams of our continent.
The wine-like atmosphere floating on
the softest of autumnal zephyrs wooed her
lovingly, and mid the surrounding scene
ry she recined ans6gured, a MASTER
piece of creative skill. With orbs as blue
as the vault they scanned she watched
the coming of those diamond heralds
which light up the night, dissipating mea-
surably the gloom peryading nature on a
moonless eve. Approaching night shut
out the earlier glory to the gazer's vision
by a picture more sombre, perhaps, but
no less grand and bewitching.
The spring of life in the lady gave vo-
tive offering to scene of Gods own pen
ceiling, and her parted lips murmured,
"How beautiful" in accents low and me-
lodious, thanksgiving and praise pure as
ever fell from the sainted lips of the vestal
devotee.
Fair child of the South, wooed by the
breath OF flowers, why hath fate ordained
that thou shalt quaff the dregs of lifc's
chalice? The dread power waited not the
midnight hour, awed by deep silence to
frame and perpetrate a deed that fanatical
zealots hurried on by years devoted to hy-
pocritical cant and devilsh harangue.
As amid the scene of Eden, where man
walked and talked with his Maker, face tc
face, uglness and deformity served to en-
hanoe or relieve the vision by manifest
contrast to uniform loviness, so framed in
this natural scene, yet scarce perceptible
for the gathering gloom and tangled
shrubbery, the white teeth, and basilisk
eyes scintillating the fire of his sensual
nature, an African viewed the maiden,
child of parent who heaped favors on
his head, and the fair mistress who six
years before he honored himself by bow
ing homage in her presence.
The pride of the sea- girt isle of the
Carolnas, the petted child of affluence,
whose queenly form was a plantation
boast, whose dulcet notes cheercd the ia
ded cotton picker; whose soft, white
hand was not too dainty to minister tc
the wretched sufferer, and of whose beau.
ty the dark hamlet sang with joy and
pride.
PICTURE 2ND.
4" Hark forth from the abyss a voice proceeds,
A long, low, distant murmur of dread sound,
Such as arises when nation bleeds
With some deep and immedicable wound"
Foremost in the ranks of those who es.
poused the Northern cause In the South
at the outset Of our fratricidal war, stood
Percy Stanhope. Prompted by purely
patriotic feelings, argument failed to con-
vince him that the South had wrongs tc
right which justified her in resorting tc
force. A stakeholder himself, and ac,