windows, linnets congregate, and bulls make their shrill autumnal bellowing: and towards the end, the beech-tree turns yellow-the first symptom of approaching autumn."

The gentle refreshing breezes by day, and the delicious calms by night, at this time of the year, draw a vast concourse of persons of leisure to the shores of Great Britain and France in the months of August and September. There is perhaps no period of the year when the sea-side is more agreeable. Bathing, sailing, and other marine recreations, are at no time better suited to beguile the hours of the warm summer day than at present: and the peculiar stillness of a seaside evening scene by moonlight is now to be enjoyed in perfection; as the orb of night begins to ascend higher in her car after the termination of the nightless summer solstice, and when the unremitted heat of the dog-days at length gives place to the more refreshing dews of a longer period of nocturnal coolness. The peculiar beauty of a sea-scene, and the hushed poetry of night, are thus woven in undying words by Byron :

"The moon is up, and yet it is not night-
Sunset divides the sky with her—a sea
Of glory streams along the Alpine height
Of blue Friuli's mountains; Heaven is free
From clouds, but of all colours seems to be
Melted to one vast Iris of the West,
Where the Day joins the past Eternity;

While, on the other hand, meek Dian's crest
Floats through the azure air-an island of the blest!

A single star is at her side, and reigns

With her o'er half the lovely heaven; but still
Yon sunny sea heaves brightly, and remains
Roll'd o'er the peak of the far Rhætian hill,
As Day and Night contending were, until
Nature reclaim'd her order :-gentle flows
The deep-dyed Brenta, where their hues instil
The odorous purple of a new-born rose,

Which streams upon her stream, and glass'd within it glows,

Fill'd with the face of heaven, which, from afar,
Comes down upon its waters; all its hues,
From the rich sunset to the rising star,
Their magical variety diffuse :

And now they change; a paler shadow strews
Its mantle o'er the mountains; parting day

Dies like the dolphin, whom each pang imbues
With a new colour as it gasps away,

The last still loveliest, till-'tis gone-and all is gray.

It is the hush of night, and all between

Thy margin and the mountains, dusk, yet clear,
Mellow'd and mingling, yet distinctly seen,
Save darken'd Jura, whose capt heights appear
Precipitously steep; and drawing near,
There breathes a living fragrance from the shore,
Of flowers yet fresh with childhood; on the ear
Drops the light drip of the suspended oar,
Or chirps the grasshopper one good-night carol more.

He is an evening reveller, who makes

His life an infancy, and sings his fill;
At intervals, some bird from out the brakes
Starts into voice a moment, then is still.
There seems a floating whisper on the hill;
But that is fancy, for the starlight dews
All silently their tears of love instil,
Weeping themselves away, till they infuse
Deep into Nature's breast the spirit of her hues.

Ye stars! which are the poetry of heaven!
If in your bright leaves we would read the fate
Of man and empires, 'tis to be forgiven,
That in our aspirations to be great,
Our destinies o'erleap their mortal state,
And claim a kindred with you; for ye are
A beauty and a mystery, and create

In us such love and reverence from afar,

That fortune, fame, power, life, have named themselves a star!

:1

All heaven and earth are still-though not in sleep,
But breathless, as we grow when feeling most;
And silent, as we stand in thoughts too deep
All heaven and earth are still: from the high host
Of stars, to the lull'd lake and mountain-coast,
All is concenter'd in a life intense,

Where not a beam, nor air, nor leaf is lost,
But hath a part of being, and a sense

Of that which is of all Creator and defence."

SCARCELY has Autumn assumed her garment of solemn gold before there is a change in the aspect of Nature,-a furrowing of deep thought upon the woods,-a silent spirit walking abroad, which speaks only to the heart-passes over the still harvestfields without an audible word, and only shows us the falling leaf with the motion of its finger, or brings to our minds the majestic grandeur of the Scripture, where it is written that "we

all do fade as a leaf; and our iniquities, like the wind, have taken us away. And all thou hast shall fall down, as the leaf falleth off from the vine, and as a falling fig from the fig-tree. For ye shall be as an oak whose leaf falleth, as oaks when they cast their leaves; and the sound of a shaken leaf shall chase them, and they shall flee." How beautiful are these similes! and hundreds such are scattered over the Bible,

"Thick as autumnal leaves that strow the brooks
In Vallombrosa, where th' Etrurian shades
High over-arch'd embower."

year,

But let us not yet look at the melancholy side of the for autumn is a lovely season.

Many and pleasant are my recollections of September, for it was the long-looked-for month in which we annually sallied forth a-nutting. How the wild lanes rang with laughter, as we sauntered through them, as merry a group of lads and lasses as ever bore a bottle of berry-brown ale! Over many a pleasant meadow we wandered before we reached the old wood. At length it rose before us, green and silent, as though all its hoary trees slumbered. Then we had to find an entrance; and there was the deep dyke to cross, over which weeds and rushes hung; and the tangling fence to scale, armed with thorns and ragged brambles. At length a gap was discovered; and then we had to hand our fair companions across the ditch, who screamed at fears of their own creating, while a watching briar caught hold of their passing drapery and claimed a portion for toll. On we rambled toward its gloomy centre, threading our way among the entangling underwood, then making a circuit to avoid some impenetrable thicket,-now stooping, or almost creeping, to pass under the low branches,-anon tearing our garments with the brambles, or hunting for a lost shoe amid the furze. At last we reached an open glade where the full sun streamed upon the untrodden grass. This we claimed as our resting-place; and having drunk a foaming bumper, we deposited