was right in what he said about truth being left free to combat with error. But, à priori, I should believe that the printing-press, in the age of steam and electricity, must be the agent of the highest uses the best ends, because, Sir, I believe that there is no great action of the natural or social world, permitted by PROVIDENCE, without these ends. There was truth in the old conceit that the stars are mated with human destiny, and that distant planets reflect aspects of this earth. There is truth in the conception that every great movement of being and of power involves the purpose of GoD in regard to humanity.

Do you think all these splendid vehicles of communication were matters of pleasure and proft, of commerce and the custom-house? I see a Providential purpose levying on these rail-roads and telegraphs to do its work, and far out on lonely seas it hangs its signal-lanterns on the bows of your steam-ships. And almost the first thought-the comprehensive and most glorious thought which the printing-press awakens in your mind and my mind and in the mind of every man, is that of great and beneficent uses. All its appurtenances are quickly translated into this meaning. Human measures are defeated, methods fail, but God's own purposes never; and the processes of His eternal righteousness and truth run in the iron grooves of the printing-press.

And so, Mr. President, it is the moral interest of the great power that is represented here tonight, that lends to the occasion its most suggestive aspect. It is the fact that the power wielded by this Publishers' Association is so much power working, on the whole, against the wrong and the falsehood that are in the world. I look upon these great priuting-offices and factories of books as so many moral encampments, and upon these ranks of working men and working women as indeed a vast army arrayed against huge Redans and Malakoffs of evil. Gentlemen of the NewYork Publishers' Association, I thank you for those munitions of war, those embattled hosts and yonder glittering signals of success. Women, bending over your work, toil on, for its leads to a result well worthy the spirit and the true mission of woman. And you, my brethren, with rolledup sleeves, remember it is a moral wide, a final conflict in which you are engaged. The rumble of the power-press is better than the rattle of artillery. The click of composing-sticks is more inspiring than the clank of armor, and every type, more sure than a bullet, and shooting noiseless as the summer air, shall hit the mark, though it be a thousand years ahead. Advance, battalions! for with every forward step the old wrong and falsehood of the world grows weaker, and is made ready to pass away.'

Mr. HENRY WARD BEECHER followed in some remarks which would have been heard with more interest, as he himself intimated, if so eloquent an orator as Mr. CHAPIN had not preceded him. And thus terminated, entirely succesfully, a Festival which will long be remembered by all who were so fortunate as to be present. - Is it our friend of the 'Bunkum Flagstaff' who sends us the following from Silver Lake, the locality of the 'Grate Sarpent?' The letter was evidently penned in much haste, and under a good deal of excitement, and the initials are so blotted that we can only decipher what seems like WAGS....,' in very straggling characters, at the end. The internal evidence of its authenticity is much stronger: 'JOE GILMAN has just brought over startling news from Snaiktown. Ir has been seen again! Yes - the wreptyle is thair. They are expectink to maik a forchin to-oncet. The Snaik will be kort and egzibited all over the ked 'ntry at 25 sents. A stork-kompany has ben form'd, to spekilate into the grate Monster of the Depe-also onto the chanses of ketching the same. The shares are all taken, but the Snaik aint. The monney is all paid in, but the old whaler's line is n't all payed out yet. The objek was saw yisterdy onto the bottom of the Laik, with a mairmaid on his back, a-comink of her hair, and the stork-holders' hartz beat hi—also the shares sell higher. The company hev bilt a high observatory, and highered watchmen to 'observe the 'Snaik of Snaiks,' and 'keap their eye onto him when seen.' The watchmen stand onto the top of the observatory, being selected from among their fellow-citizens for their superior hite; and the aforesaid being bilt at least fifty feet hi: and the above are paid a high salary, which elewated position nables them to gain a unobstructed view of the broad expans of water, and make affidavys of seeing the Snaik, which doubbles the value of the stork: it is a capital stork. Haz been seen every day twicet, and on one occashun only,' 3 times. On transfer-days it will be vizzible during bizness-hours, (by

order of the Board.) The observatory is furnisht with quizzing-glasses and a telluscope. It is thought that the observatory is suffishently conspickous to attrack the notis of the Snaik. And sum people, as is too poor to buy shares, sez if he does twig the preparationz made to ketch him, he will die of laffing, and his skin stuft immejately!' There will be a 'Consolidated United States Snake Company' before long! We know of no present

publishers to whom we feel more gratefully indebted for truc intellectual enjoyment than to Messrs. LITTLE, BROWN AND COMPANY, of Boston, for the successive issues of their convenient and beautifully-executed 'Ne Edition of the English Poets,' which is also published in New-York by Mr. JAMES S. DICKERSON, Broadway. It seems but yesterday since we received, in five volumes, all the quaint writings of the 'golden-hearted EDMUND SPENSER,' with a noble portrait, and now there lie before us, in three volumes, the complete poetical works of PERCY BYSSHE SHELLEY. From the briefer poems of the latter we cannot resist the inclination to transfer for perpetual preservation in these pages, the most touching 'Lines written in Dejection near Naples.' They are not new, it is true, but how surpassingly pathetic are the lines we have ventured to italicise:

'Some might lament that I were cold,
As I when this sweet day is gone,
Which my lost heart, too soon grown old,
Insults with this untimely moan;
They might lament; for I am one
Whom men love not, and yet regret,
Unlike this day, which, when the sun
Shall on its stainless glory set,

Will linger, though enjoyed, like joy in memory yet.'

We may well say, with a contemporary: 'It is almost incredible that such a treasure as this edition of the English poets can be purchased at the low rate fixed by the publishers. The typography is beautiful, the paper exceedingly good for the price, the engravings admirable, and each poet is represented in the fulness of his writings. All that Time has done to perfect a knowledge of their labors will find itself recorded in this edition, which is in every respect fully equal to the London one.' DON'T we 'get it' from 'Meister KARL' for a mistake which we made in one of the 'Literary Notices' in our last number? Read, and answer, and commiserate: What do you mean by saying of a 'characteristic specimen' of mine, in your October Number, etc., 'that it ought to have been sent for a first appearance to us?' Ought! ha-a-ay ? OUGHT!! Gotteshimmeldonnerwettersturmsackerlotspotzhagelkreuzelementblitzsaczamentunddonnerunddorianochienmal! — 'OUGHT!!' Turn your eyes to the KNICKERBOCKER Magazine for November, 1849, you deluded sinner: find page four hundred twenty-five, you heathen. Have you found it, you Philistine? Manes!' There! Your Magazine goes from the Californicators of the west, to the Chineymen, round by the way of New-York. Where the wild persimmon dances in the evening breeze; where the boomerang flits through the twinkey tree; where the ousquewhap woos in dulcet tones his feathered mate; 'where Brahma's darkness gathers,' and where the polar bear dances his skuipjack to the lorn Samryedan maid, your demd old Magazine is read. And all all of 'em -boomerang, Chineyman, ousquewhap, Brahma, and skuipjack, have all been informed that I wrote one of my better pieces and did n't send it to the KNICKERBOCKER. Sir, that piece was written for the KNICKERBOCKER the first three verses thereof having been composed during sermon, in a church, in the pleasant, pretty, amiable and genial New-England village of Dedham. Ain't you ashamed? In the KNICKERBOCKER you have it unemasculated and complete. I require fourteen distinct retractions of your assertion. I consider the assertion that I did not send that piece to the KNICKERBOCKER as Scan. Mag. (who was SCAN. MAG., by the way?) and slander.' WHILE in Louisville, in our recent western trip, it was our good fortune to be entertained at an hospitable mansion in the neighborhood of the city, and the turbulent river that runs thereby. The proprietor of the spacious and beautiful estate, Mr. E ———, was absent: but the honors' were most cordially rendered by his represen tative, Captain B, of the United States Army. We shall invade no rites of hospitality by saying, that for richness and variety of all manner of fruits' and rare vegetables, we have never seen an estate to equal this. On each side of the main edifice, a little in the rear, are two handsomely

1855.]

Editor's Table.

painted and carpeted dwellings, the 'quarters' of the colored house-servants.
We looked in upon the inmates, and found the apartments as 'neat as a pin'
in every part, with good beds, covered with gayly-mosaic'd counterpanes,
clean and nice to the last degree. At table, for the first time in our life, we
were waited upon by a female slave, a young woman apparently of some
She could not have been dressed in better taste,
twenty-five years of age.
nor have behaved with more quiet self-possession, had she been herself the
mistress of the splendid mansion. We were agreeably surprised by this
MR. P. PEPPER PODD will accept
specimen or phase of 'serfdom.'
our thanks. We share his adoration of 'genus' and his admiration of its
renowned exemplar, in the person of Mr. K. N. PEPPER, Esq. PODD is right.
We were not disappointed in the bearing and 'feachures' of the Grate
Pote.' We should like to know who could be:

'L. GAYLOR D. CLARK:

Demosthenes 4 Corners, Oct. 12st, 1855. PEPPER is with you! You have seen him! You 'SIR: Icongratulate you. have looked upon his face. You have beheld his person - his gate - his feachures. Did I deceive you? I anticipate your answer: 'You did not deceive us: on the contrariry, 'The half was not told us."

'Sir. I send you a letter from PEPPER from the city. It speaks for itself. It is not in blank-verse, his favorite stile; but how compleat and repleat it is with poetic feeling! It breaks out stimultuaneously, you will perceive, where he speaks of war and bums. There and there only, have I ventured to draw a line under his lucubration.

'Sir: I have known many writers. MILTON is good. JOHNSON (SAMUEL) wrote good, also. But, did they write like PEPPER? Sir- they did not.

'I have no hesitation to remark, and I say it with deference, and without preference, that if I understand myself, and I think I do, I don't know as I ever know'd a man that know'd as much as what PEPPER knows.

FREN PODD:

'Sir. I am, yours,

'DEER FELER:

P. PEPPER PODD.

Hevin got settled into mi new corters, i imejitly remember mi oald reverens & Aw fur your karicter, wich is simular to WASHINKTONS oanli you aint hed no chans to fite & dewelup your Talens. Youm a particelerli mute HAM DONE & a rayther ingloris MILTON (wich Triboot plese aksep in remembrans of me.) new York is 'altho we new Yorkers doant thine nothink ov it, praps a brefe discripshur of this sity wood be interestin & instrucktive 2 a kedentry feller like you. comprised onto a iland wich is sevral mild lonk, & rayther lest, brod. the prinsipel rode is Brodway, besydes wich their is as much as 19 or 20 uthers, be the saime moar or lest. You ken git the best Liker hear ov any placet of its sise into the united Statesn. in varis plasis is a liburty Poal, oald with aig. their is a museeum hear kep bi a mr. barnum, (wich last is a Umbug ov the larg gray kynd.) hear is to be seen the SNAIK wich fit with the ALEGAITER in gottimali. (n. b The tale is suplide by a god-fish.) the other thinks aint much. there is a Drammy attach to it wich the pirformers complanes ov mr. b. he wans all the moril parts to hisself. he is verry afectin in the cryin parts, & kin imetait a rale dyink cristian so well you thine hese a-goin rite up, wich is a mistaik. here is oshuns of hansum wimmin, (the 1st into the sity,) to be sene at al ours. they lok helthy, & hev red

checs. they air cuite frenli, 2, & aint as stiff as kedentry girls. this is al i ken thinc ov now. so ile giv you discripshun ov mi adventers sens i lef your hospital Manshun.

'It wos al rite onto the bote. dident you notis how the Captins is sparkel wen you introdoos me? So thay did al the way down. he was complainink of soar is wen we got hear. he giv me the 1st chop of everythink, & i dident hev to pay a red sent. i heerd a lady wisper whoos that distingish furrin lookin individooal, a lenink so grasefully onto his elbo? wen she found out, she coodent help fallin into love imejitly. but as i discuverd as her father was only a oldurman, i verry properl looct coald onto her. (besydes, how cood i forgit HANAH GANE!) wen i was acomink of ov the bote, the yung lady stood there with her frens, & sed, here comes the red-hared foo-foo agin! wich was verry kynd ov her, as i am alus anxius to be noan. from the 'red hare,' & not noink wot 'foo-foo' ment, i thoght at 1st she was mad a little; but a yung man which i saw afturwerds sed 'foo-foo' ment 'german Barren,' & that the germans (espeshally the Barrens) wares red hare out of chois. how stronk is woomins afeckshun! she doant chaing fur nothink.

'How they pull a feler, onto the docs! wen i got of, sum litle Bois cumd a-runnink up, & sed al to onct-cary your carpit-bag, mister? teched bi sech kyndnes, i was givin it to 1 ov em wen a nuther 1 sed- ile cary it fur 5 sents; 1 more yeld with teres into his is 4 sents, & so they kep a-goin down, a hunchin ov each uther, til 1 sed, ile cary it fur nothink, & as i coodent wate fur em to git to paying me fur the chans, i let the last boy hev it, fur which privelig he semed moar thankfle than i was to git it dun so chepe. as i was a-goink to Nickerbocker Offis 1st, i ask a man with a wip ware Brodway was, & he sed 4 mild firther on, & ask me ef ide hev a carrig-only a doler. noink i coodent afoard it, i toald him i was fond ov walkin, wich he sed it was cuite lucky i was. after goin 3 or 4 blocs i cumd to a nice wide rode & a Lov a nois. i ask a man wot it was cald, wich looct at me a spel as ef struc with Astonishmeant, and sed-ware did you come from, greny, thats Brodway& then i new the man with the wip hed ben a-lyink. i was a-goin bac to lic him, but thot i woodent.

'wen ide got up a little ways i met a well dres yung man wich looc egzackli as i looc into a glass; it was gest as ef a man walks out and sees hisself a-comink alonk. i could see Genus in his i. he notist i was a lookin at him, so he cum up and interdoos hisself as mr. P. k. Pockit. wen i toald him who i was he went into rapchers, sed he admyred me so much as he dident know as hede be abel to expres hisself. he ofered to show me sum sites, so we went alonk together. we sune cum to a plais dug out in the syde walk ware thay was a-buildink a cupel ov uvens-lyke. he sed wede hev war sune, & them was to put Bums in, to blo up the British & French. he sed evry hous hed 1 or 2, reddy to tech of wot a awfle plais fur a horstil Army! i thinc i here sumthink go of now & se about 1 thousan evacuatin or the sily. i thinc i se a hull Army fall bac! i thinc i here em cus! & then i thine i doant.

'Perti sune we cumd to a corner, wen mi fren remare that a man wantid to se him, a few dores down this strete, & toald me to wate fur him. i ges lykeli he foun his fren, fur i watid so lonk that foalks toald me to moov on, or els git mi fete out of the way; boath ov wich i finelly did. wen i got to 348 i foun i hed to cros the rode, & bi gimini! ow the dryvers swoar at me! i cum purty nere gittin rund over 2, also ov fallin down & gittin mi pans derty. won the Boy giv me mi carpit bag, wot was mi serpris to hev him put out his han & say- cum, mister, & over that shad-scail! Sech lyink! i was so astonish i stood putrifide to the spot. i rase