pression; but our emotions are of the strongest kind, when we behold any one about to perish by the hand of a brother, a sister, a son, or a parent. Euripides is happy in his choice of these disastrous incidents; for what can create more lively emotions, than Clytemnestra sinking under the bloody hand of a son, or the children of Medea, under that of their unnatural mother? In short, since innocence, suffering contrary to all appearance of justice, is odious, the picture, therefore, that tragedy should present to us on the stage, is, that of a man who may, in some measure, reproach himself with his misfortunes. Thus Hippolytus injures a jealous divinity, Jocasta neglects her most sacred duties, Priam and Hecuba exhibit too great a weakness in favour of the ravisher of Helen, and Antigone obeys the sentiments of nature, rather than the established laws.

If among the causes assigned for the calamities of the principal personage, there are some, which it may be easy to excuse, he should then be represented with weaknesses and defects, which may palliate in the eyes of the spectators, the horror of his destiny. Let us see how Euripides proceeds in such cases. Phædra is influenced with a criminal passion, which Venus had kindled in her heart, to destroy Hippolytus. Our poet therefore gives to this princess only a secondary part; he does still more; she conceives and executes the fearful project of accusing Hippolytus. Her passion is involuntary, but her crime is not so; she is only an odious character, who, after having raised some pity, ends by exciting indignation.

With regard to the incidents which excite terror and pity, the person who commits the tragical act may accomplish it in several ways. He may commit the crime, with deliberate intention; or the crime may not be discovered till after it is committed; or the act may proceed to the very verge of execution, and be suddenly stopped short by an unexpected discovery, which is by far the most perfect; and last of all, which is the worst, when the perpetrator stops, in the moment of executing his design, by a simple change of will. As an instance of the first, we may adduce that of Medea, who forms and executes the project of killing her children; but her action is the more barbarous, because it is unnecessary. Besides the above, there are several varieties, in exciting the emotions of pity and terror; such as in the fable, in the discoveries, in the characters, and in the catastrophes. The discovery, which prevents the completion of an atrocious act, is the best; but it ought not to be made the developement of the plot. Orestes, when recognised by Iphigenia, is on the point of falling by the arms of Thoas; and when recognised by Electra, is persecuted by the

Furies. He has, therefore, only passed from one danger and one calamity to another. Euripides extricates him from this latter situation, by the intervention of a divinity; an expedient which might be necessary in his Iphigenia in Tauris, but which was by no means so in his Orestes; the action of which would be more tragic, if he had abandoned the assassins of Clytemnestra to the tortures of remorse. But Euripides was fond of making the gods descend in machinery; and has but too frequently employed this gross artifice, to explain the subject and develope the plot.

What is called the manners, is the exact conformity of the actions, sentiments, thoughts and language of the personage, with his character. The manners characterize the person, in the action; and they should be good. We have an example of manners unnecessarily bad, in the character of Menelaus, in the tragedy of Orestes. Mr. Potter has justly remarked, that Menelaus, throughout this play, is represented as an ungrateful, unfeeling, timid, designing poltron. The manners must also be proper, resembling and uniform. We have an instance of want of uniformity of manners in the Iphigenia at Aulis, for there the Iphigenia who supplicates for life, has no resemblance to the Iphigenia of the conclusion. In order to give the manners boldness and lustre, they ought to be contrasted with each other, as the character of Polynices with that of Eteocles, in the Phoenissa. But as we have exceeded the limits assigned to an essay of this kind, we shall only make the observation, that though the more important characters of the dramas of Euripides are generally unexceptionable, yet those of a secondary and still lower rank, often break the proportions, and violate, in various instances, the probabilities of nature.

[Messrs. Editors,-Last winter, I received from a friend, then slowly recovering from severe illness, a letter in verse, partly humorous, partly serious. I take upon me to send you the graver half. Yours, &c.]

FRAGMENT OF A POETICAL EPISTLE.

No more, my friend,

A wearied ear I'll urge you lend
My tale of sickness-aches I've borne
From closing day to breaking morn-
Long wintry nights, and days of pain-
Sharp pain-'tis past, and I would fair
My languor cheer with grateful thought
Of him, who to this frame has brought

Soothing and rest; who, when there rose
Within bosom's dull repose

my

A troubled memory of wrong

Done in health's day, when passions strong
Swayed me-repentance spoke, and peace,
Hope, and from dark remorse release.
Lonely, in thought, I travelled o'er
Days past, and joys to come no more;
Sat listening the low beating fire,
And saw its flames shoot up-expire,-
Like cheerful thoughts that glance their light
Athwart the mind, and then 'tis night,
For ever night?-The Eternal One,
With sacred fire from forth his throne,
Did touch my heart-Oh fail it not,
When days of health shall be my lot!
Beside me, Patience, Suffering's child,
Sat with meek voice, and aspect mild;-
Sweet were the numbers, sweet and holy,
She sung to soothe my melancholy;
Won me to learn of her to bear
Sorrow, and pain, and eating care,
And to her fettered listener taught-
"Prisoner to none the free of thought :"
A truth sublime, yet slowly learned
By one who for the freshness yearned
Of open air and ample sky.

Shut out from nature, thus to lie
Chained down by long disease-to me,
Unused to such captivity;

To me-who love alike to rove
The leafy and the leafless grove;
A rambler of the field and hill;
A wanderer by the winding rill,
When taking hues from bending flowers,
Or stealing dark by crystal bowers,
Built up by winter on its bank,
Of branches shot from vapour dank-
Was trial hard:-I felt it so,
When, on the bright extent of snow,
I from my window looked, to see
The shouting boys, at liberty,
Slide o'er the crusted plain, or swift
Shoot down the steep and shining drift.

But I could stand at set of sun,
And see the snow he shone upon
Change to a path of glory; see
The rainbow hues 'twixt him and me-
Orange, and green, and golden light:
I thought on that celestial sight,
That city seen by aged John,
City with walls of precious stone.
Brighter and brighter grew the way
Between me and the God of day:
I thought to walk the dazzling road
That seemed so short to his abode.
Then suddenly went down the sun,
And left me on the earth alone.

Gone is the path, like steps of light,
By angels trod at dead of night,
While Jacob slept. Around my room
Deepen the shadows; while the gloom
Visits my soul, in converse high
Lifted but now, when heaven was nigh.
Why could not I, in spirit, raise
Pillar of Bethel to his praise

Who blessed me, and free worship pay,
Like Isaac's son upon
his way?
Are holy thoughts but visions fair,
And transient, chased by stern despair;-
As break through clouds, in darkness tost,
Sweet gleams of starlight, and are lost?
Nay turn and study thy own mind—
Nay, look on nature's face; thou❜lt find
Kind, gentle graces, smiles to raise
The wearied spirit-hope, and praise.
O, kind to me! in darkest hour
She led me forth with gentle power,
From lonely thoughts, from sad unrest,
To peace of mind, and to her breast
The son who always loved her, pressed;
Called up the moon to cheer me; laid
Her silver light on bank and glade,
And bade her throw mysterious beams
O'er ice-clad hill-which steely gleams
Sent back-a knight who took his rest,
His ample shield upon his breast.
The fence of long, rough rails, that went
O'er trackless snows, a beauty lent—

Glittered each ice-incrusted bar
Beneath the moon like shaft of war.-
And there a lovely tracery

Of branch and twig, that naked tree
From shadow soft and dim has wove,
And spread so gently, that above
The pure white snow it seems to float
Lighter than that celestial boat,
The silver-beaked moon, on air,
Lighter than feathery gossamer;
As if its dark'ning touch, through fear,
Is held from thing so saintly clear.

Thus nature threw her beauties round me ;
Thus from the gloom in which she found me,
She won me by her simple graces,
She wooed me with her happy faces.

The day is closed, and I refrain

But if my desultory strain,

Has whiled away an hour of pain;

If to my desert mind, have come

Serener thoughts, and made their home

Awhile, as from the summer sky,

Drops the fresh shower when earth is dry ;—
I fain would have my friends partake
The passing cheerfulness they wake.

LAW SCHOOL AT NORTHAMPTON.

THE Law School at Northampton, Massachusetts, has been established for several years, and has enjoyed a very liberal patronage; but until very lately there has been published no particular statement of the course of study pursued at that institution. The public seem to have been too well satisfied of the ability and learning of Messrs. Mills and Howe, its principals, to demand of them any very strict account of their mode of instruction. Within a few weeks, however, these gentlemen have published a sort of prospectus, detailing what seems to us a very excellent and judicious plan of study. As the school is rapidly rising into notice and favor, and as the whole community is interested that those who profess the complicated and difficult science of the law, should be sound and ripe scholars in their way, we have been induced to say something of this plan, and the advantages with which we suppose it to be attended.

Lectures of an hour are delivered at this institution three times a week. These lectures are intended to embrace most