themselves more picturesque, and from the recollection inseparably
interwoven with it, no spot is more interesting than the tomb of Virgil.

* * * * *


LAST CHRISTMAS DAY.

(_For the Mirror_.)


"Say, if such blandishments did ever greet
Thy charmed soul; hast thou not crav'd to die?
Hast not thine immaterial seem'd but air
Verging to sigh itself from thee, and share
Beatitude? hast thou not watch'd thy breath
In meek, faint hope, that soon 'twould sink in death?"

_MS. Poem._


Last Christmas Day! my heart leaps with joy at its very memory; it was a
mental _Noel_, a Christmas of the soul, (if I may thus express myself.)
That which I am about to relate of it is strictly true, and I do relate
it because that day is one of the very few in our brief existence which
form a moral epoch in, and influence subsequent, life. Last Christmas
Day, I well remember, my spirit revelled in an Eden blessedness--a bliss
which the unholy world did not, could not, give, and consequently could
not take away. Reader! I will hope, I will believe, that thou hast
experienced feelings and emotions, like those high and holy ones of