birth--desirous of erecting a monument to him, sought his grave, but
in vain, and was compelled to abandon his design. And thus was Holbein
driven to live among strangers, to die without a wife to console or
children to mourn him, and to lay his bones in a nameless grave in a
foreign land.

Such is an imperfect and brief account of the origin, the various forms,
and the meaning of the Dance of Death, and of the life and character of
him whose genius has caused it to be called by his name. It may
smell too much of mortality and antiquity for this fast-living and
forward-looking age; for it is not only a monument of the past, but an
exponent of its spirit. We can look back at it, through the mellowing
mist of centuries, with curiosity not unmixed with admiration; but we
should turn with aversion from such a work, coming from the hands of an
artist of our own day. We think, and with some reason, that we do not
need its teachings; for we are freed from the thraldom that gave edge
to its democratic satire; and we have learned to look with greater
calmness, if not with higher hope, upon the future, to which the grave
is but the ever-open portal. But we may yet profit by a thoughtful
consideration of the eternal truths embodied by Holbein in his Dance of
Death; and in the story of his life there is a lesson for every man, and
every woman too, if they will but find it.




LIZZY GRISWOLD'S THANKSGIVING.


"So John a'n't a-comin', Miss Gris'ld," squeaked Polly Mariner, entering