while those who had escaped the danger remained aghast and stupified, or made with frantic panic for the shore. Upwards of a hundred savages were destroyed by the explosion, many more were shockingly mutilated, and for days afterward the limbs and bodies of the slain were thrown upon the beach.

"The inhabitants of Neweetee were overwhelmed with consternation at this astounding calamity, which had burst upon them in the very moment of triumph. The warriors sat mute and mournful, while the women filled the air with loud lamentations. Their weeping and wailing, however, was suddenly changed into yells of fury at the sight of four unfortunate white men, brought captive into the village. They had been driven on shore in one of the ship's boats, and taken at some distance along the coast. "The interpreter was permitted to converse with them. They proved to be the four brave fellows who had made such desperate defence from the cabin. The interpreter gathered from them some of the particulars already related. They told him further, that, after they had beaten off the enemy, and cleared the ship, Lewis advised them that they should slip the cable and endeavor to get to sea. They declined to take his advice, alleging that the wind set too strongly into the bay, and would drive them on shore. They resolved, as soon as it was dark, to put off quietly in the ship's boat, which they would be able to do unperceived, and to coast along back to Astoria. They put their resolution into effect; but Lewis refused to accompany them, being disabled by his wound, hopeless of escape, and determined on a terrible revenge. On the voyage out, he had repeatedly expressed a presentiment that he should die by his own hands; thinking it highly probable that he should be engaged in some contest with the natives, and being resolved, in case of extremity, to commit suicide, rather than be made a prisoner. He now declared his intention to remain on board of the ship until daylight, to decoy as many of the savages on board as possible, then to set fire to the powder magazine, and terminate his life by a signal act of vengeance. How well he succeeded has been shown. His companions bade him a melancholy adieu, and set off on their precarious expedition. They strove with might and main to get out of the bay, but found it impossible to weather a point of land, and were at length compelled to take shelter in a small cove, where they hoped to remain concealed until the wind should be more favorable. Exhausted by fatigue and watching, they fell into a sound sleep, and in that state were surprised by the savages. Better had it been for those unfortunate men had they remained with Lewis and shared his heroic death: as it was, they perished in a a more painful and protracted manner, being sacrificed by the natives to the manes of their friends with all the lingering tortures of savage cruelty. Some time after their death, the interpreter, who had remained a kind of prisoner at large, effected his escape, and brought the tragical tidings to Astoria."

'Astoria' is destined to occupy no middle rank in the productions of its author; a fact of which the publishers seem to have been aware, if we may judge from the creditable pains which they have taken to present it to the public in a handsome and durable dress.

THE LADIES' WREATH: A selection from the Poetic Writers of England and America. With Original Notices and Notes. Prepared especially for Young Ladies. By Mrs. SARAH J. HALE, Author of 'Northwood,' ' Flora's Interpreter,' Traits of American Life,' etc. One vol. pp. 408. Boston: MARSH, CAPEN AND LYON.

In a former number of this Magazine, we gave notice of the coming appearance of the handsome volume now before us and we take pleasure in saying, that the favorable predictions which we ventured in relation to its character, have in our judgment been amply fulfilled. Mrs. Hale has given liberal selections from twelve female poets of England, and from an equal number of those of our own country. These selections are made with fine taste, and with that regard for useful, moral, and religious inculcation, which forms so prominent a feature in all the literary labors of the author-compiler. A short sketch of the personal history of the writers, together with terse but judicious criticisms, accompany their productions. The volume is intended for young ladies' as a mirror,' to adopt the language of an excellent preface, bright and polished, in which they may see reflected the beauty of virtue, the loveliness of the domestic affections, and the happiness of piety.' To the purehearted, or those who would become so, and to all whose bosoms are sometimes alive to the chastened and refining influences of good poetry, we cordially commend the 'Ladies' Wreath.'

EDITORS' TABLE.

PARK THEATRE - MISS ELLEN TREE. The public have at length been gratified, and their high hopes fully realized. Miss ELLEN TREE has satisfied the most judicious, that the almost unqualified admiration which the English public have bestowed upon her, has not exceeded her fair deserts. No one will expect to find in Miss Tree those wonderful characteristics which hallow the memory of Mrs. Siddons; none will look at her and expect an embodiment of the genius of tragedy, such as that which placed the great English Melpomené immeasurably beyond rivalry; yet can all say of her, and with equal jastice, what was so truly said of Mrs. Siddons: 'The spectator weeps when she weeps, smiles when she smiles, and each emotion of her heart becomes in turn his own.'

--

Perhaps the great feature in Miss Tree's acting is delicacy. A high degree of refinement is perceptible in all she does. There is nothing to astonish, but every thing to admire, and grow pleased with every thing to increase our delight, the longer we contemplate, or the closer we scrutinize. Her acting, like Macready's, evinces great study by its absolute perfection - not by its measured mannerisms. Like Macready, again, she is always sure— - she can be always depended upon-is at all times excellent; and unlike Kean, neither surprisingly great, nor indifferently tame. Another great charm in Miss Tree's impersonations, is their natural truth. They are in fact, for the time being, the very realities which they are intended to represent. No one can look upon Miss Tree's representations, without being struck with admiration at the perfect reliance which she seems to place upon the complete power of the natural expression of the sentiment over her audience, and at the utter contempt for every thing like clap-trap, or any one of the miserable resources of petty minds, to produce an effect upon her hearers. Her acting is in its character like an unruffled stream, beautiful in its repose; but as surely and as naturally as the same water is disturbed and agitated by the storm, so is the serenity of her feelings acted upon and ruffled by the storm of passion which descends upon it. We have seen those who upon the stage were in a constant state of ferment and agitation. Like a brawling brook, they were always fretting -making more noise than the majestic river, which, in its silent course, moves on in its resistless power. There is no such harshness in Miss Tree - no abruptness-none of that habitual starting and tragedy-trick, which so often mar the beauty of the best-drawn characters. There is more of the woman about Miss Tree-if we can be understood by this expression - than in any other actress we have ever seen; a particularly feminine grace in her character, which does not leave her, even when she appears in male attire, or in a character which is really meant to be masculine. And who is there that will not admire her the more for possessing at all times the true grace of her sex? For ourselves, we must say, that we never affected a lady in pantaloons, on or off the stage literally or morally — until Ellen Tree, in a male character, destroyed our scruples. But with all this delicacy, let it not be understood that our actress is tame. On the contrary, we know of none whose expressions of hate, anguish, fear, despair, anger, or any of the stronger passions, are more natural, or irresistibly powerful. Leaving out altogether Lady Macbeth, and those characters of mighty compass, which none but a Siddons ever did or could represent, and we have in Miss Ellen Tree all that the most scrupu

lous can desire, to make up the composition of a great actress In short, to parodize the words and not the sense of Shakspeare: This Tree hath robbed many trees of their several additions. She is graceful as the poplar, majestic as the oak, malancholy as the willow, profuse in beauty as the magnolia, tender as the orange, delicate yet enduring as the locust. Like the cedar of Lebanon, an evergreen, redolent of sweets, whose sacred oil, when used to preserve from decay the books of the fathers was but a type of that intellectual essence, wherewith she embalms the thoughts and inspirations of genius in our memories for ever.'

C.

EDITORS' DRAWER.We resume, and conclude for the present, our examination of the brief articles appropriate to this department. Similar papers, now in hand, will be discussed in a future number.

THE following reply to the queries of 'D.,' in the Knickerbocker for December, is timely, and, as it seems to us, well reasoned and conclusive:

To the Editors of the Knickerbocker:

GENTLEMEN: A sensible correspondent of yours, over the signature of 'D.,' proposes an attempt at an exposition of the following passage of Locke's Essay; and as I deem that quotation one of the finest specimens of writing in that great work of genius, I hasten to furnish him with my interpretation of it. Locke says:

'Reason is natural revelation, whereby the eternal Father of light and fountain of all knowledge communicates to maukind that portion of Truth which he has laid within the reach of their natural faculties. Revelation is natural reason, enlarged by a new set of discoveries, communicated by God immediately, which reason vouches the truth of by the testimony and proofs it gives that they come from God. So that he who takes away reason to make way for revelation, puts out the light of both, and does much the same, as if he would persuade a man to put out his eyes, the better to receive the remote light of an invisible star by a telescope.'

Su

This statement contains a just and profound view of the object of a revelation from heaven, and of the office to be performed by reason in the examination of its credentials. The obscurity in the language of Locke, to which your correspondent refers, arises out of the difference between the ordinary meaning of the term revelation, and that technical import which is given it in theological treatises. Revelation is either natural or supernatural. In the first sense we use this word when we say, that as soon as day-light appeared, our dangerous condition was clearly revealed to us, or such a person revealed all the facts which were confided to him, under an injunction of secrecy. pernatural revelation, implies a miraculous communication of truth to mankind, by immediate inspiration of God. In the first of these meanings, therefore, reason is very aptly said by Locke, to be natural revelation, since all the truths at which we arrive through its instrumentality, must come to us mediately, though not immediately, from the great Father of light and fountain of all wisdom. May not the magnificent scene presented to us in the external world, be said to be revealed to us by God, through the action of the eye, or external organs of vision? So reason may be regarded as the internal organ of vision, or mental eye, which discloses to us the impalpable world of truth and knowledge.

Again: Revelation is natural reason enlarged by a new set of discoveries communicated by God immediately, which reason vouches the truth of by the testimony and proofs it gives that they come from God. That is, revelation in its technical import, is an enlargement of the knowledge of mankind by a new set of discoveries communicated immediately or supernaturally by God. And as we say, that a man may have a narrow or enlarged reason or understanding, according to his degree of information, so by these communications from heaven, and under this supernatural dispensation, the reason or knowledge of mankind may be said to be enlarged by a new set of discoveries. Or what is equivalent to this statement, a state of revelation, as contradistinguished from a mere state of natural reason, is that in which the reason or knowledge subsisting in the world is enlarged by revelations from heaven. Locke means to affirm, that all the truths to which the human mind can attain by the exercise of its native faculties, may be regarded as a kind of natural revelation, made to us by the Fountain of all wisdom, inasmuch as he bestows the powers which enable us to attain them, but where our knowledge ceases, or when we arrive at the boundaries which are prescribed to our researches, there revelation approaches, and opens new fields of knowledge.

But farther: When revelations to us are announced, upon what grounds are we to receive them as genuine communications from heaven? It would not do to give credit to every person making pretensions to divine illumination, or we might have become the dupes of every impostor, from Simon Magus to the infamous Matthias. How, then, are we to guard against endless impositions, unless revelations be considered as appeals to our reason and understandings, which, in the language of Locke, are to become vouchers for their truth from the testimony and proofs which are given that they come from God? If reason is not made the umpire which is to decide the authenticity of a revelation, we should open a door to the wildest enthusiasm, and most atrocious impostures. It does not follow, however, from this appeal to reason, that she must necessarily abuse her powers. It will be her province to discriminate the cases, in which the truths revealed are within or above her comprehension, from their very nature, and yet sustained by adequate proof, from those which are to be repudiated, as contradictory to her clearest dictates.

From this explanation, I think, we cannot fail to perceive the force and beauty of Locke's conclusion, so that he who takes away reason to make way for revelation, puts out the light of both, and does much the same as if he would persuade a man to put out his eyes, the better to receive the remote light of an invisible star by a telescope.' Could a more apt and beautiful illustration be invented by human genius? I recommend it to the especial consideration of all those divines in our country, who seem to imagine that they are exalting the honors of revelation, when they are disparaging the pretensions of human reason, and making it as blind as a bat in matters of religion, when in the investigations of science, it can weigh the mountains in scales, and the hills in a balance, subject the laws of nature to its dominion, and even scan the heavens. Right reason will always be the hand-maid to true religion, and the enlightened clergyman will never entertain any apprehensions about the progress of sound science. If the Bible be the word of God, it can never be found in contrariety to the volume of his works. Originating in the same unerring wisdom, they must be found in harmony, if rightly interpreted. He who would destroy reason, therefore, to make way for revelation, puts out the light of both, because reason is the inward eye, which not only discerns all natural and moral truth, but is the only organ that enables us to perceive those remote truths which are disclosed to it by the light of revelation. Revelation may become to it the telescope, by whose aid only it can bring those truths, like invisible stars, within its sphere of vision; but it can no more supersede its functions in the apprehension of those truths, than the use of that optical instrument can preclude the necessity of the natural organ, in the observation of the heavenly bodies. The aptitude and beauty of this illustration may be still farther exhibited, by extending the points of analogy. Suppose the remote star which we desire to descry, to represent a future state of existence after death. Revelation may be symbolized by the telescope, which enables us to discern it. Now, as, after we have obtained a distinct view of the heavenly orb, through our optical glasses, it would be very unreasonable to deny its existence because it could not be discerned by the naked eye, or because its properties, as disclosed to us, are incompatible with those conceptions which we have previously formed of those planets, that come within the reach of more minute scrutiny, so also, it is equally irrational, to repudiate the doctrine of the soul's immortality, when clearly revealed, because we can attain but indistinct and inadequate ideas of the mode of its existence, and the offices it will perform in that future condition. It is enough that we can discern the remote star, through the aid of the telescope, to induce us to believe in the certainty of its existence in the regions of space. It is enough to convince us of the soul's immortality, that it is clearly disclosed to us in an authentic revelation.

Nor, finally, does this view of the subject supersede the exercise of Christian faith It only strips it of the characteristics of a blind credulity, and communicates to it the properties of a rational belief. Christian faith is a lively and operative conviction of the truths of Christianity; and surely this is a plant which will as readily spring up, grow, and flourish in the soil of reason, and, I will say, too, of sound science, as in the rank and uncultured ground of ignorance and superstition. Nay, it becomes a more wholesome and productive tree, in proportion as the mould from which it grows is better formed by nature, and cultured by art and learning.

F. B.

JUNIUS, JR.,' in a private note, 'is of opinion that, by giving place to a communication of the Rev. FREDERICK BEASLEY, to which Junius, Jr. replied, and by also giving the reverend gentleman the last opportunity that is, the opening and closing speechthe editors have dealt unfairly by the parties. If they also think so,' he adds, 'they will please give place to a reply to the article in question, contained in the November number of the Knickerbocker.' The request is but a just one, and we cheerfully comply with the wishes of our correspondent. Since, however, the matter now stands precisely

as we supposed it to remain when we expressed a similar decision, on a former occasion, we would repeat that, so far as this Magazine is concerned, the further discussion of this subject in its pages must be considered as at an end.

DEAR SIR: I have no wish to knock down your argument, and place mine on its top, by my superior skill.' I merely wish to clear away the rubbish of error, being satisfied that truth will, in all such cases, be found on the top. I have, therefore, expressed freely my sense of the question at issue, and shall be equally rejoiced, which ever side may prevail, so that TRUTH be triumphant.

The nature of your argument against Hume, I think I fully comprehend. It is built on an attempt to show, that as human testimony in some cases amounts to certainty, it therefore does not always rest on a variable experience.' This appears to me to be a contradiction in terms. The very circumstance of its being sometimes true, and sometimes false, constitutes its variableness. So far as I have learned, it always has been variable: I know that this is the character of testimony in the present day, and until it becomes uniformly true, or uniformly false, it will always continue to be variable. Not so with our experience of the laws or modes of nature: these are uniform, constantly pursuing the same course of causes and effects.

It appears, therefore, that your attempt to prove that testimony is sometimes uniformly true, is a kind of special pleading entirely one side from Mr. Hume's argument.

If, as you observe, miracles are the only evidence which should produce conviction of supernatural communications, or are the only authentic credentials of a divine mission, (and it appears to me to be quite reasonable that it should require the exhibition of a miracle to produce belief in so strange an event,) then it follows that we have no means in our reach to produce such conviction, for we are entirely without miracles, and are under the necessity of being satisfied with human testimony.

Let me put this in a more condensed position. You say: By miracles alone can any one who makes pretensions to supernatural communication expect to produce conviction in the minds of others.' But we are without miracles, therefore those making such pretensions ought not to expect to produce conviction.

Again: Miracles are the only authentic credentials of a divine mission.' But those pretending to such mission have shown us no miracles, therefore their credentials are wanting.

You put into the mouth of your opponents such a syllogism as this: 'Testimony is sometimes doubtful and deceptive: that which is sometimes deceptive must always be so; therefore testimony is always deceptive.' It will not be necessary to call in the wisdom of Solomon, or the strength of Sampson, to knock down this argument of straw. It will only be necessary to repeat the idea of Hume; that testimony is sometimes doubtful and deceptive; it cannot therefore furnish as strong proof as the laws of nature, which experience has proved to be uniform.

Allow me to quote another of your arguments, in which you appear to reason on the right side. It is clear that in regard to the constitution and laws of nature, we can neither attain to intuitive or demonstrative certainty. If we could do this, the affair would be summarily settled, and no room left for doubt. We should then be as sure that a dead man could or could not be raised, as that the three angles of a triangle are equal to two right angles.' Are then the alleged miracles, events conformable to the constitution and laws of nature,' but of which we are uncertain? If so, they are not miracles. Hume defines a miracle to be a violation of the laws of nature.' Gleig, Buck, Brown, and others, as well as yourself, define it in the same manner. It appears, from your reasoning alone, that the constitution and laws of nature are so certain, that if we were sufficiently acquainted with them, we could depend on their operations with the same certainty that the three angles, etc. But a miracle is an alleged violation or inversion of the laws and constitution of nature, therefore it is as certain that a miracle never occurred as that the three angles of a triangle are equal to two right angles.'

The earthquake at Lisbon was an unusual, though a natural event: it gives therefore no suspicion of the certainty of the operation of the constitution and laws of nature,' and can furnish no argument in favor of miracles, which are events contrary to nature.

You have again instanced courts of justice, but as you still omit to name a trial in which a miracle would be involved, allow me to suppose a case which a uniform experience of the laws of nature would render obvious. Would a jury render a verdict for damages, however strong the testimony, if an action was brought to recover the value of a horse and cart, upon the ground that the trespasser had swallowed them? You may perhaps think that I am disposed to treat the subject with levity. It is not so. I have sought in vain for an instance which should be at once obvious and serious. I am persuaded that the air of comic absurdity belongs to the nature of the proposition. Indeed I have very little doubt, that if you would endeavor to rid yourself of your preconceived opinions, and would look at miracles, with the evidence only by which they are backed and opposed, free from the prejudice of education, and the influence of popular belief, even you would soon begin to smile at your own credulity.

Your long and eloquent pleading to bolster up testimony, and to render experience of