hours per day, for enough merely to keep him from starvation; and if the corn laws were repealed, so as to let in bread-stuff's cheap, the price of labor would fall of course toward the standard in the agricultural districts. Why then have prices been so high in this country, if not the result of our paper currency? Because, with us labor is scarce, and, in consequence of our fertile soil, exceedingly productive. The sun rises not, the dews of heaven do not fall, on so vast an extent of fertile land as ours-and as yet population is not dense; but if we had about two hundred persons to the square mile, on a sterile soil like Europe, with such enormous public debts and taxation, and such local and partial legislation as there prevail, no paper currency could sustain the wages of labor beyond the mere sustenance of the operative. And to reduce him to such a condition, no policy is better adapted than what is now contended for by the Whigs, comprehending a tariff, internal improvement, bank and land bill-all well adapted to the transfer of the labor and property of the people at large to the business and pockets of a few sections and classes.

The objections, that the sub-treasury provides one currency for the government, and another and a worse one for the people-and that it is designed for a government bank of issue'-are unworthy of notice, even though uttered by such men as Mr. Rives and Mr. Clay. This, however, is a new and prominent development of the Whig party. Before Harrison was nominated, all distinctions of class were politically unmentionable. From the courtly Intelligencer' down to the least of the decency," all distinctions of class, of the rich and poor, were jacobinical, revolutionary and treasonable. Now we hear the attorney, the money-changer, the counter-hopper, shouting at the top of their lungs-"Hurrah for log cabins and hard cider !" The popular love of military glory, once denounced by Mr. Clay as so low and dangerous, is now too dignified for his party to rely on; and the emblems of poverty and privation in early settlement have become the watch-words of the aristocratic party, at the very moment they are pretending to fear, in the establishment of a metallic currency, a lapse from the present social refinement of the age. Such, however, is the characteristic perfidy of a party which forsakes its own proper leader, and renounces its own chosen name, because both have become odious by the practice of principles which they no longer dare to avow, and the oft-repeated condemnation of a great people they are now trying to deceive a party, whose hopes of success are now brightened for the moment with the prospect of using the commercial calamities of the country to mislead the understanding of the people. A party whose faith is thus based upon folly, and whose success depends on disaster, has already become an evil omen to the republic-its voice,

like that of the loon on the western waters, being loudest in seasons of storm and of gloom.

It is well. By one of those extraordinary conjunctures that supply history with epochs, the Whigs are now to make their assault upon the Democratic party, on a great test question, with all the aid of hard times and a military chieftain. Not since the conflict of '98 has the division of party and principle been more deep and vital than now on the constitutional treasury. The Whigs have likewise the talent of Clay and Webster, men worthy of the best days of Federalism. On the other hand, the Democratic party boast the calm, clear judgment, the unfaltering firmness, and the well-tried devotion of the President to democracy, through all the panics and pressures of the last twelve years. They have likewise-(to specify but two, as an off-set to those we have named on the other side)—the energetic, the indefatigable, the unswerving Benton, to whom his country owes a debt of gratitude, exceeded by the long and faithful merits of no living statesman-and the profound and brilliant Calhoun, who, in advancing po. litical philosophy beyond his contemporaries, has exalted our conception of human reason itself, the faculty by which he triumphs. We have also yet the cheering voice of Jackson himself that voice which has always been, in the civil as well as military conflicts of his country, the harbinger of victory. Let then the ballot-box be once more invoked, and its next response, we trust, will consign Federalism to long years of exile from the favor and the councils of the Republic.

THE DEATH OF HERNANDO DE SOTO.

"Thus perished De Soto. His soldiers pronounced his eulogy by grieving for his loss. The priests chaunted over his corse the first requiem ever heard on the waters of the Mississippi. To conceal his death, his body was wrapped in a mantle, and in the stillness of midnight silently sunk in the middle of the stream. The discoverer of the Mississippi slept beneath its waters. He had crossed a large part of the continent in search of gold, and found nothing so remarkable as his burial place."-Bancroft's United States.

The day-dawn in a wilderness!

It is a blessed sight

To weary wanderers who have heard

Dread noises through the night.

The ceaseless howl of hungry wolves,
And known they were so near,
That as they fed the waning fires,
Their hearts were chilled with fear.

And all uncheered by jocund morn,
Haggard and hollow-eyed,

Awoke De Soto's weary band

By Mississippi's tide.

From sleep which was not rest, they rose

From earth beds dank and cold;

Their painful looks of blasted hopes

The mournful tidings told.

They gazed upon the mighty stream,

In grandeur flowing by ;

They watched the rising sun's first gleam
Shoot up into the sky.

The stream was calm, the sky was clear,
And dread and dark around,

Pathless, impenetrable shade,

The unknown forest frowned.

Where, where the golden sands? oh, where The rich spontaneous ore,

They fondly dream'd these dreadful wilds

In such profusion bore?

Delusion, worse than madness all!

But now it had gone by,

And they had found each hope nought else

But very mockery.

Men of the proud Castilian race

Shed tears like summer rain,

Thinking of each familiar face
They ne'er might see again.

In feverish dreams Spain's olive bowers
Had danced before their eyes,

And vine-leaf wreaths and orange flowers
Would in their visions rise.

Though light with sunshine merrily
The waves dashed on the shore,
And there were ever glancing by

Birds that strange plumage wore ;

And unfamiliar sounds of life
Came from the forest wild,
Scarce heeding them, De Soto lay,
As helpless as a child.

A priest without his holy guise
Said holy words to him,

And prayed that he in strength might rise-
Yet still his eye grew dim;

And on his brow the dews of death

Were gathering thick and fast,

And with the morning's misty wreath,

Away his spirit passed.

'Twas midnight in the wilderness,

Up rose the gentle moon,

With stars in purest loveliness
Heaven's floor was thickly strewn ;

And 'neath their light, like silver bright,

The river still flowed on;

But one saw not that beauteous night,

His Exodus vas done.

Wrapped in a cloak, no shroud had he,
His corse sad mourners bore

To a light bark, which noiselessly
Lay trembling by the shore;

To where, with deep and fearful sweep,
The current swiftest flowed;

A rapid stroke the waters broke,
As that strange hearse they rowed.

A moment's pause—a hurried plash
Came on the waters wide,-

It might have been the sturgeon's dash,
Up-springing from the tide;

Then like an arrow shot the bark

Back o'er the silent wave—

The river's bed, far down and dark,

Was proud De Soto's grave.

Oswego, N. Y.

J. B. P..

Right are the Thracians, when they sadly mourn

The infant, on the morning of its birth ;

Right, also, when they joy that death has torn—
Death, the fate's minion- -some one from the earth.

Why not? The cup of life is full of sadness ;
Death is the healing draught for all its madness.

L