for? 
  In these woods, thy small Labrador,
  At this pinch, wee San Salvador! 
  What fire burns in that little chest,
  So frolic, stout, and self-possest? 
  Didst steal the glow that lights the West? 
  Henceforth I wear no stripe but thine: 
  Ashes and black all hues outshine. 
  Why are not diamonds black and gray,
  To ape thy dare-devil array? 
  And I affirm the spacious North
  Exists to draw thy virtue forth. 
  I think no virtue goes with size: 
  The reason of all cowardice
  Is, that men are overgrown,
  And, to be valiant, must come down
  To the titmouse dimension.”

  ’Tis good-will makes intelligence,
  And I began to catch the sense
  Of my bird’s song:  “Live out of doors,
  In the great woods, and prairie floors. 
  I dine in the sun; when he sinks in the sea,
  I, too, have a hole in a hollow tree. 
  And I like less when summer beats
  With stifling beams on these retreats
  Than noontide twilights which snow makes
  With tempest of the blinding flakes: 
  For well the soul, if stout within,
  Can arm impregnably the skin;
  And polar frost my frame defied,
  Made of the air that blows outside.”

  With glad remembrance of my debt,
  I homeward turn.  Farewell, my pet! 
  When here again thy pilgrim comes,
  He shall bring store of seeds and crumbs. 
  Henceforth I prize thy wiry chant
  O’er all that mass and minster vaunt: 
  For men mishear thy call in spring,
  As ’twould accost some frivolous wing,
  Crying out of the hazel copse, “Phe—­be!”
  And in winter, “Chic-a-dee-dee!”
  I think old Caesar must have heard
  In Northern Gaul my dauntless bird,
  And, echoed in some frosty wold,
  Borrowed thy battle-numbers bold. 
  And I shall write our annals new,

And thank thee for a better clew:  I, who dreamed not, when I came here, To find the antidote of fear, Now hear thee say in Roman key, “Paean!  Ve-ni, Vi-di, Vi-ci.”

* * * * *

SALTPETRE AS A SOURCE OF POWER.

Every element of strength in a civilized community demands special notice.  The present material progress of nations brings us every day in contact with the application of power under various conditions, and the most thoughtless person is to some extent influenced mentally by the improvements, taking the places of older means and ways of adaptation, in the arts of life.

We travel by the aid of steam-power, and we think and speak of a locomotive or a steamboat as we once thought and spoke of a horse or a man; and no little feeling of self-sufficiency is engendered by the conclusion that this new source of power has been brought under control and put to work in our day.

It is also true that we do not always entertain the most correct view of what we term the new power of locomotive and steamboat; and as it may aid us in some further steps connected with the subject of my remarks, a familiar object, such as a steamboat, may be taken as illustrative of the application of power, and we may thus obtain some simple ideas of what power truly is, in Nature.