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Show 1836- 1837] Fogg's Far West 219 xvm " What earthly feeHng unabash'd can dwell In Nature's mighty presence? mid the swell Of everlasting hills, the roar of floods, And frown of rocks and pomp of waving woods? These their own grandeur on the soul impress, And bid each passion feel its nothingness." HXIIANS. La grace est toujours unie a la magnificence, dans les scenes de la nature."- CHATEAUBRIAND'S " Atala." IT was morning. The storm had passed away, and the early sunlight was streaming gloriously over the fresh landscape. The atmosphere, discharged of its electric burden, was playing cool and free among the grass- tops; the lark was carolling in the clouds above its grassy nest; the deer was rising from his sprinkled lair, and the morning mists were rolling heavily in masses along the skirts of the prairie woodlands, as I mounted my horse at the door of the cabin beneath whose roof I had passed the night. Before me at no great distance, upon the edge of the plain, rose an open park of lofty oaks, with a mossy turf beneath; and the whole scene, lighted up by the sunbeams breaking through the ragged mists, presented a most gorgeous spectacle. The entire wilderness of green; every bough, spray, leaf; every blade of grass, wild weed, and floweret, was hung with trembling [ 200] drops of liquid light, which, reflecting and refracting the sun- rays, threw back all the hues of the iris. It was indeed a morning of beauty after the tempest; and Nature seemed to have arrayed herself in her bridal robes, glittering in all their own matchless jewellery to greet its coming. Constituted as we all naturally are, there exist, bound up within the secresies of the bosom, certain emotions and sentiments, designed by our Creator to leap forth in joyous- |