man, who was slowly leading away a blind and aged woman from the royal presence. The youth, as he withdrew, cast ever and anon a sad and appealing look at the judgment-seat of the Caliph, while at the same time attending and supporting his aged burden with a most assiduous care.-As filial tenderness and veneration for the aged are among the highest virtues of the Koran, so winning an instance of both could not but excite the interest of the good Giafer; and he straightway pointed out this retiring pair to the Commander of the Faithful. The Caliph spoke, and an officer instantly led them back to the foot of the Divan.

"Thy name, young man," said the benignant monarch, looking kindly on the trembling youth, who, prostrating himself till he kissed the sacred carpet, thus replied:

Oh, great King, live for ever. Thou seest before thee the meanest of thy slaves; Allah be praised! It is Omri, the son of Zadoc, the son of Omri the poet, who now breathes the same air with the vicegerent of the Prophet upon earth.”

"And this aged woman?"

"She, oh light of the earth-she who should be willing to die now that she has once heard the voice of the King, though his face she cannot see-she is the mother of Zadok, the grandmother of Omri, who now stands before thee."

The wife and grandson of Omri the poet, reduced to such wretchedness! Giafer!"the Caliph looked more sternly than was his wont at that favourite minister-"how can such things be in my dominions?"

The Vizier prostrated himself before the throne, and would have replied, but the Caliph, motioning him to rise before Giafer began to speak, told the young man to go on and tell his story.

Premising his speech, then, with all those worshipful and dulcet terms which were alike becoming in a good Mussulman and the descendant of Omri, 'the rose-breathed,' as he was called from the sweetness of his strains, the namesake of the poet thus pursued his tale:-

"Those poems, oh King, which, as none better than thou knowest, have filled all the world with fragrancy and delight, were the only dower and heritage which the blessed Omri left to Selika, his wife, and her son Zadok! and yet not poor was their estate, as all men know who have smelt the incense that once burned nightly in the palace of Zadok here in Bagdad. People from all parts of the earth thronged to this great city to buy poems of Omri from Zadok, until the banks of the Tigris were black with the concourse of strangers. Zadok and his mother, in the mean time, kept scribes-a multitude as great in number as the sands of Arabia to make copies of these poems, which all

good Mussulmen bought from him only, because the Cadi would not certify that any others were genuine save those written out under the immediate eye of the son of Omri. Now it chanced that Zadok, who saw no end to such a source of exceeding riches, and who always spent all his income-one half in contributing to the splendid hospitality of this great capital, and one half in doing good to the poor-it chanced, I say, that Zadok died one day, and left me, his son, and this aged woman, his mother, this same estate of Omri's poems.

"But-Allah forgive me-what ashes had we eaten that so much gold should turn to dust in our hands? It so happened, oh, sire, in Bagdad there was a man, one Faustiz by name, a cunning worker in metals, who contrived a machine for copying manuscripts so correctly that not one word should be amiss, and at the same time so rapidly that he could make ten thousand copies while a common scribe could make one; and straightway this Faustiz commenced the making of books and selling them to the faithful. At first he used his machine only to make copies of such poems, tales, and histories as were composed by himself or his friends, who wrote them for his special use. But soon, oh! just King, he began to lay hands on the property of others. Men found that all the copies of each book he sold were so much alike and so true to each other that they needed no longer the word of the writer or his representative, or the certificate of the Cadi, to prove each manuscript to be a genuine copy of the original; and knowing this, began to deal with the works of Omri, as if they were not the property of others. He could make the copies faster and more cheaply than we did, and he showered them over the land so profusely that there was no call for ours. The estate which Omri had in those poems, built up with so many years of preparatory study -so many of subsequent toil-the property so slowly amassed-with such honest and harmless industry-with such silent yet indefatigable pains-the property which he had bequeathed to his descendants to support his honoured name in respectability-this all melted from our possession and passed into the hands of others without any fault of our own. We become stricken in poverty and a reproach among men.

"Whose dog is that?' said the faithful, as I passed them by. Behold the beggared wife of poor Omri the poet,' said they, pointing to my grandmother. Words are not things, how could they expect to hold an exclusive property in mere words, which belong alike to all men.' Faustiz is a great benefactor to the faithful, he scattereth the good things abroad which these foolish people would ministrate for their own exclusive use.' And with a thousand such like taunts,

oh! great King, did men assail us as we begged for alms along the streets."

The descendant of the great poet paused, as if much affected. Taliph stroked his head and looked at Giafer, and Giafer shook his head with that solemn air which-even before the time of Lord Burleigh meant so much among counsellors of state. The poor pc titioner gathered fresh confidence from these important signs, and resumed with spirit -"The grandson of Omri would know of the commander of the faithful if Faustiz, the worker in metals, and other men who now use his cunning machine, should have the right of using it to make copies of books which cannot belong to them, seeing that they neither wrote these books themselves nor did they pay others to write them, nor were these books given or bequeathed to them in any way whatsoever. Their copying machine is doubtless of great use and benefit to the world in general, and its invention must contribute to the glories of the great king's reign. But even if uncommon privileges should be accorded to Faustiz the inventor, even if his high merit cannot be fully rewarded without trespassing in some way upon the conflicting rights of others, is there any reason why every common man who uses this machine should enjoy equal privileges? The writer who published his books by the old mode of copying could always preserve some control over his property-is this new machine, whose beneficial use to the world depends wholly upon the writers who supply it with original works, is it to take the life. blood from those to whom it owes its vitality? If its very origin is thus coupled with injustice, what must its influence be in those ages when the great Haroun no longer lives to hold the people of the earth in his guiding hand.

"The scholar, whose early years are now spent in toilsome study, retreating often like some holy Dervish to his cell, the man of genius who, already skilled in letters, passes his best hours in converse with our most learned Mufti; the poet who traverses strange and wonderful lands and closely studies man in all-those who now make truth and nature their guide in preparing works which must benefit humanity, and last through all time-those, who now, when once enrolled among our Arabian sages, have wealth and honours showered upon them, which lift their souls above the mean and petty struggles of the crowd-these, if they would still pursue their profession, and live by it, must be vastly changed in character. Many of them will be degraded to a class of intellectual mountebanks, who live upon the breath of public favour, and he who practises the maddest antics, will soonest get his remuneration from the mob. The reward of their labours has hitherto been slow in coming, but

it was permanent in proportion to the excellence of their works; henceforth the season for reaping that reward will be so brief, that they must minister instantly to some gust of popular passion, some passing taste or prejudice, in order to take advantage of it.Those who thus draw a temporary subsistence from the public, will, of course, be forgotten, though an association of meanness in connection with their pursuits will still remain in the memory of men; while those who will not thus grovel to get their bread, will be for the most part so poor, that the very name of poet' will pass into a byeword, as belonging to a helpless, shiftless, povertystricken being. But why do I speak thus to the Commander of the Faithful, who knows all things that are just and wise in the sight of Allah?" said Omri, as he concluded his long-winded address with a deep salaam before retiring back a step or two from the Divan.

"Let Faustiz, the cunning maker of this copying machine, be brought at once before me," thundered the Caliph.

"Odor of the universe-trampler on the necks of a thousand monarchs, to whom justice is as a handmaiden, and mercy ever a shadow, your highness is not pleased to remember, that by your own order I presented this same Faustiz with a thousand sequins, with which he soon afterward left your dominions to pursue his craft among some remote nations of infidels."

66

'Bring before me, then, any of my subjects who have dared to use this machine to filch from them the property of others ;" and straightway Mustapha, a rich dealer in books who had made half his fortune out of the inheritance of poor Omri, was led up before the king.

"Mustapha, the son of Serab, what dirt hast thou eaten that the property and rights of Omri should thus be appropriated by thee, without his consent?"

"Shadow of the prophet on earth," cried Mustapha, in unfeigned astonishment, "thy slave hath never meddled with the property of the meanest of thy subjects."

"The works of Omri the poet-hast thou not been one of those who have robbed this young man, his grandson, and heir of the property which he inherited in them!"'

Property! oh great king, and where in the wise laws of thy empire-(Heaven only bounds its extent)-where is it written, that man may have property in so unsubstantial a thing as a writing, which to preserve, he must either lock up or carry about with him."

perty, The Bedouin believes that no man can have an ownership save in the horses and camels, the tents, arms, and equipments he can carry about with him. Which, in natural law, hath the greater show of reason? That a man may call a part of the earth histhe earth which came from Allah and was given alike for the use of all, or that he may claim an exclusive property in the contrivances of his own mind-those workings of his intellect which are as much a part of him. self, and belong to him as naturally as does the web which the spider weaves from his own bowels, belong to the painstaking insect which wove it. All men at first inherited the earth as common property, but genius is a gift of God to individual men, and God will judge those who steal its fruits."

"Inshallah! the interpreter of the will of the Prophet, can scarce open his lips save to drop wisdom; but oh! Caliph! the Arab of the desert still dealeth with things substantial, whose possession he might defend with the strength of his arm, even as thy slave might be compelled to defend his house and merchandize against these same wild Bedouins, if he were not so fortunate as to live under the shadowing wings of thy power. Allah grant that it may never diminish."

"Thou defend!" echoed Haroun, with a smile of mingled merriment and contempt, as he glanced his eye over the feeble frame of Mustapha; "Thou defend! why, thou paltry slave, knowest thou not that it is the law the power of the law alone-which keeps the body and soul of such things as thou art, together. It is the law alone which guards thee and thousands like thee, in their honest possessions; and as for thy dishonest ones, if I mistake not, it is only the law which could keep this sturdy youngling from wresting them from thee, or visiting upon thy wretched carcass the injury he has received at thy hands. Answer me thou, Giafer, is it just that the mantle of the law, which so comfortably covers this merchant of books, should afford no corner for this orphan youth to creep under? Should not those who minister to the mental wants of my people be as much fostered and protected as those who supply their physical necessities? Shall we give them the lot of the Ishmaelite, and thus teach them to prey upon the society which will not protect them?"

"But this youth, oh King," doubtingly interposed the trembling Mustapha, "he did not thus minister to the wants of thy people, he had no share in producing the poems of the great Omri, which he claims as his exclusive property!"

Hearken, son of Serah," said the Caliph, "how gottest thou the means by which thon wast enabled to purchase one of these machines from Faustiz, and furnish thy ware

houses, which men say are richly filled with merchandise?"

"The grandsire of your slave, oh King," answered Mustapha, brightening up with an air of confidence at this question," my grandsire was butler in the household of the vizier of one of your royal predecessors. His faithful services after many years were rewarded with a sum of money and a house and garden in the neighbourhood of the city in which he spent his declining years, enjoying all the luxuries that are permitted to a good Musselman. This wealth my father inherited, and in turn the greater portion of it descended to me; and this honestly acquired heritage I have employed in trade."

"Your grandsire was doubtless a good man, and deserves his reward, Mustapha. The law is a just one which transmitted his property safely to you. Bnt, Mashalla! Giafer, call we this justice? Look ye once at those two men-that tawdry tradesman and that half-naked youth. His grandsire was a butler-a faithful, as it seems, and therefore justly rewarded one; but a man whose services to his employer-to his fellow-men, ceased and terminated for ever with his own existence. Of the other, the grandsire was a Poet-a man whose services to society in the time when he flourished were at least equal to those of the butler-but, unlike him, a man whose services to mankind did not cease and terminate with his mortal existence; for while the fire of his thoughts can animate, the music of his verses soothe-while he supplies aliment to the soul, and actually min gles his intellectual being with the mental texture of his reader, mankind are still the poet's debtors. Now, if a difference is to be made in the civil rights of these two men, which of them is it that should have the privilege of bequeathing the fruit of his labours to his children?"

"I give it against the Butler," said Giafer, and the Caliph embraced him for the righteousness of his decision.

The story goes on to say that Mustapha, who was slow in comprehending the full force of the Caliph's illustration, trembled in his shoes, lest every son-of-a-butler was about to be outlawed, and his own heritage exposed to be dealt with as freely as he had invaded that of Omri. But the magnanimous Haroun, while restoring a then esteemed class to their (anciently) legal rights, had no idea of accompanying this act by one of cruelty and opposition to others. His object was only to give his subjects, of all classes and pursuits, equal protection from the laws of the land.

The legend concludes by mentioning-and this is a fact which it may really interest the reader to know that the young Omri, restored to the possession (or what in modern times might be translated the copyright) of his father's poems, lived long in great affluence

at Bagdad; and shining forth under happier auspices, with some of his ancestral fire, wrote some of the best of those charming stories which, under the name of the Arabian Nights' Entertainments, have made all the world familiar with the name and fame of the great Caliph Haroun Alraschid.

LINES AFTER A TEMPEST.

By W. C. BRYANT.

THE day had been a day of wind and storm;
The wind was laid, the storm was overpast,
And stooping from the zenith, bright and warm,
Shone the great sun on the wide earth at last.
I stood upon the upland slope, and cast
My eye upon a broad and beauteous scene,

Where the vast plain lay girt by mountains vast,
And hills o'er hills lifted their beds of green,
With pleasant vales scooped out and villages be

tween.

The rain-drops glistened on trees around,

Whose shadows on the tall grass were not stirred, Save when a shower of diamonds to the ground Was shaken by the flight of startled bird;

For birds were warbling round, and bees were heard

About the flowers; the cheerful rivulet sung

And gossiped as he hastened ocean-ward; To the gray oak the squirrel, chiding, clung And chirping from the ground the grasshopper upsprung.

And from beneath the leaves that kept them dry
Flew many a glittering insect here and there,
And darted up and down the butterfly,

That seemed a living blossom of the air.
The flocks came scattering from the thicket, where
The violent rain had pent them; in the way

Strolled groups of damsels frolicsome and fair; The farmer swung the scythe or turned the hay, And 'twixt the heavy swaths his children were at play.

It was a scene of peace-and, like a spell,
Did that serene and golden sunlight fall
Upon the motionless wood that clothed the fell,
And precipice upspringing like a wall,
And glassy river and white waterfall,
And happy living things that trod the bright

And beauteous scene; while far beyond them all, On many a lovely valley out of sight,

Was poured from the blue heavens the same soft golden light,

"How can the red men be forgotten, while so many of our states and territories, rivers and lakes, are designated by their names?"

Ye say they all have passed away,
That noble race and brave,

That their light canoes have vanish'd
From off the crested wave;
That 'mid the forest where they roam'd
There rings no hunter's shout;
But their name is on your waters,-
Ye may may not wash it out.

Yes, where Ontario's billow
Like ocean's surge is curl'd,
Where strong Niagara's thunders wake
The echo of the world;
Where red Missouri bringeth

Rich tribute from the west,
And Rappahannock sweetly sleeps
On green Virginia's breast.

Ye say their cone-like cabins

That clustered o'er the vale,
Have disappear'd as wither'd leaves
Before the autumn gale:

But their memory liveth on your hills,
Their baptism on your shore,
Your everlasting rivers speak
Their dialect of yore.

Old Massachusetts wears it
Within her lordly crown,
And broad Ohio bears it

Amid his young renown.
Connecticut hath wreath'd it

Where her quiet foliage waves,
And bold Kentucky breath'd it hoarse
Through all her ancient caves.

Wachusett hides their lingering voice
Within his rocky heart,

And Alleghany graves its tone
Throughout his lofty chart.
Monadnock on his forehead hoar
Doth seal the sacred trust,

Your mountains build their monument,
Though ye give the winds their dust.

"I have, Mary," was the reply; "and, if you can spare an hour from your nursery, I want to talk with you about it, and learn your ojections."

"You have improved upon the usual method, Susan," said her sister, laughing: "most persons ask advice, and then follow their own inclinations; but you decide first, and then ask counsel."

"Why, to tell you the truth, Mary, though I was unwilling to mar Harriett's brilliant prospects by your old-fashioned notions, yet I really wish to hear your reasons for not approving the marriage.'

"My first objection is so self-evident, Susan, that it cannot be refuted. Harriet is a mere child."

"She is sixteen."

"And pray, what but a child is a girl of sixteen, whose time has been divided between the nursery and the school-room. She may be a good scholar, and possess great skill in music and dancing, but of the active business of life she can never have even a thought. It is nearly seventeen years since I was at that happy age; and yet I can recollect how totally unfit I must have been for any serious responsibility."

"Yet you ought to have been more womanly than most girls, educated as you were, by that most precise of all venerable spinsters, aunt Hetty."

"It is to our good aunt Hester's strict notions of womanly duties, that I owe much of my present happiness, sister Susan; but at that early age, I could have contributed but little to a husband's domestic comfort."

"Your experience is very different from mine, Mary; I can add ten years to your calendar; for alas! it is seven and twenty years since I was sixteen, but I can remenber how I longed to quit school, and have a house and servants of my own."

"Doubtless such idle wishes often crossed my brain, sister, when aunt Neppy kept me home, hour after hour, stitching wristbands, or sent me into the kitchen to learn how to cook a dinner, but I repeat, that to the re strictions I then thought severe, I owe many of my present enjoyments."

"But the minds of some develope much more rapidly, perhaps; Harriet has long been at the head of her school."

"I thought you intended to leave her with Mrs. Bartley another year."

"So I did; she had only visited home for the Christmas holidays; and, to tell you the truth, her trunk was packed to return to school, the very evening Edward Tracy made proposals to her father."

And Edward Tracy's proposals at once completed her education, I suppose," said Mrs. Hilton. "Well, sister, I hope it is all for the best; but I am no friend to such early marriages."

"I was married at eighteen, Mary, and have never repented it, while you-"

"I know what you would say, Susan; you mean that you at eighteen married a rich merchant, and have lived like a princess ever since; while I waited till twenty-three, only to wed a professional man, whose talents procure him a simple competence. Nay, you need not disclaim my version of your thoughts; we are each happy in our own way. The eclat of fashionable life, the ambition of giving the best dinners, and the most brilliant parties; the triumph of possessing the most stately house, and the richest French furniture, is, too, a sufficient recompense for the vexations atttendant on such a life; while I would not exchange for all your splendour the quiet, the retirement, the domestic comfort of my humble home."

"Well, you certainly seem very contented, Mary, and yet I wonder how you can reconcile yourself to sueh a life; your house is a mere bandbox."

"It is large enough to contain all my real friends, and I never give parties."

"Your furniture is very plain." "It is substantial, and as good as our father's house ever boasted."

True, but in our father's time there was no better in use; now every merchant's wife tries to display Brussels carpets and French chairs."

"I am quite content to avoid all such competition, whether with the wives of merchants or mechanics; it gives me no pain to return to my simple apartments, after spending a day in your luxurious ones."

But you have so few servants."

"I have an excellent cook who does not disdain to assist in the general work of the house; a faithful old nurse to take charge of my children, and my good little Kitty, the orphan whom I took into my family when I was just married. These women are all attached to me by ties of kindness and goodwill, so that my wishes are laws to them. It is true, I have no French cuisinier, to make my kitchen look like the caboose of a steamboat; I have no whiskered lackey to put my friends out of countenance by his impertinence to the nobodys:' no Swiss governness to teach my children bad French and worse principles; but I have a quiet, wellordered household, and to our old aunt's notions, I owe the power of obtaining such a desirable acquisition.'

"You are quite eloquent, Mary; but I believe you are more than half right. Your house always looks comfortable; your children are well-trained, and your little dinnerparties are unexceptionable; but how you manage to do all this, I cannot conceive. You would be surprised if I were to tell you the trouble I have with my eight servants. My fat old cook divides his time between ex