y Pine--
The everliving--evergreen;
That boldly cleaves the broad sunshine,
Towering high with scornful mien;
And smileth not in summer's gladness,
And sigheth not 'mid winter's sadness;
Shedding no tear
O'er the dying year,
But groweth still bright,
And touched by no sorrow,
For he feareth no night,
And hopeth no morrow.

The proud--the cold--the mountain Pine,
The tempest driven--tempest torn--
That grandly o'er the wildwood line
The forest banner long has borne;
And he waileth never the waning flower,
For he knows no death but the storm-cloud's power.
Could he have grief
For a passing leaf?
So strong in his might,
Touched by no sorrow,
Fearing no night
And hoping no morrow.

_By the Rappahannock_,
August 7, 1868.

A DAY AMONG THE MOUNTAINS.

It was one of those hot days in summer, when life is rather emotional
than operative, and will lies locked in the ecstasy of sense. For a week
the heat had been incessant, and now at early morning the thermometer
stood at 96 in the shade. We were a party of loungers thrown together by
chance, in a small town of western Maryland, united in nothing but a
desire to escape the heat. The town lay in a little basin scooped out
among circling mountains, which were veiled in almost perpetual
vapors;--but this morning the vapors had parted, wreathing the mountains
in light, delicately tinted circles, and disclosing a clear, glowing
sky. To the east rose Table Rock, a black, frowning bowlder, resting, a
mile and a half up the mountain, on a base so narrow, it seemed a breeze
would rock it into perilous motion; while to the southwest, lay
Fairmount, serene, stately, sloping upward with a symmetry which
architecture might vainly emulate. We determined upon an excursion to
the latter, and mounted our horses for the six-and-a-half miles ride.
The road was macadamized, and worn so firm and level, it reminded me,
constantly, of the stone walks in a granite quarry. Among our party was
a young man just returned from Europe surfeited with scenery and
sight-seeing, but for the rest, we were commonplace Americans, eager to
see everything, and ready to go into ecstasies over everything which we
saw. It was in early July, and the foliage had not yet wilted from its
moist, bright greenness; the atmosphere was a wave of light, and the
earth seem