y and not
unpleasant. Nature never seems so miraculous as it does when you emerge
from this hidden realm of marvellous imitations. The "dear goddess" is
so serene in her resplendent and more harmonious beauty! The gorgeous
amphitheatre of trees, the hills, the sky, and the air, all seem to wear
a veil of transfigured glory. The traveller feels that he was never
before conscious how beautiful a phenomenon is the sunlight, how
magnificent the blue arch of heaven!

There are three guides at the service of travellers, all well versed in
the intricate paths of this nether world. Stephen, the presiding genius
of Mammoth Cave, is a mulatto, and a slave. He has lived in this strange
region from boyhood, and a large proportion of the discoveries are the
result of his courage, intelligence, and untiring zeal. His vocation has
brought him into contact with many intellectual and scientific men, and
a prodigious memory, he has profited much by intercourse with superior
minds. He can recollect every body that ever visited the cave, and all
the terms of geology and mineralogy are at his tongue's end. He is
extremely attentive, and peculiarly polite to ladies. Like most of his
race, he is fond of grandiloquent language, and his rapturous
expressions, as he lights up some fine point of view, are at times fine
specimens of glorification. His knowledge of the place is ample and
accurate, and he is altogether an extremely useful and agreeable guide.

FOOTNOTES:

[B] See engraving of this hotel in the _International_ for August, 1851.

THE POEM OF THE MONTH.

The finest new poem that has fallen under our notice is the following,
from _Graham's Magazine_ for the present month. We think few who have
read Miss Carey's recent poems entitled _Lyra_, _Jessie Carol_,
_October_, and _The Winds_, with her prose volume just published by
Redfield, will be disposed to question, that in the brief period in
which she has been before the public she has entitled herself to the
highest rank among the living literary women of the United States.

WINTER, BY ALICE CAREY.

Now sits the twilight palaced in the snow,
Hugging away beneath a fleece of gold
Her statue beauties, dumb and icy cold,
And fixing her blue steadfast eyes below,
Where in a bed of chilly waves afar,
With dismal shadows o'er her sweet face blown,
Tended to death by eve's delicious star,
Lies the lost day alone.

Where late, wit