y, albeit somewhat of a long one. If an author
can be accounted a fair judge of his own writings, this is my best
effort in the imaginative line; and as it is no new brain-child (we
always love the last baby best), but was written little short of fifty
years ago, the impartial opinion of an old judge is probably a correct
one. The sun-dial is still in my garden,--and as I stood by it half a
century since, there grew up to my mind's eye this Vision:--

"I was walking in my garden at noon: and I came to the sun-dial, where,
shutting my book, I leaned upon the pedestal, musing; so the thin shadow
pointed to twelve.

"Of a sudden, I felt a warm sweet breath upon my cheek, and, starting
up, in much wonder beheld a face of the most bewitching beauty close
beside me, gazing on the dial: it was only a face; and with earnest
fear I leaned, steadfastly watching its strange loveliness. Soon, it
looked into me with its fascinating eyes, and said mournfully, 'Dost
thou not know me?'--but I was speechless with astonishment: then it
said, 'Consider:'--with that, my mind rushed into me like a flood, and I
looked, and considered, and speedily vague outlines shaped about,
mingled with floating gossamers of colour, until I was aware that a
glorious living Creature was growing to my knowledge.

"So I looked resolutely on her (for she wore the garb of woman), gazing
still as she grew: and again she said mildly, 'Consider:'--then I noted
that from her jewelled girdle upwards, all was gorgeous, glistening, and
most beautiful; her white vest was rarely worked with living flowers,
but brighter and sweeter than those of earth; flowing tresses, blacker
than the shadows cast by the bursting of a meteor, and, like them,
brilliantly interwoven with strings of light, fell in clusters on her
fair bosom; her lips were curled with the expression of majestic
triumph, yet wreathed winningly with flickering smiles; and the lustre
of her terrible eyes, like suns flashing darkness, did bewilder me and
blind my reason:--Then I veiled mine eyes with my clasped hands; but
again she said, 'Consider:'--and bending all my mind to the hazard, I
encountered with calmness their steady radiance, although they burned
into my brain. Bound about her sable locks was as it were a chaplet of
fire; her right hand held a double-edged sword of most strange
workmanship, for the one edge was of keen steel, and the other as it
were the strip of a peacock's feather; on the fac