ntinental
expeditions fitted out for the purpose of restoring the Stuarts to the
British throne were more than once ruined by the occurrence of tempests;
that the defeat of our army at Germantown was in part due to the
existence of a fog; that a severe storm prevented General Howe from
assailing the American position on Dorchester Heights, and so enabled
Washington to make that position too strong to be attacked with hope
of success, whereby Boston was freed from the enemy's presence; that a
heavy fall of rain, by rendering the River Catawba unfordable, put
a stop, for a few days, to those movements by which Lord Cornwallis
intended to destroy the army of General Morgan, and obtain compensation
for Tarleton's defeat at the Cowpens; that an autumnal tempest compelled
the same British commander to abandon a project of retreat from
Yorktown, which good military critics have thought well conceived, and
promising success; that the severity of the winter of 1813 interfered
effectively with the measures which Napoleon had formed with the view of
restoring his affairs, so sadly compromised by his failure in Russia;
that the "misty, chilly, and insalubrious" weather of Louisiana, and its
mud, had a marked effect on Sir Edward Pakenham's army, and helped us to
victory over one of the finest forces ever sent by Europe to the West;
that in 1828 the Russians lost myriads of men and horses, in the
Danubian country and its vicinity, through heavy rains and hard frosts;
that the November hurricane of 1854 all but paralyzed the allied forces
in the Crimea;--and many similar things that establish the helplessness
of men in arms when the weather is adverse to them. But enough has been
said to convince even the most skeptical that our Potomac Army did not
stand alone in being forced to stand still before the dictation of the
elements. Our armies, indeed, have suffered less from the weather than
it might reasonably have been expected they would suffer, having simply
been delayed at some points by the occurrence of winds and thaws; and
over all such obstacles they are destined ultimately to triumph, as
the Union itself will bid defiance to what Bacon calls "the waves and
weathers of time."

* * * * *

LINES

WRITTEN UNDER A PORTRAIT OF THEODORE WINTHROP.

O Knightly soldier bravely dead!
O poet-soul too early sped!
O life so pure! O life so brief!
Our hearts are moved with deeper grief,
As, d