To interrupt another, even in common conversation, is reckoned highly indecent. How different this is from the conduct of many deliberative assemblies among people called civilized and polite, where scarce a day passes without some confusion, that makes the speaker hoarse in calling to order; and how different from the mode of conversation in many polite companies with which we are acquainted, where, if you do not deliver your sentence with great rapidity, you are cut off in the middle of it by the impatient loquacity of those you converse with, and never suffered to finish it!

The politeness of these savages in conversation, is indeed, carried to excess; since it does not permit them to contradict or deny the truth of what is assert

ed in their presence. By this means they indeed avoid disputes; but then it becomes difficult to know their minds, or what impression you make upon them. When any of them come into our towns, our people are apt to crowd round them, gaze upon them, and incommode them where they desire to be private; this they esteem great rudeness, and the effect of the want of instruction in the rules of civility and good manners. "We have," say they, as much curiosity as you, and when you come into our towns, we wish for opportunities of looking at you; but for this purpose we hide ourselves behind bushes where you are to pass, and never intrude ourselves into your company.

Their manner of entering one another's villages has likewise its rules. It is reckoned uncivil in travelling strangers, to enter a village abruptly without giving notice of their approach. Therefore as soon as they arrive within hearing, they stop and halloo, remaining there till invited to enter. Two od men usually come out to them, and lead them in. There is in every village a vacant dwelling, called the stranger's house. Here they are placed, while the old men go round from hut to hut, acquainting the inhabitants

that strangers are arrived, who are probably hungry and weary; and every one sends them what he can spare of victuals, and skins to repose on.

It is remarkable, that in all ages and countries, hospitality has been allowed as the virtue of those, whom the civilized were pleased to call barbarians. The Greeks celebrated the Scythians for it; the Saracens possessed it eminently; and it is to this day the reigning virtue of the wild Arabs. St. Paul, too, in the relation of his voyage and shipwreck, on the island of Melita, says, "The barbarous people showed us no little kindness; for they kindled a fire and received us every one, because of the present rain and because of the cold."

LESSON SEVENTY-THIRD.

Picture of Life.

Life hath its sunshine-but the ray,
Which flashes on its stormy wave,
Is but the beacon of decay-

A meteor, gleaming o'er the grave.
And though its dawning hour is bright
With fancy's gayest coloring,
Yet o'er its cloud-encumbered night
Dark ruin flaps his raven wing.

Life hath its flowers-and what are they?
The buds of early love and truth,
Which spring and wither in a day,

The germs of warm, confiding youth;-

Alas! those buds decay and die

Ere ripened and matured in bloom-
Even in an hour, behold them lie
Upon the still and lonely tomb.

Life hath its pang-of deepest thrill-
Thy sting, relentless memory!
Which wakes not, pierces not, until
The hour of joy hath ceased to be.
Then, when the heart is in its pall,
And cold afflictions gather o'er,
Thy mournful anthem doth recall

Bliss, which hath died to bloom no more

Life hath its blessings-but the storm
Sweeps like the desert wind in wrath,
To sear and blight the loveliest form
Which sports on earth's deceitful path.
Oh! soon the wild heart-broken wail
So changed from youth's delightful ton
Floats mournfully upon the gale
When all is desolate and lone.

Life hath its hopes-a matin dream-
A cankered flower-a setting sun,
Which casts a transitory gleam
Upon the even's cloud of dun.
Pass but an hour, the dream hath fled,
The flowers on earth forsaken lie-
The sun hath set, whose lustre shed
A light upon the shaded sky.

LESSON SEVENTY-FOURTH.

Shenandoah the Oneida Chief.

Shenandoah, the celebrated Oneida chief, was well known in the wars which occurred while we were British colonies, and in the contest which ensued in our independence, as the undeviating friend of the people of the United States. He was very savage and addicted to drunkenness in his youth; but he lived a re

formed man for more than sixty years, and died in Christian hope.

Shenandoah's person was tall and brawny but wel made; his countenance was intelligent, and beamed with all the indigenous dignity of an Indian chief. In his youth he was a brave and intrepid warrior, and in his riper years one of the ablest counsellors among the North American tribes. He possessed a strong and vigorous mind, and though terrible as the tornado in war, he was bland and mild as the zephyr in peace.

With the cunning of the fox, the hungry perseverance of the wolf, and the agility of the mountain cat, he watched and repelled Canadian invasions. His vigilance once preserved from massacre the inhabitants of the infant settlement of German Flats. His influence brought his tribe to our assistance in the war of the revolution. How many have been saved from the tomahawk and scalping knife, by his friendly aid is not known; but individuals and villages have expressed gratitude for his benevolent interpositions; and among the Indian tribes he was distinguished by the appellation of "White man's friend."

Although he could speak but little English, and in his extreme old age was blind, yet his company was sought. In conversation he was highly decorous, evincing that he had profited by seeing civilized and polished society, and by mingling with good company in his better days.

To a friend who called on him a short time since, he thus expressed himself by an interpreter; "I am an aged hemlock. The winds of a hundred winters have whistled through my branches, I am dead at the top. The generation to which I belonged has run away and left me. Why I live the great good Spirit only knows. Pray to my Jesus that I may have patience to wait for my appointed time to die."

Honored chief! His prayer was answered-he was cheerful and resigned to the last. For several years he kept his dress for the grave prepared. Once and again, he came to Clinton to die; longing that his soul might be with Christ, and his body in the narrow house, near his beloved Christian teacher.

While the ambitious, but vulgar great, look principally to sculptured monuments and niches in the temple of earthly fame, Shenandoah, in the spirit of the only real nobility, stood with his loins girded, waiting the coming of his Lord.

His Lord has come! And the day approaches when the green hillock that covers his dust will be more respected than the Pyramids, the Mausolea, and the Pantheon of the proud and imperious. His simple 'turf and stone' will be viewed with affection and veneration when the tawdry ornaments of human apotheosis shall awaken only pity and disgust.

LESSON SEVENTY-FIFTH.

Early Spring.

I heard a thousand blended notes,
While in a grove I sat reclined,
In that sweet mood when pleasant thoughts
Bring sad thoughts to the mind.

To her fair works did nature link

The human soul that through me ran;
And much it grieved my heart to think
What man has made of man.

The birds around me hopped and played;
Their thoughts I cannot measure—
But the least motion that they made,
It seemed a thrill of pleasure.