The wisest have been fools The surest stumbled sore: This do, and thou shalt knit Closely my heart to thine; THE FACTORY GIRLS OF LOWELL. BY JOHN G. WHITTIER. World. The slaveholder dragging his languid frame from the rice-region and the sugar-plantation, full of contempt for the laborer, and bitter in his scorn of Yankee meanness, has been awed into reverence for Industry in the presence of the working-women of Lowell; and, painfully contrasting the unpaid and whip-driven labor of his plantation, with the free and happy thrift of the North, he has returned home, "A sadder but a wiser man," feeling from henceforth that woman may "labor with her hands," and lose nothing of the charm and glory of womanhood by so doing-that it is only his own dreadful abuse of labor, attempting to reverse its just and holy laws, and substitute brutal compulsion for Acres of girlhood beauty reckoned by the generous and undegrading motives, that has made square rod, or miles by long measure!—The young, the women of his plantation mere beasts of burden, the graceful, the gay-flowers gathered from a thou- or objects of unholy lust, cursing alike themselves sand hill-sides and green vallies of New England-and their oppressors. fair, unveiled Nuns of Industry-Sisters of Thrift,- Thus is it, that our thousands of " Factory Girls," and are ye not also Sisters of Charity, dispensing comfort and hope and happiness around many a hearthstone of your native hills, making sad faces cheerful and hallowing age and poverty with the sunshine of your youth and love !-Who shall sneer at your calling? Who shall count your vocation otherwise than noble and ennobling? become apostles of Democracy, and teachers of the great truth, which even John C. Calhoun, slaveholder as he is, felt constrained to recognize in his controversy with Webster: "The laborer has a title to the fruits of his industry against the universe." They demonstrate the economy of free and paid labor.They dignify woman, by proving that she can place Four years ago, in a hasty visit to Lowell I was, herself in independent circumstances, without deroat the Boott Corporation in company with JOSEPH gating from the modesty and decorum of her characSTURGE, of Birmingham, the calm, devoted leader of ter :-that she can blend the useful with the beautithe Democracy of England, and my friend Lt. Ren- {ful, and that, instead of casting herself, as a fair but shaw, of South Carolina, and more recently a mis-expensive burthen upon the other sex-its plaything sionary in Jamaica, among the newly emancipated and its encumbrance--she is capable of becoming a blacks of that Island. As the bell was ringing, and help-mete and a blesssing. the crowd of well-dressed, animated and intelligent- Yet, I do not overlook the trials and disadvantages looking young women passed by us on their way to of their position. Not without a struggle have many their lodgings, the philanthropic Englishman could of these females left the old paternal home-stead, not repress his emotions at the strong contrast they and the companions of their childhood. Not as a presented to the degraded and oppressed working- matter of taste and self-gratification have many of women of his own country; and the spectacle, I them exchanged the free breezes, and green mead. doubt not, confirmed and strengtheend his determi-ows, and household duties, of the country, for the nation to consecrate his time, wealth, and honorable close, hot city, and the jar and whirl of these crowdreputation, to the cause of the laborer, at home.-ed and noisy mills. In the midst of the dizzy rush My friend Renshaw, who was banished from his of machinery, they can hear in fancy the ripple of mother's fireside, and his father's grave, for the cause brooks, the low of cattle, the familiar sound of the of abolitionism, deeply impressed with the beauty voices of home. Nor am I one of those who count of Freedom, and hope-stimulated industry, exclaim-steady, daily toil, consuming the golden hours of the ed-Would to God my mother could see this!" At home, he had seen the poor working-women of the South driven by the whip to their daily tasks; here with gaiety and hope, and buoyant gracefulness, he saw the women of New England pass from their labors, making industry beautiful, and throwing the charm of romance and refinement over the dull monotony of their self-alloted tasks. Not in vain then, are the lessons of Free Labor taught by the « Factory Girls." The foreign traveller has repeated them in aristocratic England, in Germany, in France, and Prussia and thus have the seeds of democratic truth been sown in the waste places of the Old day, and leaving only the night for recreation, study and rest, as in itself a pleasurable matter. There have been a good many foolish essays written upon the beauty and divinity of labor by those who have never known what it really is to earn one's livelihood by the sweat of the brow-who have never, from year to year, bent over the bench or loom, shut out from the blue skies, the green grass, and sweet waters, and felt the head reel, and the heart faint, and the limbs tremble with the exhaustion of unremitted toil. Let such be silent. Their sentimentalism is a weariness to the worker. Let not her who sits daintily with her flowers, "herself the fairest," looking out from cool verandahs on still, green woods and soft flowing waters, to whom Music and Poetry and Romance minister, whose slightest wish is as law to her dependents,-undertake to sentimentalize over the " working classes," and quote Carlyle and Goethe, concerning the romance and beauty, and miraculous powers of Work-in the abstract. How is it that with such admirers of Labor, the laborer is so little considered? How is it that they put forth no hand to pull down that hateful wall of distinction which pride has built up between the labourer and the labored for? Excellent was the advice of Dr. Johnson to Boswell: "My dear sir, clear your mind of CANT." My attention has been called to a neat volume just published in London, consisting of extracts from the Lowell Offering, written by females employed in the mills, to which the English editor has given the title of "Mind amongst the Spindles." Thousands will read it, and admire it, who will not reflect upon the fact that these writings are only an exception to the general rule, that after twelve or more hours of steady toil, mind and body are both too weary for intellectual effort. "MIND AMONG THE SPINDLES!" Let all manner of Factory Agents, and "Corporations without souls," consider it. The mind of the humblest worker in these mills is of infinitely more consequence in the sight of Him who looks on the realities of His universe, than all the iron-armed and steam-breathed engines of mechanism. It is a serious fact, gentlemen, that among your spindles, and looms, and cottons, and woolens, are thousands of immortal souls-children of our Great Fatherfearfully dependent for their bias towards good or evil, for their tendency upward or downward, upon the circumstances with which they are environed.— Think less of your monster-mechanisms, and more of the SPIRIT WITHIN THE WHEELS." The one may wear out with constant friction, but it is only dead matter. It may be restored. But, who shall repair the worn out body, and renovate that spirit, the life of which has been exhausted by toil too protracted? Yes-let the unpractical say what they will, there is much that is wearisome and irksome in the life of the factory operative. All praise then to those, who, by the cultivation of their minds, and the sweet influences of a healthful literature, have relieved this weariness, and planted with flowers the dusty path-way of Toil. Honor to those who have demonstrated to the blind aristocrats of Europe and America, that the rich and the idle cannot become the entire monopolists of refined tastethat in the temple of Nature, which is open to all, the Beautiful stands side by side with the Useful -Grace throwing her oaken garland over the sun-brown brow of Labor-with the same soft skylight of OUR FATHER'S blessing resting upon all. Ꭽ REFORM. BY THOMAS L. HARRIS. A voice peals o'er life's wildly heaving waters, Of days when fields of blood will be unknown- And trembles with the presence of their doom; Falsehood, with fearful agony dissembles, And vice, within her gilded chamber trembles And hate grows darker still with idle rage. But the crushed bondsman hears it, and upspringeth To burst his shackles and once more be free, And shouts aloud until the echo ringeth O'er the far islands of the Eastern sea. The faithful lover of his race rejoices- The champion girds his gleaming armor onThe seer saith "God speaks in those earnest voices : Earth's fearful battle-field shall yet be won." Each hallowed martyr of the ages olden Leapeth for joy within his darkened grave, And new-born poets wake with voices golden To chant the glorious actions of the brave; O'er earth it rolls like peals of gathering thunder, And nations rise from slumber on the sod, And angels list, all mute with breathless wonder, Its echo in the living soul of God! O'er every radiant island of creation The music of that swelling peal is borne, Land bears to land, and nation shouts to nation The war-cry of the age-reform !-REFORM! List to that mighty music-O, my brother! Heed thou those anthem-voices, as they roll, Like bursting flames that darkness fain would smother Go forth to battle for the true and right. Success will crown each arduous endeavor, And from the strife thy soul rise great and free, And deed give birth to deeds that roll forever, Wave after wave, o'er time's grand, azure sea. A crown of thorns the foe may twine around thee: Press on, the way is open, heed not them [thee, The mournful wreath, wherewith their hate hath bound "He is the FREEMAN whom the TRUTH makes free, And all are slaves beside."-CoWPER. For the Truth, then, let us battle, Long the boast that we are FREEMEN, That his fellow mortal wrongs. He who seeks the Truth, and trembles He, at least, is but a slave. Friend, this simple lay who readest, Bold in speech and bold in action, Scorn the threat that bids thee fear, Let them strike, but make them hear. Be thou like heroic Paul; Scorn the prison, rack, or rod! Speak! and leave the rest to God. A GLIMPSE AT MERRIE ENGLAND.' BY ELIZUR WRIGHT. Time, which tarries not for mortals, has brought me to the close of my look at England. It is very awkward to sum up and generalize when one has only begun to observe; therefore understand me as giving generalizations of things as they seem to me— what a fly that lights upon England for a twinkling and is off, thinks of it. Look at the Times newspaper with a net revenue As to the bounties of Providence, substantial blessings and beauties, I cannot conceive how more could have been granted in the same space, than is the lot of this, so far as nature has made it, "merrie England." After seeing the golden harvests of the rich eastern counties and Yorkshire, the meadows of the Thames, above all, the garden valley of the Tweed; the mines of Derbyshire, and another region to which the wise do not carry coals; the bens and lochs of Scotland; the pikes and fells, and dales and meres of Westmoreland; the springs of Mal- England may be said to live under a trinity vern; the valleys of the Severn and the Wye-even of evil, kingcraft, priestcraft, and beercraft. In taking a nap on the brow of the Wyndecliffe-surely this let me not be understood to speak disrespect. I have a right to say, "Avaunt, all geography; this fully of this interesting daughter of Eve, the Queen, island is the very spot where the human race ought who with such exemplary patience obeys the comto develop itself in all its power and glory." But mand imposed upon her aforesaid mother, nor of the truly, the race, as a man, is far and painfully below reverend clergy, nor yet of the noble brewers, what a nurseling of republicanism, alighting on the many of whom write sir before and bart. after their Wyndecliffe, and drinking in the beauties of the names. They are all honorable persons, I hope and wide landscape, and knowing nothing more of Eng- trust; but the craft to which they were born or land, would expect to find it. There is ignorance bred, does, I am sure, cost England immeasurable and coarse brutality, and sullen hopelessness, and woes. O that I had the eye of a prophet and could haggared wretchedness, far beyond what there ought say that there was in the visible dimmest distance to be in the midst of such beauties and blessings. of the future, any thorough relief. As it is, sanYet there is not a little, but a great deal among the guine hope, without seeing any thing, guesses that human inhabitants, that is, like the land-scape, noble deliverance must come, somehow and at sometime and lovely and glorious, and that, not in no one class, or other. The order in which the evils press upon but in all classes, from the highest to the lowest. the country seem to me to be first, beercraft, second And a peep at history will convince one, too, that priesteraft, third kingcraft. Till the beercraft is the race is here making a progress that is truly en- removed-till the people get the clear heads and couraging and sublime. Indeed, history writes this strong hearts which pure water gives-in vain you upon the landscape. The old feudal castles, now lift at the others. Suppose you abolish the taxes possessed by ivy and owls; the ruinous abbeys, the and tithes and give England a cheap government, dimly-remembered battle fields and Smithfields," and free church and full suffrage, to what will it are way-marks that show how the race has gone amount, so far as the masses are concerned? Preforward. The Alfreds, the Shakspeares, the Hamp-cisely to more beer and consequences of beer! I dens, the Newtons, the Miltons, the Howards, the Wesleys, the Hogarths, have not lived in vain. Their mantles are worn worthily by men whom it might be invidious to mention now, but who will shine as the stars by and by; men who are doing what Cromwell did, in a wiser way. They have approached in fact, nearer than in form, to the desired goal. In enumerating the governing powers of England, you have not done when you have mentioned king, lords and commons. The press is to be named, and that not at the tail of the list. The press has outgrown the power of what is called the government, to control either by fear or favor. may be mistaken; truly I have found warm and zealous promoters of thorough temperance, but they seem to be regarded as the maddest of fanatics. Nine men out of ten of the laboring classes, so far as I have been able to observe, and I have been quite inquisitive, have not the slightest barrier between themselves and stupidity and drunkenness but their inability to get enough beer. It is their undoubted creed that beer is a blessing, and one of their deepest sorrows is that their wages will not allow them to get plenty of it, with a drop or two of gin by way of luxury. Look at poor Chartism, befogged in beer! fighting as often as any way against itself, and selling to its worst enemies even the little suffrage it commands! If the masses of England could be roused to enter upon the career so gloriously begun by those of Ireland, they would soon take a position which would settle many of the knottiest questions of politics, and the crafts of the priest and the king would be swept away like the meshes of the spider. The state and the church would then take their places as servants of the people-not masters. Yet with all this, which to an American mind is so evident, staring them in the face, there are plenty of results. England wants an occulist like Father sincere philanthropists here, enemies of slavery, of Mathew. of total abstinence upon a more commanding foundation than it has hitherto occupied. If you can get the wine out of the heads of the philanthropic of the higher class, then will they see clearly the effects of beer upon the lower. Both once delivered, the nation would not be long in discovering the folly of working itself to death to support a class of grand and idle hereditary pickpockets, nor long in devising means of relief. See if the new vision bestowed upon the Irish people does not work out such WE ARE BRITHEREN A'. BY ROBERT NICOLL. corn laws, of church tyranny, of a vampyre aris- land in the same condition with her feudal castles If men, when they're here, could make shift to agree, 'Come, gi'e me your hand, we are britheren a'.' There is one sign of the times, however, which Whan to 'gree wad make a' body cosie an' right. Many are coming to the conclusion that disease is chiefly some mysterious modification of that great poison, diet, with which we are sent into the world to battle, and this redounds greatly to the advantage of pure water. Setting poisons to catch poisons is growing into disrepute with these people, and consequently they may by and by be expected to see the absurdity of sending one dram of alcohol into the stomach to cure the disease made by its predecessor. The multitude of experiments which have now put the matter fairly to the test, seem to demonstrate that coldness combined with pure water, is the best means that has ever been tried to quench human inflammations, and when properly applied will cure any patient who has strength to be cured in any way. This being true, the occupation-I do not say of the doctors, for it will require science and wisdom to apply cold water-but of the druggists of all medical poison manufacturers, is gone. And shall not alcohol be included? From the hold this subject has taken of the most intelligent here, I look for a great pathological reform, which I think cannot fail to set the principle The knave Ye wad stand like a rock, wi' the truth on your side ; Ye wad scorn to do fausely by woman or man; Your mither has lo'ed you as mithers can lo’e; An' mine has done for me what mithers can do; Frail shakin' Auld Age will sune come o'er us baith, "God is better lodged in the heart than in great edifices." By taking revenge a man is but even with his enemy; but in passing it over he is superior." |