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KIDD'S OWN JOURNAL. 



soon lures them to their ruin. They trans- 

 gress the command, eat the forbidden fruit, 

 and their doom is fixed. The child of liberty 

 is now on its way to the pest-houses of the 

 Seven Dials ! What a transition from 

 happiness to misery ! We are, when young, 

 too much like these little birds. Vainly does 

 a fond mother warn us ; we of course know 

 better than she does. We get into trouble, 

 and sometimes smart severely for our folly. 

 The birds generally regret their folly all their 

 lives. They live prisoners, and they die 

 prisoners. If we come better off, we are 

 lucky. What lessons of practical wisdom 

 might we not learn from the lower world, if 

 we would but keep our eyes open ! 



NIGHT— A FEAGMENT. 



Day follows night ; and night 

 The dying day. Young. 



There is a beauty, a marked benevolence 

 of design, in the alternations of the seasons. 



If man's years were all summer, all sunshine, 

 all flowers, his mind would become languid and 

 enervate, and the energies which spring from his 

 nobler passions would no longer set him apart as 

 the lord of creation. If the desolation of a 

 lasting winter prevailed, he would grow gloomy 

 and unsocial ; his sympathies would become less 

 active and endearing, and the sweet buds of 

 affection would rarely, if ever, put forth their 

 blossoms. The monotony which would accom- 

 pany the continuance of any one season, would 

 render life more a burden than a blessing. So 

 singular is the constitution of humanity, its 

 strange blendings of contrasts, the union of mate- 

 rial inertness with the ever-restless activity of 

 mind, that an enduring state of tempest or tran- 

 quillity would be insupportable. In the one case 

 we should sink down from listlessness, in the 

 other from excitement. Another kind provision 

 in the revolution of the seasons, is the guarded 

 and preparatory change which takes place in 

 their succession. In this there is no abruptness. 

 Nature is not taken unawares in any of her de- 

 partments. So nicely graduated is their approach, 

 that the transition from one to the other is almost 

 imperceptible. 



# Spring turns from the winter like an affec- 

 tionate child from the arms of a stern yet en- 

 deared parent, lingering and looking back with 

 tears and smiles, till at last she is folded from 

 sight in the embraces of summer. In the lapse 

 of a few weeks the leafy -gorgeousness of the 

 latter season attains its perfection, and then a 

 change as of decline steals over the voluptuous 

 paradise, till at length its blossomed beauties are 

 gently supplanted by the more substantial deco- 

 rations of autumn. These, in their turn, are 

 destined to wax, and wane, and pass away ; and 

 winter shall fill their places with his rude yet not 

 unpleasant creations. Still in all this variation 

 from one extreme to another, there is no broad 

 line of demarcation. The months, as it were, 

 run into one another, and their union forms an 

 unbroken circle, within whose boundary the 

 " busy hours " reveal their magic and their spells. 



In fact it would be impossible to draw such a 

 line, for we cannot precisely determine when one 

 season terminates and another commences; and 

 therefore their divisions must be rather arbitrary 

 than natural. But suppose the year were divided 

 into four uniform periods — suppose that, upon 

 the tender and half-opened buds of April, the 

 sunshine of August should descend in all its 

 withering effulgence, or that the chilling blasts 

 of February should follow immediately on the 

 warm serenity of one of our summer afternoons 

 — how melancholy would be the result! 



The same regularity of concurrence accom- 

 panies the interchange of day and night. First 

 darkness, then the grey dawn, then the rosy- 

 tinted morning, and, by-and-by, succeeds the full 

 rich radiance of noon; then, as the sun declines, 

 the light lessens in intensity, till the crimson 

 twilight, the shadowy evening, and, at last, the 

 over-brooding night, again reveal their individual 

 glories as they pass in review before us. 



Beautiful, very beautiful is the " coming on " 

 of day and night! But though there is a simi- 

 larity in the imagery they present, the feelings 

 they awaken in the spectator are widely different. 

 As he looks to the brightening east, a thrill as 

 of gladness comes over him ; for there is some- 

 thing animating in the reflection, that around him 

 a world is rising from its slumbers to renew its 

 multifold and varied tasks — something stirring 

 in the thought, that presently he has to rush to 

 its thronged arena, to struggle with the bold and 

 the haughty, the crafty and the powerful, for 

 whatever prize ambition shall proffer as the re- 

 co I'pense of the victorious. So reckless is the 

 pride of his nature, that he can rejoice in the 

 prospect, and exult in the approach of the tumult 

 in which he is about to mingle. 



Not such, however, are his sensations when the 

 day's commotions are ended, and he watches the 

 setting sun as he sinks down like a dying 

 monarch upon his couch of crimson and gold. 

 The excitement of the morning has vanished, 

 and, perhaps, his heart is now drooping from dis- 

 appointment and the sickness of " hope deferred." 

 He beholds in the gorgeous and fading clouds, the 

 likeness of those visions which at dawn showed 

 so winningly, and whose brightness, experience 

 now teaches him, shone but to mock his credu- 

 lity. Yet he withdraws not his gaze, for the 

 melancholy which accompanies it is not un- 

 pleasing, and the memories awakened by those 

 passing glories, like dreams of recovered trea- 

 sures, are not without their solace * * * 



There is a tranquil lising influence in the scenes 

 which usher in the approach of evening. The 

 vesper notes of the birds exhibit less of the 

 vivacity of joyousness, and fall upon the ear 

 with a plaintive and sweeter cadence. The 

 flowers fold up their delicate petals, the clouds 

 lie listlessly along the horizon, and the air, which 

 the bustle of day has filled with strange noises, 

 becomes hushed, as if for sleep. Now and then, 

 a sound interrupts the general quiet of the scene, 

 as the milk-maid or the homeward-bound reaper 

 strikes into some familiar household song, or the 

 zephyr rustles the leafy branches, or freights his 

 wing with the low music of the distant water- 

 fall; but the continuance is momentary, and 

 serves as a pleasing contrast to the deepening 



