Various

“ Surrounding rugged and fossil exhibitions lead the mind to the convulsions and changes through which Nature has gone since the Creation. Fancy retains Niagara long after it ceases to be visible. The falls appear in both their pleasing terror and dancing beauty. Nature, ceasing to be unanimated, has exhibited at once her heavy artillery and rainbow beauties. The soul recognizes and does involuntary homage to the Grand Master of the universe. ”

“ Ladies, however, who possess these solid acquirements—who, like Lady Jane Grey, prefer Plato to a picnic—will be least likely to neglect the economy of the kitchen. They will thoroughly understand the dignity of the employment, and call to mind all the poetry of cooking. To say nothing of the dinner which Milton describes Eve as preparing when "on hospitable thoughts intent," there are the Homeric banquets at which kings literally "killed their own meat," and at which queens and princesses turned the spit for the roasting, or drew the water and chopped wood for the boiling. ”

“ Everything looked bright with hope; and hope beat higher, a great deal higher in Mrs. Harding's breast than it had done the day before. The whole world looked so beautiful that it seemed almost wicked to doubt, and they rode on over the retired hills towards Seccombe Plains, feeling almost as sure of the "bird" as though they had her "in hand." ”

“ The cascade presented a unique scene of beauty, and has been regarded as the greatest curiosity in "the State of the Broad Seal." But the Falls of Niagara far outreach all comparison. They are really stupendous, and challenge the world to outvie them in grandeur. On first witnessing them, your sensations are peculiar. Your nature becomes suffused with a sublimity of feeling. A fulmination of "the great and glorious" strikes one to silent amazement. With a "pleasing terror," akin to grandeur, you approach the precipice, and gaze unweariedly upon the wonderful cataract. ”

“ As a work of art—for only a true artist could design these graceful shapes and trace the exquisite designs—the set cannot be too highly valued, and the owners of the palatial residences on Fifth Avenue, who have their billiard-rooms and bowling-saloons, their picture-galleries, and their stables grained in oak, might thank the good taste of the importer, who has placed such a gem within their reach. Rare china, in these luxurious days, is a fashion and a taste which our fashionable circles are just beginning to cultivate. ”

“ Sarah Marshall, who was spending a week with Isabel Clark, was chatting as usual when Mrs. Clark came in with a neighbor, who was telling of the impudence of a servant who, when she was accused of falsehood, replied, "There is none of my father's family that can lie."
"Did she lie?" innocently inquired Sarah.
"No, it was found she told the truth; but then, it was her independent manner that was so offensive."
"Do you not think servants ought to have independence enough to defend themselves from an unjust accusation?" asked Mrs. Clark. ”

“ Theologians, though with the best intentions towards the establishment and preservation of peace, have been the great combatants in the conflict which, for ages, has distracted the human mind on speculative questions of religion, to determine which there has been no appeal but to man's fallible reason, to his prejudices, to his rashness, and to his spirit of hatred and persecution—power and might, not charity and good-will, being in most cases the arbiters. ”

“ Rarely, indeed, if food be wholesome, and at the same time not calculated to tempt the appetite artificially, can it be necessary, or even right, to stint its allowance to young people? Lastly, as far as possible, the application of a well-directed cookery, by which the digestibility of food is improved, ought not to be lost sight of, as an important element in the physical training of the young, or of the physical preservation of the adult.
Thus, the first essential for the healthy condition of the blood, and thence of the body, is its nourishment. ”

“ At another house, a sweet-looking girl, blue-eyed and fair, with her white arms bare almost to the shoulders, had her trunk already packed for Lowell. She "could not go." One pale mother had three daughters, one of whom was at the academy, a second in the paper-mill, and the third she must keep to assist herself. One stout, healthy girl, whom Mrs. Harding urged to the very verge of decency, preferred to stay at home to knit for the merchants at one dollar per pound. And one woman, with very yellow skin and snapping black eyes, wouldn't "have her girls go where folks were so grand. ”

“ Who slanders his neighbor is a—what is he? The signification of the term SLANDER, according to the best authority, is to belie; to speak falsely of. Who, then, slanders another, belies him—lies concerning him. Do not men forget this when they go about to blacken and vilify the character of their neighbors? And can they be justified in resorting to it for revenge? Is not the command, 'Thou shalt not bear false witness,' as binding as any of the ten? The fact that they can have satisfaction in no other way, offers no apology. To resort to it only increases their guilt. ”

“ His boots are patched to that extent that, when it has been raining very hard, he doesn't like drying them at the fire, for fear of our laughing at the numerous patches about them. His hat—but never mind about his dress, Nelly; for I feel a sort of shame in counting the darns and stitches about this poor fellow's appearance. Suffice it to say, he always looks the gentleman in the midst of his shabbiness, and that he wins the respect of us giddy little girls, even in spite of his bad clothes. ”

“ The five oval and colored sepals of the calyx alternate with them. The stamens and styles are exerted, or hang below the mouth of the corolla. The corolla and calyx are of a beautiful scarlet or rather coral color, and the whole plant, together with its drooping, pendulous flowers, is really an ornament to the barren rocks from which it springs. How wonderful that so much beauty should thus flourish in so unpromising a situation! ”

“ None has been more successful in blending the witchery of romance with the patriotic, but often stern and cruel realities of revolutionary warfare. We have had many romances founded upon the events of the struggle which terminated in the independence of the United States, too many of which, we are sorry to say, have been characterized by inflation of style and exaggerated portraitures—by improbable and often impossible incidents, and a total departure from the historic record. ”

“ Thus, whatever the means employed, the chief end of all physical training must be the perfect working of a healthy mind, by means of a healthy body, in the performance of life's duties, the enjoyment of life's pleasures, and the avoidance, as far as permitted, of life's pains.
In this life, God has linked together our bodies and our minds, and man cannot with impunity disregard their union or divide their interests; act and react they will, and do, upon one another. Their Creator has made the one the instrument of the other ”

“ How few are there who do not know the difference between the irritability, the nervous fears, the indolence and despondency of illness, and that cheerful activity of good health which laughs at trifles, looks forward with hope, and finds work a pleasure! How strong the reasons, then, for training the health and powers of the body to their highest pitch, seeing that upon their perfection depends the more or less complete fulfilment of our duty to God, our neighbors, and ourselves! ”

“ Passing the eye upward, and gazing upon the falls, they are now presented in all their stupendous grandeur. The waters roll over in huge bodies, never ceasing—rolling, rolling, rolling. You see it, and linger to see it. Echoes reverberate, and the constant murmur and rumble, like a hundred mill-races in a freshet, send a feeling which you cannot forget. No one has inclination to speak while viewing the falls. ”

“ The cultivation of flowers among the peasantry indicates a revolution in all their feelings. It is a delicate pleasure, which makes its way through coarse organs; it is a creature, whose eyes are opened; it is the sense of the beautiful, a faculty of the soul which is awakened. Man, then, understands that there is in the gifts of nature a something more than is necessary for existence; color, forms, odors, are perceived for the first time, and these charming objects have at last spectators. ”

“ Nay, how are whole communities often kept in a state of constant and feverish excitement by those whose tongues should blister with their utterances! And how soon would the fever be allayed, and the excitement die, and the strife cease, if those 'who whet their tongue like a sword, and bend their bows to shoot their arrows, even bitter words,' would learn to use aright the power of speech! ”

“ The scenery around the falls is not without its interest. Nature retains her roughest aspect, and looks pleasingly rugged and wild. There is, indeed, much that is romantic around Niagara. Along the river, below the falls, there are trees of many kinds and an abundance of uncultured shrubbery. The impending cliffs seem to vibrate with the rolling murmurs and echoes of the cataract. Table Rock, a portion of which fell some years since, and the remainder recently, was on a level with the edge of the cataract on the Canada side. ”

“ Imagine yourself in a forest of sturdy maples, averaging from seventy-five to one hundred and twenty-five feet in height, and from three to five feet in diameter. Before you are two or three large kettles, hung on a pole, and beneath them is a blazing fire. The kettles are half full of the amber-colored syrup; and you, with dish and spoon, together with some fifteen or twenty others, are testing its quality. ”

“ Give these two nurslings equal treatment in every way, the same air, the same everything, and the same food, consisting chiefly of milk and grain materials, puddings, and the like, with perhaps a little meat; the rosy face will lose none of its healthy hue; the fair, fat child will become no thinner, perhaps fatter, but, at the same time, pale and puffy, or pasty-looking, and if the diet be unchanged, finally unhealthy. ”

“ How many reputations are thus ruined—ruin for which no one is responsible—by men and women, who deal their blows in the dark, who let fly their Parthian arrows and retreat! How much mischief is caused to families and neighborhoods by cowardly people, who skulk behind 'I reckon,' or 'they say,' while they protrude their venomed tongues covered with the poison of asps! ”

“ He is the funniest little specimen you ever saw, Nelly, and ought to sit to have his portrait taken in China. He would make a capital Dresden ornament, for he is a very great curiosity; but in his present shape he is much more curious than ornamental. He is our writing-master; but his accomplishments go far beyond pot-hooks and hangers; for he teaches us, also, arithmetic, mathematics (much we understand about them!) , and Latin (we all like "Amo, I love"—I think of Sidney as I conjugate it) , and elocution; besides drawing to the juniors. Poor Penn! His is a sad life, Nell. ”