my liabilities. If I could pass this crisis, perhaps I could rally again; but it is impossible; my creditors are importunate, and I cannot much longer keep above the tide," replied Mr. Barton. "What is the extent of your liabilities?" inquired Strosser. "Seventy-five thousand dollars,” replied Mr. Barton. "Would that sum be sufficient to relieve you?" "It would." "Then, sir, you shall have it," said Strosser, as he stepped up to the desk, and drew a check for twenty thousand dollars. “Here, take this, and when you need more, do not hesitate to call upon me. Remember that it was from you I received money to establish myself in business." “But that debt was cancelled several years ago,” replied Mr. Barton, as a ray of hope shot across his troubled mind. "True," replied Strosser, "but the debt of gratitude that I owe has never been cancelled; and now that the scale is turned, I deem it my duty to come up to the rescue." At this singular turn in the tide of fortune, Mr. Barton fairly wept for joy. Every claim against him was paid as soon as presented, and in less than a month he had passed the crisis, and stood perfectly safe and secure; his credit increased and his business improved, while several others sank under the blow, and could not rally, among whom was Mr. Hawley, alluded to at the commencement of this article. "How did you manage to keep above the tide?" inquired Mr. Hawley of Mr. Barton, one morning, several months after the events last recorded, as he met the latter upon the street, on his way to his place of business. "Very easily, indeed, I can assure you," replied Mr. Barton. "Well, do tell me how," continued Mr. Hawley; "I lay claim to a good degree of shrewdness, but the strongest exercise of my wits did not save me; and yet you, whose liabilities were twice as heavy as my own, have stood the shock, and have come off even bettered by the storm." "The truth is," replied Mr. Barton, "I cashed my paper as soon as it was sent in." "I suppose so," said Mr. Hawley, regarding Mr. B. with a look of surprise; "but how did you obtain the funds? As for my part, I could not obtain a dollar's credit: the banks refused to take my paper, and my friends even deserted me." "A little investment that I made some ten years ago," replied Mr. Barton, smiling, "has recently proved exceedingly profitable." 99 "Investment!" echoed Mr. Hawley - "what investment? "Why, do you not remember how I established young Strosser in business some ten years ago?" 66 "O, yes, yes," replied Mr. Hawley, as a ray of suspicion lighted up his countenance; "but what of that?" "He is now one of the largest dry goods dealers in the city, and when this calamity came on, he came forward, and very generously advanced me seventy-five thousand dollars. You know I told you, on the morning I called to offer you an equal share of the stock, that it might prove better than an investment in the bank." During this announcement, Mr. Hawley's eyes were bent intently upon the ground, and, drawing a deep sigh, he moved on, dejected and sad, while Mr. Barton returned to his place of business, with his mind cheered and animated by thoughts of his singular investment. [Thomas Moore was born in Dublin, Ireland, in 1779, and died in 1852. He was a very brilliant lyric poet and song writer. In the latter part of his life he wrote many prose works. When a very young man, he visited America, and the following poem was one of the results of that visit. The subjoined introduction was by the author. "They tell of a young man, who lost his mind upon the death of a girl he loved, and who, suddenly disappearing from his friends, was never afterwards heard of. As he had frequently said, in his ravings, that the girl was not dead, but gone to the Dismal Swamp, it is supposed he had wandered into that dreary wilderness, and had died of hunger, or been lost in some of its dreadful morasses."] "THEY made her a grave too cold and damp For a soul so warm and true; And she's gone to the Lake of the Dismal Swamp, Where, all night long, by a firefly lamp, She paddles her white canoe. And her firefly lamp I soon shall see, Through tangled juniper, beds of reeds, And when on the earth he sank to sleep, He lay where the deadly vine doth weep And near him the she wolf stirred the brake, And the white canoe of my dear?" He saw the lake, and a meteor bright "Welcome," he said, 66 my dear one's light," And the dim shore echoed, for many a night, The name of the death-cold maid. Till he hollowed a boat of the birchen bark, Which carried him off from shore; Far, far he followed the meteor spark; The wind was high, and the clouds were dark, But oft, from the Indian hunter's camp, This lover and maid so true Are seen, at the hour of midnight damp, XVII. A VISIT TO THE VILLAGE OF BROEK.* WASHINGTON IRVING. [Washington Irving, the most popular of American writers, has for some years past resided on the banks of the Hudson River, about twenty-five miles from New York. The following extract is from his Wolfert's Roost, a collection of tales, essays, and sketches, which originally appeared in the Knickerbocker Magazine.] THE village of Broek is about four miles from Amsterdam, in the midst of the greenest and richest pastures of Holland I may say of Europe. These pastures are the source of its wealth; for it is famous for its dairies, and for those oval cheeses which regale and perfume the whole civilized world. The population consists of about six hundred persons, comprising several families which have inhabited the place since time immemorial, and have waxed rich on the produce of their meadows. They keep all their wealth to themselves; intermarrying, and holding strangers at a wary distance. What, however, renders Broek so perfect a paradise in the eyes of all true Hollanders is the matchless height to which the spirit of cleanliness is carried there. It amounts almost to a religion among the inhabitants, who pass the greater part of their time in rubbing, and painting, and varnishing. Each *Pronounced Brook. housewife vies with her neighbor in her devotion to the scrubbing brush; and it is said that a notable housewife of the place, in days of yore, is still held in pious remembrance, for having died of pure exhaustion and chagrin in an ineffectual attempt to scour a black man white. These particulars awakened my ardent curiosity to see a place which I pictured to myself the very fountain head of certain hereditary habits and customs prevalent among the descendants of the original Dutch settlers of my native state of New York. I accordingly lost no time in performing a pilgrimage to Broek. Before I reached the place, I beheld symptoms of the tranquil character of its inhabitants. A little clump-built boat was in full sail along the lazy bosom of a canal, but its sail consisted of the blades of two paddles standing on end, while the navigator sat steering with a third paddle in the stern, crouched down like a toad, with a slouched hat drawn over his eyes. After proceeding a little farther, I came in sight of the harbor, or port of destination, of this drowsy navigator. This was an artificial basin, or sheet of olive-green water, tranquil as a mill pond. On this the village of Broek is situated; and the borders are laboriously decorated with flower beds, box trees clipped into all kinds of ingenious shapes and fancies, and little pleasure houses, or pavilions. I alighted outside of the village, for no horse or vehicle is permitted to enter its precincts. Shaking the dust off my feet, therefore, I prepared to enter, with due reverence and circumspection, this shrine of Dutch cleanliness. I passed in by a narrow street, paved with yellow bricks, laid edgewise, and so clean that one might eat from them. Indeed, they were actually worn deep, not by the tread of feet, but by the friction of the scrubbing brush. The houses were built of wood, and all appeared to have been freshly painted, of green, yellow, and other bright colors. They were separated from each other by gardens and orchards, and stood at some little distance from the street, with wide areas, or court yards, paved in mosaic with variegated stones, |