Mn. normses WILD SCENES IN THE FOREST AND PRAIRIE.

THE author of these volumes is an American, addicted to fidd sports, and to the adventurous life, with its hardships and priva- tions, which the chase, in a new country, after animals of the bolder or fiercer kind, requires from its votaries. His youth was passed amidst the wild, mountainous, and scarcely-settled district, stretching away northward from the Hudson towards the Canadian border ; and though HOW, apparently, confined to a city life, he snatches every opportunity to consort with Indians and hunters, and plunge with them into the dense and uninhabited forests, which even yet are found in certain parts of the oldest -

settled states of the Union.

Mr. liorrmasi's TI 'ild Scenes have originated in three excursions of this kind : one in a pilgrimage to the sources of the Hudson, which were not discovered till 11i437, and then by the detachment employed on the Government geological survey : the other two in expeditions to the vicinity of the Wisconsan and Sacondaga rivers. In the first, his guide or escort were hunters ; in the second, Indians ; in the third, a mixture of' each, with a humorist, who adds variety by his character and his stories. The matter of each excursion consists of descriptions of scenery and wild sports, with pictures of woodland life, and stories of hunters' perils, and Indian superstitions : in addition to this there are several tales of society, and many. incidental portraits of characters ; the whole strung together by a thread of narrative, d'escribing the excursions.

So ihr as literary merit is concerned, the work is readable, lively, and spirited, with fluency rising to eloquence—of an American kind. The descriptions and sketches are obviously drawn from nature ; and many of' the incidents and characters are apparently real, possessing that interest and air of truth which reality alone can impart. The story of' Major Jake, the humorist already alluded to, is made the vehicle thr a sketch of the impudence and pushing ways of the genuine Yankee, an account of the last war on the Canadian borders, and some bitter satire on army-surgeons ; and seems to challenge credence by its very hardness. The Indian tales have also a character of eraisemblanee ; and, if not positively narrated by Indians, have evidently been derived from Indian originals, and put together by one acquainted with their characteristics. It may be argued, as far as the amusement of' the reader, or it picture of general manners is concerned, this is enough : and so it is. But there are curious points in the superstitions which render their authealicki of importance. The story or myth of Nannabozho contains a counterpart of the Mosaic and Deucalion Deluges, so far as the destruction of an old world by water ; and there are several meta- morphoses of an Ovidian character, especially " The Origin of Indian Corn," which is an Indian " Daphne in laurtun." The tales are of varying merit, but all of indiKrent kind, depending entirely upon the workmanship. And we may observe, once for all, that a deficiency of matter, in proportion to bulk, is the character of the volumes ; which in many parts are filigree. The success of WASHINGTON IRVING'S ornate and elaborate style—carried to the very verge of affectation and flimsiness, so easily imitated, so fide in imitation—will have a mischievous effect upon American lite- rature.

The first excursion of Mr. Homo:Qs presents the state of New York in a new point of view. " Without counting," he says, tithe inland seas which bound her western shores, or pausing to enume- rate the willowy ponds which freshen the verdure of her low-lands, or those deep and cauldron-like pools which are so singularly set here and there upon the summits of her mountains, New York may still count a thonsa ad lakes within her borders." To the

citizens of New York itself the discovery was astounding, that the isolated group of mountains in which the Hudson rises were among the loftiest in the United States ; and that in its region were wilder scenery, more lone solitudes, and more magnificent forests, than could be found on this side of' the Rocky Mountains,—frequented by the bear, the moose, and other wild animals, which we thought long ago extinct in the vicinity of the land of the Pilgrim Fathers. Here is a picture of one of the outposts of this region.

LAKE SANDFORD.

Striking the outlet of lake Sandford where it flows through a forest of (lark

cedars, our luggage was shifted from the buckboard and transferred with our- selves to a canoe ; we embarked at the foot of a steep hill, but oar coarse lay for some time through low swampy ground, where the canoe could sometimes with difficulty find a deep-enough channel through the sedge and water-hbes that by turns covered the surface. This amphibious track, however, soonths- appeared where the hills again coming down to the edge of the stream confined and deepened its current ; and now, after a pull of a few hundred yards through a straight narrow 'passage, we launched out upon the bosom of one of those beautiful lakes with which this region abounds. Not a sign of a house or a ming, nor any mark of the handiwork of man was to be seen anywhere, save the rude shallop that bore us. The morning was still and lowering. There was not breeze enough to lift the fog from the mountains round. Every rock and tree was reflected, with each leaf and wild flower, however minute, in the glassy surface ; the islands among which we wound our course floated double ; the hermit-like loon that glanced from beneath their embowering shelter, and seut his wild cry with a dozen echoes far among the hills, was the only object that moved or gave a sound of life across the waters.

We landed upon one islet, and I paused to observe what 1 have never been tired of studying, the manner in which nature effects her work of clothing the barren crags with soil.

Tiers, on this rocky Islet, some fifty feet in diameter, the whole process may

he seen—the first covering of moss and lichens ; the larger growth of the same ; the light black soil that is formed from their decay ; the taller plants that again, in succession, are doomed to die and be decomposed, and afford earthy nourish- ment to the first hardy forest growth—still, in its turn, to be succeeded by softer woods—may all be traced upon Iuch-Hamish.

Here, on this little spot, where yott can run a stick some three feet down through the primitive mosses that form the first covering of the rock. you have also the towering spruce, the ragged arbor-vitte, and several other hardy ever- green varieties, while a single delicate white-ash has put forth its deciduous kaves and hung its scarlet berries over the lake. An accomplished botanist has, I am told, found upwards of a hundred varieties of plants and trees upon this islet, winch is less than an acre in extent.

Cruising leisurely up the lake in this way—pausing ever and anon to admire the change of prospect as we wound round. some green headland, or lying upon our oars while trying the fine echoes which the mountains gave back to our voices whenever our course lay far from the margin—it was afternoon before we reached the point for debarking, which we attained by piercing deep within a timest that overshadows the inlet. Our canoe left the cheerful lake, and float- in a beneath the boughs of ancient trees that sometimes interlaced above our lick', startled the trout front the black pools which bathed the roots, and grated at last upon a gravelly bank, where it was drawn up and secured.

at far from this point, a portage of a fiov hundred yards enables the hunter to launch again upon Lake llemkrson, and strike the list link iii a chain of lakes, which with a few more brief portages will float his shallop all the way to the St. Lawrence.

As the traveller advances, difficulties thicken ; dangers, from weather and privation, increase ; and Nature becomes wilder and more terrifically magnificent in her forms. But the soil grows timber ; the earth contains iron and other minerals; the love of gain is propelling the enterprising Yankees to specu- late in the region ; and, in what Mr. HOFFMAN characteristically calls an " unfinished country," roads are marked out, and the location of a manufacturing town is fixed upon. In the region of all but eternal snow, nothing save an hostelry for summer birds of passage will, probably, ever be erected, and that is yet in embryo. Here is the kind of scenery which the upper part of the range presents.

A WILD GORGE.

I must adopt a homely resemblance to give the reader an idea of the size of the rocks, and their confused appearance in this part of the defile : he may imagine, though, loose boulders of solid rock, the size of tall city dwelling- houses, hurled from a mountain summit into a chasm a thousand feet in depth, lying upon each other as if they had fallen but yesterday ; each so detached from each, that it is only their weight which seems to prevent them from roll- ing further down the defile ; their corners meeting in angles that defy the ma- thematician to describe, and forming caverns and labyrinthine passages beneath them that no draughtsman could. delineate. The position of these tremendous crags seems so recent and precarious, that were it not fir other indications annuai hem, you would almost fear that your footsteps might topple over the gigantie masses and renew an onward motion tint was but now arrested. But lilac nas stamped the date of ages hi other langua:v upon their brows. e Their tops are thatched with lic1ierc c hat must be the growth of centuries ; ancient trivs are perched upon their pimismeles, and enormous twisted roots, which form a net-work over the chasms bete:eon them, and save your limbs from destruc- tion alien stepping over the treacherous moss that hides these black abysses, prove that the repairing hand of nature has 'veil here at work for ages in Cold'- lug up the ruin she has wrought in some one moment of violence. But we are now in the bosom of the pass, and the shadows of night are veiling the awful precipice which forams the background of the picture. We iroe climbed the last meent, ...epee than all the rest, mid here, in is clump of firelie and lialsam- firs, simiTilai.ded by steeps and precipices un every side, is cur place to bivouac foe the night.

Tun Soul:CC:4 Or Tfte rrunsoN.

With this view we began deseending cc previpice in the rear of our camp, to a place called the ice-hole, The trees on the side of this precipice have a secret fir growing remdiarly thei: own, or they could never flourisl. and main- tain their place in such a position. The wall, some sixty or eighty feet and ahnost perpendicuiar, is covered with moss, vhich peels off in flakes or a yard spare, as you plant your livid,: in it ht descending ; yet this flimsy sub- nitate for soil sapro I a st-ra,,,,:1;n:, ..rowtli of evergreens that will bear the wei;dit of a man as he cling, to then, to avnid heing da,lied to pieces in the glen below. The snow of the last night, which covered the mountain-tops, wade time stems of these saplings so slippery mat cold, that our hands became muff' imm grasping them her. ire we were leiltswity down the descent. The river Tuns through the bottom of t hi, ravine, but its pas.-tye is su cavernou, that it

telly by letting youNelf down into time Ii cures between the ummimicemise lioulderS,

which are here to.:ether icc bide,cribahle confusion, and crawlin!, be- math the rocks, that yon can obtain a si;fht of its current. From this ellasin you view the sky as from the bottom of a well. A pair of eagh, that ;cave their nest in the cliff al 'ove. showed. lilt cc swalbovs cu, they liov,.rcd elon-, its rtv. Tlw sun nevcr penetrates into this gloomy lai,yrinth ; and hen..., ouless the waters arc unusually high. you may find cakes of ice at 31 idstuniner. Emerging from this wild clews of rocks, we clambered a short distonee tip the sides ot the glen, amid penetrated a few hundred yards further into time pass to a sloping platform amidst the roeks, where the finest view of the whole nen e is to he obtained. And here, within a few yards of its first well-sprin:s, yott helmuld one of the strongest feetures of the mighty Hudson developed even am Its birth. it has already cloven its way through a defile as difficult as that through which it rushes near West Point. ;mil far more stupendous. A rocky precipice of twelve hundred feet rises immediately in from of you, and the Jaws if the pass open barely wide enough to admit the egress of the' stream at it highest stages of water. The cliff opposite looks raw aud recent as if rwen through but yesterday ; and ponderous blocks of stone, that would .almost make momitains themselves, wrenched from their former seat in what is now the centre of the pass, stand edgewise leaning down the glen, as if wading some new throe of this convulsion of nature to sweep them further Oil thew terrific career. Many of these features of the place you have already seen while climbing to the point where we stand; but now, upon turning round it.s you gain the head of the pass, and look out from its bosom upon the mountain region below, a view of unequalled beauty and grandeur greets the

eye. The morning sun, which will not for hours yet reach the place where you stand, is shining upon airy peaks and wooded hills which shoulder each

other as far its the eye can reach, while far down the glen, where the maple and beech find a more genial soil to nourish them, the rainbow hues of autumn are glistening along the stream, which, -within a few miles of its fountain-head, has already expended into a beautiful lake.

There is an interesting story of mingled superstition and Indian revenge, in a tale called " The Ghost Riders ;" but it could only be brought fully before the reader by a greater space than we can spare. In its stead we will take a few miscellaneous passages. The following, from " The Major's Story," descriptive of his prac-

tice when assistant-army-surgeon, looks like a satire : yet when we remember SMOLLETT'S account of candidates and examinations, and consider that the author is speaking of a suddenly-raised army in a thinly-settled country, a quarter of a century ago, the jokes may be based on truth.

0 The presence of so large a body of regulars infused something like disci- pline ilito our ranks; and our men reached the Miami of the lakes in such

gooti condition, that I began to have quite au opinion of my medical skill; when my talents as a surgeon were put to their first proof in a way that took the conceit out of me a little.

" 1 was one dav holding a pleasant talk with a militia colonel, who rode at the head of his division, when 1 was suddenly called to the rear to look after

a man that had been accidentally- shot through the arm by a fellow volunteer ;

who to exhibit at once his soldierly discipline and skill as a marksman, had diseliarg,ed his rifle across the face of the platoon in which he was marching.,

at a squirrel that was skipping aim'," a log by the road-side. The wounded man was sitting upon the loo- when freached the spot, and all so covered with blood that I could hardly Cid the place of his hurt. Not knowing exactly how to treat a gunshot wound, I still thought common sense dictated that the first thing to he done was to plug up tint hole which the bullet had made ; and I tl wrefore tried very hard tofu it with s pledget of tow ; but all may squeeziog and pushing only made the blood flow the taster ; the tow was forca out as fast as I stuck it in, and at last I saw that nothing could be done until I had got this effusion of blood under. I had more than once assisted my old masters at or- dinary bleedings, and had, sometilues helped to tie the bandages afterwards; and these, I remembered, always stopped the flow of blood from the veins by being tied below the veneseetion; and, Gout forgive me, but I never dreamt of there being suchm a thing as an artery, much less did I know any thing of the circulation of the blood. when I clapped a tourniquet below the wounmi upon that poor fellow's arm. He bled like an ox ; and, seeing that I could do no- thing to atop it, I told his friends, who had left the ranks to gather round him, that lie was mortally wounded, and beyond the reach of surgery. I helped to place him upon a smooth stump that Ile might go off with some comfiwt, and telt mightily relieved at the kind manner in which he welcomed his fate ; espe- cially when I used to think afterward of the tomahawking upon the river Raisin which he thus escaped.

" My next case was rather more fortunate, being taken off my hands before I could cuter fairly upon its treatment.

" 'rile first wounded man they brought me bad been bored through the thhAt by a British bayonet. It was but a boy, and I did not wonder that he howled like a wild Indian when I applied the probe to his hurt as he lay upon the rampart. Not knowing what next to do, I told a couple of fellows to move him ; when, just as one had raised his head, a.balli took hint right through the throat, and freed me at the sarne time from patient and assistant. Ile man that was helping him threw a kind o back Somerset from the breastwork. Ile seemed, to think at first that nothing but the shock of the fall disabled him so suddenly. Ile floundered about so curiously in trying to regain his feet, striking out the while for all the world like au awkward swimmer or a chicken that beats his wings when the cook wrings his head off that I could not forbear from laughinn.; though I tell you it made me feel all over, wham, with a wriggle of his neck, lie suddenly came to a stand-still, with eyes broad open, and so set in death upon my own face, that they appeared to look Inc thronah and through. I have often heard soldiers laugh in battle wheu mu gunshot wound makes a comrade cut these antics in dying., and yon know we do become a kind 0' Ilea:bens about such matters; but, seeing that I was not then a soldier, I never couldl fizgive myself for laughing at that poor fellow's expiring agonies."

As a specimen of Indian mythology—assuming it to be a ge- nuine tale—we will close with the story already alluded to.

ME ORIGIN Or INDIAN CORN.

" There is a place on the banks of the softly-flowing Umiadillcu, not far front its comluenee with the Susquehanna'', which in former years was an extensive heaver-meadow. The short turf sloped down almost to the brink of the stream, whose banks in this place nouri,lt not a single tree to shadow its waters. here', where they flow over pebbles so smooth and shiny that the In- dian maid who wandered along time margin would pause to comit over her strings of wampum, and think the beads had slipped awav, there came one day smile girls to bathe ; and One, the most beautiful of all, Pc gered behilid her companions to gather these bright pelddes from the bed of the river.

" A water-spirit, who had assumed the form of a musquosii, sat long watching her from the shore. Ile looked at her shining shoulders. at her drip- 11 ma lids, and the gently swelling, bosom over which they ⅈ and wlmi the maid lifted 11,:r rounded: thobs from the water and stepped lightly upon the

Cfreell Ile too raised himself from the mossy nook where he had been hid:. 'dell, and recovering his own shape, mu toenail-ace ben

" The maiden shrieked cud fled; but time enamoured pursuit, and the meadow affording no shrub nor covert to screen it cc' from her eager pursuer, she turned again towards the stream she had left, and Made for a spot %%here the wild flowers grew tall and rankly lv the moist margin. The spirit still tbllowed her ; and, frightened and flit igued, the girl would have sunk upon the ground as he approached, had she mud been supported by a tuft: of flags while hastily seizing and twining thent around her person to hide her shame.

"Ima tied- moment her slender form thinner and more rounded, her de-

lie:tte feet Lecatne indurated in the I. mmiii that opetwd to reecive them, the ldades of the flag broaileoe,1 around her fingers and enchs,ed her hand, while the pi arty pAbles that she held resolved themselves into milky grains whiell were kept tmretlier by the plaited husk. " The liatlfed water-spirit sprang to seize her by the long hair that yet floated ill ihe breeze, but the silken tassels of the rustling maize was all that met his grasp."

The classical student mav compare this simple narrative with the " Dophne" of Ovin, and observe how poetical art has added variety and interest to the mere story. In the simple Indian tale, and perhaps in the original myth, there is merely the sight of the object, desire, pursuit, anti an escape by transformation. The artist-poet, versed in literary masterpieces and critical lore, takes up the tale, and, without overlaying it, or detracting front its character, imparts motives., actions, and dramatic incident. The love of Apollo for the nymph, and her aversion, are not accidental feelings. They spring from the haughtiness of Apollo, flushed by the recent conquest of Python ; aud his contemptuous treatment of the God of Love-

" Quidque tibi, lascive puer, corn fortibus armis?"

The passion which inflames him is caused by the golden and acute- pointed dart—the aversion that actuates Daphne is produced by a blunt and lead-tipped arrow, both purposely selected. The trans- formation is not effected no one knows how—the all-but overtaken nymph appeals to the river-god her father. But when her prayer is granted, the theme is not exhausted. Since you cannot be my wife, says the disappointed day-god, you shall be my tree : the laurel shall grow for ever green ; it shall adorn my hair, my lyre, and my quiver ; the Roman conquerors shall wear it when they approach the capitol in triumph, and (delicate flattery!)

Pastibus Augrestis cadem fidissima custos

Ante fores stabis."