It was not till the 20th of March, 1590, that Governor White embarked [at London] in three ships to seek his colony and his children. White found the island of Roanoke a desert. As he approached he sounded a signal trumpet, but no answer was heard to disturb the melancholy stillness that brooded over the deserted spot. What had become of the wretched colonists? No man may with certainty say: for all that White found to indicate their fate was a high post bearing on it the letters CRO, and at the former site of their village he found a tree which had been deprived of its bark and bore in well cut characters the word CROATAN. There was some comfort in finding no cross carved above the word, but this was all the comfort the unhappy father and grandfather could find. He of course hastened back to the fleet, determined instantly to go to Croatan, but a combination of unpropitious events defeated his anxious wishes; storms and a deficiency of food forced the vessels to run for the West Indies for the purpose of refitting, wintering and returning; but even in this plan White was disappointed and found himself reluctantly compelled to run for the western islands and thence for England. Thus ended the effort to find the lost colony; they were never heard of. That they went to Croatan, where the natives were friendly, is almost certain; that they became gradually incorporated with them is probable from the testimony of a historian [John Lawson] who lived in North Carolina and wrote [published] in 1714: "The Hatteras Indians who lived on Roanoke Island or much frequented it, tell us," (says he) "that several of their ancestors were white people and could talk in a book, as we do; the truth of which is confirmed by gray eyes being found frequently amongst these Indians and no others."

GEORGE DENISON PRENTICE.

1802-1870.

In

GEORGE DENISON PRENTICE was born in Preston, Connecticut, and was a teacher and lawyer in early life. 1830 he went to Kentucky, and a year afterward became editor of the Louisville "Journal," which position he held and made illustrious during the remainder of his life. His wit and humor gave him great influence, and his paper, afterwards consolidated with the "Courier" and known as the "Courier-Journal," became a power in politics, commerce, and society. A fine statue of him adorns the CourierJournal building in Louisville, and his fame is by no means forgotten. "Prenticeana" is a collection of his witty and pungent paragraphs. See Memorial address by his successor, Henry Watterson.

Life of Henry Ciay.

Poems, edited by John James Piatt.

WORKS.

Prenticeana, [with life-sketch.]

Mr. Prentice's best known poem is the “ Closing Year," which elocutionists have kept before the public and which has often inspired young poets to sad verses on the passing of time.

THE CLOSING YEAR.

(From Poems.)*

'Tis midnight's holy hour-and silence now

Is brooding, like a gentle spirit, o'er

The still and pulseless world. Hark! on the winds,
The bell's deep-notes are swelling. 'Tis the knell
Of the departed year.

* By permission of Robert Clarke & Co., Cincinnati,

No funeral train

Is sweeping past; yet on the stream and wood,
With melancholy light, the moonbeams rest,
Like a pale, spotless shroud; the air is stirred,
As by a mourner`s sigh; and on yon cloud,
That floats so still and placidly through heaven,
The spirits of the seasons seem to stand-
Young Spring, bright Summer, Autumn's solemn form,
And Winter, with his aged locks--and breathe

In mournful cadences, that come abroad
Like the far wind harp's wild and touching wail,
A melancholy dirge o'er the dead Year,
Gone from the earth forever.

'Tis a time

For memory and for tears. Within the
Still chambers of the heart a spectre dim,
Whose tones are like the wizard voice of Time,
Heard from the tomb of ages, points its cold
And solemn finger to the beautiful

And holy visions that have passed away
And left no shadow of their loveliness

On the dead waste of life. That spectre lifts
The coffin lid of hope, and joy, and love,

And, bending mournfully above the pale,

Sweet forms that slumber there, scatters dead flowers O'er what has passed to nothingness.

eep,

The year

Has gone, and, with it, many a glorious throng
Of happy dreams. Its mark is on each brow,
Its shadow on each heart. In its swift course
It waved its scepter o'er the beautiful,
And they are not. It laid its pallid hand
Upon the strong man, and the haughty form
Is fallen, and the flashing eye is dim.
It trod the hall of revelry, where thronged
The bright and joyous, and the tearful wail
Of stricken ones is heard, where erst the song
And reckless shout resounded. It passed o'er
The battle plain, where sword, and spear, and shield

Flashed in the light of midday—and the strength
Of serried hosts is shivered, and the grass,
Green from the soil of carnage, waves above
The crushed and mouldering skeleton. It came
And faded like a wreath of mist at eve;

Yet, ere it melted in the viewless air,
It heralded its millions to their home
In the dim land of dreams.

Remorseless Time!

Fierce spirit of the glass and scythe! what power
Can stay him in his silent course, or melt
His iron heart to pity? On, still on
He presses and forever. The proud bird,
The condor of the Andes, that can soar
Through heaven's unfathomable depths, or brave
The fury of the Northern hurricane
And bathe his plumage in the thunder's home,
Furls his broad wings at nightfall and sinks down
To rest upon his mountain crag-but Time
Knows not the weight of sleep or weariness,
And night's deep darkness has no chain to bind
His rushing pinion. Revolutions sweep
O'er earth, like troubled visions o'er the breast
Of dreaming sorrow; cities rise and sink,
Like bubbles on the water; fiery isles
Spring, blazing, from the ocean, and
go
back
To their mysterious caverns; mountains rear
To heaven their bald and blackened cliffs, and bow
Their tall heads to the plain; new empires rise,
Gathering the strength of hoary centuries,
And rush down like the Alpine avalanche,
Startling the nations; and the very stars,
Yon bright and burning blazonry of God,
Glitter awhile in their eternal depths,
And, like the Pleiad, loveliest of their train,
Shoot from their glorious spheres, and pass away,
To darkle in the trackless void; yet Time,
Time, the tomb-builder, holds his fierce career,
Dark, stern, all pitiless, and pauses not