THE
CONTINENTAL MONTHLY:
DEVOTED TO
LITERATURE AND NATIONAL POLICY.
Vol. IV.—AUGUST, 1863.—No. II.
Transcriber's Note: Minor typos have been corrected and footnotes movedto the end of the article. Table of contents has been created for the HTML version.
Contents
OUR FUTURE.
GOD'S HARP.
AUTUMN LEAVES.
ACROSS MAINE IN MID-WINTER.
DIARY OF FRANCES KRASINSKA.
THE SLEEPING PERI.
MY LOST DARLING.
REASON, RHYME, AND RHYTHM.
THE BUCCANEERS OF AMERICA.
UNDER THE PALMETTO.
A SPIRIT'S REPROACH.
JEFFERSON DAVIS AND REPUDIATION.
EVERGREEN BEAUTY.
DYING IN THE HOSPITAL.
LITERARY NOTICES.
BOOKS RECEIVED.
EDITOR'S TABLE.
OUR FUTURE.
In these exciting times, when our country is enduring the throes ofpolitical convulsion, and every time-honored institution, everywell-regulated law of society seems tottering from the broad foundationof the past, how few are there who ask themselves the question, What isto be our future? For the past two years we have lived in a state ofextraordinary and unnatural excitement, beside which the jog-trotexistence of the former days, with all its periodical excitements, itshebdomadal heavings of the waves of society, pales into insignificance.Like the grave, with its eternal 'Give! give!' our appetites, stimulatedto a morbid degree by their daily food of marvels, cry constantly formore; and a lull of but a few brief months in the storm whose angrypinions are constantly bringing new wonders to our view, begets analmost insupportable ennui in the public mind, and a restlessnessamong the masses, such as our history has never before shown. Nor willthe craving be satiated so long as the war shall last; for the stirringevents, following so closely upon each other, and filling every hour ofour national life, will keep up the unnatural excitement, even as thestimulating effect of alcoholic drinks is prolonged by repeateddraughts. Only when the source is entirely cut off will the stimuluspass away; and then, when peace is established, and we drop again intothe ruts and grooves of the olden days, the reaction will set in, andhappy shall we be if it is not followed by a political deliriumtremens.
To-day we are living in and for the present alone. Men's minds are socompletely absorbed in the wonderful events that are constantly passingaround them, in the startling denouements that each day brings forth,that their attention is entirely distracted from that future to which weare inevitably tending. A