IONAL INSTITUTIONS, NATIONAL FREEDOM. We have had too
much of State law, too much of State rights, too much of State slavery.
The NATION MUST BE SUPREME. The States must be subordinate. As we uphold
and perpetuate the National authority, so will be our existence as a
people. As we detract from this, so will be our weakness and downfall.

GOD PRESERVE THE NATION!

* * * * *

ROANOKE ISLAND.

THE SITE OF THE FIRST ENGLISH COLONY IN AMERICA.

'I know that historians do borrow of poets, not only much of their
ornament but somewhat of their substance.'--_Raleigh's History of
the World._

The name of Roanoke Island awakens in the mind of every lover of
American history, sentiments of veneration and respect. It carries us
back to the days of England's great Queen, to ruffs and rapiers, and
calls up the memories of the gallant but unfortunate Raleigh, and of the
brave knights, Grenville, Lane, and White, men who made their mark in
history even in that golden era of chivalry and enterprise.

Let us go back through the vista of nearly three centuries, and trace
the history of this spot where our language was first spoken and written
on this continent. When we recall the first occupation of this island by
the English, and picture to ourselves the Indians in their normal state,
with their dress, habitations, and implements, so picturesque and
unique, as well as the gallant gentlemen in the costume of that
picturesque age, it seems almost to border on romance. But there is a
dark side to the picture. The sombre veil of uncertainty hangs over the
fate of two entire colonies, which, if lifted, would consecrate this
spot to the extremes of suffering and bloodshed. It was, no doubt,
better to have these scenes buried in oblivion, and for each succeeding
historian to fill up this chapter with his own fancies, than to be able
to give the minute details of long days and months of probable famine,
pestilence, war, captivity, and torture, which have occurred here or in
the immediate vicinity. The certain knowledge of them would have
awakened in their countrymen sentiments of retaliation and vengeance,
and a fearful retribution would have been meted but to the natives, and
have fallen upon the innocent as well as the guilty.

It was not until about the commencement of the sixteenth century that
England could be considered one of the great maritime powers in Europe.
Although Henry the Seven