s the Bay of all Rivers--the Bay of
all Delights--the Bay of all Beauties. From circumjacent hill-sides,
untiring summer hangs perpetually in terraces of vivid verdure; and,
embossed with old mosses, convent and castle nestle in valley and glen.

All round, deep inlets run into the green mountain land, and, overhung
with wild Highlands, more resemble Loch Katrines than Lake Lemans. And
though Loch Katrine has been sung by the bonneted Scott, and Lake Leman
by the coroneted Byron; yet here, in Rio, both the loch and the lake
are but two wild flowers in a prospect that is almost unlimited. For,
behold! far away and away, stretches the broad blue of the water, to
yonder soft-swelling hills of light green, backed by the purple
pinnacles and pipes of the grand Organ Mountains; fitly so called, for
in thunder-time they roll cannonades down the bay, drowning the blended
bass of all the cathedrals in Rio. Shout amain, exalt your voices,
stamp your feet, jubilate, Organ Mountains! and roll your Te Deums
round the world!

What though, for more than five thousand five hundred years, this grand
harbour of Rio lay hid in the hills, unknown by the Catholic
Portuguese? Centuries ere Haydn performed before emperors and kings,
these Organ Mountains played his Oratorio of the Creation, before the
Creator himself. But nervous Haydn could not have endured that
cannonading choir, since this composer of thunderbolts himself died at
last through the crashing commotion of Napoleon's bombardment of Vienna.

But all mountains are Organ Mountains: the Alps and the Himalayas; the
Appalachian Chain, the Ural, the Andes, the Green Hills and the White.
All of them play anthems forever: The Messiah, and Samson, and Israel
in Egypt, and Saul, and Judas Maccabeus, and Solomon.

Archipelago Rio! ere Noah on old Ararat anchored his ark, there lay
anchored in you all these green, rocky isles I now see. But God did not
build on you, isles! those long lines of batteries; nor did our blessed
Saviour stand godfather at the christening of yon frowning fortress of
Santa Cruz, though named in honour of himself, the divine Prince of
Peace!

Amphitheatrical Rio! in your broad expanse might be held the
Resurrection and Judgment-day of the whole world's men-of-war,
represented by the flag-ships of fleets--the flag-ships of the
Phoenician armed galleys of Tyre and Sidon; of King Solomon's annual
squadrons that sailed to Ophir; whence in after times, perhaps, sail