full keeping with
the principle suggested--an object unattainable by the means ordinarily
in possession of mankind, yet which, if attained, would lend a charm to
the landscape-garden immeasurably surpassing that which a merely human
interest could bestow. The true poet possessed of very unusual pecuniary
resources, might possibly, while retaining the necessary idea of art
or interest or culture, so imbue his designs at once with extent and
novelty of Beauty, as to convey the sentiment of spiritual interference.
It will be seen that, in bringing about such result, he secures all the
advantages of interest or design, while relieving his work of all
the harshness and technicality of Art. In the most rugged of
wildernesses--in the most savage of the scenes of pure Nature--there
is apparent the art of a Creator; yet is this art apparent only to
reflection; in no respect has it the obvious force of a feeling. Now,
if we imagine this sense of the Almighty Design to be harmonized in a
measurable degree, if we suppose a landscape whose combined strangeness,
vastness, definitiveness, and magnificence, shall inspire the idea
of culture, or care, or superintendence, on the part of intelligences
superior yet akin to humanity--then the sentiment of interest is
preserved, while the Art is made to assume the air of an intermediate
or secondary Nature--a Nature which is not God, nor an emanation of God,
but which still is Nature, in the sense that it is the handiwork of the
angels that hover between man and God."

It was in devoting his gigantic wealth to the practical embodiment of
a vision such as this--in the free exercise in the open air, which
resulted from personal direction of his plans--in the continuous and
unceasing object which these plans afford--in the contempt of ambition
which it enabled him more to feel than to affect--and, lastly, it was in
the companionship and sympathy of a devoted wife, that Ellison thought
to find, and found, an exemption from the ordinary cares of Humanity,
with a far greater amount of positive happiness than ever glowed in the
rapt day-dreams of De Stael.

MAELZEL'S CHESS-PLAYER

PERHAPS no exhibition of the kind has ever elicited so general attention
as the Chess-Player of Maelzel. Wherever seen it has been an object of
intense curiosity, to all persons who think. Yet the question of its
_modus operandi is _still undetermined. Nothing has been written on this
topic which can be consider