nymphs and mermaids, especially at night, when, in the setting sun, the colors fade in vapory exhalations, and the waters seem haunted by the spirits of their own beauty--pale, tremulous, waiting the vitalizing ray of the morning light. But it is in winter that the effects of the sun on the sea are most marvellous; this arises, in part, from the clearness of the air, and the dazzling setting of snow, which expresses more vividly the glow of the sea; then, too, that part of the water not exposed to the sun has an ashen, gray tint, which intensifies, by contrast, the more gorgeous hues. I remember many who saw Church's 'Icebergs' thought the coloring too brilliant, while, to those familiar with the sea, it seemed entirely natural. Thus, critics will find that it is by the study of nature we are educated up to high art; and artists, that their great danger is not in being more brilliant, but less delicate than nature. It is on the sea shore that we find the purest democracy--any man who is respectable and desirous of enjoying life may fraternize with the whole population. He who lives in the struggle to acquire or maintain a position can appreciate this social luxury. The sea exercises a delightful influence over the character--its perils induce self-reliance and fearlessness, which are redeemed from conceit by a child-like simplicity arising naturally from the contemplation of an element menacing, invincible, and symbolical of eternity. Then, too, the legends of the sea invest the mind with a sensitive, poetic passion as delightful as it is unworldly, as reverent as it is credulous. No one would deride these superstitions who has watched, as I have, the various phases of the sea--its motions, its intonations--its mists, its foam, its vapors--its sunlit splendors--its phosphorescent marvels--its moonlit and starlit mysteries; but would feel, with something of the awe of the ancients, that the sea is the place of magic, and that only a film separates between the material and the spirit land. A. J. S. READERS: You with ourselves have looked upon a very ugly thing since we last met in the pages of THE CONTINENTAL. A Briareus-handed, multiple-formed, Proteus-faced monster, of huge dimensions, wickedly scheming brain, myriad fanged, and every fang imbued with virulent copperhead poison, stormed through our streets in the light of day and in the gloom of night, during many ghastly hours, knowing no law save its own wicked will, while Treason, Cruelty, House-breaking and House-burning, Robbery, Assassination, Torture, Hanging, Murder, stalked on in its wild train of horror. But we know its face now, and it will be our own fault if anything so foul shall e'er be seen again in our midst. We must be on the alert to act when called upon--not to suspect the innocent, but to guard against the guilty.