God for his dispensations, whether terrible or joyful, I would bless anew the tyrant, my oppressor, and all his myrmidons, in that they were, unwittingly, however, His appointed agencies for my instruction and exaltation. I have learned 'how sweet are the uses of adversity'- how far more precious than gold are the lessons which persecution may impart to him who will admit into his soul the cheering light of sublime faith-how sweetly wisdom comes with her gentle insinuations in the darkest hour of trial, though in the sunshine of prosperity and success she had knocked at the door only to be scorned and denied admittance! How sweetly the grateful memories come, troop on troop, to the prisoner in his cell come on the moonbeams, on the wings of zephyr, and even upon the harsh breath of the storm as it makes the voices of midnight revelry around battlement and tower. Ay! some holy recollections are mine! ye tyrants, usurpers, myrmidons of power! But they can never be yours! never! Ye have gathered spoils, of war and of fraud - the price of blood and the purchase of the soul's virtue! Ye flaunt the genus which meanest power has filched from weakness and innocence, until the sunlight blushes red in their flashing brilliancy! Ye may gather to these all that Golconda, Peru, and the unravished bed of the ocean may yield, and yet, with their sum twice told, ye may not purchase the immortal gems and pearls I gathered in your grim 'BASTILE BY THE SEA!' Your day has come, but its fading light proclaims the fearful night ye contemplate with fear and trembling, like cowards that await an avenging jus tice without hope; while your victims wait their morning, whose dawning light even now climbs up the heavens t their view."

The following beautiful poem was composed by Mr. Wright while a prisoner in Fort Warren:

MY BASTILE YEAR.

Uh! heavy, sad, and gloomy year.
As now thy retrospect I scan,
Memory waits to drop one tear

For th' inhumanity of man:
Thy record, traced upon my soul,

Each burning line instinct with life,

As though some fiend had marred the scroll, Is stained with hate and fear and strife.

There lingers yet an angry cloud

Which shuts out every cheering ray; I list the thunder, deep and loud, And watch the vivid lightnings, play; Anon, that cloud by thunder riven And scattered in the lightning's gleam, I see beyond a silvery heaven

Where blessed rays of promise beam.

I note some weird pictures there,
And seem to hear th' enraptured strains
Of wildering accents on the air

Which zephyr wakes along the plains.

There Love's enchantments lingering glow
As now she weaves her magic spell;
I list her voice in numbers flow
Like echoes of a fairy bell.

Dear Friendship, too, handmaid of love,
Hath left the impress of her hand,
As to my questioning heart she'd prove
Her kindred with the angel band.

Now Hope essays her magic powers
To lend her radiance to the scene,
Still strives to cheer my weary hours,
Yet with illusions sweet, I ween;
She nestles under fancy's wings,
And glistens in the beams of noon;
Now her entrancing carol sings

And flies me with the waning moon.

Oft she has sought my casemate cell
Te lure me with a cheering beam.

But when the stalking sentries yell
She flees like phantom of a dream,
But still she points me to the skies,

And leads her sister, Faith, to me,
That from despair my soul may rise.
And bright, celestial joys may see.

Faith, sweet messenger of Heaven

To every wretched child of earth,
Now whispers me her mission given
To tell my soul its heavenly birth;
She blends her light with Hope and Love,
And sheds her pure, transcendent rays
Tillume the path to realms above,

Where pleasures dwell through endless days And Faith brings Patience in her train,

The virtue gentle, meek, and fair; She constant sings her dulcet strains With chorus spirits of the air.

Be still, sad heart! thy murmuring cease,
And heed the message from above!
There's nought of earth thy pain can ease,

Make room for Patience, Faith, and Love.

Now, Memory! the scroll is thine,
Essay thereon thy weird skill,
Bid hate to mar no single line

By faintest trace of suffered ill.

Let envy's dull envenomed trace,

As serpent slimes the fairest flowers,

Thy precious tablets ne'er deface,

Nor soil the wings of golden hours.

Dispel the dark'ning shades of fear

That come like shadows of the night:
Tell my sad heart that God is near,
He ever will defend the right.

Let malice ne'er the cup infuse,
Which angels proffer to my lips,
Brimful wita nectar, pure as dews

The bee from th' opening rosebud sips

Should she, perchance, prevail to blot

Thy record of my Bastile year,

Bid Charity conceal the spot,

Or cleanse it with a shining tear.

Oh let oblivion's darkest wave

Roll o'er thy gathered horrors now, Or hide them in that welcome grave, O'er which eternal waters flow.

Thy task is done; bind up the scroll;
Bear it in triumph to thy shrine,
And thither lead my willing soul,
To dream in pleasures only thine.

HON. RICHARD H. STANTON.

"O more flagrant outrage upon the rights of citizens was perpetrated during the war, than the arrests made at Maysville, Kentucky, on the 2d of October, 1861, by General William Nelson. They were not made because the exigencies of the military service or the safety of the country demanded them, but because a few political leaders, to whom General Nelson had surrendered himself, expected to promote their party interests, by getting rid of the most influential Democrats in the community.

General William Nelson was at that time recruiting his brigade in Mason, and the adjoining counties, and had established a camp a short distance from Maysville. His headquarters were in the city, where he was surrounded by his counsel of advisers, a few men who had been the life-long enemies of the Democratic party. These men made out a proscription list for General Nelson, embracing about twelve of the leading and most influential Democrats of the city, and urged their arrest and departure from the State.

On the morning of the 2d of October, 1861, two hundred armed soldiers, from the camp, under General Nelson's orders, were marched into the city, and stationed at the markethouse. Squads were sent out, and the following gentlemen, whose names had been selected by the political coterie who controlled General Nelson, were suddenly seized and placed in custody of the armed force at the market-house: the Hon. Richard H. Stanton, James H. Hall, Washington B. Tolle, Benjamin F. Thomas, Wm. Hunt, Isaac Nelson, George Forrester, and William T. Castoe.

Mr. Stanton had been an influential and leading Democrat, who represented his district in Congress, from 1849 to 1855,