THE SEMI-COLON.

NO. I.

January 1st, 1845.

AN IMPORTANT DISCOVERY.

EVERY body knows, because Shakspeare says it, that

"Time hath a wallet at his back

Wherein he puts alms for oblivion;"

but very few know what a host of authors are devoting themselves exclusively to the labor of preparing the alms for that same wallet. Even in the West, where there are so many other matters requiring attention, old father Time has found many charitable contributors-many who give freely and liberally their two mites out of their penury,—so that he comes on his collecting tours as regularly as the clerks of the Philadelphia and New-York merchants, and generally with much better success.

On one of these occasions, old Edax rerum finding his wallet filling faster than he wished or expected, began to get tired of such a run of contributions; and, at length, getting fairly into a passion, begun to speak his mind very freely-to himself, (and we recommend every one who undertakes to speak his mind very freely, to do the same, viz.: to speak it to himself.) "Well really," said he, "this is beyond endurance. This country is get