Two years in the French West Indies

When you find yourself for the first time, upon some unshadowed day, in the delightful West Indian city of St. Pierre, -supposing that you own the sense of poetry, the recollections of a student, -there is apt to steal upon your fancy an impression of having seen it all before, ever so long ago, -you cannot tell where. The sensation of some happy dream you cannot wholly recall might be compared to this feeling. In the simplicity and solidity of the quaint architecture, -in the eccentricity of bright narrow streets, all aglow with warm coloring, -in the tints of roof and wall, antiquated by streakings and patchings of mould greens and grays, -in the startling absence of window-sashes, glass, gas lamps, and chimneys, -in the blossom-tenderness of the blue heaven, the splendor of tropic light, and the warmth of the tropic wind, -you find less the impression of a scene of to-day than the sensation of something that was and