It is a singular fact, that a man can institute his mystery or medicine, but once in his life; and equally singular, that he can reinstate himself by the adoption of the medicine of his enemy; both of which regulations are strong and violent inducements for him to fight bravely in battle: the first, that he may protect and preserve his medicine; and the second, in case he has been so unlucky as to lose it, that he may restore it, and his reputation also, while he is desperately contending for the protection of his community. bravely for his country, he suffers a dis- | something useful. We have no drones grace scarcely less than that which occurs in this hive; every bee must contribute a in case he sells or gives it away; his proper share of useful production, or he enemy carries it off, and displays it to will be disgraced and discontented, and his own people as a trophy; whilst the either go scantily supplied himself, or loser is cut short of the respect that is somebody else must be injured. Ours is due to other young men of his tribe, and beehive law, and Bible law too; for, 'If for ever subjected to the degrading epi- any will not work, neither let him eat."" thet of "a man without medicine," or Then again, if he saw people moving "he who has lost his medicine;" until he about in a moping way, with a sluggish can replace it again, which can only be step, the hands hanging from the wrists, done by rushing into battle, and plunder- a listless yawn, and a vacant countening one from an enemy whom he slays ance, or one that expressed only a mixwith his own hand. This done, his medi- ture of indolence and fretfulness, he would cine is restored, and he is reinstated say, "Come, cheer up. Look as if it again in the estimation of his tribe; and really was a pleasure to you to be alive even higher than before, for such is and active. Do not creep like a hencalled the best of medicine, or "medicine turkey on a snowy day.' Now, a henhonourable." turkey on a snowy day is really one of the most striking pictures of desolateness and discomfort that can be imagined. Her feathers look dirty and draggled. She seems not to know where to set her foot, and to be anxiously looking for something that she does not find. Most likely this is really the case. Turkeys are creatures which suffer much from wet and cold; and though, when they are domesticated, provision is made for their shelter and supply, yet, as instinct prompts the parent bird to seek worms and insects, on which her young ones partly feed, she discovers a restless desire to get abroad in quest of them, even when the weather is such as to render her exertions both uncomfortable and fruitless. No wonder that her aspect is that of moody disappointment. If we could reason with the bird, we might advise her to give over endeavours that must be baffled-to content herself for the present with the provisions assigned her, and to hope for the not far distant day when changing weather and circumstances shall enable her to supply her brood in a manner more congenial with her wishes. But there are those who might be reasoned with, and who ought to reason with themselves; yet, who, contrary to reason, and to Scripture too, indulge a gloomy, discontented spirit, and go about as pictures of misery, either on account of merely imaginary evils, or, if real, evils which a little energy and perseverance might surmount, or, at any rate, evils which, if absolutely unavoidable, are capable of being made the best or the worst of, according to the disposition in which they are encountered. "There are two sorts of evils," said my grandfather, "about which a wise man During my travels thus far, I have been unable to buy a medicine bag of an Indian, although I have offered them extravagant prices for them; and even on the frontier, where they have been induced to abandon the practice, though a white man may induce an Indian to relinquish his medicine, yet he cannot buy it of him; the Indian in such case will bury it, to please a white man, and save it from his sacrilegious touch; and he will linger around the spot, and at regular times visit it and pay it his devotions as long as he lives. Such, then, is the medicine bag-such its meaning and importance; and when its owner dies, it is placed in his grave and decays with his body. COMMON SAYINGS. COMPARISONS WITH ANIMALS. OLD grandfather Griffiths had many shrewd sayings about animals. If he saw young people disposed to be indolent and loitering, he would say, "Come, my dear, jump about, find something to do; and will never make himself miserable; those which can be remedied, and those which cannot. The first he will set himself diligently to mend, and the very effort will make him cheerful: the second he will set himself quietly to bear; and time and patience, if they do not make the yoke absolutely easy, will, at least, inure the shoulders to bear it. A man of wisdom, energy, and piety, may know what it is to be sad and sorrowful; but he will not yield to desponding indolence; he will not go about moping like a hen turkey on a snowy day.' Poultry are in general easily collected by the voice of her who is accustomed to feed them; but at the close of harvest, when they are turned into the stubble to gather the scattered grains that may have escaped both the reaper and the gleaner, they are not easily attracted by a distant voice. I have, more than once at that season, heard my aunt and her dairymaid complain of the difficulty of catching poultry for the market or the spit, and even of ascertaining that their number was all right; for so pleased were they with their range in the corn-field, that they would scarcely (especially the geese) come in even at night. If my grandfather saw people inclined to stay too long over their pleasures, or unwilling to leave one kind of work in which they were much interested, for some other needful, but less agreeable service, he would say of them, "Ah, we may call, but they will hear with their heels, as geese do in harvest,' or if they come, they move towards us with a snail's gallop.' A young man applied to my grandfather to get him a situation, and named a sum with which he should be satisfied. Pretty well for a beginning," replied my grandfather, “if you get half the money: but what do you propose to do by way of earning it? for folks now-a-days are not over fond of paying a salary for the sake of having somebody to look at. If they agree to give you money, they will expect to have money's worth out of you in return. What can you do?" Several employments were proposed, to each of which the young man started some objection. Close confinement would not suit his health; stirring work would be too laborious; one sort of employment was too dirty; another was not genteel enough; a city would be too close and smoky; a village would be too dull. "Ah!" said my grandfather, "you are like 'the cat that would eat fish, but did not like to wet her feet;' and I fancy she got very hungry before the fish jumped into her mouth. Those who have their living to seek must learn to put out their strength and skill, and to put up with many things. You are blessed with health and strength to fit you for active labour, and you have had an education to fit you for a counting-house, if such be your choice. Don't despise dirty work, for 'dirty work earns clean money;' and don't fancy that anything can be ungenteel or disgraceful which is lawful, honourable, and useful. Let me tell you, young man, before you are likely to get suited, you must come down several notches in your notions, and go up at least as many more in your willingness and determination to make yourself useful. If you have good sense, you will learn these lessons of your own accord; if not, it is likely that want will be your teacher. The bird that can sing, and won't sing, must be made to sing. To those who pleased themselves with talking about what they intended to do in circumstances which they had not yet attained, and how they intended to dispose of property not yet acquired, my grandfather would say, "I wish you readier meat than a running hare.' It is a good rule in cookery to catch your hare before you skin it, and your fish before you fry them,' and in the poultry yard, not to reckon your chickens before they are hatched.' Future things are so uncertain, that it is seldom wise to reckon upon them. Even what we possess slips away from the gaze of our eyes, and the grasp of our hands, Prov. xxiii. 5; Jer. xlv. 5; and as to the future, they are indeed foolish builders who build 'castles in the air.' It is foolish to take anxious thought for the morrow, to perplex and distress ourselves about wants which may never arise, and cares which it is our duty and our privilege to cast upon God; and it is really presumption, as well as folly, to reckon upon future possessions and enjoyments, especially if as is often the case-people excuse themselves in the neglect of present duty by fine promises of how much more and how much better they will do at some future time, when they have their golden dreams fulfilled, which perhaps they had no reason whatever to entertain rate, which it cannot be certain they will ever realise.' Two instances present themselves to my recollection. One, of a person who was in the habit of drawing largely on the kindness of his friends, yet at any who never was known, by any effort of self- | mortification.-Years rolled on; he rose exertion or self-denial, even to attempt to in the counting-house, and acquired a requite their kindness, but satisfied himself liberal salary; but he found it no more with professing deeply and gratefully to than sufficient to support him in the genfeel it, and boasting what wonderfully teel style which he considered suitable to great and generous things he would do his ultimate prospects, and essential to for them all, when the wheel of fortune his success in forming a matrimonial should turn, and he should be placed in alliance. In one or two other attempts, circumstances of affluence and power. he met rebuffs nearly as mortifying as "Ah," said my grandfather, "fine pro- that in the parable of the king of Israel, mises truly, to be made good at the ex- 2 Kings xiv. 9. At length, he married piration of a lease of nine hundred and a person without property and without ninety-nine years, when the hedges bear education. His dreams of wealth were guineas instead of blackberries, and 'when equally vain. I have stated that, while the sky falls,' so that we may catch he had an ample salary, he lived up to it. larks.' The other was a young man re- This was suddenly cut off by the failure cently installed in a merchant's counting- of the mercantile house with which he house. This young man made some ad- was connected; and he sought, with vavances to my sister Lydia. I should rious success, one employment after anrather say, made up his mind that he other, each somewhat less advantageous intended to marry her, and forgot to than the preceding, and each abandoned take into his calculation the possibility of for want of accommodating his mind to being rejected. He was very fond of his circumstances, and by indulging a laying splendid plans for the future. It restless ambition for something more and was not his intention, he said, to settle in something better. And not only was the city. He should take a house at the there a failure of the "goods" which he west-end of the town, or in one of the intended to "lay up" for the solace of his villages adjacent to the metropolis. He "soul;" but also of the "many years" on should, however, thoroughly devote his which he had calculated for the enjoytime and energies to business for ten or ment of them. He died almost before fifteen years; and then-having realised the meridian of his life was passed, a prey an ample competency-should, with what- to disappointment, resulting from vain ever family he might have, visit the con- expectations. tinent of Europe, and travel until he met with some elegant retreat—most likely in Switzerland or Italy-where he should fix his abode. "Go to now," said my grandfather, in the emphatic language of Scripture, "Go to now, ye that say, Today or to-morrow we will go into such a city, and continue there a year, and buy and sell, and get gain. Whereas ye know not what shall be on the morrow. For what is your life? It is even a vapour, that appeareth for a little time, and then vanisheth away. For that ye ought to say, If the Lord will, we shall live, and do this, or that," James iv. 13-15. It is almost needless to add, that not one of the day-dreams of this ambitious schemer was fulfilled. On proposing himself to my sister, he was petrified to learn that she had been long engaged to another, and was on the point of marriage. Observe, I do not mean to insinuate that he was in any danger of breaking his heart after her. Such schemers are invariably selfish, incapable of deep and generous affection, and susceptible only of selfish preference, selfish pride, selfish gratification, and selfish THE MILK OF THE WORD. IN a Liverpool paper it is said :-The following anecdote was a few days ago related to a friend in this town, by a respectable gentleman recently arrived from Cork :-A short time since, a Romish priest of the county of Kerry received information that a very naughty member of his congregation, a milkman, was in the habit of frequently reading the Scriptures, and the reverend confessor, well knowing that such a practice would place "the craft in danger," lost no time in paying a pastoral visit to the poor ignorant and misguided delinquent. On arriving at the humble cabin, he found poor Pat employed in his domestic affairs, and thus addressed him, "Why, my good fellow, I am informed that you are in the habit of reading the Bible; is my information correct?”- -"Sure it is thrue, plase your riverence! and a fine book it is." "But you know," rejoined the priest, "that it is very wrong to read the Scriptures. An ignorant man like you has no right to do so." "Ah!" replied 66 THE INFANT'S GRAVE AT PERE LA CHAISE. Pat, "but you must be afther provin' | that same, before I can consint to lave it off." The colloquy then proceeds as follows:-Priest: "That I will soon do." Pat: "Sure if your riverence does that, I'll read no more, and give it up to you.' Priest: "I will, from the book itself, convince you that you have no business to read it." The priest immediately took up the Bible, and read to Pat from 1 Pet. ii. 2-" As new born babes, desire the sincere milk of the word, that ye may grow thereby." "Here you see," said the priest, you are wrong to read the Scriptures yourself; you are only a babe; and you are enjoined to desire the sincere milk of the word.' One who understands what the sincere milk really is, must give it you, and tend you." Pat listened attentively to the priest's authoritative address, but, in no way at a loss to reply to what might have puzzled wiser heads, said, "Ah, but be aisy, your riverence, while I tell you. A little time ago I was took ill; I got a man to milk my cows, and attend to my business, and what do you think he did? Why, astid ov givin' me the rale milk, he chated me by puttin' wather into it; and if you get my Bible, you may serve me that same. No, no, I will keep my cow, and milk it myself, when I shall get the sincere milk, and not as I should from you, mixed with wather. The priest, finding himself thus defeated, and desirous that the mischief should spread no farther, said in a conciliatory tone, "Well, Pat, I see you are a little wiser than I thought you; but, as you are not quite a babe, you may keep your Bible, but don't lend it or read it to your neighbours." Pat, eyeing his admonitor very cunningly, but seriously, replied, "Sure enough, your riverence, while I have a cow, and can give a little milk to my poor neighbours who have none, it is my duty to do so as a Christian; and, saving your riverence, I will." The priest, abashed, walked off immediately, doubtless convinced, to a considerable extent, that the circulation of the pure word of God must ultimately overthrow the superstition and soul-enslaving fabric of Popery. THE INFANT'S GRAVE AT PERE LA WHO can walk among the graves of heroes, and philosophers, and the departed multitudes, whose tombs adorn the blooming cemetery of Pere la Chaise, with a heart untouched? surely not the Chris tian. On ascending the rising ground the green and flowery scene before you, interspersed with hundreds of elegant marble tombs, over which the graceful willow is constantly waving its drooping foliage, presents an affecting picture. Nor can the efforts of survivors make us forget that it is still 66 a valley of dry bones." Gay and busy Paris is seen from hence in the distance, the various ranks of whose inhabitants are daily increasing the tenants of this "city of silence.' Amidst the proud memorials of the rich, and the dust of the great, and the learned around, Ney and Tallien, Laplace and Molière, a little white marble pile attracted our attention, a garland was hung upon it, and at the foot a simple flower was in blossom; it had been carefully watered, most likely by the mourning mother of the babe over whose dust it bloomed. On the marble was the following inscription: O mon fils, Ici repose Qu'une mort prématuré et funeste "O my son, like a tender flower, thou wast cut down in the morning of life. Here rests Amadeus Augustus, a young child of eight months, whom a death premature and sad, snatched from the tenderness of his parents." The Christian mother, while she mourns in the language of this touching and simple epitaph, will be comforted by the words which fell from the lips of our Saviour. Oh, encouraging thought to the bereaved parent, "Suffer little chil dren, and forbid them not, to come unto me, for of such is the kingdom of heaven," Matt. xix. 14. What a transformation does a reliance on these words effect! 66 The faithless mother gazes on the corpse of her infant, shrouds it in satin, decks it with flowers, looks on it as a nipt blossom," and calls it lost, while she who rests on the Saviour's words, sheds as tender tears, and equally feels a mother's aching heart; but cheering faith enables her to look through the veil, and call it a transplanted flower; a safely housed lamb; one among that "spotless, guiltless company, in whose mouth was found no guile, and who are faultless before the throne of God." ENGLISH HISTORY. CHARLES 11. THE reign of Charles 11. was constantly disturbed with plots, and the rumours of designs against the king and his government, even from the commencement. The year 1664 began with a special commission being sent to the northern counties, to try those who were accused of planning an insurrection, and of being concerned in a tumultuary assembly in Yorkshire. Twenty-one persons were convicted and executed. There were other trials in London. On March 16th, the parliament met, when the king made use of the late tumult, attributing it partly to a law passed in 1641, which some considered required a new parliament every three years. This was doubtfully expressed; but the law was now repealed, and another enacted that three years should not pass after a parliament had been dissolved, without calling a new assembly. The clauses of the former act, which directed the sheriffs to proceed to elections, even if the royal writs were not issued, were not repeated. Thus the whole power, as to the regular meeting of parliament, was left at the pleasure of the crown, and the king could repeat his father's most unpopular proceedings in this matter. Severe measures were urged against the Dissenters. In May the Conventicle Act was passed, forbidding, under heavy penalties, the meeting of more than five persons for religious worship, in addition to the members of a family. For the third offence, the punishment was a fine of 100%., or transportation for seven years, increasing the penalty 1007. for each offence. This act was a direct violation of the royal promise of toleration: it was enforced with vexatious severity, and Clarendon would have urged still stricter proceedings. The prisons were soon crowded with victims, many of whom perished from disease, while those who had property were impoverished by the fines, or the sums they had to pay as bribes to the favourites in power. The latter part of the year was occupied by disputes with Holland, which ended in hostilities, the duke of York capturing more than a hundred Dutch merchant vessels before war was declared. The pretext was, injuries to the British seamen. The expenses attendant on this warfare embarrassed the king; but he F |