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The disk of this beautiful planet is now less than half illuminated; and she therefore appears like a bright crescent. From her rapid approach to the earth her brightness daily increases, and she will attain her maximum brilliancy, about the 21st of this month. Under favourable circumstances, when at her greatest brightness, she has sometimes been known to cause objects to emit a shadow.

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Eclipses of Jupiter's Satellites.

There will be 20 eclipses of the first and second of these satellites this month, but only the following three will be visible at Greenwich: viz.

Emersions.

First Satellite, 7th day, at 1 m. 50 s. after 11 at night

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Conjunction of the Moon with the Planets and Stars.

June 1st, with 8 in Capricorn, at midnight

23d 29th

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Jupiter...
B in Capricorn

9 in the morning

9

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Other Phenomena.

The planets Mercury and Saturn will be in conjunction with each other at midnight of the 17th of this month. The former will also attain his greatest elongation on the 27th.

The following lines are applicable to the planet Venus during the fine evenings of this month, when she shines with considerable brilliancy:—

The EVENING STAR.

The Evening Star illumes the blue south,
Twinkling in loveliness. O, holy star!
Thou bright dispenser of the twilight dews;
Thou herald of night's glowing galaxy,
And harbinger of social bliss, how oft,
Amid the twilight of departed years,
Resting beside the river's mirror clear,
On trunk of massy oak, with eyes upturned
To thee in admiration, have I sat,

Dreaming sweet dreams, till earth-born turbulence
Was all forgot; and thinking that in thee,
Far from the rudeness of this jarring world,
There might be realms of quiet happiness.

Blackwood's Magazine.

The Naturalist's Diary

For JUNE 1828.

The season now is all delight,
Sweet smile the passing hours;

And Summer's pleasures at their height,
Are sweet as are her flowers.

CLARE.

EACH chapter of the creation is equally divine, equally the emanation of its omnipotent author. The minutest particle of it is too great for the puny intellect of man to grapple with: how, then, shall it comprehend the whole? The earth clothed with an endless variety of animal and vegetable life; and even the mould beneath its surface inhabited by beings adapted to their state of existence: oceans and rivers peopled with shoals of living things, to the shapes and instincts of many of which we are strangers: and, to descend to minutiæ, the air itself animate with congregated myriads of imperceptible creatures: the liquids we make use of, but masses of animation;--an animal almost imperceptible is the

theatre and support of millions which are entirely so. How is the mind swallowed up and lost in the immensity which it vainly attempts to fathom; but, even on the surface of which, it is tossed and driven about like a feather on the ocean. But, perhaps, amid this apparently boundless variety, there is no class of created things more calculated to delight the senses of man than that of flowers.

What a beauteous and odorous populace burst into existence beneath the footprints of creative Spring, as she walks over the earth clothed with beauty as with a garment. Then advances Summer, in the full pride of maturity, and deluges its whole surface with prodigal and luxuriant fertility. Lovely are the variegated fruit-blossoms, the beauteous cradles of the little germs which are soon to ripen into those coloured and sunny balls, which shall bow down the branches in autumn! Beautiful are the gay inhabitants of the garden! the gorgeous and queenlike rose-purity's emblem, the fair lily-the lofty and clustering lilac-the white snowdrop (a little billet flung from the delicate hand of Spring, to command the departure of Winter)-the fringed pinkthe lowly. heartsease- the climbing and odorous honeysuckle, entwining itself around, and adorning the object by which it is upheld (lovely emblem of the affection and devotedness of woman)-the rainbow-headed tulip; and many beside, too many to be enumerated. But do these alone possess beauty and impart delight? Does not the field, the hedgerow, the river's brink, and, indeed, every spot accessible to the silver shower, or the creative sunbeam, present the mind with volumes to amuse and instruct it? Are the exquisite flowers of the violet, blue and white (like constancy and purity), inferior to any of the minions of cultivation? Is there not beauty in the asphodel? Does not the simple and modest daisy begem the fields and the lawns almost entirely through

out the year? Hath not the meadow its golden wealth of cowslips; the hedge its hawthorn; the heath its blue-bells? And, low as they may be ranked in the scale, are not even the lichens and mosses, which clothe the most desolate places, replete with sweetness and with beauty?

They are the jewels of nature-the poetry of the earth! yet how dull and insensible is mankind to the moral which they inculcate; how deaf to the language which they convey. While the sensitive and intellectual few, of all ranks, perceive and revel in their sublimities,—the unfortunate, whose orbs of vision are sealed in darkness, is not more blind to them than are the great majority of mankind. Behold the vulgar clown, or, it may be, the not less vulgar mammon-worshipper, what charms have natural objects for him?

A primrose by the river's brim,

A yellow primrose is to him,
And it is nothing more.

How is the ethereal spark of mind tainted, or absorbed by the earthiness of our nature! How recklessly will they tread under foot, without observation, things which thrill the more gifted mind of the poet or the painter with ecstasy'.

Bring flowers, young flowers, for the festal board,
To wreath the cup ere the wine is poured;
Bring flowers! they are springing in wood and vale,
Their breath floats out in the southern gale,
And the touch of the sunbeam bath waked the rose,
To deck the hall where the bright wine flows.
Bring flowers, to strew in the conqueror's path--
He hath shaken thrones with bis stormy wrath!
He comes with the spoil of nations back,
The vines lie crushed in his chariot's track,
The turf looks red where he won the day-
Bring flowers, to die in the conqueror's way!

Spirit and Manners of the Age, vol. i, p. 289.

Bring flowers to the captive's lonely cell,
They have tales of the joyous woods to tell;
Of the free, blue streams and the glowing sky,
And the bright world shut from his languid eye;
They will bear him a thought of the sunny hours,

And a dream of his youth,-bring him flowers, wild flowers!
Bring flowers, fresh flowers, for the bride to wear!

They were born to blush in her shining hair.
She is leaving the home of her childhood's mirth,
She hath bid farewell to her father's hearth:
Her place is now by another's side-

Bring flowers for the locks of the fair young bride.
Bring flowers, pale flowers, on the bier to shed
A crown for the brow of the early dead :

For this, through its leaves hath the white rose burst;
For this, in the woods was the violet nursed;

Though they smile in vain for what once was ours,
They are love's last gift-bring ye flowers, pale flowers.
Bring flowers to the shrine where we kneel in prayer,
They are nature's offering, their place is there!
They speak of hope to the fainting heart,
With a voice of promise they come and part,
They sleep in dust through the wintry hours,

They break forth in glory-bring flowers, bright flowers.

FELICIA HEMANS.

The Austrian rose blossoms in the early part of the month, as does also the Chinese rose: these are followed by the common garden rose, the single yellow rose, and the white rose; last of all comes that loveliest of floral attractions,-the Moss ROSE.' A Polish poet has written a beautiful eulogy on the rose; it is thus translated by Mr. BowRING:

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Rose of the morning, in thy glowing beauty,
Bright as the stars, and delicate and lovely,
Lift up thy head above thy earthly dwelling,
Daughter of heaven!

Wake! for the watery clouds are all dispersing;
Zephyr invites thee: frosts and snows of winter
All are departed, and Favonian breezes

Welcome thee, smiling.

Rise in thy beauty,-Wilt thou form a garland
Round the fair brow of some beloved maiden?
Pure though she be, unhallowed temple never,
Flow'ret, shall wear thee!

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