66 seventeen tine, Now, I can die happy." On the contrary, it occasionally happens, when reading some feat of sporting, skill, or daring, that instead of admiration of the man, my feeling is that of sympathy for his victim. Besides being himself the destroyer, man has, for his own amusement, made animals combat with other animals, and ocasionally with man. The "sports" of the Roman amphitheatre furnish the best-known example of this in former times; the Spanish bull-fight in our own: "Foil'd, bleeding, breathless, furious to the last, 'Mid wounds, and clinging darts, and lances brast, And now the matadores around him play, Shake the red cloak, and poise the ready brand: Once more through all he bursts his thundering way- Wraps his fierce eye-'tis past-he sinks upon the sand!" In our own islands bull-baiting and bear-baiting are now illegal; and other "pastimes," once considered manly, are likewise regarded as the relics of a barbarous age. May the time speedily come when they will be utterly abolished, not merely by the terrors of the law, and the expression of public feeling, but by the growth of a kindlier and more humane spirit towards the brute creation! 10. SANITARY.-If we but think of the impurities with which both land and water are daily laden, and the vast amount of animals of various kinds that die every day, it is obvious that unless there existed a sanitary police, more vigilant and more universal in its operations than any of human enrolment, the air would become tainted, and the ocean itself impure. Such a police is found among animals themselves, and it bespeaks the consummate wisdom by which all the vast framework of animated existence is carried on, that the operations are incessant, and for the most part unseen. "Wheresoever the carcase is, there will the eagles be gathered together." Minute particles of animal matter diffused through seas and rivers, instead of undergoing the process of chemical decomposition, are laid hold of by animalcules, whose existence is made known to us only by the microscope. Others, not so minute, in conjunction with polypes, crustacea, and mollusca, are at work in freeing the water from animal impurities. Animals, some of them of larger size, jelly-fishes, star-fishes, sea-urchins, crabs and mollusks, attack dead or decaying bodies. Fishes of different species are efficient labourers in the same field. If the body be of large size, and rises to the surface, aquatic birds, of several kinds, hasten to partake of the spoil. Under the joint efforts of so many labourers, aided by chemical agencies which are ever at work, the largest animal body, even that of the whale, rapidly disappears, and its component parts, instead of generating disease and death, have gone to the support of life and animated existence, in a vast variety of forms. 11. The arrangements regarding the sanitary police for the land are not less efficient than those for the sea. In some countries numbers of rapacious birds are on the watch to attack the body of any large animal, almost as soon as it has fallen. Gordon Cumming, after describing his encounter with a lioness, and the death of the animal, says: "Before we had proceeded a hundred yards from the carcase, upwards of sixty vultures, whom the lioness had often fed, were feasting on her remains.” Beasts as well as birds are ready for such banquets, and gorge themselves to repletion. Insects of different classes take an efficient part in the work. After the muscular fibre has been removed from the carcase by beasts and birds, the skeleton is cleaned of every particle of flesh by those pigmy assailants. In countries where the larger animals which prey on carrion are not found, insects are the primary agents for its removal. Some pierce the skin; others deposit their eggs in the flesh; while wasps, ants, and beetles of several species, promptly give their assistance. 12. To trace out more in detail the part borne by these different agents, in the removal of dead and putrifying carcases, would more properly belong to a treatise on the habits of animals than to one on their uses to man. Enough has been said to show, that to animals we are indebted for much of that purity which the earth presents,. and that freedom from noxious effluvia which the atmosphere retains. Millions of animals die annually in the sea, or are poured into it, with other impurities, from mighty rivers; yet the ocean is as untainted now as at its birth, unaffected alike by age and by corruption. "Such as Creation's dawn beheld, thou rollest now!" 13. I have endeavoured in the preceding pages to point out some of the advantages which man derives from the inferior animals. They not only augment, in many ways, his physical comfort, but may, in a certain sense, be said to be important means of human civilization and advancement. To the eye of the artist, the flight of the sea-birds about the headlands, whereon they build,. is not more pleasing than their cries commingled with the sound of the waves upon the beach. The one is in keeping with the other. Not only do birds and beasts give animation to the scene, but they impart to it characteristic features, which nothing else would supply. The camel is associated in our minds with the glare of eastern skies and of sandy deserts; the reindeer with wide-spread snowy wastes; the chamois with Alpine solitudes; the lowing herd with grassy pastures and quiet homesteads. In like manner, we associate the condor with the scenery of the Andes; the birds of paradise with the islands and legends of another hemisphere; the domestic fowl with the thriving farm-yard; the bittern with the marsh, and with all that is waste and desolate. What would be the effect on the senses of man, if all those varied living objects, on which his eye rests, were converted into stone? if those sounds, that fill the air with the evidence of animate existence, were stilled for ever? Who, if deprived of it for a time,. would hesitate to term the "carol of a bird" precisely what the "Prisoner of Chillon " has done "The sweetest sound ear ever heard?" But these sights and sounds fulfil a higher purpose than merely affording gratification to the eye or the ear.. They speak of a providential care that never slumbers ; that guards the young, feeds the mature, and in the most wondrous and diversified ways provides for the continuance of the species. Those students of nature whose knowledge has had the widest range should, from that very circumstance, be the most willing in another department to "become as little children." They are prepared to receive the great and consolatory truth, conveyed in the simple words : "Are not two sparrows sold for a farthing? and one of them shall not fall on the ground without your Father. "Fear ye not, therefore, ye are of more value than many ROBERT PATTERSON. sparrows. Political and Domestic Economy. BY R. H. WALSH. LESSON I. FRUGALITY AND PRUDENCE. "And when he had spent all there arose a mighty famine in that land; and he began to be in want." 1. INSTEAD of wishing, like those who are called Communists, to deprive the wealthy of what they possess and divide it among others less affluent-or seeking, like Socialists, to make Government the head of each working establishment, with powers to arrange how much shall be paid to the labourers and employers respectively, the mode of conducting the business, and the distribution and destination of such property as belonged to any one who dies, (if indeed under a system of this nature private property could be said to exist) — it is far better to consider how each may earn money for himself, without taking away from others, or interfering in any manner whatsoever with what they are entitled to. 2. And to one who has not seriously reflected on this subject, it will be astonishing to see all he can do for himself if he only set about it in earnest, instead of wasting his time and energies in abusing the rich and coveting their possessions, or seeking to control them. He will find it can readily be explained with what facility he can improve his condition by using the opportunities within his reach; and if not satisfied by the reasons offered, he may be convinced by innumerable examples of persons who have succeeded in life with no greater advantages than he had. Most commonly, indeed, without looking beyond the circle of his own immediate acquaintances and neighbours, he may discover many who have got on well and made themselves comfortable without any better opportunities than he had at starting, merely because they turned those that presented themselves to good account. And he may also learn that had he acted like them, not only would his material comforts have been increased, but, moreover, he would be in a position far more favourable to the advancement and preservation of moral worth. 3. The habits, inclinations, and desires of individuals presenting considerable variety, the means by which they hope to satisfy themselves differ in a corresponding degree. Some hope to attain a position of wealth and eminence so high as to raise them far above the rest of their class, and place them among the great ones of the earth; while the aim of others is less ambitious, they only wishing to secure themselves a comfortable position without advancing in any remarkable degree beyond those in their own walk of life who are pretty well circumstanced. As for the more aspiring, it is not here intended to treat of them at any length. Those who become very rich or very great are necessarily few in number, and aided usually by extraordinary advantages of some kind or other; which shows that it can benefit the public generally but little to consider the means whereby a success can be attained which is beyond the reach of most. Besides, even when it is attained, its effects in promoting the true welfare of its possessors are extremely doubtful, the greatest success often disappointing expectations, and being purchased at the expense of such excessive toil of mind and body, nay, sometimes at the sacrifice of the best principles of our nature-so that the struggle to attain it may not only produce misery or even vice while it lasts, |