18. Though the ancient Greeks and Romans were acquainted with glass, yet they seem never to have used it in windows. This improvement in the comforts of life, was generally adopted in Europe in the middle ages. The first mention of glass windows occurs in writers of the third and fourth century.

19. A method of staining glass was generally known and employed during that period, which has since been lost. Efforts were made during the last century in Germany and France to revive this beautiful art, but with very imperfect success. The solemn and mellow light of the old Gothic churches which tends to inspire us with pensive, yet pleasing emotions, is owing to the use in them of stained glass.

20. The chief sufferings of Europe during the middle ages grew out of the neglect of agriculture. The monks applied themselves early to this useful art, and taught others how to practice it. The monasteries were generally situated in remote and desert places; the monks reclaimed the soil, drained the marshes, fertilized even the rocky mountain tops, and improved whole districts. They also taught the people other useful arts. Thus when the people of Sussex in England, were perishing with hunger during a famine, in 605, Bishop Wilfrid at the head of his monks, plunged into the sea in presence of the assembled multitudes, and thus opened to them a new source of subsistence, of which their ignorance or druidical superstitions had hitherto deprived them.* 21. The monks also cultivated botany, and studied the medical qualities of plants. The clergy were in many places the only physicians. It is a remarkable feature in that age, that every pursuit was referred to, or connected with, religion. The names of flowers were taken from some supposed aptitude to recall religious reminiscences. The passion-flower, the marygold, and others are examples of this. How beautiful and poetical the turn of thought, which suggested the idea of the Floral Calendar, by which the plants, by their different times of flowering, marked the division of time, and pointed to the holy festivals of religion! This was truly giving to the flowers a language, which spoke of God and his saints-of religion-of Heaven!

The invention is prior to

22. The clock was invented in the middle ages. the twelfth century, though the author of it is not clearly known. The phrase, "the clock has struck," was common in the twelfth century. Some award the honour of the invention to the famous Gerbert, already mentioned, who certainly put up a clock for Otho the Great, at Magdeburg, about the year 1000. Others

the fanatical followers of Mahomet, at least in its relation to the European literature of the middle ages. Yet some authors would wish to convey the impression that what we do not owe to the Chinese, we owe to the Arabs!

• See Burke's works, volume 2, page 514, et seq.

ascribe it to the Italian monk Pacificus, and others to the Abbott William, of Hirschau in Germany. It is probable that they all contributed their share to the invention at nearly about the same time. It is a remarkable fact in the history of human knowledge, that in its progress many learned men in different places hit simultaneously upon the same invention. Every scholar has heard of the controversies between the friends of Gallileo and Huygens about the application of the pendulum to clocks, between Newton and Hook and the Bernouillies, about the first discoverer of the laws of attraction; and between Newton and Leibnitz about the authorship of the fluxional and integral calculi. Before the invention of clocks, the sun-dial, the hour-glass, and the Clepsydron (constructed on the principle of water dripping through a small orifice,) were the only instruments used for measuring time.

23. In the thirteenth century, painting was revived in Italy by Giunta of Pisa, Guido of Sienna, and the great Cimabue of Florence. Thus was commenced the great Italian school of painting, which afterwards produced a Raphael, a Titian, a Michael Angelo, a Domenichino, a Hannibal Caracci, and a Leonardo da Vinci.

J

24. Silk was almost unknown to the ancients. Among the unpardonable extravagances of the Roman Emperor Heliogabalus in the third century, (A. D. 222,) historians enumerate his having had a garment entirely of silk! The silk worm was brought from the East Indies, or China, to Constantinople in 552, and the Italians first introduced its culture into Europe in the twelfth century. Roger, King of Sicily, deserves to be mentioned as the first who called the attention of Europe to this subject. The silk manufactures of Italy, France, and Flanders flourished to a wonderful extent in the thirteenth and following centuries, and the beautiful specimens of gold lace, and splendidly flowered and variegated silks of that period, equal, if they do not surpass, any thing of the present enlightened days. Many of them may be seen in the old cathedrals and museums of Europe.

25. Those ages had the merit of originating and carrying to the greatest perfection, a new style of architecture. Who has not admired the splendid specimens of Gothic architecture still visible throughout Europe; specimens which, even in the ruins, which the fanatical vandalism of the sixteenth century has left of many of them, in England, Ireland, and Scotland, are imposing still! How massive, and yet how light, is that order of architecture! How complicated the parts, and yet how simple the effect of the whole! The massive walls, and the vast pilasters, as well as the pointed arch, the delicate column and pyramid, and the fairy tracery,-all contribute their parts to the effect! Take for example the famous cathedral of Pisa, with its leaning tower, or rather the latter only. Can modern skill in architecture rear a pile like that: upwards of 200 feet high, six stories high besides the basement and pinnacle, with 209 beautiful marble columns encircleing it, and leaning between 18 and 20 feet from the perpendicular! It was built by William of Norimberg and Bonanno

of Pisa, in the twelfth century, and has been standing more than 600 years! Let men of the present day build an edifice like this, leaning as much, let it stand 600 years, and then if it be still firm and uninjured, they may sneer at the darkness of the middle ages!!!

ESTABLISHMENT OF THE CATHOLIC MISSIONS IN THE INDIAN TERRITORY.

PART I.

The government of the United States having deemed it good policy to concentrate the aborigines of the country, commonly called Indians, assigned for this purpose a territory, beyond which, within a distance of 1500 miles, no suitable habitation for white men can be made. This Indian territory is bounded by the States of Missouri and Arkansas towards the east, by the so-called American desert on the west; by Texas on the South; and by the Missouri and Platt rivers to the north. It has been assigned as the permanent abode of the various Indian tribes scattered throughout the Union. The Pawnees, Omahaws, Kanzas, Osages and Missourians roamed at large over the lands of this Territory, before this plan was adopted by our Government, which, as a necessary consequence of the new appropriation, was obliged to confine them within certain limits; and to persuade them to cede part of their lands to their red brethren east of the Mississippi. In consequence of this arrangement, the Choctaws, Chickasaws, Cherokees, Creeks, Seminoles, Senecas, Pottowatomies, Ottaways, Chippeways, Otoes, Miamies, Shawanees, Delawares, Kickapoox, Ioways and Foxes, emigrated,-some by force, others by persuasion, but all most unwillingly from the various States of the Union to the respective portions of the territory assigned to them by the U. S. Government. The original inhabitants of this territory are called the Indigenous tribes, and are savage and wretched to the extreme; the emigrant tribes are more or less civilized, according to the different relations they have had with the settlers of the States. The whole number of the Indians of this territory amounts to about 80,000 souls.— With regard to their numbers, it may be observed, that they appear gradually to decrease, owing to their inordinate mode of living, their vicious habits, the unsuitableness of the soil, the change of air by emigration &c: So that they may be said in the language of the Prophet Osce to disappear, (c. 13. 3.) as early dew that passeth away,-as the dust that is driven with a whirlwind out

of the floor, and as the smoke out of the chimney.'

may

Of their character, it

be said in general, that they are "the simple nation, described by Isaias (1. 4.) a people laden with iniquity, a wicked seed, ungracious children." It is true that the emigrant tribes have some civilization; but, generally speaking, with all the vices of the white men, they have brought few or none of their virtues over to the Indian wilds.

The state of our Holy Religion is truly deplorable among these unhappy people. Almost all the tribes are in favor of Catholic Missioners, and feel a kind of natural aversion to Protestant preachers. And yet, in the absence of the former, the latter are almost every where to be found; and the whole territory has about 40 Protestant Missionary establishments. But every plantation not made by the hand of the Father, shall be rooted out. Vain are the efforts of these unsent apostles to make proselytes among the Indians. They, may, indeed, scatter hundreds of Bibles among the Savages; but these are neither prized nor understood. The principle that faith is to be conceived by the Bible-and by the Bible alone-proves quite incomprehensible to the illiterate and savage mind: and the consequence is, that all the Protestant congregations of the Indian territory do not amount to 500 souls.

While a few of the Indians, whose devotion is bought and paid for, like any other marketable commodity, are nominal adherents to Protestanism; while thousands daily worship their Manitoos, and indulge in all the excesses of unbridled licentiousness; the voice of the Catholic Church is almost unheard, except on the banks of Sugar Creek, a tributary stream of the North fork of the Osage river. We would, however, willingly indulge the hope, that, within a few years, a line of Catholic Missions may be established, from the Missouri river down to Texas,—a plan by no means difficult of execution, and one which would be of incalculable advantage to Religion. The field is large, and the harvest promising; but the laborers are by far too few.

Twenty years ago, the zealous Bishop of Upper and Lower Louisiana directed the views of his ever active zeal towards the unfortunate Indians, especially the Osages. With the co-operation of the Rev. Charles Van Quickenborne,†

The opinion generally entertained, and which our correspondent adopts, that the Indians are rapidly diminishing in number, is somewhat contradicted by Bancroft who asserts that the dimunition of their number is far less than is generally supposed. Vol. 111. p. 253. (ED. CATH. CAB.)

†This zealous Missionary was born near Ghent, in Belgium, in 1788; he entered the Society of Jesus in 1814, and was sent to America in 1817. His success in converting many of the Osages and establishing schools for the Indians, induced Monsigneur Dubourg, the Bishop of Upper and Lower Louisiana, to entrust the whole District of the Missouri river to him. He established the order of the Sacred Heart at St. Louis, and St. Charles, where he likewise built a beautiful church of Stone. He was the founder of the Noviciate of the Jesuits at Florissant, and of the Catholic University of St. Louis, which, at present, contains 40 members of the Society of Jesus. During the month of August 1837, he fell sick on his way to visit a newly converted parish; and, on his arrival at Portage des Sioux, on the the Mississippi, he was obliged to confine himself to his bed. In the middle of the night, word was brought him, that one of the flock was on the point of death. As no other Priest was at hand, this heroic Missionary caused himself to be conveyed to the sick man's bed-side, heard

then Superior of the Jesuits of Missouri, two schools were opened for Indian youths in the township of Florissant, near St. Louis: the Indian boys were placed under the charge of the Jesuits, and the girls under that of the Ladies of the Sacred Heart. To enable them to succeed in this undertaking, the Rev. Gentlemen, under whose care the schools were placed, applied to the Government for a moderate annual income, from the sum annually appropriated for the civilization of the Indians. This request was readily complied with: but the greatest obstacle to success was found to consist in the unwillingness of the Indian youth to quit their parents home, their sports and their games, and to go to a distant place for the purpose of acquiring the learning which they so little valued. It was soon discovered that to establish missionary stations among the Indians in their own country, would be a more successful and less difficult enterprise. In consequence, this having been determined on, the Rev. Charles de la Croix, then Missioner in the State of Missouri, now a Canon Regular in Ghent, set out on a visit to the Osages,-one of the most savage of the Indian tribes. His efforts were blessed with success; and records now before us prove, that the number of children baptized by him on that occasion was very large, and the number of marriages he blessed not inconsiderable. Shortly after, he was followed by the Rev. C. Van Quickenborne, who also visited the Osage nation, and who was particularly successful in inducing the Chiefs and Headmen of the tribe to send their sons and daughters to St. Louis County. The schools, composed of Osage, Iowa and Iroquois youths, flourished for a few years, but were finally broken up, in consequence of the complaints of their parents, on seeing their children separated from them by such a distance, as also of the disinclination of the young Indians to bend under the yoke of discipline. A few years after the Rev. Joseph Lutz, of the Diocese of St. Louis, visited the wild Kanzas. The courageous efforts of this zealous Missionary appeared likely to be crowned with signal success: and already the headmen of that ferocious nation knelt in prayer by his side, when, after a residence of more than four months among them, the paucity of clergymen in the diocese caused him to be recalled to supply what appeared to be more pressing wants. The unsteady Kanza fell back into his former irregularities.

In 1835, the Rev. Father Van Quickenborne paid a missionary visit to the Miamies, on the north-fork of the Osage river. They are the small remnants of four once powerful nations the Kaskaskias, the Peorias, the Weas and the Pienkeshaws. He was received by them with great joy; and many of them,

his confession, and administered the Sacrament of Extreme Unction. When conveyed home, he found that his end was approaching; all his thoughts and affections were instantly turned toward Heaven. He had been twenty years a Missionary in America, during which time he created the principal religious establishments in the Missouri, and undertook immense labors for the glory of God. He had visited the Osages three times, and several times travelled over the vast Territory, north-west of the Missouri, raising churches, and laboring with his own hands in building them. In the midst of his greatest labours, his favourite exclamation was: how sweet it is to labour in company with the Angels, for the salvation and happiness of men.