WILLIAM.

The north pole is quite in darkness.

MOTHER.

The north frigid zone you mean; the poles are only the points on the surface of the globe where the axis ends. When the earth is situated as our little globe is at 5, the days in the northern hemisphere are shorter than the nights; and to all the countries north of the equator it is Mid-winter, while it is Mid-summer to all the southern hemisphere.

ELIZABETH.

Then the two hemispheres have their seasons exactly reversed to each other?

MOTHER.

Exactly; and when we have followed the earth round its orbit, you will see how equally the blessing of light is distributed to all parts of the globe. As I move our little globe through 6, on to 7, the length of the days in the southern hemisphere is affected in the same manner as the days in the northern hemisphere were when we moved it from 1 to 2; and at 7 the days and nights are again equal all over the world, for the globe is situated,

with respect to the sun, just as it was at the opposite point, 3, of its orbit. The earth reaches this part of her orbit about the twenty-second of March.

ELIZABETH.

Is not this what is called the Vernal, or Spring equinox?

MOTHER.

Yes; to the inhabitants of the northern hemisphere it is so, but to those who are in the southern hemisphere it is the Autumnal equinox.

ELIZABETH.

Because, while it is spring with us, it is autumn with them. How very clearly this little globe, and the wire circle, explain the difference of the

seasons.

MOTHER.

As the earth advances, the days continue to lengthen in the northern hemisphere, and to shorten in the southern, till it arrives at the point from which it set out; and then the north frigid zone is again entirely in the light, and the south frigid zone in complete darkness. To show you

this, I will move the globe on through the point 8 to 1 again. From this exhibition you may understand the reason why the days lengthen and shorten from the equator towards each of the poles every year; why the days and nights are of the same length all the year round at the equator, which is always equally divided by the circle that appears to separate the light from the darkness; and why there is no day and no night, alternately, within each of the polar circles.

ELIZABETH.

I should like to read you a passage I met with in a book I was reading some time ago, in which the feelings that naturally arise in the mind, in each different season, are expressed :-"While the great end of the variation of seasons, is the support and maintenance of the world to which we belong, it has yet, also, an indirect effect in the moral and religious instruction of man. There are emotions which every where characterize the different seasons of the year. When spring appears -when the earth is covered with its tender green, and the song of happiness is heard in every shade, it is a call to us to religious hope and joy. Over the infant year the breath of heaven seems to blow with paternal softness, and the heart of man

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willingly participates in the joyfulness of awakened nature. When summer reigns, and every element is filled with life, and the sun, like a giant, pursues his course through the firmament above, it is the season of solemn adoration; we see then, as it were, the majesty of God; and wherever we direct our eyes,' the glory of the Lord seems to cover the earth as the waters cover the sea.' When autumn comes, and the annual miracle of nature is completed-when all things that exist have waited upon the God which made them, and ' he hath given them food in due season,' it is the appropriate season of thankfulness and praise. The season of winter has also similar instructions; to the thoughtful and feeling mind it comes not without a blessing upon its wings; and, perhaps, the noblest lessons of religion are to be learnt amidst its clouds and storms."

THE warmth and climate of the different parts of the earth's surface, differ in proportion as they are more or less exposed, and for a longer or shorter time, to the rays of the sun; and the surface of the globe is, by geographers, supposed to be divided into different zones, or bands, according to their distances from the equator. The word Zone is derived from a Greek word signifying belt. The broad space on the earth which corresponds to the space, like a band or girdle, on the terrestrial globe, between the tropics, is called the Torrid Zone; and the equator is in the middle of it all around. The space to the north of the equator, between the tropic of Cancer, and the arctic circle, is called the North Tem