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Cruelty to Animals, 56, 63, 83, 121, 185, 226, 248,

317

Wag-tail, The, 91
Wardian Cases, 182
Water, Value of, 250
Wax Insect Tree, 363
Weather Wisdom, 300
Westminster Abbey, 211
White-bait, The, 231
White Shark, The, 213
Winds, The Prevailing, 270
Wine-Cork Insect, 60

Woman,-a "Magic Lemon!" 254
Women and their Parasols, 346
Wood-lark, The, 58, 371
World, The Artificial, 254

Yew Tree, The, 331

Zollverein Bird Cages, 56
Zoological Folk-Lore, 222, 352

(DDS DWN JOURNAL.

JANUARY, 1853.

THE PAST, THE PRESENT, & THE FUTURE. should be filled with love for the Maker of

NATURE,-attend! Join every living soul,
Beneath the spacious temple of the sky!
In adoration join; and, ardent, raise
One general song! We cannot go
Where Universal Love smiles not around,
Sustaining all yon orbs, and all their suns;
From seeming evil still educing good,
And better thence again,-and better still,
In infinite progression! ...

Come then, expressive Silence, MUSE His praise!
THOMSON.

W

HILST OUR PEN IS NOW WRITING, the Old Yearone thousand, eight hundred, and fifty-two, is, though tempestuously raging, fast declining. Ere the ink which is flowing in our pen shall be thoroughly dry, the old year will have sunk to his rest, and be known only as among the things that have been.

Such is the winter of life!

The year which has just closed upon us, has been one of the most eventful within our recollection. It will be for the historian of the year, to collect the extraordinary circumstances that have occurred, both at home and abroad, within the past twelve months; and to place them in array before us. We who know them, and have watched them narrowly in their progress, can meantime ruminate on the significance of their meaning, and turn them to a profitable account. It is a favorite axiom of ours, that nothing happens by chance; and that everything that transpires

is "right."

Heaven and Earth! Alas! how little the regard paid to either body or soul, when feasting and excess are considered the main points of a good life! But let us change the

scene.

The seasons of the year are the topics which most concern us and our readers at this time. It will be remembered, that the Winter of 1851-2 was a remarkable one,all sorts of changes prevailing on one and the same day. It was sometimes cold, sometimes warm; sometimes frosty, and sometimes wet, all within twenty-four hours. The consequence was, perpetual illness, almost universal sickness, and a great increase in the Bills of Mortality. Spring and Winter seemed to have formed a coalition. They were hardly discernible the one from the other. The whole of the first half-year, as a perusal of OUR JOURNAL will testify, was unseasonable in every respect. were deluged with rain; and all of us worn out with the. pains and sufferings inseparable from such long-continued damp and cold.

We

what a Summer! We rose at once from Suddenly, Summer broke in upon us. And zero to boiling heat. We were all but fried as we walked along the streets. This continued for a goodly time. Our gardens soon

felt the influence, and we found ourselves planted on every hand in a perfect paradise of flowers. The joys of this season we shall never forget; neither those connected with

the commencement of Autumn. Our pen

Holding such a strange doctrine as this, has already been eloquent on the subject, and it will be less a matter for surprise that we have yet other singular ideas. For instance, leaves of OUR JOURNAL. our thoughts will be found registered in the we cannot fall in with the usual custom of seeing the Old Year out, and the New Year of the commencement of Winter, we would Of the concluding portion of Autumn, and in-amidst riot, noise, smoke, drink, and fain be silent. We had such a constant sucdebauchery. Let the wassail bowl have its cession of wet days, and wet nights-such notaries, the bottle its unflinching compa- storms, and such elemental discord, that we nions-but let us have an equally free choice. would indeed forget the remembrance of them. The results of intoxication have already met Many who were in the enjoyment of perfectly our eye. Men have been transformed into robust health in the Summer, were, ere the taste, whilst Nature was kindly preparing close of Autumn, consigned to their last restRibald jests, profanity, and obscenity, have pleasing gossip upon bright future prospects 1 set before them the glories of a New Year! ing place. Many, with whom we held much rent the air-at a season when every voice during the past summer, have long since been

VOL. III-1.

B

numbered with the dead. They sleep,-to meet us again in this world no more.

It is impossible to regard these things, as too many do, as mere matters of course. Old Time is stealing a march upon us, and we find our turn approaching. We know not how soon! This increases our desire, and our ardent longing, to be "useful" in our day and generation; and we will not deny that we feel some little pride in knowing that many feel interested in the extension of our life. Long ere Christmas, our earthly career was apparently at an end. Our sand, it was imagined, had nearly run out. Our life hung on doubt, for many days. We had prepared for the great change.

The wise Dispenser of events, however, caused hope to spring up. In the hands of a skilful practitioner we rallied. We contended vigorously against the invasion of our internal enemy; and, being a man of the most temperate habits, we finally vanquished him. For our victory, let us thank the God of all our mercies. We do so, most devoutly the more especially, as many who were at the same time with ourself suffering from a precisely similar malady (but who were not men of temperate habits), sank under their sufferings. Another forcible argument this, for our favorite motto-Temperance in all things.

We have taken occasion, in former numbers of OUR JOURNAL, to commend to our readers' especial notice the due observance of Christmas,- a season when all families and their various branches should make a point of assembling together, to cement the bond of love. Nature, no doubt, rejoices as much as we do in the various réunions that take place at such a time. Many ill-feelings have perhaps been suffered to exist, between many parties, for many months previous to this grand meeting. A kiss of love at once annihilates the remembrance of these. Fresh vows are exchanged; future meetings planned; many sweet promises of communicating more frequently are given; and so the New Year dawns auspiciously on all. We repeat, that we look upon the season of Christmas, with its holly, misseltoe, and other commendable associations, with fond delight. Nor have we been wanting this season in performing our part in what we so strongly recommend to others. We feel individually all the better for it; and we will undertake to say as much for the possessors of the many happy, cheerful, loving, and lovely countenances, with which ours has innocently come in contact.

Well; we will not now dilate upon these matters; though we feel justified in hinting at them, and in gently enforcing their observance. Let us turn to the New Year.

It is a wise provision of Nature, to make

certain little breaks in the routine of our too regular life. She introduces a succession of pleasing changes, to keep our minds in equilibrio. From to-day, we shall live in the hope and pleasing expectation of seeing a daily change in the aspect of our fields and gardens. Hitherto stationary, there will be a progressive movement in vegetation. Though the year is young, there is already much to delight us; for the season, having been unusually mild, many pretty little heads are modestly popping up, even now, to greet us as we pass from place to place.

We must not forget, too, that the days are gradually lengthening; and that the dear, bright, and glorious sun has commenced his new annual course. Feeble though his rays at the beginning of the month, yet is his enlivening countenance shining upon us Still, brighter and brighter every day. Winter is upon us, and we must, for a little season, amuse ourselves indoors as well as out; for the voices of the birds are not yet fully lows." It is a painful sight to see how some heard, their "harps are hung upon the wilof our tiny friends are benumbed with the the pleasure we feel in welcoming them to cold; but it is more than compensated by the hospitality of our table. The wrens, the robins, Dickey Dunnock," and the blueheaded titmouse, flock around us on every side; and many a grateful song do we get, by the way, in return for a few crumbs of bread thrown out of the window.

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JANUARY, in its early days, is a cold, wet, drizzly, unsatisfactory month-a month of colds and asthma, rheumatism and lumbago. All nature partakes of its blighting influence. Still it comes with its awakening hand, and shakes grey-bearded old Winter in his chilly sleep:--

A wrinkled, crabbed man, they picture thee, Old Winter; with a rugged beard, as grey As the long moss upon the apple tree. Blue-lipt, an ice-drop at thy sharp blue nose; Close muffled up, and on thy dreary way Plodding alone through sleet and drifting snows. Rude, too, and violent, is the awakening hand of January, causing the very icicles which bind old Winter down, to rattle again, whilst breathing into his frozen ear tidings that each successive day is longer than the last; and bidding him prepare to abdicate in favor of the tender, delicate snowdrops, whose graceful heads are even now visible as they exert their growing energies to make their way through the frost-bound earth :

Nature! great parent! whose unceasing hand Rolls round the seasons of the changeful year, How mighty, how majestic, are thy works! With what a pleasing dread they swell the soul That sees astonished! and astonished sings! How wearisomely would the year pass away, but for these changes! How would life hang

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