according to my wonted custom, I sat me down to examine the subject a little more closely. inside contents were so out of keeping, that | proper frame of mind, after running through a whimsical puff on " Improved Periwigs?" Or turn with becoming gravity to the spiritual food provided by Fuller and Flavel, Boston and Baxter, from a paragraph written in high commendation of "Pickled Gherkins, and Potted Yarmouth Bloaters?" It may be that I am a little fancifulmany old people are so; but every thing that I read affects me for some time after, and therefore it was that the strange mixture of advertisements on the outside of the magazine, disqualified me altogether from reading the inside with advantage. As Old Humphrey never willingly gives offence, nor intentionally brings an unnecessary blush on the face of any one, so is he the more free in his observations. If he sees a friend wearing a lamb's-wool stocking on the wrong side; or, a stranger, who has set his back against a whited wall, he can no more help pointing out the defect, than he can help warming his hands in cold weather. The magazine, as I said, was a religious one, and I took it up with that sort of feeling which harmonized with what I expected to find in the work itself. The title of a book is often, to a reader, what the tuning of a violin is to a musician; it prepares him to enter on his undertaking in a proper manner. Unfortunately, the magazine had six or eight leaves of advertisements at the beginning and ending, of so odd and mixed a character, that the mind of Old Humphrey, too often affected with trifles, was sadly deranged by them. If, in going into a place for Divine worship, you were to find two buffoons standing in their motley dress, arrayed in their cap and bells, it would perhaps unfit you for the service, just the same as these advertisements unfitted me for the profitable reading of the contents of the magazine. Old Humphrey wanted to enter into the marrow of the work; but he was so pestered with the strange medley of "Artificial Teeth," and "Steam-cooking Kitchens ;"" Quarto Bibles," and "Buckskin Breeches ;" "Fountain Pens," "Tallow Candles," "Beaver Bonnets," and "Sabbath Meditations ;" ""Irish Linens," "Cheddar Cheese," "Religious Tracts," and "Cure for the Tic Douloureux;” “Soda Water," "Fire Escapes," "Sacred Classics," and "Patent Chronometers," that he was fain to shut up the book altogether, till the hodgepodges had subsided in his mind. A great deal more might be said on this subject; but, to confess the truth, Old Humphrey himself is often complained of as being sadly out of keeping; sadly inconsistent. He is blamed, and with too much The leaves in their very colour were at reason, for letting the liveliness of his diswar with the tone of my mind; there was position peep through some of his most nothing sober about them: one was a deep serious remarks. He goes from a cheerful blue, another a fiery red, and a third a observation to a text of scripture too sudfrightful yellow; but the colour of the denly; and, therefore, knowing his own leaves was a trifle compared to their con- infirmity, he ought not to be severe on the tents. It was well enough to advertise infirmities of others. He will say no more, Prayer Books and Homilies," but what then, about the medley of advertisements had they to do with "Rowland's Kalydor," on the covers of the magazine, than this, his "Pearl Dentifrice," or his "Macassar that he hopes what has already escaped Oil?" To put into the same page "His-him is not out of keeping with good nature tories from Scripture," and "Old Hock, and christian affection, and it may suggest fine crusted Port, straw-coloured Sherry, to some whom it may concern, a useful and exquisitely sparkling Moselle," seemed hint on consistency. a little out of order. What affinity, what possible connexion could there be between "Watts's Psalms and Hymns," and "Imperial Saxony Cloth, Canton drill Trowsers and Petersham Great Coats?" These things, to say the least of them, were sadly out of keeping; they were not consistent. So long as human beings remain such poor infirm mortals as we are, so long will it be necessary to pay some attention to those things that affect us. Who is there who could read a pious commentary in a THANKFULNESS. Он, be ye thankful. I feel that I have not said enough on that word of the apostle's, "I thank God;"—and I cannot. Let your gratitude to Christ supply my omissions. Were I to speak for hours, I could not fully show your cause for thankfulness. Be thankful through life for every deliverance in conflict and temptation. Be thankful in death for such a Deliverer from the last enemy. Be thankful, throughout eternity, to God, through Jesus Christ our Lord!-Hambleton. INSECTS. No. XXXVIII. (Continued from page 141.) Ir seems fair to suppose, from the variety of sounds produced by insects, that they are intended as signals to their companions, who must, of course, possess the organs of hearing. The address of the poet to the cricket, one of the creatures remarkable for such sounds, is very pleasing :— Little inmate, full of mirth, Thus thy praise shall be express'd, Though in voice and shape they be The celebrated naturalists, Linnæus and Bonnet, were disposed to consider insects as deaf; but the knowledge of Shakspeare was more accurate when he made Mami lius say, I will tell it softly, Yon crickets shall not hear it. As soon as it becomes dark, the chirping of crickets increases, and they come running forth, often in great numbers, from the size of a flea to that of their full stature. We speak now of the hearth-cricket, (acheta domestica;) both this and the field-cricket (acheta campestris) are sometimes kept for their music; and the learned Scaliger took so great a fancy to their song, that he was accustomed to keep them in a box in his study. It is said, that in some parts of Africa they are kept and fed in a kind of iron oven, and sold to the natives, who like their chirp, and think it is a good soporific. The female cricket is mute. The instru ment on which the male plays, consists of strong nervures, or rough strings in the wingcases, by the friction of which against each other, a sound is produced and communiIcated to the membranes stretched between them, in the same way that the finger produces vibrations on a tambourine, which are diffused over its surface. The male tree-hopper, cicada, has a curious instrument of sound. He is furnished with a pair of drums, one on each side, consisting of two large plates, oval or circular in some, and triangular in other spe cies, fixed to the trunk between the belly and the hind legs. When this exterior membrane is raised, a cavity is brought into view, a part of which seems to open into the belly, and another part to be covered with a second membrane, much more delicate than the exterior one, tensely stretched, and irridescent, and in the middle there is a horny plate, placed horizontally along the bottom. All this, however, seems only a secondary portion of the instrument; for the sound is in the first instance produced by a bundle of muscular strings, which are attached at one extremity to another membrane in the interior, obviously the true drum; for when Reaumur pulled the strings, and let them go again, the sound was produced, even after the insect had been a long while dead. These muscles, indeed, are so attached to the under concave surface of the drum, that when they pull it downwards, and let it jerk quickly back again, a vibration is produced; the sound issues through an opening contrived on purpose, like the opening in our own larynx, or the sound hole in a violin. with the ancients, who often kept them in Some grasshoppers were great favourites cages for the sake of their song. They were supposed to be perfectly harmless, and to live on dew. One poet calls the grasshopper "the nightingale of the nymphs;" and another styles it "the sweet prophet of the summer." So attached were the Athenians to some of these insects, that they fastened golden images of them in their hair; addressed them in the most endearing terms; and from this we may gather that their notes were sweet. Indeed, the sound of them and of the harp were called by one and the same name. grasshopper sitting on a harp was the usual emblem of music, which was thus explained :-Two rival musicians, Ennomus and Ariston, were contending upon that instrument, when a grasshopper flying to the former, and sitting on his harp A supplied the place of a broken string, and secured to him the victory! At Surinam, the music of one species is still supposed to resemble so much the sound of a harp, or lyre, that there they are called harpers. CHANCE. "It happened so," said an infidel, upon hearing the relation of a circumstance similar to the following: A pious young man, in consequence of a series of misfortunes, was reduced to great poverty and distress, but his confidence in God was unshaken. A few weeks since, he entered the room where I was, pale and pennyless; it was then about ten o'clock: he told a friend of mine, who was standing by my side, that he had had no breakfast that morning, and looking up, with tears in his eyes, said, "I left a piece of bread at home, about the size of my two fingers, for my wife; and her dear little infant is dying of want;" but, said he, with a smile upon his wan countenance, "I know the Lord will provide; I am sure he will." "You will take some dinner with me to-day," said Mr. R.; he, of course, assented, and while he was sitting at dinner, a letter was delivered, directed to Mr. H. He opened it, and found 10s. inclosed, and was also informed that if he called that day week at Ostreet, he should receive another 10s. With a countenance deeply impressed with emotion, the starting tears of gratitude flowed freely down his cheeks; and turning to Mr. R., he said, "Did I not tell you the Lord would provide?" That morning the distressed Mr. H. had called upon a person, from whom he received no relief, but to whom he related the situation in which he was placed. Shortly after he had left, a humane gentleman called upon this person, from whom he received an account of the distressed circumstances of Mr. H. "O, if I had been here," he replied, "I would have given him 10s." "You will find him at Mr. R.'s," said the person who had related the facts of the case to him; he then immediately sent off a note with the sum inclosed. THE BRITISH EMPIRE. "My brethren," remarks bishop Heber, in a discourse delivered in India, “it has pleased the Almighty to give that great, valiant, and understanding nation to which we ourselves belong, an empire in which the sun never sets, a commerce by which the remotest nations of the earth are become our allies, our tributaries, I had almost said our neighbours, and by means (when regarded as human means, and distinct from his own mysterious providence) so inadequate, as to excite our alarm as well as wonder, the sovereignty over these wide and populous heathen lands. But is it for our sakes that he has given us these good gifts, and wrought these great marvels in our favour? Are we not rather set up on high in the earth, that we may show forth the light by which we are guided, and be the honoured instruments of diffusing these blessings which we ourselves enjoy throughout every land, and in every distant isle which our winged vessels visit? If we value, then, (as who does not value?) our renown among mankind; if we exult (as who can help exulting?) in the privileges which Providence has conferred on the British nation; if we are thankful (and God forbid that we should be otherwise) for the means of usefulness in our power; and if we love (as who does not love?) our native land, its greatness and prosperity, let us see that we, each of us in our station, are promoting to the best of our power, by example, by exertion, by liberality, by the practice of every christian virtue, the extension of God's truth among men, and the honour of that holy name whereby we are called. There have been realms as famous as our own, and (in relation to the then extent and riches of the civilized world) as powerful and as wealthy, of which the traveller sees nothing now but ruins in the midst of a wilderness, or where the mariner only finds a rock for fishers to spread their nets upon. Nineveh once reigned over the east; but where is Nineveh now? Tyre had once the commerce; but what is become of Tyre? But if the repentance of Nineveh had been persevered in,her towns would have stood to this day. Had the daughter of Tyre brought her gifts to the temple of God, she would have continued a queen for ever." Let the infidel say, this was "all chance," "that it happened so;" but let him know, that although the rain descends upon the evil and the good, upon the just and upon the unjust, yet God bestows special favours Price d. each, or in Monthly Parts, containing Five upon those that love and serve him. JOHN DAVIS, 56, Paternoster Row, London, Numbers in a Cover, 3d. 1 A. G. W. TYLER, Printer, 4, Ivy Lane, St. Paul's. ON TORTOISES. No. II. (Concluded from page 210.) IN our preceding paper we entered into a few details on the general characters of the tortoises, as they constitute an order distinguished by striking peculiarities of form and structure. We shall now proceed to explain the more important of those differences which form the grounds of their separation into subordinate groups. We may premise by observing that they may be divided into land tortoises, fresh-water tortoises, marine tortoises or turtles, and soft tortoises. The land tortoises, of which the Greek tortoise, (testudo Græca,) and the gigantic Indian tortoise, (testudo Indica,) are examples, are distinguished by the solidity of their osseous investment, and the arched form of the carapace, which is united by nearly the whole of its lateral margins to the plastron. The limbs are short, thick, VOL. III. and clumsy; the feet appearing merely as the abrupt terminations of them, and to be recognised as such only from the circumstance of being provided with short toes, (five before, four behind,) armed with stout nails. The skin of the limbs and neck is course, hard, and intersected by numerous fissures. Their food consists of vegetable matter. Their actions are slow, and their pace an awkward crawl. Many are distinguished by the beauty and regular distribution of the colours with which their shell is adorned. Some have the anterior part of the plastron moveable by means of a hinge, stretching across, so that when they retract their head and arms, they can close the aperture, and shut themselves in. Such form the genus pyxis. In another genus, kinirys, the posterior part of the carapace is moveable. The land tortoises are most, if not all, hibernating in their habits; at least they pass a portion of the year in a state of DD lethargy; having previously dug a hole in the ground for their reception. which and the true skull, inclosing the bram, there intervenes an enormous space filled by muscles, to which this osseous envelope may be considered as a sort of carapace. Hence the skull of the turtle appears much larger than it is in reality; the brain being very small, and its true osseous covering in proportion. It is to this group that two of this most interesting order belong; one the celebrated green turtle, (chelonia mydas or viridis ;) the other, the tortoise-shell turtle (chelonia imbricata.) The green turtle is well known; it abounds in the regions of the torrid zone, and is gregarious in its habits, feeding on sea-weed and other marine vegetables. Its eggs, which are deposited in the sand, are as highly esteemed as its flesh. This species often attains to the weight of five or six hundred pounds; so that to lift and secure one, by tying it to a clump of wood on shore, four men are not unfrequently necessary. It obtains the name of green turtle, from the colour of its fat. The fresh-water tortoises are distinguished from the land tortoises by their flattened form, from the carapace being less arched, and less stout, its osseous stratum being in general comparatively thin. In addition we may observe, that the toes are thoroughly developed, terminated by long nails, and united by intervening webs, enabling them to swim with great facility. Among the fresh water tortoises, or emydes, are a group having the plastron so divided by a transverse hinge, as to be capable, after drawing in the head, limbs, and tail, of shutting themselves completely up; hence they are termed box-tortoises. In another group, on the contrary, the tail is so long, and the limbs so voluminous, as to render it impossible for them to be withdrawn beneath the buckler. Of this group, the chelydra serpentina is an example. It is a large tortoise of rapacious habits, inhabiting the rivers of the warmer parts of the American continent, and living upon fish, The chelonia imbricata is little inferior small aquatic mammalia, reptiles, and even in size to the common or green turtle, and birds. Indeed, as it respects the food of is found in nearly the same latitudes. Vathe emydes, or fresh water tortoises in ge-lued for the sake of its scales, which conneral, we immediately notice a departure from the vegetable diet of their terrestrial relatives. With increased activity, and consequently an increased facility of procuring food, we find the emydes all carnivorous; their prey consisting of insects and their larvæ, small fishes, reptiles, &c. Many, as the emys picta, emys pulchella, &c, are remarkable for their varied and beautiful colours. Two species, or perhaps varieties of one species, (emys orbicularis,) are found over the whole of the south of Europe, and as far north as Prussia. They are gregarious in their habits, and feed on frogs, fish, &c.; their flesh is highly esteemed as nutritive and delicate food. The marine tortoises or turtles next demand our notice. In these we also observe a depressed form of carapace, which is too limited to protect either the head or limbs, | while the plastron is still more circumscribed, and irregular in figure. The feet no longer retain any claim to that term, but are moulded into true paddles, in accordance with the completely aquatic habits of their possessors. On land the turtle shuffles along like a seal in the sea it is an active swimmer. The skull in this group of tortoises offers too remarkable a peculiarity to be passed by. It is vaulted over by a sort of helmet, dense and solid, formed by a production of the bones of the face, between stitute the costly "tortoise-shell," it is taken in great numbers on the island of Ascension; a place which appears to be a sort of annual rendezvous for thousands, which traverse leagues of the ocean in order to deposit their eggs on its shores. The men employed in this business, watch their opportunity (when multitudes, under cover of night, have ventured from the water to the beach) to run in among them, and turn each victim upon its back, in which position it is utterly unable to move: when a sufficient number are thus made prisoners, they are collected and shipped. Our last group contains the soft tortoises, so called because a soft skin, in place of scales or horn, envelopes their carapace and plastron. They are aquatic in their habits, frequenting fresh waters, and, like the emydes, have the feet webbed; but three toes only on each foot are furnished with nails. Both the carapace and plastron are flat, and very limited; a great portion being simply cartilage instead of bone. The nose is elongated, and the tail is short. Of this group (trionyx) the species are limited in number, but widely distributed. They are found in Java, in the Ganges of India, in the Euphrates, in the Nile, in the rivers of Carolina, Guiana, and other hot parts of America. They attain to large dimensions, and are fero'cious in their habits and manners; seizing |