ELIHU BURRITT.

about two hundred volumes. There was no great choice amongst them. They consisted of history and sermons; but he had had an earnest conference with his mother in the church porch, and they had come to a compromise with regard to the books to be selected for the next two months, with which he could not be greatly dissatisfied. He was to select one half, according to his own particular taste, for his own particular reading, and she the remainder. It is needless to say that his choice fell upon books of history, while his mother devoted herself to sermons and homilies. Two little volumes were, however, but scanty fare for his hungry mind, and, spite of the most rigid frugality of reading, never lasted him beyond the first month of the stipulated time; so that, to use his own phrase, for the last month he was in a state of intellectual famine. The last week of this month, and the one before the "next drawing of books," was one of great excitement; and most earnest used his endeavours to be to persuade his mother that, with so good a minister as they had, one small volume of sermons might suffice for her spiritual necessities; and sometimes, but not often, he induced her to be of his opinion.

In this way, by the time he was sixteen, he was master of the contents of all the historical works contained in the little parish-library, and many of which he had read two or three times over. Burritt himself attributes the living, unappeasable zest which he has ever had for books, to the early difficulty which he had in obtaining them. It is probable, he says, that had he been turned into an immense library as soon as he was able to read, he should never have acquired such a taste for reading, and the whole tenour of his life might have been different.

Soon after the age of sixteen, he apprenticed himself to a blacksmith, and took up his residence with his brother Elijah, who, as we said before, fled from Georgia to his native town, and here opened a school.

By Elijah's advice, however, when his term of apprenticeship had expired, and he was one and twenty, he laid aside his hammer, and became a student with his brother for one half-year. In doing this he had no higher aim in view than that of being able to manage a surveyor's compass, and perhaps of reading Virgil in Latin. He could earn a dollar and a half a day at his trade, and consequently might consider that every day he spent in school cost him that sum of money. This reflection made him doubly industrious. After this half-year of study, in the spring, he found himself well-versed in mathematics; he had gone through Virgil in Latin, and had read several French works; he was therefore well satisfied with himself, and returned again to the forge, determined to make up for lost time. To accomplish this thoroughly, he engaged himself to do the work of two men, and thus received double wages. Severe as this labour was, and requiring fourteen hours of each day, he still found time to read a little of Virgil, or a few pages of French, morning or evening. He at this time also first began to look into the Spanish, which, to his delight, he found he could read without much difficulty. Burritt's was not a mind to stand still, or to be satisfied with the attainment of the nearest goal; there was still always a goal beyond, and that must also be reached. Thus it was that, during this summer, he conceived the idea of making himself acquainted with Greek. He procured, therefore, a Greek grammar, a little book which would just lie in the crown of his straw hat, and which he thus carried with him to his work, which was the casting of brass cow-bells in a couple of furnaces, which he had to watch with no small attention. Whilst standing over these, waiting for the fusing of the metal, he would take out his little grammar, and commit part of a Greek verb to memory. Thus he worked on, both with head and hands, till autumn.

ELIHU BURRITT.

He then removed to New Haven, and took up his abode there during the next winter. On arriving in the town he took lodgings at an inn, and commenced a course of study on the following plan, which we will give in his own words :-"As soon as the man who attended to the fires had made one in the common sitting room, which was at about half-past four in the morning, I arose, and studied German till breakfast, which was served at half-past seven. When the

boarders were gone to their places of business, I sat down to Homer's Iliad, without a note or comment to assist me, and with a Greek and Latin lexicon. A few minutes before the people came in to their dinners I put away all my Greek and Latin, and began reading Italian, which was less calculated to attract the notice of the noisy men who at that hour thronged the room. After dinner I took a short walk, and then again sat down to Homer's Iliad, with a determination to master it without a master. The proudest moment of my life was when I had first possessed myself of the full meaning of the first fifteen lines of that noble work. I took a triumphal walk in celebration of that exploit. In the evening I read in the Spanish language until bedtime. I followed this course for two or three months, at the end of which time I had read about the whole of the Iliad in Greek, and made considerable progress in French, Italian, German and Spanish."

When the winter was over, he returned again to New Britain, girded on his leathern apron, and again resolved to "make up for lost time." The fame of his learning, however, had travelled before him, and he was requested to take the management of a grammar-school in a neighbouring town. This post he occupied for a year, attending no less sedulously to his own studies than to those of his pupils. At the end of this time, however, his health suffered from the confinement, and from the want of that vigorous

exercise to which he had been accustomed, and he was compelled to give up his school.

Mr. B. now became a travelling agent, and was thus engaged about a year. During these journeys he commenced the study of the Hebrew language. He then began trading on his own account, but did not succeed, and he now resolved to devote his life to the pursuit of knowledge.

We

We have thus gone through the early life of this remarkable man, but we have much more to tell you about him. We have not told you half yet. shall have to tell you how many more languages he mastered, and then how he began to think in what way he could make use of his vast learning for the good of others—all mankind. When reading the old books of many languages, he saw that war had always been the curse of the world; and so he set himself to work to point out the evils of all war, and the blessings of peace. In America he did much good in this way, and then he came to England, and is now very busy with his pen and his tongue trying to get men to love one another. We had the pleasure of entertaining him at our own fireside a few days ago, and to-morrow we expect him again. But we must finish the sketch of his life first, and then tell you something about what he said and did when he was here. "Blessed are the peace-makers, for they shall be called the children of God."

Let us all pray that those days so long predicted in Holy writ may soon come, when

"They shall not hurt, nor more destroy,

On Zion's holy ground;

But perfect peace and holy joy,

Throughout the earth abound."

BY WILLIAM BAILEY, MISSIONARY IN ORISSA.

Ar early dawn, on the day of the full moon, in the month Joisht-hu (June), the brahmins are seen wending their way to the temple of Juggernaut.* When they arrive at the temple door, a shrill blast is blown from a large shell, which wakes the god from his slumbers. When he has recovered himself from the effects of sleep, the announcement is given with all becoming reverence by the officiating priest, "To-day is the day appointed for your bathing. Give the order, and we will remove you from your throne to the place prepared for the ceremony." The god, condescendingly, is made to give a nod of assent; ten

"Juggernaut" is derived from two Sanscrit words-" jugut," the world, and "nat'hu," lord-"rut," car; "jatra," festival.