THE NATIVES OF AUSTRALIA.

AUSTRALIA is about 16,000 miles from Great Britain. It lies between the Pacific and Indian Oceans, and is the largest island in the world. Only a part of it has yet been explored.

Although the voyage to Australia occupies three or four months, which is a long while for any one to be confined in a ship on the sea, numbers of our countrymen are constantly leaving their native land to settle there, and some of them take large families with them.

In that vast country there is plenty of room for as many more as are likely ever to go; and the climate of that part of it which is known is mild and beautiful, and likely to promote the health of those who live there.

Many things which seem strange to us have been told of this island.

In

The summer there happens while we have winter here, and the autumn in our spring-time. December, January, and February the weather is so hot that the fruits and corn are then ripened, and the people gather their harvest.

There are curious trees in Australia, most of.

them evergreens. One has leaves like grass growing upon it. Another has fruit which looks like a pear, but is to the touch as hard as wood. There is also a fruit like a cherry, with the stone growing outside.

Some of the animals that belong to this country are remarkable in their appearance. The Kangaroo is one of these. This is a very pretty creature, measuring nine feet in length from the tip of the nose to the end of the tail. Its head and neck are small compared with the lower parts of its body. Its front legs are about half a yard in length, but its hinder legs nearly a yard and a quarter. The

head is something like that of the deer, and it has the same gentle looking countenance. The ears are large and erect, the eyes full, and the mouth small. The skin is of a pale brown or gray colour. When the Kangaroo rests, it sits upright on the whole length of its hind feet, with its fore feet hanging in the same way as those of a dog taught to beg; while the weight of its body is partly supported by its tail, which is extremely thick and strong, and with which it is able to defend itself from many of its enemies. When this animal moves from place to place, it does not walk or run, but leaps or springs; sometimes even to the distance of twenty feet. Its young are preserved in a wonderful manner, The female has a pouch or pocket in front of her, into which the little ones jump in time of danger; who put their heads out and peep, like kittens confined in a child's pinafore.

The Opossum is in some respects similar to the Kangaroo, and in others widely different. It also possesses a pouch, and indeed sometimes two or three, in which its offspring are taken care of. The Opossum is about the size of a cat, and is covered with fur. It has a head like that of a fox, ears like those of a rat, bright eyes; feet having, like hands, five fingers, with white crooked nails. The tail is round and about a foot in length. The Opossum lives upon small animals, chiefly birds. It hides in the trees, while watching for its prey. When on the ground it moves very slowly, but climbs trees with great rapidity, and will hang upon them for hours by means of its tail, which enables it also to swing from tree to tree. It will then drop suddenly upon any creature underneath, which it may be able to conquer, and will quickly devour it.

The natives of Australia are a most wretched and

degraded people, they are more like brutes than men in their habits and character. Their persons resemble those of the Africans, and for this reason they have been called Australian negroes. They have flat noses, wide mouths, and thick lips, and those who inhabit New Guinea have very dark skins and woolley hair.

They have either no habitations, or merely rude huts formed of the bark of trees. The men seldom wear any clothes, except in cold or wet weather, when they cover their backs with the skin of the Opossum, which is tied round the neck. The women sometimes wrap themselves in a cloak or blanket. These poor savages wander about in companies in search of food. They never cultivate the ground, nor do they keep any tame animals, but live upon wild beasts and birds, or upon roots, which the women dig out of the ground with a stick.

The different tribes of these people arc continually at war, in which they use sharp wooden spears. They are fierce, mischievous, and treacherous; “hateful and hating one another." Many of them are eaters of human flesh.

The Australian in the picture looks as if he were cruel as well as cunning, and not only savage, but sullen and miserable.

Let us hope that, as many Christian people are now found among the settlers in Australia, some of them will endeavour to make known to the unhappy natives the "glorious gospel of the blessed God."

HEAVEN.

THE traveller who has taken a long and wearisome journey in a rough way, and through a strange and dangerous country, where he is liable to lose himself and to become the prey of wild beasts, or to be plundered by robbers, rejoices greatly when he arrives at the city from which he set out, where the friends he loves are waiting for his arrival. Then his toilsome pilgrimage is over: he has reached The Christian is a pilgrim through this

home. world

his home is heaven.

The Israelites when they left Egypt were told by God to expect that they should be settled in the land of Canaan, and they were led about for forty years in the waste howling wilderness, hoping they should take possession of the country that was promised them, and rest in and enjoy it. They did enter into it, and it became their own.

The apostle tells us, in his epistle to the Hebrews, that there is a rest that remaineth for the people of God. That rest is heaven. As the Jews were happy and joyful when they entered Canaan, so those who love God and are his people now, shall, when they arrive in heaven, rejoice with joy unspeakable and full of glory.

There they will live with Jesus Christ, “who loved them and washed them from their sins in his own blood;" and he will welcome them to the mansions he has prepared for them.

There they will meet with holy angels, who filled all heaven with gladness whenever any one of them repented of his sins and turned to God.

And there they will find Abraham and Isaac and Jacob-the prophets-the apostles-the martyrs— all the good, and wise, and great men who have ever lived,-made pure and perfect by the love and grace of Jesus Christ.