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"Bo," which means good, in the imperfect Portuguese which they speak. So, I took the path, and found it the right one, which soon led me out of the wood. I know not if the negro had been taught in Africa that the insect had this faculty, or whether it was a superstition he had learned from the Portuguese.

I caught one on a mountain on the shores of the Black Sea, which was more curious and extraordinary in its appearance and movements than I had before seen. any I shut it up in a box, and forgot where I laid it. Several months after I found the box, and when I opened it, I saw the prisoner inside as vigorous and lively as when I enclosed him. He seemed even more sage and active than any of his tribe. I kept him for nearly a year in this state of abstinence and confinement, and frequently exhibited him for the amusement of my friends. I never let him out for fear he should become invisible like his predecessors; but within the precincts of his prison he displayed all his extraordinary talents, and never seemed to suffer from the seclusion of air, light, or food. I sent him to a friend in England as a curiosity, hoping that he would have an opportunity of exhibiting him alive in the same way; whether the voyage was as ungenial to his feelings as to other animals, and he sunk under the effects of sea-sickness, or whether the period of his natural life had arrived, I know not, but, when my friend opened the box, on its arrival, the poor, wise, immortal Mantis was dead.

This insect is a very stupid and voracious creature, and is not really endowed with any wonderful qualities. It devours without mercy every living insect it can master. Their propensities are so pugnacious, that they frequently attack one another. They wield their fore-legs like sabres, and cleave one another down like dragoons; and when one is dead, the rest fall on him like cannibals and devour him. This propensity the Chinese avail themselves of: they have not the veneration of Europeans for their imaginary qualities, so they use them as game cocks, and wagers are laid on the best fighter.

The first step to knowledge is to remove falsehood. In this respect we are growing wiser every day. The

fables of ignorance and superstition are fast disappearing, and we have sufficient cause for admiration in the qualities that God has really given to all his creatures without assigning to them fictitious ones of our own creation. It is the great goodness of the Deity to confer on every being such faculties as are admirably adapted to its nature: to suppose they have more than they want, would be an imputation on his wisdom.-Dr. Walsh.

THE INSECT CREATION.

THEN insect legions, pranked with gaudiest hues,
Pearl, gold, and purple, swarmed into existence;
Minute and marvellous creations these!
Infinite multitudes on every leaf,

In every drop, by me discerned at pleasure,
Were yet too fine for unenlightened eye,

Like stars, whose beams have never reached our world,
Though Science meets them midway in the heaven

With prying optics, weighs them in her scale,
Measures their orbs, and calculates their courses,
Some barely visible, some proudly shone,

Like living jewels; some grotesque, uncouth,
And hideous, giants of a race of pigmies;
These burrowed in the ground, and fed on garbage;
Those lived deliciously on honey-dews,
And dwelt in palaces of blossomed bells;
Millions on millions, winged, and plumed in front,
And armed with stings for vengeance or assault,
Filled the dim atmosphere with hum and hurry:
Children of light, and air, and fire they seemed,
Their lives all ecstasy and quick cross motion.

Montgomery's Pelican Island.

HISTORY OF INDUSTRY.

To industrious study are to be ascribed the invention and perfection of all those arts, whereby human life is civilized, and the world cultivated with numberless accommodations, ornaments, and beauties. All the stately, pleasant, and useful works which we view with delight, or enjoy with comfort, were contrived and framed by industry.

Industry reared those magnificent fabrics, and those

commodious houses; it formed those goodly pictures and statues; it raised those convenient streets, bridges, and aqueducts; it planted those fine gardens with various flowers and fruits; it clothed those pleasant fields with corn and grass; it built those ships whereby we plough the seas, reaping the commodities of foreign regions. It has subjected all creatures to our command and service, enabling us to subdue the fiercest animals, and render the gentler kind most tractable and useful to us. It taught us, from the wool of the sheep, from the hair of the goat, from the labours of the silkworm, to weave our clothes to keep us warm. It helps us from the inmost bowels of the earth, to bring many needful tools and utensils.

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It collected mankind into cities and orderly societies; devised wholesome laws, under shelter whereof we enjoy safety and peace, wealth and plenty, mutual succour and defence, and beneficial commerce.

It, by meditation, did invent all those sciences whereby our minds are enriched and ennobled, our manners refined and polished, our curiosity satisfied, our life benefited.

What is there which we admire, or wherein we delight, that pleases our mind, or gratifies our sense, for which we are not indebted to industry?

Does any country flourish in wealth, in grandeur, in prosperity? It must be imputed to industry; to the industry of its governors, settling good order; to the industry of its people, following profitable occupations: so did Cato tell the Roman senate, that it was not by the force of their arms, but by the industry of their ancestors, that the commonwealth did arise to such a pitch of greatness.

When sloth creeps in, all things corrupt and decay; and the public state sinks into disorder, penury, and a disgraceful condition.--Dr. Barrow.

THE ROSE.

How fair is the rose! what a beautiful flower,
The glory of April and May;

But the leaves are beginning to fade in an hour
And they wither and die in a day

Yet the rose has one powerful virtue to boast,
Above all the flowers of the field;

When its leaves are all dead, and fine colours all lost,
Still how sweet a perfume it will yield.

So frail is the youth and the beauty of man,
Tho' they bloom, and look gay, like a rose;
Yet all our fond care to preserve them is vain,
Time kills them as fast as he goes.

Then, I'll not be proud of my youth or my beauty,
Since both of them wither and fade,

But gain a good name by well doing my duty;

This will scent like a rose when I'm dead.-Watts.

MIGRATION OF BIRDS.

WHILE one part of the creation daily publishes, in the same places, the praise of the Creator, another portion travels to relate his wonders to the whole earth. Couriers traverse the air, glide in the waters, and speed their course across mountains and valleys. These arriving on the wings of the Spring, enliven its nights with their songs, build their nests among its flowers, and, disappearing with the zephyrs, follow their movable country from climate to climate; those repair to the habitation of man; as travellers from distant climes, they claim the rights of ancient hospitality. Each follows his inclination in the choice of a host; the Redbreast applies at the cottage; the Swallow knocks at the palace: this daughter of a king still seems attached to grandeur, but to grandeur, melancholy like her fate; she passes the summer amid the ruins of Versailles, and the winter among those of Thebes. Scarcely has she disappeared, when we behold a colony advancing upon the winds of the north, to supply the place of the travellers to the south, that no vacancy may be left in our fields. In a hoary day of autumn, when the north-east wind blows over the plains, and the woods are losing the last remains of their foliage, a numerous troop of wild ducks, all ranged in a line, traverse in silence a melancholy sky. If they perceive, while aloft in the air, some Gothic castle surrounded by marshes and by forests, it is there they prepare to de

scend; they wait till night making long evolutions over the woods. Soon as the vapours of the eve enshroud the valley, with outstretched neck and whirring wing, they suddenly alight on the waters, which resound with their noise. A general cry, succeeded by profound silence, rises from all the marshes. Guided by a faint light, which, perhaps, gleams through the narrow window of a tower, the travellers approach its walls, favoured by the reeds and by the darkness. There clapping their wings and screaming at intervals amid the murmur of the winds and of the rain, they salute the habitation of man.

Among these travellers from the north, there are some who habituate themselves to our manners, and refuse to return to their native land; some, like the companions of Ulysses, are captivated by the delicious sweets of certain fruits. Most of them, however, leave us after a residence of some months: they are attached to the winds and the storms, which tarnish the polish of the waves, and deliver to them that prey which would escape them in transparent waters; they love none but unknown retreats, and make the circuit of the globe by a round of solitudes.

It is not always in troops that these birds visit our habitations. Sometimes two beauteous strangers, white as snow, arrive with the frosts; they descend in the midst of a heath, in an open place, where it is impossible to approach them without being perceived; after resting a few hours, they again soar above the clouds. You hasten to the spot from which they departed, and find nothing but a few feathers, the only marks of their passage, already dispersed by the wind.

Concordances with the scenes of nature, or reasons of utility to man, determine the different migrations of animals. The birds that appear in the months of storms have dismal voices and savage manners, like the season which brings them; they come not to be heard, but to listen; there is something in the dull roaring of the woods that charms their ears. The trees, which mournfully wave their leafless summits, bear only black legions, which have associated for the winter; they have their sentinels and their advanced guards: frequently a crow, who has seen a hundred winters, the ancient sybil of the

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