WINTER EVENINGS.

71

Father. Her final conflict was severe; but leaning her || happiness might she have enjoyed! how many might head upon the bosom of Jesus, she died exulting in the assurance of a blissful eternity.

copse

she have rescued from the snare of the fowler!

But enough. I will only add a few lines, which were handed me by a friend during my visit. They are beautifully descriptive of the place, and are expressive of my feelings.

"Beautiful bower, my long lov'd spot,

In past life's sunny day;

Happy and rare has been thy lot,

For finger of change has touched thee not,
Nor spirit of cold decay.

Touchingly true thy features look

To memory's glistening eye;

It knoweth them all-the shady nook,
The dark gray rock, and the little brook
So noisily whirling by.

The sinuous path with leaves bestrew'd,
The bank with moss o'ergrown,
The sunless gloom of the white pine wood,
And that old sycamore tree which stood
Just down by the stream alone.

The leafless oak, by the hillock's brink,
That scathed and splinter'd thing,
With a mark on its trunk like a streak of ink;
And last, not least, as we used to think,
The limb that upheld the swing.

And here's the old stump of the hollow tree,
With squirrels in it still;

And there, again, as it used to be,
A wood-chuck burrows his gallery
At the foot of yonder hill.

Again I hear in the forest's hush,

The chewink's plaintive cry;
And here, as of old, the mocking thrush,
Perched over his nest in the under-brush,
Whistles melodiously.

Caroline was another whom I tenderly loved. Never shall I forget the affectionate look and manner of this fairy creature, when, after a long absence, I met her again for the last time. Consumption had taken hold upon her, and a few short months wore her down to the tomb. Her life had been a scene of perpetual sun-shine; and finally having married one in all respects suited to her tastes, the object of her heart's first, deepest love, two years of uninterrupted conjugal bliss closed her career. Our dwellings were separated by a distance of half a mile. The intervening grounds were singularly romantic, combining wood and meadow, and field, with rock and stream, and it was often traversed by us, while mutual expressions of sympathy and love sweetened our walks. I well remember when on one of these occasions we had reached the most interesting point in our way, C. surprised me by exclaiming, "I wish I was a Christian!" It was a calm autumnal day; and the whole scene was calculated to inspire those unutterable feelings which can only be understood by kindred spirits. The eye of my friend sparkled, and her cheek glowed with the excitement of the moment. Never did she appear more lovely. As I gazed upon her with mingled emotions, she faulteringly added, "but I could not resign the gratifications I now enjoy-I could not, for instance, dress plainly as you do, G.; and to enjoy religion, I know that I must deny myself." At this moment, she doubtless felt that the Christian calling was holy, and that it embraced our all of being and of action. The particular cross which presented itself to her, and which caused her (like the young man in the Gospel) to go away sorrowful, was self-denial in dress. Had she then submitted to walk in the divine light which shone upon her heart, with what luster might her setting sun have declined! But she died pleading for mercy. Strange that one so intelligent, so generous, should thus cling to a single indulgence which conscience taught her was to her forbidden! But this was her idol, and trifling as it was, she loved it more than she loved her Savior. Mary possessed many graces of temper and person, with every advantage that wealth and education could afford. She was a favorite with all. She had suffered conviction of sin, and had attached herself to the Church; but the fascinations of gay life were too powerful for her firmness, and she was religious without the comforts of religion. With her face turned toward Zion, she wandered amidst the mazes of the world. Pledging her heart to God, she still yielded it to pleas- But while spring, summer and autumn, each in its turn Violating conscience and grieving the Holy Spir-proclaim the wisdom and beneficence of our Creator, it-resolving, yet lingering, she went on till disease winter seems most favorable for reflection and improveassailed her, and with scarcely time to cast herself on ment. The trees, indeed, are stripped of their foliage; the mercy of Heaven, she was hurried to eternity. the streams are bound in icy fetters; bleak winds sweep My heart was pained as I contemplated the issue of around our dwellings; but within, around the blazing such a life. I could not yield to the apprehension that fire, may be thankful hearts and happy voices. When M. was lost; but if, perchance, she was saved, how the labors of the day are past, and the long night comes much holier might she have been! how much more on, it is, to parents especially, the golden opportunity

ure.

How strangely like! and memory's light
Plays softly o'er the scene:

The visions of youth come fresh to sight,
As if they were of but yesternight,

Tho' years have roll'd between.

Yet mournfully has my spirit mov'd
Amid these scenes to-day;
They are unchang'd, but those who rov'd
Beside me once, those forms belov'd,
I see not-where are they?"

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Original.

GERTRUDE.

WINTER EVENINGS.

We have abundant cause of thanksgiving to God for his goodness to us, as manifested in the changing seasons, and can exclaim with rapture, in the language of the poet,

"The rolling year is full of thee."

72

PHYSICAL SCIENCE.

for the inculcation of moral truth, and giving bent to the intellectual and moral powers of their children.

Original.

PHYSICAL SCIENCE.

BY PROFESSOR MERRICK.

MAN.

The cultivation of the intellect and affections should be inseparably connected; for the noble energies with which we are endowed, are only productive of happiness when employed in virtuous pursuits. On whom MAN stands at the head of the animal kingdom. His rests the responsibility of the proper direction of these superiority to all other animals is obvious in his physipowers? On the teachers to whom we commit the || cal, and in a still greater degree, in his mental constituyouth of our land? No. They are but auxilaries- tion. He is properly styled, "lord of the lower world." often powerful it is true; but it is in the sanctuary of Under all his various modifications he is but of one spehome, under parental influence, the child is to be train- cics, though divided into several races, or varieties. As ed in the way he should go. to the number of races, a great diversity of opinion has The parent can call many auxiliaries to his aid, and existed among naturalists. Linnæus referred all the one of the most important is to be found in well select-human family to five; Cuvier admitted but three; while ed books. And how can we more profitably employ Malta Brun recognizes sixteen. The arrangement of the winter evenings than in a course of useful reading? Blumenbach, however, is now generally adopted. He Let the subject we read be the theme of conversation. has five varieties; viz., the Caucasian, Mongolian, EthioLet the standard of parents in mental and moral excel- pian, American, and Malayan. The following descriplence be high, and a proper direction to the talents of tion of these several varieties or races, is from Dr. youth will be given, by the most powerful of all teach- Morton's Crania Americana : ing-example. Biography, for the young, has many charms. History will enlarge our views, and free the mind from narrow prejudices. Natural science will open a field for our observation boundless in extent, where we may gaze upon the wonders of creation until we can exultingly exclaim, with the poet above mentioned,

I. THE CAUCASIAN RACE is characterized by a naturally fair skin, susceptible of every tint; hair fine, long and curling, and of various colors. The skull is large and oval, and its anterior portion full and elevated. The face is small in proportion to the head, of an oval form, with well proportioned features. The nasal bones are arched, the chin full, and the teeth vertical. The "These are thy glorious works, Parent of good." race is distinguished for the facility with which it atBut we need, also, something of a miscellaneous de-tains the highest intellectual endowments. This race scription to revive in our memories the events of the past-to speak to us at the present, as with a living voice-to point out our duty, and cheer and animate us in the peformance of it-to give to the aged, the II. THE MONGOLIAN RACE. This race is characmiddle aged, and the young, their portion in due sea-terized by a sallow or olive colored skin, which appears son (every month.) As a desideratum, therefore, we hail the "Ladies' Repository, and Gatherings of the West." We welcome it with joy, as a New-Year's gift. We still bid it welcome, as a faithful friend and counsellor. We welcome it as the "gatherer," whose rich gleanings shall give a new interest to "home, sweet home," on a winter's evening.

11440

L. E. A.

FILIAL LOVE. THE love of parents may be considered the law of human nature. In most bosoms the affection is as spontaneous as the pulsations of the heart. From this fact arises our horror of the crime of parricide, which is reckoned the most aggravated offense within the power of fallen man.

Filial fidelity is, in some instances, instinctive with brutes. The stork is an example. Its Hebrew name signifies mercy, and indicates its attachment for its dam, which it will guard and cherish at the sacrifice of life. The Romans are said to have called it avis pia, or the pious bird. Sometimes it was denominated pietatis cultrix; i. e., one that cherishes or cultivates piety. Thus does the Almighty provide, that irrational tribes shall admonish us of our duty, and shame us into the practice of virtue.

is sub-divided into the Caucasian, Germanic, Celtic, Arabian, Lybian, Nilotic, (Egyptian,) and Indostanic families.

to be drawn tight over the bones of the face; long, black, straight hair, and thin beard. The nose is broad and short; the eyes are small, black, and obliquely placed, and the eye-brows arched and linear; the lips are turned, the cheek-bones broad and flat, and the zygomatic arches salient. The skull is oblong-oval, somewhat flattened at the sides, with a low forehead. In their intellectual character, the Mongolians are ingenious, imitative, and highly susceptible of cultivation. The sub-divisions are the Mongol-Tartar, Turkish, Chinese, Indo-Chinese, and the Polar families.

III. THE MAYLAY RACE. This is characterized by a dark complexion, varying from a tawny hue to a very dark brown. Their hair is black, coarse, and lank, and their eye-lids are drawn obliquely upwards at the outer angles. The mouth and lips are large, and the nose is short and broad, and apparently broken at its root. The face is flat and expanded, the upper jaw projecting, and the teeth salient. The skull is high and squared, or rounded, and the forehead low and broad. This race is active and ingenious, and possesses all the habits of a migratory, predaceous, and maritime people. The sub-divisions embrace the Maylay and Polynesian (or South Sea Island) families.

IV. THE AMERICAN RACE is marked by a brown complexion, long, lank, black hair, and deficient beard.

PHYSICAL SCIENCE.

73

The eyes are black and deep set, and the brow low- of small fibres, each of which is inclosed in a thin, the cheek-bones high, the nose large and aqualine, the || delicate sheath, or membrane. A stronger membrane mouth large, and the lips tumid and compressed. The surrounds each of the muscles, by which they are sepskull is small, wide between the parietal proturberances, prominent at the vertex, and flat on the occiput. In their mental character, the Americans are averse to cultivation, and slow in acquiring knowledge; restless, revengeful, and fond of war, and wholly destitute of maratime adventure. The families into which this race is subdived, are two-the American and the Toltecan.

arated from others with which they come in contact, and over which they move with perfect freedom. Muscles are generally divided into three parts; viz., the middle, which is the thick fleshy portion called the belly, and the extremities which are denominated the origin and insertion. Most muscles are attached to two bones; to one by the origin, which is the fixed extremity, and to the other by the insertion, which is moved towards the origin by the shortening of the

the muscles to the bones, there is an enlargement of the latter, and a contraction of the former. This enlarged portion of the bone is called a process. The diminished portion of the muscle, which is white and shining, is called a tendon, or sinew. It is sometimes called a cord. This arrangement, also, adds much to the beauty and symmetry of the form. We next notice

V. THE ETHIOPIAN RACE is characterized by a black complexion, and black, woolly hair; the eyes are large || intervening part. To give room for the attachment of and prominent, the nose broad and flat, lips thick, and the mouth wide; the head long and narrow, the forehead low, the cheek bones prominent, the jaws projecting, and the chin small. In disposition the negro is joyous, flexible and indolent; while the many nations which compose this race present a singular diversity of intellectual character, of which the far extreme is the lowest grade of humanity. The Negro, Caffrarian, Hottentot, Oceanic Negro, Australian, and Alforian families, belong to this race. I shall now give a very brief description of some of the most important parts of the human body, commencing with

THE BONES.

THE SKIN.

This is composed of three layers—the cuticle, or scarf-skin, the retemucosum, or mucous coat, and the corium, or true skin. Each of these has important functions to perform in the animal economy. The cuticle, which is the outer coat, though exceedingly thin, serves as a protection to the more sensitive parts beneath. It is furnished with neither blood vessels, nor nerves, and is, therefore, wholly insensible; and if it has pores, they are too small to be seen even by the aid of the microscope. On some parts of the body, especially such as are exposed to pressure and friction, as the palm of the hands, and the soles of the feet, the cuticle is naturally thick, and is rendered still more so by use. The nails belong to the cuticle, separating with it from the true skin.

The number of bones entering into the composition of the human body is more than two hundred. They constitute the frame-work of the body, and are generally divided into those of the head, trunk and extremities. Some of these are designed for the protection of the parts which they cover, but most are constructed with special reference to locomotion. Bones are composed of two kinds of substances; viz., those of an animal, and those of an earthy nature. The proportion of animal to earthy matter in persons of middle age, is about as one to two; while in infancy the animal portion greatly predominates, and in old age the earthy. Hence, in the young the bones are soft and yielding, in middle life strong and elastic, and in old age dry and brittle. To describe the forms, relations, and purposes of even the most important bones of the system, would transcend the limits prescribed for this article. It need only be added, that in the wonderful adaptation of the bones to answer the purposes for which The corium, which is the innermost coat, is a dense, they were designed, the wisdom and goodness of the Cre- firm tissue, peculiarly adapted to bind together and ator are most strikingly displayed. Here is neither su- protect the more internal parts of the body. Unlike perfluity nor deficiency. In form and position, no im- the other layers, it is distinctly organized, and abunprovement could be suggested. Like all other works of dantly supplied with nerves and blood-vessels, which nature, the human skeleton shows that the hand that are so numerous and minutely divided, that the point made it was divine. In no part is there the least indi- of the finest needle cannot be placed apon the surface cation that it is the work of blind "chance," but every-without coming in contact with them. It is the seat where there is indelibly impressed the most unequivocal marks of design.

THE MUSCLES.

Covering the bones and attached to them are the muscles. They are very numerous, and employed in communicating motion to all parts of the system, They constitute what is commonly called the lean flesh, or the red fleshy part of the body, and are composed

10

The mucous coat lies between the cuticle and corium. It is a thin, soft net-work, which seems to be designed to preserve the moisture of the nerves, which are spread out upon the surface of the true skin, to moderate the effect of external pressure and friction. It is, like the cuticle, unprovided with nerves and blood-vessels, and, of course, like that, insensible. It is the seat of the coloring matter of the skin.

of sensation and touch, and an organ of absorption and exhalation. It also assists in regulating the heat of the body. As an organ of exhalation, it is of great importance. The amount of waste matter carried off by the skin is, undoubtedly, much greater than is generally supposed. By the most accurate experiment it has been found that, under ordinary circumstances, no less than twenty ounces of such matter is thrown off

in this manner every twenty-four hours, mostly by the medium through which they, in turn, act upon the what is termed insensible perspiration.

Original.

THE SAILOR.

BY REV. A. M. LORRAINE.

Mr "Voyage up the Cattegat" naturally enough produced a train of recollections and reflections, which I trust would interest the readers of the Repository.

I closed that recital by observing, "that we had many a fearful talk about the pinnace, after we put to sea.' These conversations were generally wound up by Old Chaplain Jack, who, with an indefinable squint, would exclaim, "Away with your ifs and your ands--your round turns and half-hitches! My great comfort is, 'What is to be, will be.' He who is born to be drowned, cannot be hanged. Didn't I make fast the painter with my own flippers? And when they raised the holloo below, did I not run to haul up the pinnace? But never a piece of a boat could I see, as big as you might stuff in your eye. Bad luck to the old yawl! "Tis not the first break that she has taken. I would rather pull the bow oar in the jolly-boat, than to sit in the starn sheets of the pinnace."

sooner than Atheism. They have, as they think, a more formidable reason for not obeying the word of God, than infidelity. They admit that it is all true and good, very good; but they contend that God will make an exception for poor sailors, in consideration of the tempests, disasters, and shipwrecks which they encounter in the world, and the dog's life which they live. They urge that he will not call into strict question an occasional sprey on shore. Nor do I mean by superstition the unshaken belief of sailors in the possi bility of occasional visits from the world of spirits; for, as many pious and learned men have advocated this, I leave it to others dogmatically to denounce it as superstition; and when they have proved it such, I shall agree with Dr. Clarke, that it is infinitely less dangerous than infidelity.

But by superstition I mean the voracious credulity with which seaman swallow every hook that is baited with a ghost or hobgoblin. They will tell not only of the spirits of departed men and women, but of the apparitions of houses, ships, boats, and things which were never sentient in this world or the world to come. When a boy, I could not desire snugger moorings, in the mid watch, than to be pressed in the circle between two shaggy pea-jackets, while,

"Heard solemn, went the goblin story round, "Till superstitious horror crept o'er all." One fellow would go on with his chilling and unearth

But Old Jack would not say this until he had exhausted his own eloquence on the subject, and had listened to all that could be said, pro and con, from the boatswain down to the cabin-boy. And when he found that we began to gather in our slack, "for want of argument," he felt it to be his province, as an "ancient mariner," to wind up the whole with relig-ly tale, until the whole watch drank in the panic, exion-if that can be called religion which throws cept himself, he being braced by an inward consciousaloft the blame of all that is done on the land and ness that the story was of his own fabrication. But on the sea. Poor Jack's insight of the doctrine of as soon as he would wind up his yarn, and give place fatality was extremely convenient. It absolved him as to another, himself would begin to drink the same cup readily of the sin of a drunken frolick, as it did of the of trembling which he had been administering to othdeath of Charley, of which he was indeed innocent. ers. Thus did they proceed, each believing others However, there was no protest to his dogma in those more honest than himself. And it was no hard matter days; for it was indescribably pleasant to all hands, to thus to believe, as each succeeding tale was more and know that they had done all that could be done to more strongly fortified, by the most solemn asservasave their ship-mate, and that, as it regarded them-tions-sometimes honor, life, and every thing else selves, no shark could devour them until their time

came.

If there were no hereafter, it is questionable whether it would be an act of mercy to dispossess the sailor of this delusion. It is. a deadening opiate, lulling the scaman in danger, and in tempest, just as it quiets the fears of the Mussulman in the rage of battle. But when we consider that man is immortal-that there is a God to be loved-a heaven to be obtained--that our eternal states are hanging on the feeble life-rope of a fleeting probation, and that man is a moral agent, we must acknowledge that it is philanthropic to anoint the eyes of seamen, that they may see.

being pledged for the veracity of the story. This was an indispensable preface'; for a sailor would pay very little attention to a tale, were he advertised beforehand of its falsehood. "Away with your spoon-drift," he would say, "who do you think will hearken to your lie?" Sometimes they would all become so timorous, that it required considerable effort for the stoutest of them to go alone on the forecastle to call the watch. However, they did not always riot in the supernatural. At times they recited tales that would not discredit the "Arabian Nights' Entertainments."

A fellow might be ever so shiftless and lazy-might turn the ship into a sloop forty times in a day-to "make a sloop of a ship," is to skulk on the forecastle, so as to bring the three masts in a range with the officers

I spoke in my former communication of the sailor's superstition. But the word "superstition" I do not use in the infidel sense. It does not embrace that strong || abaft)—he might, in one word, be a perfect land-lubpersuasion which the mariner has of the truth of the Bible. In all my acquaintance with seamen, (and the morning of my life was with them,) I never found one who had the temerity to deny the Scriptures; and my conclusion is, that salt water might breed any thing

ber, yet when night came, the crew would forgive him all, if he could only tell a fine yarn, or sing a good song.

When religion spreads extensively on the sea, how delightfully will the nocturnal hours be employed by