for the nobler feats of the mind may be acquired,— the first, the especial object of your youth, will be to establish that control over your own mind, and your own habits, that shall ensure the proper cultivation of this precious inheritance. Try, even for a short period, the experiment of exercising such control. If, in the course of your study, you meet with a difficulty, resolve on mastering it; if you cannot by your own unaided efforts, be not ashamed to admit your inability, and seek for assistance. Practise the economy of time; consider time like the faculties of your mind, a precious estate, that every moment of it well applied is put out to an exorbitant interest. I do not say, devote yourself to unremitting labour, and sacrifice all amusement; but I do say, that the zest of amusement itself, and the successful result of application, depend in a great measure on the economy of time. When you have lived fifty years, you will have seen many instance in which the man who finds time for everything, for punctuality in all the relations of life, for the pleasure of society, for the cultivation of literature, for every rational amusement, is he who is the most assiduous in the active pursuits of his profession. Estimate also, properly, the force of habit; exercise a constant, an unremitting vigilance, over the acquirement of habit, in matters that are apparently of entire indifference, that, perhaps, are really so, independent of the habits they engender. It is by the neglect of such trifles that bad habits are acquired; that the mind, by tolerating negligence, procrastination in matters of small account, but frequent recurrence, matters of which the world takes no notice, becomes accustomed to the same defects in matters of higher importance. If you will make the experiment of which I have spoken, if for a given time you will resolve that there shall be a complete understanding of everything you read, or the honest admission that you do not understand it; that there shall be a strict regard to the distribution of time; that there shall be a constant struggle against the bondage of bad habit, a constant effort which can only be made within to master the mind, to subject its various processes to healthful action,—the early fruits of this experiment, the feeling of self-satisfaction, the consciousness of growing strength, the force of good habit, will be inducements to its continuance, more powerful than any exhortations. These are the arts, this is the patient and laborious process by which, in all times, and in all professions, the foundations of excellence and of fame have been laid. I am well aware that the observations I have addressed to you have nothing of novelty to recommend them; that the truths to which I have adverted are so obvious, that they scarcely require the aid of reasoning to enforce them. But they are truths of vital importance, and it too frequently happens that the ready assent which we give to them has not the practical influence on our conduct which it ought to have. If it had, how many of us would have been spared the painful retrospect,-that retrospect which you may avert, but which we cannot,-of opportunities lost, time mispent, habits of indolence or negligence, become inveterate. Hitherto, I have referred exclusively to the considerations of worldly advantage and worldly fame, as encouragements to early or continued exertion. You have other incitements to labour, other rewards of virtuous exertion, should the hope of praise or glory be obscured. You have the express command of God to improve the faculties which distinguish you from the beasts that perish. You have the awful 86 knowledge, that of the use or neglect of these faculties a solemn account must be rendered. You have the assurance of an immortality different from that of worldly fame. By every motive which can influence a reflecting and responsible being, a being of a large discourse, looking before and after," by regard for your own success and happiness in this life, by the fear of future discredit, by the hope of lasting fame,-by all these considerations do I conjure you, while you have yet time, while your minds are yet flexible, to form them on the models which are the nearest to perfection. By motives yet more urgent, by higher and purer aspirations, by the duty of obedience to the will of God, by the awful account you will have to render, not merely of moral actions, but of faculties intrusted to you for improvement,-by all these high arguments do I conjure you, so "to number your days that you may apply your hearts unto wisdom;" unto that wisdom, which, directing your ambition to the noble end of benefiting mankind, and teaching you humble reliance on the merits and on the mercy of your Redeemer, may support you" in the time of your tribulation," may admonish you" in the time of your wealth," and "in the hour of death, and in the day of judgment," may comfort you with the hope of deliverance. [SIR ROBERT PEEL'S Address to the Students of Glasgow University.] THE SONG OF THE BREEZE. I've swept o'er the mountain, the forest and fell, I have moaned in the ear through the rosy shell; I have roamed alone by the gurgling stream, I have danced at eve with the pale moonbeam; I have hung over groves where the citron grows, DISTANCE in truth produces in idea the same effect as in real perspective; objects are softened and rounded, and rendered doubly graceful; the harsher and more ordinary points of character are melted down; and those by which it is remembered, are the more striking outlines, that mark sublimity, grace, or beauty. There are mists, too, in the mental as in the natural horizon, to conceal what is less pleasing in distant objects; and there are happy lights to stream in full glory upon those points which can profit by brilliant illumination.-SIR WALTER SCOTT. from our own colonies, there would be the greatest difficulty in procuring masts for our navy, and it is a singular fact that the French Government also draws a part of its supplies of masts from Canada. Trees for masts are, however, difficult and expensive to procure, being often required ninety-nine feet long, and thirty inches cube, at fourteen feet from the but; measuring, when dressed, above thirteen loads of fifty cubic feet. Those in the neighbourhood of navigable waters, have long ago been cut down, and they must now be looked for in the recesses of the forest, perhaps three, four, or five hundred miles from the place of shipment, and require a road to be cut through the bush for their conveyance from the locality of the tree to the nearest water-course. Even in new and hitherto untouched parts, not one tree in ten thousand is fit to convert into a mast of the smallest size for the Royal Navy. The lumbering business in Canada is one of great hardship and endurance. The establishment of a first-rate Shanty, as it is called (Chantier, French) by the Americans and settlers, from the French Canadians, is a matter of great outlay. It must be commenced by the 1st of October, for the supply of the succeeding year. The party, consisting of from thirty to sixty persons, with as many horses and oxen, with provisions and provender for six months, fix themselves in a neighbourhood previously selected; the Advance made by the merchant of Quebec, Montreal, or St. John's, (as it may be,) amounting to little short of two thousand pounds. THIS beautiful species of Pine, so well known for many years past as the Weymouth Pine of our shrubberies, appears to have become naturalized with us. It is, however, a native of the northern parts of the continent and islands of America, to which alone it is peculiar, being by far the most abundant in our own provinces of Canada and New Brunswick. Its leaves burst out from the sheath in clusters of five, and in its growth it shows a tendency to a spiral turn, particularly visible in masts of vessels. It is the most majestic of the trees of the Canadian forest, with the exception of some of the family found in the "far West," in the neighbourhood of Columbia River, reported to be often 250 feet high, and 50 in circumference, whilst the White Pine is rarely found to exceed 150 feet in height, and five in diameter at the foot. When growing in open space, it is beautifully feathered to the ground, but in the Canadian forests is no more than an immense stick, with a small quantity of brush at the head, in about the same proportion as hair on the tail of an elephant. The age to which it attains is not known; 1500 annular lines have been counted, each being considered as indicative of one year's growth. It is the White Pine of commerce, and from its large size, small specific gravity, straightness of growth, freedom from knots, and facility in working, the consumption is immense, being equally in repute for the largest masts of our men-of-war and the smallest article of carving or interior decoration. As it resists the sun, and is not brittle, it is greatly preferred by the Americans for the decks of their ships; whilst in this country, it is equally prized for the manufacture of musical instruments; were it not for the supply LEAVES AND BLOSSOM OF THE WEYMOUTH PINE. This timber is imported into Great Britain both in square timber and deals, probably in no very different proportion. The former being called White Pine, and the deals Yellow Pine, possibly to distinguish them from the White Deals of the Baltic, which are cut from the Spruce Fir, or Abies. The importance of this tree to the commerce of this country, may be in some degree estimated from the fact, that nearly four thousand cargoes, generally of large vessels, are loaded annually from Canada and New Brunswick, nearly two-thirds of which may be considered as composed of White Pine, either as square timber or in deals. As a great deal has been said of a tendency in this timber to what is called dry rot, we shall shortly refer to this subject. N. G. LONDON: JOHN WILLIAM PARKER, WEST STRAND. PUBLISHED IN WEEKLY NUMBERS, PRICE ONE PENNY, AND IN MONTHLY PARTS PRICE SIXPENCE. Sold by all Booksellers and Newsvenders in the Kingdom. THE ABBEY CHURCH OF BATH. "THE diocese of Bath and Wells," says Peter Heylin, "though it hath a double name, is one single bishopric. The bishop's seat was originally at Wells, where it still continues. The style of Bath came in but upon the bye." The spot on which the Abbey Church now stands is supposed to have been the site of a temple of Minerva, in the time of the Romans, who chose this city as one of their stations, probably on account of its fine springs, over which they imagined Pallas to preside. Bath was afterwards known among the ancient Britons as Caer Pallader, or the city of Pallas. But our Saxon ancestors changed its name to Akemannceaster, or the Sick Man's City, from the invalids who resorted thither, that their complaints might either be removed or alleviated by the use of the waters. In more recent periods, fashion and amusement were consulted as much as health in a visit to Bath. An account, printed in the middle of the last century, informs us; "In the Spring, Bath is most frequented for health, and in Autumn for pleasure, when at least two-thirds of the company come to partake of the amusements of the place; and in some seasons there have been at Bath no less than eight thousand persons, besides its constant inhabitants." Going back to the early history of the monastery of Bath, we find that it was founded as a nunnery by Osric, King of the Northumbrians, in the year 676; and that having remained under the presidency of certain abbesses, whose names are preserved, it was destroyed by the Danes, and rebuilt, about 775, by Offa, the famous King of Mercia, who dedicated it to St. Peter, placing within it secular canons, It underwent another change towards the latter part of the tenth century, when King Edgar removed the secular canons, and fixed in their room an abbot, and Benedictine monks. During the abbacy of Elfsig, (or Alsius,) on the Domesday survey of the abbey property being taken, the annual revenue of the lands amounted to 717. 13s. 6d. In 1088, in the rebellion in favour of Robert, the eldest son of the Conqueror, Bath, with its religious house, was plundered and burnt. About this time, as we have had occasion to state in our previous notices of Cathedrals, it was ordained, for the dignity and usefulness of the church, that certain bishops' sees should be removed from small towns to places of greater note, among which the episcopal see of Wells was transferred to Bath; John de Villula, or, as he is sometimes called, of Tours, (the French town of which he was a native,) having been empowered, by a charter from William Rufus, to carry this change into effect. The king also granted him the city of Bath, a mint and other rights, for the purpose of augmenting the see;-an example followed by Henry the First, who showed great favour to Bishop John. This munificent prelate had been Bishop of Wells, a title which he dropped on becoming Bishop of Bath in 1090, He greatly enriched the monastery, and directed that it should thenceforth be governed by a prior instead of an abbot: adding to its convenience by building two baths* within its pre • One of these baths John gave for the benefit of the public; the other was appropriated to the prior. They continued in use till the middle of the sixteenth century. An attempt was made, in the early part of the eighteenth century, to recover the prior's bath spring, in consequence of the following passage in the particulars of the priory estate, made just before the sale of it in 1014. There is a bath which was for the prior's private use, but it is now filled up with rubble, and covered with earth, and of no use; but there be many of the town that do remember when it was of great use, for there is as hot a spring in it as in any of the baths; and a little charge will restore it to its former virtue, and fit it for use.' cincts, and a palace for his own residence. He also existence until the Reformation. A noble tomb to his After this bishop's death, the church was again destroyed by fire; but was rebuilt and enlarged by Robert, a monk of Lewes, on his appointment to the bishopric, about' the year 1140. The next bishop who became a patron to this see, was Dr. Oliver King, In consetranslated from Exeter to Bath in 1495. quence, it is alleged, of a vision which he beheld, he resolved to build the church of St. Peter in the most correct, and at the same time, splendid style. This Oliver King had been principal secretary to Edward the Fourth, Edward the Fifth, and Henry the Seventh, at a time when our English architecture was carried to an excess in finishing, which marks the works of that period, particularly the chapel of Henry the Seventh, at Westminster. In his reported vision, of which Sir John Harrington has chronicled up an account, and which seems to have suggested the beautiful ornaments of the grand Western front; "The bishop, having been at Bath, saw, in his dream, angels ascending and descending a ladder, near to which was a fair olive-tree, supporting a crown; and he thought he heard a voice saying, 'Let the Olive establish the crown, and a King restore the church.'" Another strange and forced allusion to the name of the founder of the present fabric was taken from the parable of Jotham (Judges ix. 8); and the following lines, accordingly, cut upon a stone on the west side;— The trees going to chese + a king, Said, Be thou to us, Oliver, King! But though this prelate carried forward the work with all the activity in his power, and with a liberal outlay of money, he did not live to see it completed. It remained to be finished by the priors of Bath, after his death. Prior Bird, after expending large sums upon it, died blind and poor. His rebus, W. and a Bird, are to be seen, cut in stone in different parts of the building. A chapel and tomb dedicated to him, still exist, and are greatly admired for their richness and beauty. His successor, Holway, alias Gibbes, also applied himself with zeal and energy to the completion of King's design; but it was scarcely finished when he, with others, subscribed to the supremacy of Henry the Eighth, and surrendered the whole monastery to the crown. The king's commissioners subsequently offered St. Peter's Church to the city of Bath for five hundred marks, which were refused; whereupon all the glass, iron, and lead, belonging to it, were sold to merchants, the skeleton only of the building being left standing, which, with the monastery, was purchased by Humphry Collis, in 1542. The year after, an Act of Parliament was passed for the dean and chapter of Wells to make one sole chapter for the bishop. The fabric having become sadly dilapidated after the period of the dissolution, Mr. Peter Chapman was the first person who began to repair it, about 1572, at the east end, to secure it from the effects of the weather. Under the auspices of Queen Elizabeth, ration, Thomas, Earl of Sussex, her majesty's chamwho enabled the citizens to raise money for its restoberlain, did much in its behalf, and was followed by others, especially by William, Lord Burleigh. Thus the Choir was completed for divine service, and The adventurer, however, who had been induced to search, and concealed to this time. whose name was Swallow, failed of success; and the spring remains Old word for choose, the church reconsecrated, under the names of St. Peter and St. Paul. Various patrons, among whom may be mentioned Dr. James Montague, Bishop of Bath and Wells, his brother, Sir Henry Montague, chief justice of the King's Bench, and Sir Nicholas Salterus, Knt., of London, contributed their aid and means to the following portions of the structure :The side aisles of the choir, and the transepts; the western portion of the nave; the beautiful west door; and the vestry. Thus, by the assistance of these benefactors, Bath Abbey Church was raised to the state in which we now behold it. From the number of the windows, it was formerly called the Lantern of England. It is built in the form of a plain cross, with a magnificent tower at the intersection. This tower is peculiar for its not being square, but greater in the north and south, than the east and west dimensions. The transept is narrow, and has no aisles. The nave and choir have each a north and south aisle. There is no trace of tombs in the choir, which is fitted up as a parish-church, with the addition of a throne for the Bishop of Bath and Wells, when he occasionally attends divine serIvice within it. The window at the east end of the south aisle is inserted in a niche, which appears to be Norman, and is probably the only remains of a more ancient edifice. The west front, as represented by our engraving, is better seen than any other part, but by no means at a sufficient distance for its full effect. The north side is much built up with small houses, and the south partially so. The east, in consequence of its situation, appears but to little advantage; and from no point can the whole building be seen so as to do justice to its exquisite tower. Bath Abbey Church is distinguished for the beauty of its design, and for the harmony and symmetry of its several parts. It is supposed to have been the last edifice of considerable magnitude, purely Gothic, which was erected in this country; and almost the only one which remains in the state in which it was originally planned. The following are stated in Dugdale to be the dimensions:: As great and exalted spirits undertake the pursuit of hazardous actions for the good of others, at the same time gratifying their passion for glory,—so do worthy minds in the domestic way of life deny themselves many advantages, to satisfy a generous benevolence which they bear to their friends oppressed with distresses and calamities. Such natures one may call "stores of Providence," which are actuated by a secret celestial influence to undervalue the ordinary gratifications of wealth, to give comfort to a heart loaded with affliction, to save a falling family, to preserve a branch of trade in their neighbourhood, to give work to the industrious, preserve the portion of the helpless infant, and raise the head of the mourning father. People whose hearts are wholly bent towards pleasure, or intent upon gain, never hear of the noble occurrences among men of industry and humanity.-Spectator. He is the true man of honour, who keeps steadily in the path of virtue, and braves the laugh of the world.GILPIN. CONSTITUTION OF THE ATMOSPHERE. MAN, forgetting how insignificant he is, and how limited his utmost knowledge, is too apt to measure Omnipotence by the standard of his own narrow intellect; and to be guided by his own selfish feelings, in judging of the extent of Divine benevolence. That the earth, a minute fraction, as it is, of a great and wonderful system, should be amenable to the general laws by which the whole system is governed, is, at the least, exceedingly probable. Of such general laws, of their changes, of their aberrations, or of their influences, we, situated in this extremity of the universe, cannot see the object. What, therefore, appear to us anomalous or defective, may, in reality, be parts of some great cycle or series, too vast to be comprehended by the human mind, and known only to beings of a higher order, or to the Creator himself. So, again, amidst the desolation of the hurricane, or of the thunder-storm; in the settled affliction of malaria, and in the march of the pestilence; the goodness of the Deity is impugned, his power, even, is regarded doubtfully. But what, in truth, are all these visitations, but so many examples of the “unsearchable ways" of the Almighty?" He sits on the whirlwind, and directs the storm :" a hamlet is laid waste; a few individuals may perish; but the general result is good: the atmosphere is purified; and pestilence, with all its train of evils, disappears. Nay, however inscrutable the object of the deadly malaria itself, do we not see one end which it serves, namely, to stimulate the reasoning powers, and the industry of man. By his reason, man has been guided to an antidote beneficently adapted for his use, which has stripped malaria of half its terrors. By his industry, the marsh has been converted into fertile land, and disease has given place to salubrity. When, therefore, we duly consider all these things, when we reflect also on the number, the properties, the various conditions of the matters composing our globe, the wonder surely is, not that a few of these matters occasionally exist as foreign bodies in the atmosphere, but that others of these matters are not at all times diffused through it, and in such quantity as to be incompatible with organic life. Thus, the original constitution of the atmosphere, and the preservation of its purity against all these contaminating influences, may be viewed as the strongest arguments we possess, in demonstration of the benevolence, the wisdom, and the omnipotence of the Deity: benevolence in having willed such a positive good; wisdom in having contrived it; and omnipotence in having created it, and in still upholding its existence. [PROUT'S Bridgewater Treatise.] THE BLIGHTED OAK. HAST thou seen in Winter's stormiest sky Passed carelessly by, nor turned again That scathed wreck to view; But now I can draw from that perishing tree, |