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Jacob

and on that condition engages to worship and serve Him. Supposing we adhere to the rendering of the common version in our Bibles-as do Luther, Calvin, and Le Clerc-the true idea of the vow lies here. appeals to the very words of God's promise, in which the Lord had engaged to be with him, to support him, and to bring him back in safety; and, in order to strengthen his faith, adopts a method suited to his weakness, binding himself to an open recognition of Jehovah as his God, and to services and offerings expressive of his gratitude, when the promise was fulfilled (as he doubted not it would be); and thus he admonishes and stimulates himself to a firmer reliance on the Covenant. It was by the fulfilment of the promise that the Lord would testify that He condescended to be his covenanted God; only on that ground would Jacob be warranted in assuming the fact of such a relation, which in every case must originate in a movement of grace on the part of the Supreme, not of choice on the part of man. Those who charge Jacob with a mercenary spirit are just those who habitually lose sight of that great principle. True it is that all are naturally bound to yield homage to the Most High; but no sinful man can dare to claim the Lord as his God, as bound to him by covenant relations, till the Lord has displayed His gracious purpose to receive and own him as the object of His love. But it is right to mention that this idea, on which we insist, is brought out more clearly by another interpretation of the second clause of verse 21, which is preferred by some eminent authorities, as by Junius and Tremellius, Rosenmüller, and Dr.

Raphall, and which seems more accordant with the Hebrew idiom of the passage. Instead of reading,-"Then shall the Lord be my God, and this stone... shall be God's house," we then read, "And if the Lord will be my God, . . . then this stone," &c.; so that the vow simply embraces the two engagements to consecrate that spot to God's public worship, and to dedicate the tenth of his property to God's service; which must include offerings on God's altar, and alms to the poor. Altogether, the terms of the vow are expressive not only of firm faith, but of the most limited desires for temporal good (he asks only food, raiment, and safe return), and of the lowliest and most entire dependence on the Divine support and protection. For the merest necessaries of life he looks to the goodness of the Lord; and, should he obtain more, how will it be? Not of his own ability or skill, but of God's bounty, which he will not fail to acknowledge, for "of all that Thou shalt give me, I will surely give the tenth unto Thee."

What encouragement is afforded by this vision to believers in all ages, when we consider the circumstances in which this revelation was given! We can hardly imagine a more depressed and lonely condition than that of Jacob fleeing from his father's

house with a sense of sin and weakness clouding his mind. Yet Jehovah comes and reveals Himself to this

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MORAL PHOTOGRAPHS OF A DARK LAND.

TOWARDS the close of March in 1863, a young European of culture and taste might be seen in the company of some thirty or forty wretchedly clad and dirty fellows, leaving the capital of Persia, for a long and dreary march into the dark regions of Central Asia. This young man was about proceeding on a perilous mission -a mission of his own creation, whose dangers were believed to be fatal by those who knew best, and concerning which his own eager fancy had not a few anxieties. He was leaving for many long and weary months the last outpost of partial civilization, and going amongst people, who, if they knew his plans, would cut off his head as soon as they would crop a thistle, or snap a whip. He was going through a vast desert of forty stations in length, where a drop of sweet water cannot be found for days, even if you offer a thousand pounds a drop; where trees are as scarce as in the ocean, and a burning sun seems determined to make the vast realm of sand his own by right of "absolute monarchy."

Mr. Arminius Vambery (for this is the name of the traveller), is a Hungarian by birth, and in early life possessed a taste and faculty for acquiring languages, which ultimately fostered in his mind the irresistible desire to know the origin of his own dialect. To ascertain this, he conceived it to be necessary to make himself acquainted with the dialects of the Turco-Tartaric tribes inhabiting that portion of Central Asia called "Turkestan." This country, which is bordered by the Russian Empire, China, Persia, Hindostan, and the Caspian

Sea, is thus surrounded by mighty empires, all of which have influence in this region, either by the affinities of race, or religion, or through the conquests of the sword, and the fellowship of partial commerce. The cities of principal note in this wild region, are Bokhara, Khiva, Samarcand, and Khokand. The Sultan of Constantinople is regarded as Chief of Religion and Khalif; but the real political powers are identified with districts called Khanats, ruled by Khans, as in Khiva and Khokand, and by an Emir, as in Bokhara; the tribes around these places being severally amenable to their government in some form or

another.

The Kalifat had its seat formerly at Bagdad. When the rulers come into office, it is their habit to receive badges of investiture from Constantinople, but the real influence of the Porte is merely nominal, and, as it would be conjectured, mainly of a religious kind.

The people inhabiting the principal regions mentioned, call themselves Türkmen, or Turkomans, and were originally Tartars, but there has been an intermixture of other races, mainly of the Persian, which has considerably modified the original type.

They have been brought under the dominion of the Mahometan faith, and Bokhara is thought by them to be the capital of Islam. Mr. Vambery thinks that this grim city may be looked upon as the Rome of Islam, while Medina and Mecca are its Jerusalem. The sceptre of Mahomet is swayed to-day over some of the wildest men on earth; and, while our hearts are naturally oppressed with the fact,

we cannot but see in the very presence of some faith in unseen spiritual power, the pledge that these dark races of the human family will eventually become the subjects of the Prince of Peace.

Let us follow Mr. Vambery in his route, and gather a few incidents and facts which may interest our hearts in the moral welfare of those tribes of men who are not at present approached by the teachers of salvation through Jesus Christ.

The young Hungarian had to enter upon his journey as a "begging pilgrim," or dervish, because the most rapacious robbers could not cast an evil eye upon a ragged and wretched vagabond, and the cruellest monsters of those regions will behave civilly to the poor maniac who wanders from land to land for the "love of Allah." To accomplish his plan, he had to bear with terrible privations of all kinds; to have his tongue parched with consuming thirst, as of burning fire; to endure a toilet which a son of St. Giles would disdain; to eat food which happy English dogs would refuse; to drink water worse than doctor's physic; to pass long nights on the back of a camel, or an ass, when sleep would be worth more than gold could buy; to herd with people who would spill the blood of a European like water; and to feign himself the devotee of a faith in which he no more believed than does the reader. For months he dared not tell the secret of his mission to a single creature, and had to trust to his own clever tricks of concealment in perilous contingencies when the keen edge of a Bokhariot sword might almost rest upon his neck.

It may make us a little thankful to

know some of the things which he endured, and cause us to stir the fire and poke our slippers into the fender, and remember that we are in Old England to-night instead of Central Asia. If the pursuit of knowledge at such a hazard can be risked, may we not well ask ourselves how much we are prepared to risk in the service and love of Jesus Christ? The missionary of the Cross may find a motive here for his sacred enterprise.

His first morning station in the desert was a spot whose awkward name means, "The place where men perish." A look on all sides would have convinced a traveller that name and nature were allied in this instance. The vast sweep of sand spread around like a sea. "Not a bird was visible in the air, not a worm or beetle upon the earth; traces of nothing but departed life in the bleaching bones of man or beast that had perished, collected by every passer-by in a heap, to serve to guide the march of future travellers. Why add that we moved on unnoticed by the Turkomans? The man does not exist on earth that could make a station here on horseback!"

The water quickly diminished in the skins, and at night, or in the day, men slept grasping their water-vessels as wary soldiers their swords when they fear a surprise from marauders. The camels failed, and two of the travellers, too poor for camel-carriage, fell so sick and wearied in the march, that they were obliged to bind them at full length upon the camels, as they could not sit and ride. The poor fellows were covered from the heat, and as long as they could gasp a cry, they called, "Water! water!" and these were the only articulate sounds that escaped their burning

lips. The usual charities of the human heart were stayed, and all clung to the drops of water in their skins as to pearls and diamonds of priceless worth. Death released one sufferer from his torments: "His tongue was quite black, the roof of his mouth of a greyish white; in other respects his features were not much disfigured, except that his lips were shrivelled, his teeth exposed, and the mouth open."

A strange incident occurred one evening as the Caravan in the desert had broken up into several parties in search of rain-water. The Hungarian was with the manager of the Caravan, and the two had advanced but forty steps when the latter noticed evident signs of the nearness of human beings. Their muskets were prepared, and they followed a track which led to a cave. There they saw a semi-savage, a wild man of the desert, clad with the skin of a gazelle, having long hair and beard. Coming forth from his hiding place, he rushed towards them with his levelled lance; the unmoved Kervanbashi stood erect and withdrew his sword, simply murmuring in a low voice, "Amanbol," ("peace be unto thee,") and turned away from the haunt of a poor criminal who had for years been wandering round the desert, fleeing from the avenger of bicod, not daring to look upon any human face, and spending summer and winter alike away from all his fellows, a miserable wanderer, with the Cain-mark upon his brow.

At length Bokhara was reached. Here the Oriental is to be seen in all his purity. The wild races of the parts around this Eastern city regard it as their Paris or London. Bokhara, Mr.

Vambery affirms to be a city not more than four miles in circumference, inhabited by a mixed population, amongst whom are a few thousand Jews, all ruled by a severe military despotism, at the head of which is Emir Mozaffared-din Khan, himself a well-disposed man of 41 years of age, upon whose signet is impressed the device— "GOVERNMENT BY JUSTICE," and who is honoured by his people in the expression which they use concerning him, that he is "Killer of elephants, and protector of mice." There are in the city a large number of mosques; the Bokhariot boasts that there are 365, giving him the opportunity of saying his prayers in a fresh place every day of the year. There are also a large number of medresse, or colleges, where some kind of education is imparted, and bazaars where European goods may be purchased, but not by Europeans. The book-stall contains twenty-six shops, where Mr. Vambery saw many things which Western scholars would rejoice to possess, but no Western scholar can buy them.

These Bokhariots profess to be very orthodox Mohammedans, and to be greatly shocked at the laxity of their Khalif at Constantinople. But Vambery reports that he found them steeped in the most abominable deceits. He describes a practice they have of sitting round in a circle, squatting on the ground, for the purpose of contemplating religion, in which it was a common custom for them to fall asleep and snore in unconsciousness of all that was transpiring. But this even was regarded as a manifestation of the divine nature within. Let us hope that, should Mr. Vambery see any sleepers in English churches, he

may draw kind inferences from the unfortunate phenomenon. The "police" of the capital is almost as strict as that which Napoleon III. secured in Paris after his coup d'etat.

Our traveller visited a Caravanserai in the city, which he found to be in the hire of three wholesale dealers as a depôt for slaves, towards whom they stood related as owners or commission brokers for the fierce robbers of the surrounding country. Our fellow beings are bought and sold in Bokhara and Khiva, from the age of three to that of sixty, unless they suffer from physical defects. It is professed that unbelievers alone are sold as slaves, but the Bokhariots are clever at evasion. The Jew is so much despised, fortunately for himself, that Bokhara will not have him in her slave-market. There is some honour in being made a slave!

The cruelties to which the poor slave is exposed when he is in the market are frightful. Truly awful and heartrending are the feelings excited in one's breast at the details furnished concerning the atrocious miseries to which the poor Persians are subjected who chance to fall into the hands of any of the Turkomans.

These latter have a plan of attacking an inhabited settlement or caravan with astonishing dash and rapidity. They are the Zouaves of Central Asia. The Persians are generally paralysed by the sudden and daring nature of the attack, and, though they should be five times as numerous, quail with abject terror in the presence of their fierce captors. Resistance is soon punished with a death-stroke from the fell weapon of the marauder, and if he yields, he is bound to a saddle behind his foe, or

driven on before him; sometimes he is tied to the horse's tail, and is obliged to follow in this dreadful condition the return of the horseman to his distant home.

A case is mentioned of a Persian slave, in the possession of a man who treated Vambery with marked kindness. On his return to his tent one day, he found the poor Persian in desperate agonies, imploring him for a drop of water, saying that for two entire days he had been eating dried salt fish instead of bread, and although he had been doomed to work the whole day in the lemon-field, he had been denied a drop of water. Vambery gave him his water-skin, for the man was bathed in tears, and allowed him to satisfy his thirst, and go away with blessings in his heart for his benefactor.

The lives of the nomadic people are passed in great indolence. The women are made to work harder than the men; it is a disgrace for the lazy lords of creation to be domesticated.

Mr. Vambery mentions a frightful scene which he witnessed in Khiva. As he was being escorted one day to the residence of the treasurer, in a court he passed through he noticed 300 wretched prisoners, who had been taken in a late campaign against certain marauders, covered with rags. The awful dread of their coming fate gave them such agony, that, added to the hunger which they had endured for several days, they looked like inhabitants of tombs. Those who had not reached their fortieth year were set apart for slavery, the rest, the "bearded men," regarded as the ringleaders, were reserved for a fearful doom. He saw ten men placed upon their backs upon the ground,

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