comfortable in your mind?' he immediately answered, Very comfortable-very comfortable;' and exclaimed, Come, Lord Jesus, come!' He then hesitated, as if incapable of bringing out the last word; and one of his daughters, involuntarily as it were, anticipated him by saying,' quickly,' on which her departing father gave her a look expressive of his most complacent delight." And soon after this he died.

We cannot do better than conclude this brief and imperfect sketch by transcribing the following passage with reference to the life of Robert Hall. It is from the pen of Sir E. Bulwer. "Here is a man connecting himself directly with a heavenly purpose, and cultivating considerable faculties to that one end; seeking to accomplish his soul as far as he can, that he may do most good on earth, and take a higher existence up to heaven; a man intent upon a sublime and spiritual duty; in short, living as it were in it, and so filled with the consciousness of immortality, and so strong in the link between God and man, that, without any affected stoicism, without being insensible to pain -rather, perhaps, from a nervous temperament, acutely feeling it-he yet has a happiness wholly independent of it. It is impossible not to be thrilled with an admiration that elevates while it awes you, in reading that solemn dedication of himself to God.' This offering of 'soul and bodytime, health, reputation, talents'-to the divine and invisible Principle of good, calls us suddenly to contemplate the selfishness of our own views and hopes, and awakens us from the egotism that exacts all and resigns nothing."

ARTHUR SUTHERLAND'S TWO JOURNEYS.

CHAPTER I.

"WE shall have a moist night of it, sir," said the coachman of the Emerald to a young man who shared the coach-box with him: "will you be kind enough to hold the reins while I slip on my coat ?" And a stormy night, too," he added, when that operation was performed. "There was a

flash! We shall soon be in the thick of it."

"With all my heart," said Arthur Sutherland; "I don't mind a little damp. But cannot you give the poor woman a place inside? There are no inside passengers, I think."

The words were kindly spoken, and the "poor woman" looked thanks to the young man, who, for his part, seemed rather to enjoy the pelting rain, which, succeeding a hot July day, was laying the dust of the broad turnpike road, and stirring up a refreshing scent from the meadows and hedges which lined it.

Our story is of the by-gone days, when railroads, as travelling roads, were only beginning to be talked of, and were the standing joke of travellers, reviewers, and theoretical philosophers.

Beautiful! grand!" exclaimed the young man, suddenly, before the driver had time to reply to his question, as a vivid flash of forked lightning, followed by a loud peal of thunder, caused the highbred cattle to plunge in their traces, and proved the coachman's anticipations to be correct and in course of speedy fulfilment. The same flash and peal

which startled the horses and excited the admiration of the young traveller, drew from the poor woman just behind him a faint cry of alarm; and, on turning his head, Arthur saw that she was pale and trembling, and that the infant she carried was convulsively clasped to her bosom. He saw, too, that the slight summer cloak she wore, and the additional shawl which she had drawn over her bonnet and spread around her baby, were an insufficient protection from the rain, which was now coming down in right earnest.

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Surely you will let her get inside," he said compassionately; "poor thing! she and her child will be wet through in another five minutes." "We shall change horses directly," replied the coachman; "and then I will see what I can do; but our governors are very particular. If they were to know of my doing such a thing, I should get a dressing. But on such a night as this is like to be"

The coach drew up to the inn door, even as the coachman was speaking; and while the four panting, steaming horses were exchanged for a team fresh from the stable, the young woman and her infant were, much to their comfort, transferred from the outside to the inside of the coach.

The storm increased in its fury as the evening drew on. The lightning was fearfully brilliant and almost incessant, the thunder was terrific, and the rain poured down in torrents. The three or four outer passengers, wrapping themselves up in comfortable waterproof coats and cloaks, and pulling their hats over their eyes, silently wondered when it would be over, only now and then expressing a fear, which seemed not without foundation, that the horses wouldn't stand it much longer, and that the off-leader, especially, would bolt "before one could say Jack Robinson."

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But there was no such catastrophe; and another stage was accomplished. The thunder-storm had partially abated; but the rain still poured down heavily as the coachman threw the ribands" to the horsekeeper, and a waiter from the inn ventured out upon the now muddy road to announce that the coach would remain there half an hour, and that a supper was on the table, if the passengers would please to alight.

Glad to change his position, and not unmindful of the demands of a youthful and sharp appetite, Arthur Sutherland had accepted the invitation, and was entering the supper-room, when a loud and angry altercation at the inn-door arrested his attention and his steps.

"Is she an inside passenger, I ask? that's all I want to know: ' "the voice was domineering and fierce.

"No, sir, she is not"-this was the coachman: "but she has got an infant, and is going all the way to Birmingham, and isn't over and above well clothed for the journey, night travelling and all; and as there wasn't any one inside, and the storm came on, I thought there wasn't any harm—”

The coachman was interrupted in his apology and explanation by a coarse oath, and a declaration that if he didn't mind what he was about, the Emerald should soon have another driver, with an insinuation that there was some understanding between him and the woman about an extra fee, but that he (the angry speaker) would be one too

many for him (the accommodating coachman) this time.

"There isn't anything of the sort," replied the coachman bluntly; " and here's a gentleman," pointing to Arthur, who had come forward a few steps, "that can tell you so. He knows when and why I put the woman inside."

The young gentleman, thus appealed to, briefly explained that at his earnest solicitation the poor woman was accommodated with an inside place when the storm came on. "She would have been drenched to the skin by this time," he added, "if she had retained her former seat on the top of the coach."

"That doesn't signify," retorted the other, who was evidently one of the coach proprietors, upon whom the Emerald had lighted somewhat unexpectedly, and upon whose overbearing and defiant address the outward costume of a gentleman sat misfittingly, while his temper was probably roughened by the light load of the Emerald that night: "it doesn't signify; if the woman goes inside, she must pay inside fare, that's all;" and returning to the coach door, he in a few words placed the alternative before the traveller.*

Without any further reply than that she was unable to accede to the demand, the young mother was about to step out into the soaking rain, when the youth-for Arthur Sutherland could by no means have lawfully claimed to be considered a man-gently interfered. "You surely do not mean to turn the poor woman and her baby out into the rain, sir? It may cause her death to be exposed to it through the whole night. I dare say she is not much used to travelling; and she has nothing to wrap round her but a thin shawl."

"I can't help that," said the proprietor, sharply, for he seemed to think the interference of the young traveller a piece of gratuitous impertinence to be resented; "the young woman should have taken care of that herself."

"I did not think of its being such a night when the coach started," the woman said, in a soft gentle voice; "and if I had known it, I had nothing warmer to put on; but I dare say I shall do very well," she added, resignedly; "at least, if it wasn't for the poor baby." And, wrapping this object of her solicitude as warmly as she could in her shawl, she was stepping from the coach, when the young man again interfered.

It is a great shame," he said, indignantly; " and I shouldn't have expected—”

As the reader may reasonably doubt whether any person in such circumstances could act so brutally, the writer has to say that he was on the coach-top that night, and witnessed the

informed her that she was to keep her inside place the rest of the way. This settled the matter.

Come, Mr. Sutherland," shouted a voice from the supper-room; "you are going to help us, arn't you? Here's some good stowage; but you must make haste about it; nothing like time present; it will soon be 'Time's up, gentlemen.'

"Thank you,” replied Arthur; "but I am not going to take supper this evening." The extra fare had dipped deeply into a purse not very well lined. If the "poor woman" had known the penance to which her young champion doomed himself as the price of his generosity, and how, in the drenching rain which lasted all the remainder of the journey, he was fain to content himself with munching and mumbling a dry biscuit, just to amuse his internal economy with the hope of something better to follow, she would not, I think, have passed the night so comfortably as, in her ignorance, she did. But however this might be, in due time, or within half an hour of it, the Emerald drove up to the office of the "Hen and Chickens," where, in the early morning, a pleasant-looking, manly young mechanic was, among others, waiting the arrival. A gleam of satisfaction passed over his countenance as he scrutinized the roof of the coach.

"I am glad she didn't come through such a night as this has been," he said to a fellow-workman by his side. "She is delicate and timid, and wasn't well provided with cloakings, either; and the poor baby

'Here, Alex" the voice of his wife from the open coach window stopped short the young man's colloquy; and he hastened to open the door.

"Bless you, Edith! you here? I thought you wouldn't have come in such weather, and I didn't think to look for you inside, anyhow."

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"Oh, I wanted to get home so badly," said the young traveller, putting her infant into its father's arms; whereupon it began to kick and crow good-un," as he said afterwards; "and besides," she added, "it didn't seem like rain when we left London, or perhaps I mightn't have come." "Well, I am glad you were able to get an inside place."

"I shouldn't, though," said Edith, "if it hadn't been for a young gentleman- ;" and she looked round to thank her friend afresh, just in time to see him turn the corner of New-street. "There! I am vexed," she said; and on her way home, like a dutiful wife, she gave her husband a true and full account of her incidents of travel, from the Bull and Mouth in London to the office in Birmingham.

A few weeks afterwards, one Sunday morn ing, as Arthur Sutherland, with his sister, was walking towards church, he passed a respectable young couple, in one of whom he recognised the

poor woman" his travelling companion. It was plain that he too was remembered, for in another minute the man had turned and was at Arthur's elbow.

"Excuse my freedom, sir," he said; "but I wish to thank you for your kindness to my Edith my wife, I mean-that terrible night she came down from London."

Don't speak a word about it," replied the youth; I am glad I was able to give a little assistance;

man's" behaviour. ;

didn't get any harm; for she had some of the storm, as it was." "Not the least in the world, sir; but she might have got a good deal if she had come all the way outside of the coach. She had been to London to see her friends, and hadn't more than enough left to pay her fare down. I think you was money out of pocket, sir," the man added, after a little hesitation; "and if you wouldn't be offended at my offering to pay back again'

Not a word about it, my good fellow; I couldn't think of it

"Then, sir, I must thank you for it, and hope to be able to return the kindness some other way;" and the man rejoined his young wife.

"That's young Sutherland," he said. "His father's a regular screw, they say; but this one has got a good name, as far as he can do anything. If the old gentleman had been on the coach that night instead of the young one, you might have been wet through fifty times before he would have said a word for you, Edith."

"What new friend have you picked up now, Arthur?" asked his sister when the short conference was ended; "and what is that about the coach? I guess now why you had to borrow of me the day after your journey, to make up your book, as you said."

Well, never mind now, Jessy; I'll tell you all about it another day," said Arthur.

[TO BE CONTINUED.]

INSECT CURIOSITIES. AMONG the many marvels which are continually before our eyes, there are few more worthy of observation, or which more forcibly illustrate the condescending wisdom and beneficence of the great Maker of all things, than the wonderful instincts, if instincts they are to be called, implanted in the minutest creatures, to enable them to provide for their hourly wants, and to secure the welfare of their progeny, which, in the case of insects, for the most part come into existence after the death of the parent. We demur somewhat at the word "instinct," because, from occasional observation of the doings of these little creatures, and from what we have read of the observations of others, persons of very good authority, we feel inclined to question the appropriateness of the term. It is our object at present to bring together a few of the characteristic performances of the insect race, some of which have passed under our own notice, while for others we are indebted to the writings of a celebrated naturalist, Mr. Rymer Jones, from whose second volume on the "Natural History of Animals we shall make a few abbreviated selections. We shall confine our instances to facts which we have personally observed, and to others already recorded but not generally known.

The most casual observer must have remarked at times, in field or garden, upon the leaf of an oak, or some fruit-bearing tree, a brownish patch of a downy texture, looking not very unlike a mole on the human skin. Did he ever imagine that this was a moths'-nest ? "Several kinds of moths," says Rymer Jones, "construct very beautiful and curious nests, impervious to wet, and entirely com

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posed of hair stripped from their own bodies. With this material, which they tear off by means of their pincer-like ovipositor, they first form a soft couch on the surface of some leaf; they then place upon it, successively, layers of eggs, and surround them with a similar downy coating; afterwards, when the whole number is deposited, they cover the surface with a roof of hairs, the disposition of which cannot be too much admired: those used for the interior of the nest are scattered without order, but those that are placed externally are arranged with as much art and skill as the thatch of a cottage, and as effectually keep out water; one layer of these hairs partially overlaps another, and, all having the same direction, the whole resembles a well-brushed piece of shaggy cloth or fur. When the mother has finished this labour, which often occupies her for twenty-four hours, and sometimes for even twice that period, her body, which before was extremely hairy, is rendered almost wholly naked; she has stripped herself to clothe her offspring, and having performed this last duty of her life, she dies."

Many have seen the chrysalis of the butterfly hanging by its tail to a leaf of the hawthorn or a rose-bush, without perhaps considering how the caterpillar accomplished the business of suspending himself by the tail by means of silk spun from his mouth while encased in a skin which must be cast off before the process is finished. Let us see how he sets about it. "When the caterpillar has selected an object to which it proposes suspending itself, the first process is to spin upon it a little hillock of silk, consisting of loosely interwoven threads; it then bends its body so as to insinuate the anal pair of prolegs amongst these threads, in which the little crotchets which surround them become so strongly entangled as to support its weight with ease. It now hangs perpendicularly from its silken support, with its head downwards. In this position it often remains for twenty-four hours, at intervals alternately contracting and dilating itself. At length the skin is seen to split on the back, near the head, and a portion of the pupa appears, which, by repeated swellings, acts like a wedge, and rapidly extends the slit towards the tail. By the continuance of these alternate contractions and dilatations of the conical pupa, the skin of the caterpillar is at last collected in folds near the tail, like a stocking which we roll upon the ankle before withdrawing it from the foot. But now comes the important operation. The pupa being much shorter than the caterpillar, is yet at some distance from the silken hillock upon which it is to be fastened; it is supported merely by the unsplit terminal portion of the latter's skin. How shall it disengage itself from this remnant of its case, and be suspended in the air while it climbs up to its place? Without arms or legs to support itself, the anxious spectator expects to see it fall to the earth. His fears, however, are vain; the supple segments of the pupa's abdomen serve in the place of arms. Between two of these, as with a pair of pincers, it seizes on a portion of the skin, and bending its body once more, entirely extricates its tail from it. It is now wholly out of the skin, against one side of which it is supported, but yet at some distance from the leaf. The next step is to climb up to the required height. For this purpose it repeats the