containing the shortest fibres. These reverse ends of the slivers are then spliced together, a process called planking. The breaking frame receives the wool from the planking-table. This instrument consists of a series of four wheels, moving with different velocities. The object of the breaking frame is to draw out and equalize the sliver, which it does, increasing its length threefold. The drawing frame is a machine somewhat similar in construction to the breaking frame, and intended for a similar purpose. By these processes the sliver is frequently increased in length a thousand times. The roving frame will take two slivers together, and draw them out four times their length; and in this way the worsted is made so small, that it would break with the least weight if a slight twist were not given to it. The bobbins which are taken on the spindles of the roving machine, are transferred to the spinning frame, in which the requisite degree of twist is given to the worsted. There is but one process more in the manufacture of worsted, or, we might rather say, in its preparation for the market, as we have already mentioned all that is required for the manufacture. Before a long horizontal reel exactly a yard in circumference, twenty bobbins from the spinning frame are placed, and wound off together. When the reel has revolved eighty times, that is to say, when eighty yards from each bobbin are on it, a small bell is rung, and the reel is stopped. A thread is then passed round the eighty yards of each bobbin, and this quantity is called a ley. The reel is then made to revolve again, and another eighty yards are added, and tied. Seven leys make a hank, which of course increases five hundred yards. The hanks, when taken from the reel, which is easily done by loosening one of the rails, being hung upon hooks, are twisted tightly with a stick, doubled, and twisted again, in the state in which they are brought to the market. H. A GOOD EXAMPLE. WE may learn from the example of Isaiah (Isa. vi. 8) how to conduct ourselves on receiving any important call. When the prophet heard the voice of Jehovah, saying, "Whom shall I send, and who will go for us ?" (who will be my messenger?) he was ready at once to consent, saying, "Here am I;" but he did not omit to add, "Send me," that he might not go without the Divine will. A “ready mind” is much more pleasing to God than that of one who must be constrained into his service; as was Moses to become the shepherd of the children of Israel. Therefore we may and ought to offer ourselves to God for any commission wherewith he may be pleased to entrust us; only we must wait until he send us, and wait to know what our place or appointment is; at the same time remembering, that as we are but human instruments at best, there is a possibility of running before he sends us, or when he does not want As we can be nothing more than his instruments, the less we mingle with his work what is merely ours, in other words, the more immediately we depend for our sufficiency upon God himself, the more direct is our progress to its complete fulfilment.Bengel. us. OLD HUMPHREY ON EXTREMES. HAD I only attended to one half the rules which I have ventured to lay down for the guidance of others, how carefully, how creditably, and how exemplarily might I have walked through the world! but we are more disposed to give advice than to take it, and it is easier to lay down good plans for our own guidance than to carry them into effect with uniform steadiness and perseverance. A word with you now on the subject of extremes. Instead of talking learnedly about Scylla and Charybdis, I will say in more homely language, that in avoiding the watery ditch on one side the road, we often run into the muddy quagmire on the other. Now it is but a sorry source of comfort when a man considers that he has escaped falling into one puddle up to his knees, by getting into another up to his neck. Avoid extremes! There is a golden mean that we shall all do well to attain. Though we need not fear being too humble, too honest, too sincere, or too eager after heaven, yet in a thousand things we may err by carrying matters to excess. There are few who run into the extreme of abstinence in eating, drinking, and sleeping, though many grievously err in the opposite excess of gluttony, drunkenness, and sloth. Instances, however, of all kinds of extremes do occur. I knew a man who almost killed himself by an excess of abstinence; and another, a clergyman, who attributed his ill state of health to the circumstance of his lying so much in bed, though it was a rare case for him not to rise before four o'clock in the morning! Gravity and mirth are both good in their way; but that, which in one degree may be an advantage, may, in another, be an affliction. Neither excessive gravity nor excessive mirth is suited to man. Excessive gravity would rob him of the energy of action, and excessive mirth would unfit him for salutary thought. My advice is, that you neither go scowling through the world like a screech owl, nor grinning like a monkey. With stedfast mind partake life's sweets and sours, And neither grin nor growl away thy hours. There are those who make haste to be rich, adding, at all hazards, field to field, house to house, and barn to barn; and there are also who, by impru dence, are industrious in attaining poverty. A wise man will strive to shun, and a good man will struggle to avoid the snares that lie in the extremes of riches and poverty. Agur saw these snares, and urgently put up the prayer, "Give me neither poverty nor riches feed me with food convenient for me: lest I be full, and deny thee, and say, Who is the Lord? or lest I be poor, and steal, and take the name of my God in vain," Prov. xxx. 8, 9. If you desire a smooth path on earth, and a bright prospect of heaven, be thankful that your lot is not cast in the extremes of riches and poverty. Let neither needless penury be thy rod, Some have the gift of speech, and indulge it to such a degree that they will run on by the hour in conversation, Prodigality and parsimony are evils; scarcely allowing those around them to the one being the excess of spending interrupt the current of their discourse. and bestowing, the other the excess Others are habitually so silent, that of laying up and withholding. For drawing an observation from them is my part, I hardly know which is most like extracting a tight cork from the to be pitied and despised-the poor narrow neck of a bottle. Talkativeness prodigal who wastes his goods, or the and taciturnity are extremes that are avaricious man who denies himself and not to be commended: of the two, others the comforts of existence. Did however, I prefer the latter; for talking the prodigal and the parsimonious know too much is certainly a greater fault how much good might be done by a than talking too little. If you wish to well-spent penny, they would neither render yourself useful and agreeable give away uselessly, nor begrudge hard to your friends, you will neither heartedly. Whether rich or poor, try chatter like a parrot, nor sit dumb to keep up a prudent and a liberal as though the gift of speech were denied spirit, neither scattering as a spend- you. thrift, nor amassing as a miser. Treat not as dross the goodly gifts of Heaven, Thoughtlessness and care are extremes that ought to be avoided. Let us neither tempt God, by despising his gifts, nor dishonour him by distrusting his goodness! There is enough of pain, poverty, sorrow, and sin in the world to call forth reflection and prudence, and there are far too many proofs of our heavenly Father's care for us, to warrant unreasonable anxiety for ourselves. Neither pass away life with reckless indifference, nor waste it in gloomy apprehensions of evil. With prudent forethought let thy paths be trod, A man of wisdom tempers well his tongue, Severity and weak indulgence are failings that cling closely to parents, though the latter is more common than the former. At times, these excesses are found in the same person, who at one season excuses great faults, and at another sternly reproves trivial errors. Parents! be on your guard; for what father can hope that his child will love him, if he snaps him up sharply on the least occasion; and what mother can expect a child to honour her in age, who is allowed to make faces at a bald head? Be kind hearted, and reprove evil; but be neither weakly, nor wick¦edly indulgent or severe. Be neither swift to censure, weakly blind, Unjustly cruel, nor absurdly kind. Credulity and scepticism are sad errors; for the one will weakly believe what is false, and the other will wilfully doubt what is true. To give credit to every idle report, or to call in question what knowledge and experience have proved, is equally to manifest a want of wisdom. I know those who believe it to be an ill omen to see a magpie; and I also know those who doubt the eternal truths of God's most holy word. Extremes indulged are certain to grow strong, Weakness and wilfulness must both be wrong. Sharpness and excessive softness in conversation are extremes attended with great disadvantage; the former being disliked, and the latter being always suspected. A friend of mine, the other day, describing two characters, said of them, "The one is as sharp as freshgathered mustard, the other is a dear oily man; both together they would make an excellent salad." Sharp words and soft deceit show want of sense; Let truth be told, but still without offence. Extremes in dress and appearance, though not so objectionable, are still more apparent than extremes in manners. One man wears a very low hat, with a broad brim; another has one high in the crown, with hardly any brim at all. One wears shoes three inches broad at the toe, another has boots, whose points are sharp and turning up somewhat in the style of a Turkish slipper. One man shaves himself clean, and has his hair clipped unreasonably close; another lets his hair grow long on his head, his neck, and his face. One man takes out with him a thin cane, that can neither defend him, nor sustain his weight; another carries a thick cudgel as though he were about to beat a buffalo. There is no end to excesses and extremes among mankind. In word and deed, in manners and in dress, I might lay before you a catalogue of extremes, and one way of increasing its length would be to add thereto the list of my own excesses; but enough has been said, perhaps, to set you to work to discover the extremes into which you yourselves most commonly run, in order that they may be corrected. In this THE poising and motion of fishes in the water has interested some of our greatest philosophers, as Galileo and Borelli. It is estimated that fishes make their way through a medium which resists nine hundred times more than the atmosphere. But then, as it offers a certain resistance to their progress, it resists also the motion of their tail and fins, by which they have their power of progression. The breadth of the tail of fishes, compared with that of their fins, and its muscularity of power, declare what is affirmed to us upon authority, that the tail is the great instrument of their progression; and we can see that when the trout darts away, the force of his motion lays down the fins close upon his body. But the fins direct him, as outriggers, and the pectoral fins especially, by raising or depressing the head, give direction to the whole body, under the force of the tail. The lateral fins, and particularly the pectoral fins, also sustain him in the right position in the water: without the co-operation of these with the tail, the fish would move like a boat skulled by one oar at the stern. As the digestion of fishes, as well as that of other animals, is attended with the extrication of air, and as the intestines are below the centre, the belly would be To all this may be added, that the solid which the mathematicians have discovered, by refined application of the calculus, and have termed "the solid of least resistance," because it is the conformation which is less than any other affected by the resistance of any medium, resembles a fish in its form.-Lord Brougham. SKETCHES OF FRANCE. THE following extracts are from a journal of two Protestant clergymen recently travelling in France : At Avignon we had a fresh evidence of the oppressive influence of the Roman Catholic system. While the male part of the Roman Catholic population almost universally incline to principles of infidelity, the female part are bigoted to a high degree. Indeed, the further we proceed in our journey through France, the more strikingly it appears to us, that the Roman Catholics are acquiring new energy and power; and in many parts, their animosity towards Protestants has so greatly increased, that at the very first opportunity, a fresh persecution may justly be apprehended. At Grenoble we visited the active minister of a small Protestant congregation. He keeps a superior female boarding school, in which from eighteen to twenty young ladies are educated in a truly Christian manner. The Roman Catholic bishop of Grenoble lately published a Lent address, in which he issues his positive command to commit all the Bibles, circulated by the hawkers, to the flames. We must in general observe, that the Roman Catholics now assume a haughtiness of spirit, and bitterness of tone, such as would not have been anticipated even a few years ago. In the mountainous districts of the province of Dauphiné, we entered a Roman Catholic village school, where we had ocular demonstration of the very defective mode of education existing in many of the provinces of France, especially among Roman Catholics. We found sixteen children standing round the fireplace, warming themselves. Not one could read, even to a tolerable degree: but no wonder; for the method of the schoolmaster consisted merely in spelling syllable after syllable himself, which some of the scholars, in a noisy unpleasant tone, repeated after him. At Marseilles great pains have lately been taken, by Roman Catholic priests, to revive the former attachment of the population to the Roman Catholic church and system. Some of them publicly advocated the cause of the inquisition. Their hearers were so numerous, that they found it necessary to appoint particular hours for the assemblage of each sex. Finally, separate addresses were given to the rising generation; and no less than four thousand children were formed into a public procession, which paraded the streets, notwithstanding the unfavourable state of the weather. Since the Roman Catholic clergy can no longer depend on the aid of the secular arm, they have begun to resort to specious argumentation, and to make eloquent appeals to the passions of men. On the 6th of April, we reached Mont- | climar, a town, almost all of whose inhabitants had formerly professed the Protestant faith. Now the reverse is the case; for only a small number are at present Protestants, and even among these few, true vital religion is wanting. A Protestant shoemaker at Montpellier had married a Roman Catholic woman. When the missionaries, connected with the latter church, paid a visitation to the above city, they took pains to gain the Protestant husband over to their faith, and repeatedly entered into disputations with him; but being unable to conquer him by force of argument, they soon desisted, and the wife herself became a Protestant. It gave us real pleasure to observe, in several provincial towns of France, which we happen to visit, some Roman Catholic schoolmasters, who not only read the Scriptures themselves, with great profit and edification, but also publicly recommended them to the attention and perusal of their scholars. ECCENTRICITY NOT NECESSARILY A PROOF of the judgment of Howe, as well as of that harmony of mind, of which I have so often spoken, was his exemption from those eccentricities, as they are called, which are so often associated with exalted genius, and which generally display themselves, either in a contempt for little things, often of sufficient importance, however, to affect seriously the convenience of others, or in some ludicrous peculiarities of appearance and manner, These are sometimes the effect of sincere negligence, and perhaps quite as frequently of affectation. To be forgiven, in consideration of the noble qualities, which they may depreciate, but assuredly cannot enhance, is the utmost that ought to be demanded for them; yet, strange to say, they are often the objects of admiring wonder, and even of sedulous imitation to the fools who imagine that because genius is eccentric, eccentricities will establish a claim to genius. Now, such eccentricities are at best infirmities, and not excellences; and in proportion as a mind is more perfect, in that proportion will it avoid them : it will not only think nothing beneath its attention, which ought to be attended to, but be capable of adapting itself to the various demands of life, whether great or little, with a truly Protean facility.-From the Life of John Howe. READY TO DEPART. Ir a man, on his return homeward from a distant country, should be detained in some port by contrary winds, he might be content to take up with such employments and pleasures as the place afforded, and might enter with some interest into them. But at the first notice that the wind had changed, that there was a possibility of weighing anchor, he would throw aside whatever he was about; he would be ready to depart, Phil. i. 23. (ávaλõoai.) Ought not this to be the feeling of the Christian with respect to his enjoyment of the world? He is in the world, John xvii. 11, and in those lawful pleasures which the world affords, in domestic comforts, in the works of nature or of Providence, he may take a temporary interest; but surely, where grace exists in any considerable degree, this will not be without many an eager look towards his Father's house, John xiv. 2, towards his better country, Heb. xi. 16. And though the first appearance of that disease, which comes as a messenger to tell him that the wind is fair for his departure, may create a start, yet surely he must and will hail it as the bearer of good tidings, as the announcement that his Lord is waiting to receive him to himself. And shall he be backward to set sail?-Rev. C. Neale. NOTICE. WE beg to apprize our readers, that the History of England will be resumed and continued monthly during the coming year; that a series of papers, illustrative of Scripture, from Chinese Literature, will be immediately commenced; and that Old Humphrey, the Perambulator, and other valuable contributors, purpose continuing their respective labours. Printed by William Tyler, 5, Bolt Court, London. |