one aosorbing inquiry urges itself on the mind: "Whose hand hath done this?" and though no audible response be heard, the heart feels the reply, "The Lord, strong and mighty, the Lord mighty in battle!" "He doeth according to his will in the army of heaven, and among the inhabitants of the earth; and none can stay his hand, or say unto him, What doest thou?"

Jerusalem! thou hast awakened my awe, my reverence, and my spiritual affections, and more deeply impressed on my mind the everlasting verities of the book of truth. And, Thebes!

I view thy noble relics with a sigh,

Thy glory and thy greatness are departed!
Thy tenants have forsaken thee, and hid
Their faces in the dust; and thou art left
A mouldering monument, wherein I read
Not only their mortality, but mine.

THE

ROYAL ADELAIDE GALLERY,

AND THE

POLYTECHNIC INSTITUTION.

THERE is no spot of earth that can be altogether uninteresting to a Christian perambulator, and for this plain reason, wherever he goes, God has been there before him, and left some unequivocal trace of his almighty presence. The heavens are richly coloured, the earth is clothed with beauty! The change of seasons is but a change in the glorious exhibition of God's

wondrous creation. Illimitable power, unsearchable wisdom, and inexhaustible goodness, are inscribed on even his "lowliest works." In the country, well may the heart beat, and the eye sparkle with gratitude and joy, for the sources of delight are unbounded; and he who is accustomed to look on all as the gift of God conferred for the good of man, will indeed find

"Tongues in trees, books in the running brooks,

Sermons in stones, and good in every thing."

That knowledge which connects earth with heaven has an increased enjoyment. It gives an added interest to the scenes around us:

And doubly sweet are rural hours,

The hills, the dales, the trees, the flowers,
The wood, the wave, and water-fall,
When God is seen among them all.

Nor yet are the peopled pathways of the crowded city without absorbing interest, for there may be seen men and manners in all their varied modifications. There, too, is found all that is rare and curious, heaped up in a thousand treasure-houses; so that a perambulator may walk abroad with pleasure, and return home laden with instruction. London, indeed, abounds with exhibitions of interest, where every degree of intellect, and every variety of disposition, may find amusement and advantage. Whether my tent has been fixed in the "mart of all the earth," or elsewhere, I have always been a perambulator in the neighbourhood around me. No wonder, then, that the varied exhibitions of this mighty metropolis should have attracted me.

When any one, young or old, gazes for the first time on a steam-engine, without being prepared for such a sight, he is altogether confounded by the spectacle. He

sees the machine, like a huge giant with a hundred arms, achieving wonders; but he is lost among the rods and cylinders, the revolving wheels, the heaving levers, the groaning axles, and the hissing steam; he confounds the effect and cause; he is astonished and perplexed, but not made wiser. But let any one familiar with the engine, explain to him the principle of its action, so that he can distinguish between the mere machine and the mighty energy that keeps it in motion, and how different will be the amount of his pleasure and profit. In like manner, a slight degree of information given to him who, for the first time, visits any other exhibition, will not be useless.

Did you ever visit the ROYAL ADELAIDE GALLERY? If not, thither will we bend our steps; the only advantage that I can claim over you is this, that I have been there already. Bear in mind that I neither undertake to play the part of a catalogue, by directing you to all that the gallery contains, nor yet to decide which things are the most entitled to your attention. My pleasure will be to roam here and there without restraint; and my business to implant in your memory useful knowledge, and to excite in your mind right feelings.

*

Well! we have passed the crowded Strand; we have walked along the Lowther Arcade; we have entered the Long Room of the Institution with a catalogue in our hands; and now, what use can we make of the models, the magnets, the steam-engines, boats, and carriages; the fire-escapes, air-pumps, safety-lamps, and hydrometers; the life-boats, rudders, anchors, paddles, and paddle-wheels; the rafts, blow-pipes, gasmeters, and electrifying machines; the life-preservers, cylinders,

shafts, cog-wheels, pulleys, and inclined planes? If we attend to a tenth part of what is before us, we must stay here a week: let us look at a few of them, and be

content.

calculate the amount of Almost every machine, result of intense study;

How hard it would be to mind that now lies before us! model, and plan has been the days and nights, weeks, months, and even years, have been devoted to the perfecting of some of the designs presented to our view. We see the result only. The disappointments that have been endured, the difficulties which have been overcome, the unconquered patience, the determined perseverance that have been exercised, We shall err, then, if we regard these miniature models as mere playthings to amuse an idle hour; they are, for the most part, efforts of the mind for the benefit of the human race.

we see not.

Look at that model of Eddystone lighthouse. It is a mere bauble in itself; but when we consider, that the lighthouse which it exactly represents is really standing, like a warning angel, amid the stormy breakers of the British Channel, enduring the attacks of the heaving ocean, as it pours its roaring billows from the wild Atlantic, making signs to the mariners to keep aloof from the dangerous rocks that threaten him with destruction, it gives it an indescribable interest. I must have another look before I leave it.

Why have you passed by that model of a raft so hastily? Come back again, and examine it afresh. Do you take it for a play-thing? it is something better. You see these little barrels and strips of wood tied together. Now, by observing this model attentively, you may learn from it how human lives may be rescued

from destruction in a season of extremity, by the use of materials ready to hand. Imagine that a vessel is foundering in the mighty deep: it " reels to and fro, and staggers like a drunken man," and the seamen are at their wits' end.

"One wide water all around thèm,

All above them one black sky;

Different deaths at once surround them

Hark! what means that dreadful cry?”

Perhaps, when all seems lost, two or three steady-minded sailors step forward, and from the materials of little worth that a ship always carries with her, begin to form a raft of safety. Three or four empty water-casks are well lashed to a few spars and planks, or gratings; on which a chest, a bag of provisions, and a butt of water are quickly placed; rude as the construction may be, it floats upon the water with a score or two seamen on it. The ship founders, but the raft lives through the waves, and some days, or weeks after, is picked up by a friendly vessel, or makes some point of land in safety. I see that you look on the model of the life-raft with more attention than did; you it is meant to preserve life, and is, therefore, not a work of science only, but of humanity.

Here is a life-preserver, meant to be thrown into the sea when a sailor falls overboard. I hope that you can swim, and are able and willing to render assistance when you see any one in the water in danger. A few weeks ago, a poor idiot, seeing a child fall into the canal, leaped in after him, and saved the child's life. Who would be outdone in humanity by an idiot?

Hark! that flourish of trumpets announces that the steam-gun is about to pour its stream of leaden bullets