Their sharpness, ere he is aware. When thoughts

Of the last bitter hour come like a blight

Over thy spirit, and sad images

Of the stern agony, and shroud, and pall,

And breathless darkness, and the narrow house,

Make thee to shudder, and grow sick at heart—

Go forth, under the open sky, and list

To Nature's teachings, while from all around—

Earth and her waters, and the depths of air—

Comes a still voice—" Yet a few days, and thee

The all-beholding sun shall see no more

In all his course; nor yet in the cold ground,

Where thy pale form is laid With many tears,

Nor in the embrace of ocean, shall exist

Thy image. Earth, that nourished thee, shall claim

Thy growth, to be resolved to earth again,

And, lost each human trace, surrendering up

Thine individual being, shalt thou go

To mix for ever with the elements—

To be a brother to the insensible rock,

And to the sluggish clod, which the rude swain

Turns with his share, and treads upon. The oak

Shall send his roots abroad, and pierce thy mould.

"Yet not to thine eternal resting-place Shalt thou retire alone—nor could'st thou wish Couch more magnificent. Thou shalt lie down With patriarchs of the infant world—with kings, The powerful of the earth—the wise, the good, Pair forms, and hoary seers, of ages past, All in one mighty sepulchre.—The hills Rock-ribbed, and ancient as the sun—the vales Stretching in pensive quietness between; The venerable woods—rivers that move In majesty, and the complaining brooks That make the meadows green; and, poured round all, Old ocean's gray and melancholy waste— Are but the solemn decorations all Of the great tomb of man. The golden sun, The planets, all the infinite host of heaven, Are shining on the sad abodes of death, Through the still lapse of ages. All that tread The globe, are but a handful to the tribes That slumber in its bosom.—Take the wings Of morning, and the Barcan desert2 pierce,

Or lose thyself in the continuous woods
Where rolls the Oregon,3 and hears no sound
Save his own dashings—yet the dead are there;
And millions in those solitudes, since first
The flight of years began, have laid them down
In their last sleep—the dead there reign alone.

"So shalt thou rest—and what if thou withdraw
Unheeded by the living—and no friend
Take note of thy departure? All that breathe
Will share thy destiny. The gay will laugh
When thou art gone, the solemn brood of care
Plod on, and each one, as before, will chase
His favourite phantom; yet all these shall leave
Their mirth and their employments, and shall come
And make their bed with thee. As the long train
Of ages glide away, the sons of men,
The youth in life's green spring, and he who goes
In the full strength of years, matron, and maid,
And the sweet babe, and the gray-headed man—
Shall one by one be gathered to thy side,
By those who, in their turn, shall follow them.

"So live, that, when thy summons comes to join
The innumerable caravan, that moves
To that mysterious realm, where each shall take
His chamber in the silent halls of death,
Thou go not like the quarry-slave at night
Scourged to his dungeon, but, sustained and soothed
By an unfaltering trust, approach thy grave,
Like one who wraps the drapery of his couch
About him, and lies down to pleasant dreams."

NOTES.

1 Thanatopsis—"A Vision of Death.''

2 Barcan Desert—The African Sa

hara

3 The Oregon—A river falling Into tho Pacific in North Western America. It was an utter solitude when tbfl poem was written.

To gild refined gold, to paint the lily,

To throw a perfume on the violet,

To smooth the ice, or add another hue

TJnto the rainbow, or with taper-light

To seek the beauteous eye of heaven to garnish,

Is wasteful and ridiculous excess.

THE HERITAGE.—James Russell Lowell.

Mr. Lowell was born at Boston, Massachusetts, in 1819; studied law and graduated at Harvard University. He is one of the first humorists of the day, as shown in his u Biglow Papere," but he is also a thoughtful, serious poet, and his prose writings show him to be a man of wide culture and great eleganco of mind. He is still alive.

What doth the poor man's son inherit?
Stout muscles and a sinewy heart,

A hardy frame, a hardier spirit;
King of two hands, he does his part
In every useful toil and art;—

A heritage, it seems to me,

A king might wish to hold in fee.

What doth the poor man's son inherit?
Wishes o'erjoyed with humble things,

A rank adjudged for toil-won merit,
Content that from employment springs,
A heart that in his labour sings ;—

A heritage, it seems to me,

A king might wish to hold in fee.

What doth the poor man's son inherit?
A patience learned by being poor;

Courage, if sorrow come, to bear it j
A fellow-feeling that is sure
To make the outcast bless his door;—

A heritage, it seems to mo,

A king might wish to hold in fee.

O rich man's son! there is a toil
That with all other level stands;

Large charity doth never soil,

But only whiten, soft white hands;—
This is the best crop from thy lands;

A heritage, it seems to me,

Worth being rich to hold in fee.

0 poor man's son! scorn not thy state;
There is worse weariness than thine,

In merely being rich and great:
Toil only gives the soul to shine,
And makes rest fragrant and benign

A heritage, it seems to me,

Worth being poor to hold in fee.

Both heirs to some six feet of sod,
Are equal in the earth at last;

Both children of the same great God,
Prove title to your heirship vast
By record of a well-filled past;—

A heritage, it seems to me,

Well worth a life to hold in fee.

ANCIENT EGYPT.

1. The banks of the River Nile have been the home of a civilized race from the earliest ages. Before there was such a place as Rome, and before even Greece, which was still older than that city, had begun to have a history, the cities of Egypt w^ere filled with busy crowds; its pyramids rose in grandeur f its temples stood as they do to-day, and all the arts and industries^ life had made it their home. ,

2. It is not certain whether the Egyptians came from Western Asia, like the European races,1 or down the long course of the Nile, from Ethiopia, or whether they were not the original inhabitants of the country. On the earliest paintings they appear dusky or red in complexion, with European features; on those of a later age, they have more of the negro type, as if the original race had mixed with the black population of the interior, and on those of the most flourishing period of the Egyptian empire, they have the sallow tint and the peculiar outline of face,■. marking the races known as Semitic,2 of whom the Jews are an, example.

3. Their religious notions were in many resjects striking. The sun was their chief god, and was worshipped at different hours under different names. All the other gods were; inferior to him, and most of them held their rank according to their place in hia service.

4. The human soul was believed to have beamed forth from this supreme god—the sun—and to return to him, for judgment, in the Hall of Truth after death. If its life on earth had been good, it was carried in the ship of the sun to the abodes of bliss, but if it had lived wickedly it was sent back to the earth, to enter the body of some animal or degraded man. Some of the gods were represented with human heads, but many had the heads of birds or beasts. Thus the gods of the sun had hawks' heads, others, the head of a ram, or of a crocodile, an ibis, or a jackal.

5. But besides statues of the gods, they had sacred animals in which they supposed the spirit of the gods dwelt. Thus the bull was sacred to the sun at one place, and to the moon at another; apes were sacred to the moon; the dog, the wolf, the cat, the

crocodile, to other gods. These creatures were kept in the enclosures of the temples, and terrible lamentations were made when any of them died. Every honour was paid to them during life, and they wore carefully embalmed after death.