lacerated by the tight cords that had bound them. On the following day two more Sikhs were brought back, and these the Chinese declared were the last of the survivors. The poor creatures were in a fearful state of anguish, and one of them died shortly afterwards. Then came several carts, with twelve coffins containing the mangled and decomposed remains of twelve more of the captured, while two missing were supposed to have been decapitated and their bodies thrown into a canal. Among these victims was Mr. Bowlby, the "Times" correspondent.

When the allies learned the sad fate of their countrymen, the indignation in the camp reached a terrible pitch, and fortunate it was for the Chinese that no more encounters occurred, as they would thenceforth have received no quarter on the battlefield. Lord Elgin was so impressed with the necessity of enforcing a severe act of retribution on the Emperor, that he resolved on committing the palaces of Yuen-ming-yuen to the flames. His reasons for doing so were that it was the Emperor's favourite residence, and its destruction could not fail to be a blow to his pride as well as to his feelings. He also found that it was to this place the prisoners were taken, that they might undergo the severest tortures within its precincts.

The first division were detailed for this work of destruction. Ere long a dense column of smoke rising to the sky indicated that the work had commenced. As the day waned the column increased in magnitude and grew denser. and denser, wafting in the shape of a large cloud over Peking, and having the semblance of a fearful thunderstorm impending. On approaching the palace the crackling and rushing noise of fire was appalling. The sun shining through the masses of smoke gave a sickly hue to every plant and tree, and the red flame gleaming on the faces of the troops engaged made them appear like demons glorying in the destruction of what they could not replace.

Sonnets of the Sacred Year.

BY THE REV. S. J. STONE, M.A.

SEVENTH SUNDAY AFTER TRINITY.

The difficulty of maintaining these remote and thinlypopulated dependencies, possessed of only one navigable river, and so unproductive in themselves that the forts on the Lower Syr-Daria have to be victualled from Orenburg, at a cost to the Government of £3 for every quarter of flour, needs no demonstration; and the only feasible solution of the problem (M. de Lesseps' projected railway from Orenburg to Samarcand) is simply unattainable without the aid of foreign capital. In a word, our surest way to keep Russia out of India is to lend her no more money.-Ker's "On the Road to Khiva."

MALAGASY CHRISTIANS.-Sir Bartle Frere pays a very high tribute to the devoutness of the native Christians of Madagascar Upon his return home to England he made the following statement to the officers of the London Missionary Society: When sailing along the northern coast of Madagascar on a Sunday morning, and as they were not far from shore, he saw a native town. Desiring to see what a native Malagasy town was like, he went ashore in a boat. They found all the streets deserted. He inquired of his interpreter the reason for this, and was told, "The people are praying, sir." He was then conducted to a large shed, where some two thousand people were devoutly attending the worship of God. He listened attentively, and never saw nor heard a service conducted with more devoutness and propriety. At the close of the service some went away, the others remaining. Through the interpreter he was told that the people were next about to hold a communion service. Sir Bartle Frere sat down with them at the table of our Lord. A beautiful

H to endure! to tread the pilgrim ways
With all the true Jeshurun to the verge
Of farthest Jordan: in that stream to purge
My feet, aweary of the toilsome days,
From every stain of travel: on my gaze
To find all Eden break as I emerge

From the dark depths, and in my ears the dirge
Changed to the greeting of my Master's praise,
"Well done, thou good and faithful!"-O my Lord,
For Whom I toil, to Whom I tend! O Thou
Almighty, with my holy covenant vow
Make all my life in holiness accord;

So shall I, through what weariness or strife,
Win-not my merit but Thy gift, of Life!

was produced. "Never in all Christendom," added Sir Bartle Frere, "had I seen a communion service conducted with such propriety." This station was fully three hundred miles away from the nearest European missionary station. When it was asked how the people there came to the possession of the truth, he was told that it had been conveyed thither, in 1846, by two native slaves, who were sold at the capital, and who had previously been under missionary influence.

DIANA OF THE EPHESIANS.-Mr. J. T. Wood gives the result of his last season's explorations on the site of the great temple of Diana. The architecture is Grecian-Ionic, as seen in the base, capital, and sculptured drum of columns now in the British Museum. "The temple is found to measure 163ft. 9 in. by 342ft. 6 in.; the platform on which it was raised, 239ft. 4 in. by 418ft. 14in., measured on the lowest step. The length here given nearly accords with that given by Pliny-viz., 425 Roman feet; the ascertained width exceeds Pliny's dimensions of 220ft., which dimension must have, therefore, lost something in transcript from the original. An element of great beauty had almost escaped discovery-i.e., the plentiful use of gold in the decoration of the temple. One fraginent was fortunately found, composed of two astragals, between which a narrow slip of lead

was doubled in, in the fold of which was inserted a narrow strip of gold, which formed a fillet of gold between the astragals. I presume the three sets of double astragals of the bases of the columns, one of which is in the British Museum, were all enriched with golden fillets as here described. The beauty of the temple was, moreover, heightened by the use of brilliant colours, remains of which are found in numerous fragments, blue, red, and yellow being readily distinguished-blue for the back-ground of enrichments and sculpture in relief, red and yellow for the parts requiring greater prominence. A number of the columns are inscribed on their bases, showing that they were dedicated to Artemis by various persons or communities. The question whether the pronaos was fenced off from the peristyle has been decided by the discovery of some of the mortises for the iron standards. The foundations of the great altar in the cella have also been further explored, and the position of the statue of the goddess has been, therefore, decided. The remains of a wide portico have been found surrounding the temple on three sides, and at a distance of seventy feet on the south side has been recently discovered another temple or other building in the Grecian-Doric style, which is now being partially explored."

66

WEIGH HOUSE CHAPEL.-On this site, we are told by Strype, was weighed merchandise, brought from beyond the seas to the King's beam, to which belonged a master, and under him four master porters, with labouring porters under them. The house belongeth to the company of Grocers. But of late years little is done in this office, as wanting a compulsory power to constrain the merchants to have their goods weighed, they alleging it to be an unnecessary trouble and charge." In former times it was the usual practice for merchandise brought to London from abroad, to be weighed at the king's beam in the presence of sworn officials. In the Weigh House there was originally a Presbyterian chapel, founded by Samuel Slater and Thomas Kentish, two divines driven by the Act of Uniformity from St. Katherine's to the Tower. John Clayton, chosen for this chapel in 1779, was the son of a Lancashire cotton bleacher, and was patronised by the well-known Countess of Huntingdon. Dr. Binney was Clayton's successor; he was pastor of Weigh House Chapel more than forty years.

St.

LABOUR SERMONS.-The Rev. Henry Burgess, LL.D., Andrew's Vicarage, Whittlesey, says :-"I preached upon the subject of Labour Unions. Those who witnessed the appearance of my church on those occasions will not readily forget it. Every foot of the area was densely filled with a congregation exhibiting a larger proportion than usual of well-dressed farmers' men, filling the streets in picturesque harmony with farmers, ladies, and well-dressed women. In this church an impressive silence is always noticeable while the preaching is going on, but on these special occasions it was almost painful. A neighbour ing clergyman came over to hear me preach one of these sermons, and his testimony to the impressiveness of the scene, and the apparent influence exerted upon the men, was most gratifying to me. One of my texts, intended to favour the men, was, 'Be content with your wages,' which I explained to mean that a man was to get all he fairly could, and to be content when he had what was reasonable, though it might fall far short of his wishes. 'A reasonable wage,' I stated, must be sufficient to keep a labourer's wife and children out of the fields, and to pay for his children's schooling.' Another text was, 'Friend, I do thee no wrong; didst thou not agree with me for a penny?" from which I pointed out the necessity of an honest and strict regard to the men's engagements with their masters, and the general importance of a fair construction of the terms on both sides."The Rock.

BLACK POPLAR.-A correspondent of the "Times" renews the recommendation of using black poplar in building, on account of being the most incombustible wood known: "Captain Shaw remarks that he considers his experimental pitch-pine post, which was exposed to a petroleum fire for seven hours, and was as good a story-post as ever at the end, 'a strong practical testimony in favour of massive timber for the internal support of heavily-loaded buildings.' Your correspondent (A. Dawson), in the Times' of June 13, 1873, told of a Nottingham manufactory which burnt out to the top from a fire originating on the second story; but, although the floor lay a yard thick in hot clinkers and melted machinery, the fire did not get down wards because the floors were of poplar.' For 200 years writers on arboriculture have reminded us that the wood of white poplar is light, uninflammable, and well adapted for flooring rooms. Mr. James Brown, in his standard modern book, The Forester,' relates that he sold a black poplar tree only 35 years old, but containing 66 cubic feet of timber, at 2s. per foot, or

£6 12s. Old John Evelyn himself in 1675 says that the Dut-h look on a plantation of these trees as an ample portion for a daughter,' which may truly be allowed if, according to the calculation of Sir Richard Weston, £30 laid out in these plants would render at least £10,000 in 18 years.' How is it that this tree, with an apparently authenticated good character for so many generations, is neither to be seen growing in our plantations nor quoted in our timber merchants' catalogues? If Captain Shaw could speak a good word for it, and you, sir, could induce English builders to put poplar planks, instead of the now dear pine and fir deals into their specifications for our floors, you would win the gratitude of the next generation of householders, and landed proprietors would gladly at once begin to plant poplar trees 'as ample portions for their daughters.'

PURCHASE IN THE CHURCH.-Bishop Wordsworth, of Lincoln, has spoken plainly about the sale of church livings." "Pastors of the Church of Christ are tempted by the inducements, not of saving souls and promoting the glory of God, but by such allurements as gardens and greenhouses, coaches and stables, a comfortable parsonage and well-kept grounds, with a trout stream and grammar-school for the sons, and with the sca not far off for the wife and daughters, and good society and a railway station within a mile, and an income of £800 a year; and, it is added, that the incumbent is 75 years of age, and that the population is small, with light duty." "We have opened slave markets of souls in London. Congregations of immortal beings are publicly put up for auction and are sold to the highest bidder, and the clergyman who has bought them-either directly by his own money, or by some clandestine and oblique subterfuge and evasion-comes and presents himself to a bishop for institution, and makes a solemn declaration that he has made no simoniacal contract, by himself or others, to the best of his knowledge and belief." "Purchase has been recently abolished in the army at a great national sacrifice, and the question is now freely asked, if promotion in the army is to depend solely on merit, ought advancement in the Church to be saleable for money? Is the salvation of men's souls less important than the protection of their bodies?"

EMPEROR OF GERMANY.-We lately quoted Prince Bismarck's explanation of the Prussian poliey as to ultramontanism. The declaration of the Emperor, in his letter to Earl Russell, acknowledging the sympathy of English Protestants, is a memorable historical manifesto: "It is incumbent on me to be the leader of my people in a struggle maintained through ceuturies past by German emperors of earlier days, against a power the domination of which has in no country of the world been found compatible with the freedom and welfare of nations--a power which, if victorious in our days, would imperil, not in Germany alone, the blessings of the Reformation, liberty of conscience, and the authority of the law. I accept the battle thus imposed upon me in fulfilment of my kingly duties and in firm reliance of God, to whose help we look for victory, but also in the spirit of regard for the creed of others and of evangelical laws and administration of my States. The latest measures of forbearance, which has been stamped by my forefathers on the my Government do not infringe upon the Romish Church or the free exercise of their religion by her votaries; they only give to the independence of the legislation of the country some of the guarantees long possessed by other countries, and formerly possessed by Prussia, without being held by the Romish Church incompatible with the free exercise of her religion. I was sure, and I rejoice at the proof afforded me by your letter, that the sympathies of the people of England would not fail me in this struggle the people of England, to whom my people and my Royal House are bound by the remembrance of many a past and honourable struggle maintained in common since the days of William of Orange."

NORWEGIAN HOUSES.-Mr. Fulford Vicary, North Tawton, writes to say that the cost of a house similar to that erected by him would not be so much as stated in the article in the "Leisure Hour" (p. 399). "When it is considered that the £877 which I paid for the house as shipped in Christiania included a great many things besides the timber, the advance in the price of timber does not affect the total sum so very much. The freight I paid was excessive, and from being new to the work I paid too much in the erection. Taking everything into account I am convinced that instead of a similar house costing 100 per cent. more, 10 per cent. more would be nearer the fact. I find my house comfortable and pleasant. I have no reason to regret my enterprise in the matter, but I shall regret if it should go forth that other persons could not share the advantages I have pointed out without paying double the cost I paid."

selection with unfailing interest. The struggles of the captured sheep to return to their scared and bewildered fellows, whose plaintive and responsive bleatings echoed loudly along the hillsides; the eager panting dogs that hemmed the captives in, or gave chase to some terrified individual that had regained its liberty, and was frantically rushing here and there, only to meet these ubiquitous tyrants at every turn it made; the guiding cries of the shepherds, the ceaseless barking of the dogs, made up a scene of much excitement and amusement to us, though mingled with pity for the poor "silly sheep," whose innocent white or black faces seemed to appeal to us for it.

But no such busy scene presented itself anywhere to us this afternoon as we walked along the hilltops towards that portion of them pertaining to Mr. Telfer's farm. It was a mild spring-like day, though we were in the heart of winter; and we were so fortunate as to find Tam sitting quietly alone on the sheltered side of his favourite knoll, with his dogs, as usual, lying at his feet.

Both my mother and I delighted greatly in the fresh breezy air of those green hillsides, and in the sense of calm and sweet solitude which they created. Not that they possessed the actual loneliness of being far removed from the neighbourhood of men there were farmhouses and cots in their vicinity; but so shaped and arranged were these hills as to make this impression upon the mind. Green swelling slopes, with rounded summits, appeared clustered together-a tumultuous, undulating, grassy sea-when once you had surmounted the outmost overlooking ridge, and turned your face from the more open country that you had ascended from. Not a habitation of man was then visible; nothing but a verdant hilly desert, with here and there a grey boulder embedded in the turf, looking like a solitary sentinel keeping watch over the quiet hillsides.

My mother alluded to this peculiar characteristic of the scenery; and to the feeling of peace and serenity which, she said, it always imparted to her, as she sat down on the grass over which Tam insisted on spreading his plaid for our accommodation.

"Ay, mem," said Tam, looking round about him reverently, and then up at the blue sky, where masses of white cloud were slowly sailing, casting, when not obscuring the wintry sun, long moving shadows on the pleasant slopes; "ay, mem, it's a grand thing to be alone with the works of God. I would rather follow a shepherd's life than any other trade just on account of this. We are busy enough at times, but then we have plenty of leisure between both for reading and thinking; and it's wonderful what thoughts come into my head as I sit by myself on the hillside, with no a sound to be heard around me but now and then the bleat of a sheep or the chirp of a bird. Such verses there are in the Psalms now about a shepherd's life. I often croon over the twenty-third :

"The Lord's my shepherd, I'll not want.
He makes me down to lie

In pastures green: he leadeth me
The quiet waters by-'

just as if I was David my own self keeping my father's sheep on the hills of Bethlehem. Isna there the 'pastures green' here too, mem? Could anything be greener and more pleasant to look at than these bonnie sloping braes, with the sunshine

and the clouds streaking them time about? Did you ever see a finer day for the time of year, mem? it's as if the winter was making up for the bad summer we had. Well, and as for the 'quiet waters'-just look, mem, at that burn down there below us; it's never dry in the hottest summer, for it has its source in a deep loch lying far back among the hills, that's ayo kept brimming with the hundreds of wee water-courses that trickle down the hillsides after every shower. And there it goes winding in and out among the hills; and even on the lownest summer day, when there's no enough of wind, you would think, to blow a thistledown off, you'll no hear a murmur from it; for it just steals through the grass, and there's no a rock or a big stone in all its course hereabouts to disturb it.”

"You are quite poetic, Tam," said my mother, who had followed his description with her eyes, and felt the truth of it.

"Eh, mem! I never made a verse o' poetry in all my life, but I'm very fond of reading it. But they say there's a shepherd down Ettrick ways that's written some very bonny things. Me! no, no; I have no gift that way, and you must just be laughing at me, mem, to speak o't. But what I like verses for is that they put in words what I have often thought myself, but didna ken how to express; and I suppose that's the use of poetry."

This kind of conversation lasted some time; but at last my mother changed it by remarking that we must not sit much longer in the open air at this season of the year, and that she would be glad to hear how his courtship was progressing before we returned home.

"Finely, mem, finely," said Tam, cheerfully; "the old folk have given their consent, and Susy 's agreeable."

"But how did you get her to understand that you want her to be your wife?" asked my mother, with natural curiosity.

"I'll tell you, mem. You could scarcely believe what a quick creature Susy is by nature, unless you were often beside her. It was a story that her mother tell't me about her glegness that first made me think how we might get her to understand it. The Bissets have a number of Scripture prints pasted up on the walls, that they bought from a travelling packman (pedlar). One of them is meant, it says below, to represent Joseph's marriage to Asenath, the daughter of Potipherah, priest of On. Joseph 's got a light blue coat with gilt buttons on him, yellow breeches, and a grand ruffled sark at his bosom, besides top-boots, no unlike them that the duke wears when he comes here for the hunting. The bride is something browner than him-I suppose the Egyptian folk were darker in their colour than the Israelites; but she has braw ornaments on her head and neck and arms, and she has a red silk gown on, open in front, with a white satten petticoat below it. King Pharaoh is seated on his throne, with a gold crown on his head and a skepter in his hand, with all his counsellors round about him; and the pair are standing in front of them. Joseph is holding up the third finger-that everybody kens is the marriage finger-of the bride's left hand, and is just slipping a plain gold ring over it.

"Weel, mem, her mother, who is aye in the house with her, and kens her ways best, saw that Susy was greatly taken up with this picture when they first got it. She was clearly trying to make out the

meaning o't, but couldna succeed, till one night all at once it seemed to break on her. From looking at the picture, she came and set herself down beside her mother, and began to examine what hand her marriage-ring was on. Having made herself sure of this, she then fell to coonting the fingers, and found that her mother's ring-finger was the same as that one of Asenath's that Joseph was holding up. Then up she jumps from her stool, making her mother, who thought it best to humour her, to rise and stand in the middle of the floor. Then she would have her father get up next, which he was sweert to do after his day's work; but his wife advised him to please the poor lassie, as there was evidently something working in her mind, and she couldna bear to cross her. So up he got, and Susy made him stand in front of his wife, as it is in the picture-only the braw claes were wanting. Then She took off her mother's ring, made her father hold up the third finger of his wife's left hand, gave him the ring, and made signs to him to slip it on the finger. And when he did it she clapped her two hands together in great glee, and then pointed to the picture, as much as to say that she had now found out all about it. Now, mem, wasna that wonderful clever for one like her?"

"Very remarkable indeed, Tam," said my mother. "Well, the way we brought it to bear on my case was this. I had begun to come gey and often at nights; and I aye took a seat beside Susy, as Mary's lad did beside her. And I would give her a smile and a nod every now and then, with maybe a bit kindly clap on the shouther by way of variety. And she didna take it ill, and gloom at me, as I feared at first she might. Then one day that the maister sent me to the fair I bought a bonnie ribbon for her, the very colour of Asenath's gown; and she was real well pleased with it, that was she. Well, mem, one night when there was nobody there but her and the gudewife and me, the gudewife, as we had planned it between us, signed to me to rise and stand in the middle of the floor. Then she brought Susy and placed her in front of me; then she took off her wedding-ring and gave it to me; and I held up Susy's left hand and third finger, as in the picture, and slippit it on. Then-then-well, mem, I just put my arm round her neck and gave her a good smack to show that I was claiming her for my wife," said Tam, reddening and laughing heartily; all in the way of honest coortship, you know, mem," added he, apologetically.

it was

"Certainly, Tam," said my mother, highly amused by the description.

"But the end o't was gey droll," continued Tam. "She evidently considered that she was my wife, and that the ring now belonged to her, for when her mother wanted it back, she aye pointed to me and wouldna give it up. And the truth is, mem, I have been obliged to buy the wedding-ring already, although we're not to be married for some weeks yet; and as it's broader and more shiny than her mother's, we found no difficulty in getting her to take it instead. Her mother and her have been over at the house to see what things are wanted there; and they got the lend of a cart yesterday, and a neighbour's laddie drove it to the town, to get them. I gave the old wife, who's a grand hand at making bargains, the five-and-twenty pounds, telling her to get the gown and shawl for Susy, and either of the two for herself, as a marriage present, with what was

over.

And when they came to the door at night with the things, didna the old wife hand me back two pounds of what I had given her! It'll be a nest-egg to provide for Susy if it's the Lord's will that I'm taken away first; I have put the notes back into my mother's stocking and hidden it away in the old hole. The only thing I'm vexed about, mem, is that I canna be married by my own minister. But, you see, they belong to Mr. Tait's parish, and they wouldna like to pass him by-he's a fine man too, Mr. Tait. But Susy will come with me to my own kirk when we're man and wife."

And we left Tam on his hillside, and much amused and interested we were by the information he had given us about his betrothal.

So Tam and Susy were married. Mr. Tait, as wo learned from him afterwards, had so far to alter the usual ceremony as to substitute signs for words in laying the marriage vows upon the bride; but Susy, from her extraordinary acuteness, evidently comprehended much of their meaning. The marriage was laughed at by many, and wondered at by all except those who, like my father and mother, were acquainted with Tam's reasons for making such a choice. Tam appeared with his wife in church; and though most eyes there were bent inquisitively on them for at least the first two Sabbaths, he stood the scrutiny with composure, and as if he was not ashamed of the step he had taken. As for Susy, the people had to acknowledge that though a "dummy,' she was in looks and behaviour "just like other folk."

My mother paid a visit of congratulation at Tam's cottage not long after the marriage. She made it in the evening, that she might be certain of finding him at home. Our knock was followed by the cheery sound of Tam's voice inviting whoever it was to enter. We did so, and found Tam sitting by the bright fireside in the "big chair;" for Susy had always seen her father occupy the seat of honour as head of the house, and now followed her mother's example by yielding it up to her "gudeman." Tam gave us a most beaming welcome, and the chair was vacated for my mother's accommodation. It was a pleasant home picture we had intruded upon. The dogs lay on the white hearth-stone like privileged inmates, and the cat was in Susy's lap. She was seated opposite to her husband's chair on a stoolTam's seat in childhood-which seemed her favourite position, and knitting diligently as he had described She was neatly and becomingly dressed in the national "short gown "-a dress much more picturesque than the "wrapper" of present times-a full woollen petticoat striped black and red, and a blue and white check apron, whose strings gathered the short gown tidily in to her waist. She had not the dull, heavy look which those who suffer from her deprivation often have, and her quick observant eyes seemed in great measure to supply the lack of her absent senses.

to us.

Tam seemed delighted to show his wife and his altered house to my mother. It was altered truly. The new articles of furniture, of course, did something towards the change; but it was the order and cleanliness that now reigned instead of the former dirt and confusion that were the principal cause of it, and which pleased my mother; and she could not but think that Tam had been guided wisely though strangely in his choice of a wife.

He pointed out to us with simple pride the various