which are generally neatly edged with silver, always make these plates of precisely the same shape as the talipot strips used for writing.

Besides all the uses described, the Cingalese employ the talipot leaf extensively in thatching their houses. They also manufacture hats from it; these hats are made with brims as broad as an outstretched umbrella, and are chiefly worn by women nursing, to defend them and their infants from the heat.

The talipot is not a very cominon tree at present, and is rarely seen growing by those who only visit the coasts of the island and do not penetrate into the interior. It seems to grow, scattered among other trees, in the forests. In a view of the town of Kandy, as it was in 1821, a fine specimen of the talipot, in flower, is seen close to a group of

cocoa-nut trees.

NATURE.

In a state of nature no race of animals is unhap py; they are all adapted to the mode of life which God has ordained them to lead; and their chief enjoyment consists in pursuing their natural habits, whatever these may be. The woodpecker, while boring a tree, and clinging to it for hours by its scandent feet, is just as happy as the eagle is when perched upon the mountain cliff, or pouncing on its, quarry from the clouds. Neither could lead the life of the other, but each is happy in the state which has been assigned to it; and this is observable throughout all nature. A rat, which burrows in a ditch, is as happy as it could desire, so long as it can find garbage sufficient to feed on; and a

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heron, immovably fixed watching for the approach of small fishes and frogs, has, there can be little doubt, as much pleasure as any lover of the angle can enjoy while wearing out the summer day in marking his light float, and waiting, in mute expectation, the wished-for bite. We generally, I believe, connect rapidity or slowness of motion with the ideas we form of an animal's happiness. If, like the tortoise, it move with slow and measured steps, we pity or despise, as the mood may be, its melancholy, sluggish condition; and the poor persecuted toad has, probably, incurred as much of the odium so unjustly attached to it, by its inactivity, as by the supposed loathsomeness of its appearance. On the other hand, enjoyment seems always to be the concomitant of celerity of motion. A fly, dancing in the air, seems more happy than the spider lurking in his den; and the lark, singing at "heaven's gate," to possess a more joyous existence than the snail, which creeps almost imperceptibly upon a leaf, or the mole, which passes the hours of brightness and sunshine in his dark caverns under ground. But these and all other animals are happy, each in its own way; and the habits of one, constituted as the creatures are, could form no source of felicity to another, but the very reverse. Though activity may stimulate the appearance of superior enjoyment, we may conceive, that where it is excessive, the animal in which it is so demonstrated must suffer much from fatigue. This would be another mistake, in so far as relates to animals in a state of nature. The works of God are all perfect in their kind; but if an animal were formed to lead a life of almost perpetual motion, and that motion were accompanied or followed by fatigue, the work would be imperfect: take the swallow as

an example; it is constantly on the wing except at night. From the early morning to the downgoing of the sun, it is forever dashing through the air with the rapidity of an arrow, but neither morning nor evening does it ever show one symptom of weariness; it has a wing which never tires; and at night it betakes itself to repose, not worn out by the fatigues of the day, but prepared for sleep after what is to it a wholesome exercise.

'GYMNASTICS.

A late distinguished senator said in the parliament of England, man is born to labor as the sparks fly upwards." This observation is founded on a thorough knowledge of the destiny from which none can escape. The idle are always unhappy, nor can even mental vigor be preserved without bodily exercise. Neither he who has attained to inordinate wealth, nor he who has reached the greatest heights of human intellect is exempt from the decree, that every man must "work for his living." If the "gentleman" does not work to maintain his family, he must work to maintain his life; hence he walks, rides, hunts, shoots, and travels, and occupies his limbs as well as his mind; hence noblemen amuse themselves at the turning lathe, and the workman's bench, or become mail

coachmen, or "cutter-lads:" and hence sovereigns sometimes play at being workmen," or, what is worse, at the "game" of war.

Without exercise the body becomes enfeebled, and the mind loses its tension. Corporeal inactivity cannot be persisted in even with the aid of medicine, without symptoms of an asthenic state. From this deliquium the patient must be relieved in spite of his perverseness, or he becomes a maniac or a corpse. Partial remedies render him “ nervous man;" his only effectual relief is bodily exercise.

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Exercise in the open air is indispensable, and many who walk in the wide and rapidly extending wilderness of the metropolis have sufficient; but, to some, the exercise of walking is not enough for carrying on the business of life; while others, whose avocations are sedentary, scarcely come under the denomination of sesquipedalians. These resort to stretching out the arms, kicking, hopping, what they call "jumping," running up and down a pair of stairs, sparring, or playing with the dumb bells: these substitutes may assist, but, alone, they are inadequate to the preservation of health.

Some years ago a work on gymnastics, by Salzmann, was translated from the German into English. Its precepts were unaided by example; it produced a sensation, people talked about it at the time, and agreed that the bodily exercises it prescribed were good, but nobody took them, and gymnastics, though frequently thought upon, have not until lately been practised in London. Mr. Voelker, a native of Germany, has recently opened a gymnasium in that city.

This gentleman's prospectus of his establishment is judicious. He contends that while education has