ON THE MARTIN. MARTINS are a kind of swallow-they build their nests in towns and villages about the houses. People do not molest them, for they do good rather than harm, and it is very interesting to view their manners and actions. They feed on flies, gnats, and other insects. They are, as indeed most birds are, very attentive to their young. As soon as they have caught a few flies, they hasten to their nests, pop into the hole, and feed the little ones. A pair of Martins once built their nest in a porch; and when they had young ones, it happened that one of them, climbing up to the hole before he was fledged, fell out, and, lighting upon the stones, was killed. The old birds, perceiving this accident, went and got short bits of straw, and stuck them with mud, like palisades all round the hole of the nest, in order to keep the other little ones from tumbling after their poor brother. Martins have also a great disposition to help one another. A cock sparrow got into a Martin's nest whilst the owner was abroad; and when he returned, the sparrow put his head out of the hole, and pecked at the Martin with open-bill as he attempted to enter his own house; the poor Martin was sadly provoked at this, but was unable by his own strength to right himself. So he flew away, and gathered a number of his companions, who all came with a bit of clay in their bills, with which they plastered up the hole of the nest, and kept the sparrow in prison, who died miserably for want of food and air. In autumn, when it begins to be cold weather, the Martins assemble in great numbers on the roofs of high buildings, and prepare for their departure to a warmer country; for as our insects disappear in the winter, the Martins would have nothing to live on if they were to remain; and how astonishing is that faculty with which God has endowed them, which prompts them to this flight at the proper season, and enables them to steer their course through the air to the proper spot. Sometimes they are driven about by contrary winds, and fall into the sea, unless they happen to meet with a ship, on which they sometimes alight and rest themselves. The swallows from England are supposed to go as far as the middle of Africa. In spring they take their flight back again, to the very same villages and houses where they were bred-this has been discovered by catching some of them and marking them. How interesting and wonderful is every thing in nature; and how much should the contemplation of it raise our thoughts in grateful adoration to its great Author. Selected from " Evenings at Home." ON BOYS KNITTING AT CHARITY SCHOOLS. I ONCE went into a charity school, and found it full of very little children. They were all employed in works of industry. They learned to read; but they also learned what is not less useful to poor children, how to earn their maintenance by industry. And what was not very common, I saw that the boys were knitting, and they seemed to be doing it exceedingly well;-quite as well as the girls. This seemed to me an excellent plan. Most little children waste a great deal of time, in schools upon the old method. According to the national system, this is prevented; but very often there is nothing even these, but reading and writing. The girls, it is true, learn needle work, knitting, &c. I am speaking, however, now of a village school for little boys and girls, where they are not too old to be together. Why should not the little boys learn to knit? It keeps them employed-which is a great matter:they are out of mischief, and they are learning habits of industry. Idleness is ruin; he who is an idle boy, is generally afterwards an idle man, and consequently a ruined man. How very useful it must be to a shepherd boy to know how to knit. He has numbers of hours when he is alone, and yet he must be on the spot to watch his sheep. Why should he not, whilst he is sitting under a hedge, be making himself a pair of stockings? It is profitable; and it prevents idleness,-which is, I say again, ruin. V. To the Editor of the Cottager's Monthly Visitor. THE FUNERAL. -There has been a funeral to-day,-one of eight brothers, and the best.-It, at first, strikes our weak, erring sight, as something strange, that they who are blessings to those around them, the poor man's best friends,-and are human nature in her kindliest, best dress,-should be first taken awaythus diminishing the workers of good—and leaving it very uncertain whether any others will come forward in their place to finish the acts of benevolence which they had begun. -But why, instead of wondering, do we not at once see in it the goodness of the Almighty, who, in his mercy, removes them from this painful life to those happy realms above, where they will meet with none but those who are good like themselves, and where the scoffs of the wicked will not reach them. How low, how unworthy an opinion we must have of the rewards promised by a gracious Father to those that he will, through the intercession of our blessed Saviour, admit into his heavenly kingdom when we so constantly repine at the lot of those, who, dying in the faith of Christ, are taken from this world. We seem quite to forget that with them" to die is gain."-We rejoice that we are spared,—but is it with the serious feeling, and earnest desire of improving the longer time allowed us, and of seeking to become less unworthy? Or is it not rather because we cling to those ties which endear this world to us and are busied with the thoughts of happiness which we fancy here awaits us ?-When it is impossible that it can at all come up to the measure of that which will be the lot of those who are told to "enter into the joy of their Lord!" Copied-From my scrap book:-and offered in all humility since you have accepted some written by the same hand. P. P. G. W. Sussex, July 25th, 1823. LITTLE MARY. "Do you think you shall die, dear mother?"— said little Mary very gently, after having sat quietly for a long time watching her sick parent. "No, my dear child," said her mother," I think it has pleased the Almighty that I should recover, for my fever is now quite gone, and, though I am very weak, I dare say in a few weeks I shall be about again." "Are not you sorry mother, that you are to live longer here, instead of going to God,-and being with none but those who are good?" "No, my dear, I am thankful for being spared; because I feel that I ought to strive to lead a better life than I have hitherto done:-my illness has made me think a great deal; and I have found out that I have a number of faults, and have thought of a great many things which I have always neglected to do, which I trust, by the help of God's grace, I shall do, now I have been brought to a sense of what is right." "But, dear mother, you have always been very good I think-you have gone to church, and read your bible every day as well as Sundays.' "Yes, Mary; but we may do all that, and still be very unworthy servants of our Lord-we may pride ourselves on doing these things, and that is a very wicked thing indeed." "But I am sure you did not mother;—and you are so kind to father and to me:-and every one says that if I do but grow up like you, I shall be a blessing to those that know me.” -- "Yes, my child, I know that if I did not think more about what is right than some do, I must be very wicked indeed-for very few people have had the advantages which I have had, as I was brought up by our Vicar's mother who was, as you have often heard me say, more like an angel upon earth than a human being: but still, when I thought I was dying, I then felt, Mary, how very unfit I was to go to heaven. You know how often I made you read to me the Sermon on the Mount; and that perfect rule seemed to shew me all my sins; and the history of our blessed Saviour's life, while He was here on earth; shewed me how different my life had been, and that I had not followed him in faith, in purity, and humility, as I ought to have done." "Tell me all those things, my dear mother, which you mean to do in future." - "No, my love, I cannot tell you them now, as I feel already tired with talking, but I hope to shew you them by my life-and by giving you a better example. I see, too, that my great plea must be for mercy through my Saviour's merits. But I must be quiet now, and I think, dear, if you were to repeat to me my favourite hymn, 1 should afterwards get a little sleep before your father comes home." "Very well, mother ;-and when I have said that, I will sit beside you very quietly, and employ myself at my work till you wake." |