'Tis a pleasant thing, also, when time is an object with you, to go a journey by the rail-road. When you are once set going, you feel that you are travelling in right earnest. Away goes the steam-engine, almost flying along the iron pathway, leaving a long line of smoke, eight or ten feet from the ground; and away go the steam carriages after it, filled with company. One talks of the useful discovery of steam; another wonders what will be invented next; and a third doubts, after all, whether the affairs of men absolutely require them to hurry on so fast through the world. Still, on you go, and before you can believe it, you are at your journey's end. When you are in a very great hurry, the rail-road, is a capital mode of conveyance.

Thus through life's stage we hurry on,

And our journey soon is o'er;

And this beauteous earth, that gave us birth,

Beholds our face no more.

'Tis a pleasant thing to travel by pleasure-boat along the river, when you have plenty of time on your hands. Oh, how delightfully do you glide through the clear running stream! I have sailed as much as a hundred miles together down the winding Wye, fairest and most romantic of British rivers! Sometimes gazing on the pebbled shallows, and sometimes on the dark deep waters. It was pleasant to dart down the rapids, pleasant to gaze on

Chepstow and Goodrich Castles, and Windcliff and Tintern Abbey; and pleasanter still, looking up at the snow-white, sun-lit clouds, as they glided through the clear blue sky, to sing with the heart as well as the lip,

"When all thy mercies, O my God,
My rising soul surveys,

Transported with the view, I'm lost

In wonder, love, and praise."

'Tis a pleasant thing to travel by steam-boat, when the sun shines, and the river is broad, and the music plays, and the passengers wear smiles on their faces. I have travelled by steam-boat, and talked with the captain and passengers, and stood by the pilot as he turned round his wheel to guide the vessel, and leaned over the bulwarks, musing on the paddle-wheels tearing their way through the waters. The band has played the while, and the huge vessel has obeyed the pilot as obediently as a child. Sometimes, too, I have met with a fellow passenger, who has made a serious remark, an acknowledgment of God's goodness, and we have talked together of holy things, and of the way of salvation through the Saviour of sinners.

"Tis pleasant in our pilgrimage,

In fair or stormy weather,
To meet a traveller Zion-bound,

And journey on together.

I

'Tis a pleasant thing to travel over the mighty ocean in a ship, when the broad sails are filled with a favourable wind, and the sea and the sky seem to lose themselves in each other. When the billows of the great deep sparkle with beautiful colours, when the dolphin plays, the flyingfish leaps from the water into the air, and the sea-gull hovers over the foam-fringed waves. have sailed on the billowy ocean in a gentle breeze, and in a storm I have mounted up as if going to the heavens, and plunged downwards as if descending to the bottom of the sea. Yet still the rudder has guided the ship, and still the sails have enabled her to keep her course. God has given wonderful power to man, enabling him to say to the bounding waves, "Bear me safely on your back;" and to the blustering winds, "Waft me forward on my course." Truly, "The Lord is a great God, and a great King above all gods. In his hand are the deep places of the earth: the strength of the hills is his also. The sea is his, and he made it; and his hands formed the dry O come, let us worship, and bow down; let us kneel before the Lord our Maker."

land.

Where ocean rolls his mighty flood,

Where billows rise and fall,

Wisdom and power are infinite,

And God is all in all.

Ah, well! whether we travel high or low, by land or by water, by ship, steamer, or boat, by rail-road, stage-coach, or post-chaise, by gig, horseback, or on foot, we are all travelling towards the grave; every stage brings us nearer our journey's end, and our journey must, of necessity, be a short one.

It may be that we shall see threescore and ten birth-days; perhaps we may be strong enough to witness fourscore: but he who looks back to his childhood, even though his hairs are grey, regards it as yesterday. "We spend our years as a tale that is told." Is it well, then, to think so fondly of a bubble that is so soon to burst? of a dream that has well nigh passed away? Will it not be better to think less of this world, and more of the next? Less of what is, as it were, for a moment, and more of what shall endure for ever? Surely it will. Begin, then, reader, to do this at

once.

O gird thy loins, set out for heaven,
Ere earth's enjoyments wither;
And give not slumber to thine eyes

Till thou art journeying thither!

ON

THE HUMAN VOICE.

IT is not often that I enter on a scientific or philosophic subject, and may, therefore, the more readily be pardoned when I do. If a circumstance or thing appear curious or puzzling to me, it is not the fear of being laughed at for my simplicity that will prevent me from obtaining information. Ignorance is not half so discreditable as pretending to be wise when we know little or nothing, and as I am altogether ignorant on the subject I am about to introduce, I may as well acknowledge it at first as at last.

The other day, when reflecting on the human voice, I was struck with a peculiarity in reference to it, which had never before occurred to me, nor do I remember ever having seen it alluded to in any publication. The human voice may be familiarly defined to be occasioned by the emission of the breath with different degrees of force, the organs of speech adapting themselves to the