ÆäÀÌÁö À̹ÌÁö
PDF
ePub

them several kinds of mantis, who were disturbed by the fire, and instinctively moving from it. Their motions were very grave and deliberate. After moving a little way, they stopped and looked back, as if to see whether the fire was advancing to them, and then walked on again. I brought away with me a large one, which exactly resembled a branch with a leaf attached to each side, and I kept him a long time at the palace at Constantinople, watching his motions, which exactly resem→ bled what I had heard of them. He sometimes held up his fore-feet, with his head raised, as if in the act of prayer; and sometimes he would turn and look up to me in the same attitude, as if entreating me to let him go. I caught another on a pine tree in an island of the sea of Marmora, which was endued with the faculty of distinguishing sounds, and was attracted or repelled as they were agreeable or disagreeable. He was standing on a table, when a lady in the room struck a pianoforte. He started, turned his head in the direction of the sound, and astonished every one present by actually raising and letting fall one of his fore-feet, as if beating time to the music. On another occasion I was exhibiting the insect to a friend in my apartments, and turned round to call his attention to some curious motions it was making. When I looked again it was gone, as if it rendered itself invisible the moment I took my eyes from it. We searched every where, but could find no trace of it, though it was as large as a bird. A few days after it re-appeared, and I found it clinging to the wall.

They seem to possess different faculties or habits in different countries. I never saw those I had in the East point out the way; but I did in the West. One day I lost my way on the side of the Corcovado mountain, in Brazil. This mountain abounds with curious and beautiful insects, and negroes are frequently sent out by their masters with gauze nets to catch them. I met a party, and inquired the road. One of them had caught a mantis, and motioned me to ask him. I did so, and the insect actually lifted up one of its fore-feet, and seemed to point to a path in the forest, with its long fingerlike claw. The negro said, "Bo," which means good, in the imperfect Portuguese which they speak. So, I took the path, and found it the right one, which soon

led me out of the wood. I know not if the negro had been taught in Africa that the insect had this faculty, or whether it was a superstition he had learned from the Portuguese.

I caught one on a mountain on the shores of the Black Sea, which was more curious and extraordinary in its appearance and movements than any I had before seen. I shut it up in a box, and forgot where I laid it. Several months after I found the box, and, when I opened it, I saw the prisoner inside as vigorous and lively as when I enclosed him. He seemed even more sage and active than any of his tribe. I kept him for nearly a year in this state of abstinence and confinement, and frequently exhibited him for the amusement of my friends. I never let him out for fear he should become invisible, like his predecessors; but within the precincts of his prison he displayed all his extraordinary talents, and never seemed to suffer from the seclusion of air, light, or food. I sent him to a friend in England as a curiosity, hoping that he would have an opportunity of exhibiting him alive in the same way; whether the voyage was as ungenial to his feelings as to other animals, and he sunk under the effects of sea-sickness, or whether the period of his natural life had arrived, I know not, but, when my friend opened the box, on its arrival, the poor, wise, immortal Mantis was dead.

This insect is a very stupid and voracious creature, and is not really endowed with any wonderful qualities. It devours without mercy every living insect it can master. Their propensities are so pugnacious, that they frequently attack one another. They wield their fore-legs like sabres, and cleave one another down like dragoons; and when one is dead, the rest fall on him like cannibals and devour him. This propensity the Chinese avail themselves of: they have not the veneration of Europeans for their imaginary qualities, so they use them as game cocks, and wagers are laid on the best fighter.

The first step to knowledge is to remove falsehood. In this respect we are growing wiser every day. The fables of ignorance and superstition are fast disappearing, and we have sufficient cause for admiration in the qualities that God has really given to all his creatures, without assigning to them fictitious ones of our own creation. It

is the great goodness of the Deity to confer on every being such faculties as are admirably adapted to its nature to suppose they have more than they want, would be an imputation on his wisdom.-Dr. Walsh.

THE INSECT CREATION.

THEN insect legions, pranked with gaudiest hues,
Pearl, gold, and purple, swarmed into existence;
Minute and marvellous creations these!
Infinite multitudes on every leaf,

In every drop, by me discerned at pleasure,
Were yet too fine for unenlightened eye,

Like stars, whose beams have never reached our world,
Though Science meets them midway in the heaven
With prying optics, weighs them in her scale,
Measures their orbs, and calculates their courses,
Some barely visible, some proudly shone,
Like living jewels; some grotesque, uncouth,
And hideous, giants of a race of pigmies;
These burrowed in the ground, and fed on garbage;
Those lived deliciously on honey-dews,
And dwelt in palaces of blossomed bells;
Millions on millions, winged, and plumed in front,
And armed with stings for vengeance or assault,
Filled the dim atmosphere with hum and hurry:
Children of light, and air, and fire they seemed,
Their lives all ecstacy and quick cross motion.

Montgomery's Pelican Island.

HISTORY OF INDUSTRY.

To industrious study is to be ascribed the invention and perfection of all those arts, whereby human life is civilized, and the world cultivated with numberless accommodations, ornaments, and beauties. All the stately, pleasant, and useful works, which we view with delight, or enjoy with comfort, were contrived and framed by industry.

Industry reared those magnificent fabrics, and those commodious houses; it formed those goodly pictures and

statues; it raised those convenient streets, bridges, and aqueducts; it planted those fine gardens with various flowers and fruits; it clothed those pleasant fields with corn and grass; it built those ships whereby we plough the seas, reaping the commodities of foreign regions. It has subjected all creatures to our command and service, enabling us to subdue the fiercest animals, and render the gentler kind most tractable and useful to us. It taught us, from the wool of the sheep, from the hair of the goat, from the labours of the silkworm, to weave our clothes to keep us warm. It helps us from the inmost bowels of the earth, to bring many needful tools and utensils.

It collected mankind into cities and orderly societies; devised wholesome laws, under shelter whereof we enjoy safety and peace, wealth and plenty, mutual succour and defence, and beneficial commerce.

It, by meditation, did invent all those sciences whereby our minds are enriched and ennobled, our manners refined and polished, our curiosity satisfied, our life benefitted.

What is there which we admire, or wherein we delight, that pleases our mind, or gratifies our sense, for which we are not indebted to industry?

Does any country flourish in wealth, in grandeur, in prosperity ? It must be imputed to industry; to the industry of its governors, settling good order; to the industry of its people, following profitable occupations; so did Cato tell the Roman senate, that it was not by the force of their arms, but by the industry of their ancestors, that the commonwealth did arise to such a pitch of greatness.

When sloth creeps in, all things corrupt and decay; and the public state sinks into disorder, penury, and a disgraceful condition.-Dr. Barrow.

THE ROSE.

How fair is the rose! what a beautiful flower,

The glory of April and May;

But the leaves are beginning to fade in an hour,
And they wither and die in a day.

Yet the rose has one powerful virtue to boast,

Above all the flowers of the field;

When its leaves are all dead, and fine colours all lost,
Still how sweet a perfume it will yield.

So frail is the youth and the beauty of man,
Tho' they bloom, and look gay, like a rose;
Yet all our fond care to preserve them is vain,
Time kills them as fast as he goes.

Then, I'll not be proud of my youth or my beauty,
Since both of them wither and fade,

But gain a good name by well doing my duty;
This will scent like a rose when I'm dead.-Watts.

MIGRATION OF BIRDS.

WHILE one part of the creation daily publishes, in the same places, the praise of the Creator, another portion travels to relate his wonders to the whole earth. Couriers traverse the air, glide in the waters, and speed their course across mountains and valleys. These, arriving on the wings of the Spring, enliven its nights with their songs, build their nests among its flowers, and, disappearing with the zephyrs, follow their moveable country from climate to climate; those repair to the habitation of man; as travellers from distant climes, they claim the rights of ancient hospitality. Each follows his inclination in the choice of a host; the Redbreast applies at the cottage; the Swallow knocks at the palace: this daughter of a king still seems attached to grandeur, but to grandeur, melancholy like her fate; she passes the summer amid the ruins of Versailles, and the winter among those of Thebes. Scarcely has she disappeared, when we behold a colony advancing upon the winds of the north, to supply the place of the travellers to the south, that no vacancy may be left in our fields. In a hoary day of autumn, when the north-east wind blows over the plains, and the woods are losing the last remains of their foliage, a numerous troop of wild ducks, all ranged in a line, traverse in silence a melancholy sky. If they perceive, while aloft in the air, some Gothic castle surrounded by

« ÀÌÀü°è¼Ó »