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ascended the side of a small hill, and got a plentiful supply of their favourite white moss. A day or two after their arrival, the change of food and climate affected the calves; two of them could not be found. KARINA, however, begged me not to trouble myself, for that the mother had concealed them where no one but herself could find them. In the afternoon I ordered JENS to draw the whole of them to the shore: he collected them in a moment by whistling, and began to descend the hill, when KARINA came to me laughing, and pointing to a female who was loitering behind, and who, as soon as she fancied herself unperceived, turned back; She is gone to fetch her child,' said KARINA, and with it she soon made her

appearance.

"I have been often amused by the manner in which the males examine and dress their wonderful horns; it is performed in the neatest manner with the hind foot.

"In Lapland, the herds of these animals are extremely numerous: the poor have from fifty to two hundred; the middle class from three to seven hundred, and the rich above a thousand. Their greatest enemy is the wolf, which sometimes breaks into the fold, and destroys thirty or forty at a time. The Laplander holds him in the greatest detestation, and is almost in a rage when the name is mentioned. The first question put to me by JENS HOLM, was, 'Are there wolves in England?' and when told that they were entirely extirpated, he clasped his hands, and said, If it had snow, mountains, and rein moss, what a happy country it would be.' Bears sometimes destroy the deer, seizing them by surprise; but this is rather a rare occurrence."

(To be continued.)

HISTORY OF THE PROPHET JEREMIAH. (Continued from page 81.)

A STRIKING feature in the character of sinners, is either cold insensibility to kindness, or marked ingratude for benefits received. JEHOIAKIM, the King of Judah, was influenced, in no slight degree, by this harsh and sullen disposition. Although restored to regal honours by the conqueror's clemency, and favoured by the mercy of JEHOVAH with a suspension of impending judgments, yet he was neither humbled nor amended, but pursued, with an increased avidity, those heinous crimes which had so fearfully exposed him to the wrath of Heaven.

The people, too, were, like their sovereign, so infatuated by iniquity as scarcely to discern the hand of judgment in the evils they had suffered; yet the spoliation of their temple, which had been robbed of its most costly treasures, and the bereavement of their noblest families, whose children had been forced into captivity, could not but humble and affect them in some slight degree. As a token of their sorrow, they therefore set apart the day on which their city had been taken by the Babylonish army, to be commemorated ás an annual fast. The Prophet JEREMIAH, anxious to improve so favourable an occasion, availed himself of this solemnity, again to urge them to repentance; and, therefore, when the people were assembled from the various parts of Judah, for the purpose of confessing their transgressions, he ordered BARUCH to go up into the temple, and read a second time the scroll, containing those predictions of approaching judgment, which he had written by divine command. From the window of a chamber, appropriated to the sittings of

the Council, he read the parchment to the multitude below; and so alarming were the threatenings it contained, that they were presently reported to the royal household, who sent for BARUCH, and required that he would read, the roll to them. Affrighted at its terrible denunciations, they took the writing, and ordered him to go with JEREMIAH to some secret place, while they reported what had happened to the King. JEHOIAKIM, on hearing the relation of his nobles, required them to produce the roll, and read it in his presence; but he no sooner heard a portion of it, than his anger and impatience became so intemperate, that he snatched it from the reader, and, cutting it in indignation with his pen-knife, cast it at once into the flames. This impious outrage, which the remonstrances of his attendants could not restrain him from committing, he seconded by issuing orders for the apprehension of the persons who had thus excited his displeasure, that he might wreak his venge. ance more efficiently on them. But he was impotent in wrath; for GoD preserved his servants, who, following the suggestion of the Council, concealed. themselves too closely to be discovered by the emis saries of the King. The consequences of his sin and folly were, however, bitterly entailed upon himself and his apostate family: a new command was given to JEREMIAH to cause the roll to be re-written, accompanied with an appalling sentence of death and infamy against the man who had not scrupled so profanely to offend alike against the anger and the clemency of Heaven.

Without religion, morality builds only upon sand. This wicked monarch, false to his God, could not prove true to man. Although engaged, by the most

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HISTORY OF THE PROPHET JEREMIAH.

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solemn promises, to recognize by tribute and submission that right of conquest which the King of Babylon had recently exacted from him, yet with a want of prudence, not less striking than his want of principle, he ventured to rebel against him, and refused to pay the stipulated purchase of his liberty and throne. To sustain himself in this resistance, he formed a new confederacy with PHARAOH-NECHO; but soon perceived, that to put confidence in Egypt, was but relying on a broken reed. Hearing of his revolt, the King of Babylon, being himself employed on more important conquests, commanded the surrounding nations, who were still his tributaries, to chastise him for his perfidy and pride. Moab and Ammon, Syria and Arabia, were thus armed against him; and jealous as they were of the prosperity of Israel, and ever ready to exult in their calamities, they executed willingly a charge which gratified the envy and unkindness of their hearts. Infested with incursions from these numerous enemies, the kingdom, for three years, became a scene of desolation and distress! Jerusalem was then invested, and again exposed to all the horrors of a siege. Impatient of its lingering miseries, JEHOIAKIM, on one occasion, sallying forth beyond the walls, was taken prisoner, murdered, and his body left exposed, a spectacle of horror, on the public road. Vile and contemptible both in the eyes of GoD and man, he was denied the common rites of sepulture, and, realizing the prediction of the Prophet, was "buried with the burial of an ass."

This awful and dishonourable conclusion of the disastrous reign of his ungodly parent, produced no salutary influence on the spirit of JEHOIACHIN, who,

being elevated to his father's throne, conformed to his example, and soon participated in his punishment. Mature in vice, though but a child in years, his early indications of extreme impiety became peculiarly offensive to the LORD, who, by the mouth of JEREMIAH, denounced against him a most awful curse. He lived to feel that youthful wickedness as certainly entails upon itself severe and exemplary punishment, as early piety ensures the favour of JEHOVAH, and brings down his blessing on succeeding life.

The siege commenced against Jerusalem, was prosecuted by the tributary nations, till the arrival of the King of Babylon; to whom, JEHOIACHIN, finding himself unable to maintain the war, went out and made submission, attended by his wives, his mother, and the noblest branches of the families of Judah. The only favour granted by this haughty monarch was the substitution of captivity for death. Void of integrity, as void of courage, he was despised by NEBUCHADNEZZAR, who, regarding him unworthy of his confidence, put him in chains, and sent him, with ten thousand meaner captives, to bear the yoke in Babylon, where he remained immured in prison till the conqueror's death, a period of full seven-and-thirty years.

Before he left Judea, the King of Babylon again despoiled the temple of its treasures, plundered the royal palace, and removed the choicest of the soldiers and artificers, to swell his armies, and construct his public works. But not intending wholly to destroy it, he appointed ZEDEKIAH, the uncle of JEHOIACHIN, to fill the vacant throne; binding him first by the most solemn obligations to be faithful to him, as his sovereign lord. Thus NEBU CHADNEZZAR, having closed his second war with con

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