ground. It was part of man's punishment; but God has also made it a part of his happiness. Idle people are always unhappy.

Caroline.-Yes, papa; for there is lazy Lewis. See him lying under the tree in the corner of the fence.

Edward.-His dog seems more awake than he is; he watches while Lewis sleeps.

Frank. He puts us in mind of a text which Delia got the other morning. What is it, sister?

Delia." He that gathereth in summer is a wise son; but he that sleepeth in harvest, is a son that causeth shame."-(Prov. x. 5.)

Mr. W.-Yet, the lazy fellow thinks that he is of more account than these honest men who are at their work. Their fathers were not rich, but they were industrious, and taught their children to be industrious. These strong and ruddy young men will perhaps be rich in the course of a few years. The two men who are reaping in the front row are more than sixty years old. Yet, how hale and robust they are!

F. They cut it very close and even.

Mr. W.-Yes, they do indeed. In these days it is not the custom for the poor people to glean, as they used to do in old times. In Judea they always left something for the poor to pick up. It is possible that some of you remember a passage to this effect.

A. In the 19th chapter of Leviticus, it is commanded, "And when ye reap the harvest of your land, thou shalt not wholly reap the corners of thy field, neither shalt thou gather the gleanings of thy harvest." You all remember how Ruth gleaned in the field of Boaz. Let us go under this stately tree, and look in our Bibles at this history of Ruth.

Car-Here, I have found it; it is in the second chapter. When Boaz came into the field, he spoke very kindly to the reapers. He said unto the reapers, "The Lord be with you; and they answered him, The Lord bless thee."

Mr. W.-It was the beautiful custom of those times. Harvest, you know, was a season of joy. Among good

people, this was holy joy; and they blessed one another in the name of the Lord.

A.-The Psalmist alludes to this in the 129th Psalm. He is there comparing the enemies of Zion to grass on the house tops, "which withereth before it groweth up: wherewith the mower filleth not his hand; nor he that bindeth sheaves, his bosom; neither do they which go by say, The blessing of the Lord be upon you, we bless you in the name of the Lord."

Car.-Let us go on about Ruth. In the next verses I see that she asked leave to glean. And then she gleaned all day. And then Boaz invited her to stay near his young women, and to drink what the young men had drawn.

F-Drink! Why, did they use strong drink in those days?

Car. I cannot tell you what they drank; perhaps Arthur can.

I

A. They had vinegar and water to quench their thirst. suppose this is what is meant in the 14th verse-" And Boaz said unto her. At meal-time come hither, and eat of the bread, and dip thy morsel in the vinegar." It was not uncommon to use this drink, for if you turn to Numbers vi. 3, you will see that it is said of the Nazarite. "He shall drink no vinegar of wine, or vinegar of strong drink."

Mr. W.-This is not so strange as you might think. The common drink of the Roman soldiers was vinegar and water.

Car. The reapers left a good deal on purpose for Ruth, and she gleaned an ephah of barley.

A.-An ephah is between three and four pecks.

F-Did the Hebrews cut their grain with a machine, or with a sickle ?

Capt.-Not with a machine, I dare say; for in the greater part of Europe, nobody ever saw what we call a cradle. The reaping-hook or sickle is what they use. I have been in Wales during harvest, and have seen them reaping with a very large sickle. They gather grain in the arm, and cut it more neatly and quickly than in the common way.

4.- What you say about the gathering of the stalks in

the arm, explains a verse in the 17th of Isaiah-" And it shall be as when the harvest-man gathereth the corn, and reapeth the ears with his arm."

Mr. W.-Perhaps the prophet means something else. He says the harvest-man reapeth the ears with his arm; perhaps he means to say, that they pulled up the grain by the roots.

D-I have seen them pulling up flax in that way, but I never saw them pull wheat. Why should they do so? Mr. W.-It is the most common way in the east. All the eastern travellers tell us so. They have so little fodder for their cattle, and so little fuel, that they save every inch of straw, and leave no stubble in the field, yet they sometimes use the sickle.

F-Now. uncle, look at the field on the other side of the brook. It looks something like a camp. The shocks look like tents. I suppose it is the practice in most countries to put up sheaves into little stacks or shocks?

Mr. W.-After the grain was cut down or pulled up by the Israelites, it was formed into sheaves; but the sheaves were never set up into shocks as with us, although they are mentionod in our translation of Judges xv. 5, Job v. 26; for the original word signifies neither a shock, composed of a few sheaves standing in the field, nor a stack of many sheaves in the barnyard, but a heap of sheaves laid loosely together, in order to be trodden out as quickly as possible.

F-Now they have done working. Roger is putting on his coat.

Delia.- Yes; see, brother Arthur, how pleased they all seem to be with your barrel of molasses and water! They like it as well as spirits; and what is better, they will not quarrel with their wives when they go home.

Car. I almost envy these hard-working men. They are so hungry, that they will enjoy their supper; they are so weary, that they will be ready to sleep sweetly.

Captain.-A little hard work would soon cure you of your envy, Caroline. Yet there is some truth in what you say. Solomon says the same: "The sleep of a labouring

man is sweet, whether he eat little or much! but the abundance of the rich, will not suffer him to sleep."(Eccles. v. 12.)

Mr. W.-The clouds begin to gather in the east, and it grows dark. We will return. While we are on our way, let me remind you of some lessons which we may all learn. Can you tell me what kind of grain this is?

D.-It is wheat.

Mr. W.-What kind of grain was sown here last autumn?

D.-Wheat, papa; of course.

Mr. W.-How is that? Do people always reap the same kind of grain that they sow?

D.-Certainly, papa.

Mr. W.-What should this teach us?

D. It should teach us to be careful to put good things into our minds, that we may reap the benefit of them in time to come.

Mr. W.-Does it teach you anything else?

Edward. It teaches us that we must be faithful and obedient, and then we shall be happy. I know a text about it. "Be not deceived; God is not mocked; for whatsoever a man soweth, that shall he also reap; for he that soweth to his flesh, shall of the flesh reap corruption; but he that soweth to the Spirit, shall of the Spirit reap life everlasting." (Gal. vi. 7.)

F.-I wish to reap life everlasting.

D. Then you must take care what you sow. I am afraid I have been sowing nothing at all in my heart. F.-Perhaps you have sowed tares. I remember that I heard a minister say, that when we are idle, we are letting the devils sow tares in our minds.

Mr. W. - The prophet Hosea spoke to the wicked Israelites, who lived more than twenty-five hundred years ago, saying, "Ye have ploughed wickedness, ye have reaped iniquity;" and again, "Sow to yourselves in righteousness, reap in mercy."—(Hos. x. 12, 13.) And he also spake thus: "For they have sown the wind, and they shall reap the whirlwind." (Hos. viii. 7.) All this teaches us that we

must not expect to be happy in this world, or in the world to come, without trying. No one expects a harvest without sowing the grain. Suppose I sow the seeds of cockle all over a field?

D.-Then, papa, you will have a fine crop of cockles for your pains.

"He that soweth

Mr. W.-Just so. Solomon says, iniquity, shall reap vanity.”—(Prov. xxii. 8.)

(To be continued.)

WONDERS OF THE VEGETABLE WORLD.

LET us regard the vegetable kingdom in respect of its apparent nature and services to man and beast. Notwithstanding all the use that could be made of the earths and metals, and of animal bodies as food to themselves and us, all would be unavailing without the aid of plants. We have food and physic, and fire and clothing, from the things that live and grow, but which know not that they exist. The animal substance that is so needful for us is but vegetable matter, transformed, by a rapid process, from the grass or grain of the field to the flesh and blood and bones of our horses and cattle, and sheep and pigs, and birds of all sorts.

We will attend for a moment to the grasses-the graminaceous kinds, as they are called. Of these fertile plants that spreads over our meadows, skirts the road-side, and even carpets the common and the wilderness wherever it is possible to live, there are, perhaps, fifty different species, with more than as many names, which it will not answer cur purpose to record. In the family of grasses, too, our botanists include not only the corn of all sorts, but sedges and reeds-the bamboo and the sugar-cane-so that a walking-stick is but a straw of a stronger kind.

Q. Those botanists and other learned naturalists tell us often that certain very different things belong to the same tribe or family-pray what do they mean by it? Is it really true that a cat and a tiger, a hay-stalk and a