ago, and that in Jeremiah nearly 2,500 years ago. How remarkable that in the present day we should be able to look upon the Arabian nation, and say, Here is the people, and here their character, manner, and habits exactly as foretold by the Holy Spirit. Such facts should induce us to revere the Holy Scriptures, to read them with constancy, and believe in them unwaveringly. THE Syrian plough is a very simple instrument, so simple in its construction that the husbandman is under the necessity of guiding it with great care, bending over it and pressing upon it with all his weight, otherwise the share would glide over the surface and make no incision. His mind must be wholly intent upon his work, at once to press the plough into the ground and make a straight furrow. "Let the plougman," says Hesiod, "attend to his charge and look before him, and not turn aside to look upon his associates, but make straight furrows and have his mind attentive to his work." In the use of the ancient plough we see an illustration of several texts of Scripture. 66 It was customary with the ancients to measure land by the plough. Hence in 1 Samuel, xiv. 15, we read, And that first slaughter which Jonathan and his armour-bearer made was of about twenty men, within as it were a half an acre of land, which a yoke of oxen might plough." This manner of measuring a space of ground, by a comparison from ploughing, seems to have been customary in these times from what is here said of Jonathan. A similar instance also occurs in Homer; for, speaking of contending chiefs, he says So distant they, and such a space between, As when two teams of mules divide the green. II. iii. 109-POPE. For the explanation of the comparison it may be proper to add Dacier's description of the manner of ploughing: “The Grecians did not plough in the manner now in use. They first broke up the ground with oxen, and then ploughed it more lightly with mules. When they employed two ploughs in a field, they measured the space they could plough in a day, and set their ploughs at the two ends of that space, and those ploughs proceeded towards each other. This intermediate space was constantly fixed, but less in proportion for ten ploughs of oxen than for two of mules, because oxen are slower, and toil more in a field that has not yet been turned up; whereas mules are naturally swifter, and make greater speed in a ground that has already had the first ploughing." It was on this account that the law of Moses forbad the Jews to plough with an ox and an ass together. See Deuteronomy xxii. 10. A carucate, or plough-land, in Doomsday-book, from caruca. is as much land as will maintain a plough, or as much as one plough will work. It was usual in hot countries for the husbandman to perform his labour in ploughing and sowing with but few clothes on; and it was to this fact that our Lord alludes when he says in Matthew xxv. 1: "Neither let him who is in the field return back to take his clothes." Virgil alludes to the same custom when he says Plough naked, swains, and naked sow the land, For lazy winter numbs the lab'ring hand. It was a custom also, on the complete destruction of a city, to drive a ploughshare over its ruins. Hence the prophet Jeremiah says, "Zion shall be ploughed like a field." The Jews suppose this prophecy to have been fulfilled in the utter destruction of the second temple by Titus, when Terentius razed the very foundations of the city and temple, and so fulfilled the prediction of Christ that there should not be left one stone upon another. When conquerors would signify their purpose that a city should never be rebuilt, they used to break up the ground where it stood. Judges ix. 45. Ovid alludes to this custom when he says that corn-fields wave where Troy once stood. THE HISTORY OF ELIJAH. "You are engaged, I see, Eliza, or I was going to ask you to walk with me this evening, as it is an holiday, and we have not often the opportunity of thus enjoying ourselves." "I am reading," said Eliza," as you see, the precious Word of God. I had the house to myself, and I thought I could not employ my leisure-hour in a better way than in reading that word which is designed to be our guide through life and our support in death." "But the Bible is not a very entertaining book, is it, Eliza? I like to read those books which amuse me, and which are pleasant and agreeable." "Well, Jane, there is no book which is more pleasing and interesting than the Bible. It contains the history of the most distinguished individuals that ever lived in this our world, and the most distinguished events which ever took place upon earth. We may be pleased, profited, and edified by every part of it; for it is profitable for doctrine, for reproof and instruction in the way of righteousness, so that we may grow wiser and better by its perusal every day." "Oh, yes, Jane! He was an illustrious character. It is true that his parents are unknown, and he generally endeavoured to hide himself in obscurity; but, notwithstanding this, he enjoyed the greatest honour which can be conferred on man; for he was employed for God, and the Lord always suits his instruments to the work which he wishes them to perform. It was so with Moses; he was meek and gentle as a lamb, and this was suited to his work. He had to deliver God's people from a very low and afflicted state in Egypt, and any other disposition might have prevented that deliverance. was so with Elijah. He had to reprove the desperate wickedness of the age in which he lived; and it was needful that he should possess an earnest and zealous spirit." It "Well, Eliza; but mention some of the remarkable events of his life. We may perhaps enjoy ourselves in this way as much as "What part were you read-in going out." ing, Eliza, when I came in, and you seemed to be so intent upon ?" Well, Jane, I was reading the history of Elijah the prophet, who was raised up by God to reprove the sin of idolatry as it existed among his people Israel." "And was there anything very remarkable in his history, Eliza?" "The first thing, then, Jane, which we hear of him is a threatening that there should be no dew nor rain, but according to his word, for years. He had doubtless spoken to the people in warning before, though we have no account of it; and this threatening that there should be neither dew nor rain was the punishment of their obduracy and unbelief." "But, Eliza, what a bold speech for a man to say that there should be no rain but according to his word, as if he could stay the bottles of heaven!" "Well, Jane, God interposed in his behalf, and commanded the ravens, a ravenous and devouring kind of bird, to feed him there; and they brought him bread and flesh in the morning, and bread and flesh in the evening. But, "It was, indeed, Jane; but he owing to the drought, the brook was mighty with God and pre-dried up, and the prophet was vailed. The apostle James, when then sent to a poor widow to be speaking of him, ascribes the fed by her; and though she was event to his power with God in reduced to the last extremity, all prayer; and for our encourage- her provision being nearly gone, ment says that the fervent yet, in obedience to the prophet, effectual prayer of a righteous she baked him a cake; and, as man availeth much." an evidence of the divine approval of this act of kindness, God promised that her barrel of meal should not fail until he sent rain to replenish her stock again. But read it all, Jane; you will find it in 1 Kings xvii. I am sure you will be gratified with it, and I hope profited, for these things are written for our instruction. Elijah was at last taken up to heaven in a chariot of fire." "But was it kind in him, Eliza, to pray for this? What distress must have been produced to have been without rain! Why, if we have a long drought, how soon things begin to droop and wither!" "Yes, Jane; but you must keep in mind that he acted under divine influence. He spake as from God, whose servant he was, and whose judgments he threatened. He only denounced what God would exe cute, and which was a just punishment for the iniquitous practices of the people. He had, however, to flee for his life from Ahab the king, and to hide himself by the brook Cherith, beyond Jordan." "But, Eliza, how did he live in that place? Who brought vietuals for him to eat?" "Thank you, Eliza, I will. I had no idea that I should have so much pleasure in my staying with you. I hope in future I shall read the Word of God in a better state of mind that I have ever yet done." E. B. BRIGHOUSE. SELECT VARIETIES. AN ACCOUNT OF THE MANNER IN WHICH SERPENTS ATTACK, CONQUER, AND DEVOUR LARGE ANIMALS. IN our colonies of the East | tail, and thereby acquiring an Indies there are serpents upwards addition of strength, redoubles of twenty-five feet in length. his efforts till he suffocates him. Though their throat may seem At the same time he seizes him too narrow to be capable of swal- by the nostrils with his teeth, and lowing animals of a large size, so not only intercepts his breathwe have, notwithstanding, fre- ing, but the deep wounds he gives quent proofs that this indeed with his bites occasion a great happens; and amongst those I loss of blood. He at last kills have bought of our hunters, a by this method the largest stag of middle age was found quite entire, with his skin and all his members in the body of one of them. In another was found a wild goat, with his horns, and no part of his body was wanting; and in a third a hedgehog, armed with all his prickles. It is so they swallow up whole animals, which they find means to compass in the following man ner: When hunger presses them, they lie in ambush, and endeavour to surprise some animal; and when they have seized it, they twine about its body so closely that they break its bones by squeezing it. If the animal is strong and makes great resistance, and the serpent cannot stifle him in his first position of laying hold of him, he strives to grapple with some trunk of a tree, which he surrounds with his animals. Persons of credit assured me of having seen in the kingdom of Aracan, near Bengal, a like combat, near a river, between an enormous serpent of this kind and a buffalo, an animal at least as large as a wild ox, which was killed and devoured by the serpent. His bones made so great a noise while the serpent was breaking them, by twining about his body and pressing it together, that it was heard a long way off by some persons who were witnesses of this spectacle. It seems astonishing that those serpents, whose throats are so narrow in proportion to the rest of their bodies, can swallow so large an animal quite entire, and without tearing it to pieces, as dogs and lions; but they succeed effectually, and the way is thus:— When these serpents, whose |