Ed. Why there are many places where the Times is_regu larly filed year after year. Miss Hartley might have made the search herself.

Aug. She did not seem to be aware of that.

Mrs. M. On the whole, Mr. Editor, what do you think of this strange narrative?

The

Ed. It is certainly a singular account. There can be no doubt that the child belongs to respectable parents. Whether it was stolen, or conveyed to an obscure part of the country, that its supposed death might remove an impediment out of the way of somebody's inheritance, can only be surmised. authoress of the "Narrative" is inclined to see marvellous coincidences where I cannot see more than accidental, and not necessarily connected events. She supposes the murdered lady to be the child's mother; of this there is no proof at all. The burning house may have been this lady's home, but that does not render it this child's home. In fact, it is not probable that she resided so near her parent's house. The young lady in the house of mourning might have been a mother sorrowing over her own child, and struck by some fancied resemblance in Murphy's little girl, or by some similarity in age. It is a merely vague surmise which regards her as probably the aunt of the deserted infant.

Aug. But Thady-he is a fact, at any rate.

Ed. And, to my mind, a very important fact. His hanging about the child's new home, his acquaintance with her, and his sullen refusal to tell anything he knew, all confirmed the little one's own simple statement. Something may yet transpire through him.

Old L. But why is all this made into a book?

Aug. With the hope, by thus widely circulating all that is known of the child, of the narrative meeting the eyes of her friends, and leading to her restoration to her family.

Mrs. M. May it be successful! Who can tell but that her parents yet live, and recognising their child's portrait, as seen in the frontispiece, may regain their lost treasure.

Ed. What is the next book, Augustus, to come under our notice ?

Aug. DR. KITTO'S BIBLE ILLUSTRATIONS;* the third volume of the Evening Series.

Ed. What is its subject?

Aug. A History of Christ, condensed from the Evangelists, arranged according to the best Harmonies, with a careful exami nation of every peculiar or difficult topic.

The author says that

he has endeavoured to realize and bring into view the position

Edinburgh: Oliphant and Sons.

which Jesus appeared to occupy in the eyes of the people-the condition of the country, and the state of Jewish public opinion at the time He appeared-the fluctuations of that opinion in regard to Himself and the causes that led to, or the effects that resulted from, the particular circumstances recordedshowing, it is believed, that the Gospel history is not made up of isolated incidents or anecdotes; but that all its parts will be found, by those who examine them with attention, not only to manifest a determinate purpose, but to bear a close relation to each other."

Ed. And Dr. Kitto is just the man to do this. He is industrious, dispassionate, and, what critical inquirers too frequently lack, has a deep reverence for the Bible.

Mrs. M. You remind me of the pain I have sometimes felt in reading German theological books: the writers seem to forget that the Bible is inspired, and handle it with as little ceremony as if it were a human composition.

Ed. And as if, like other books which are imperfect because they are produced by imperfect men, the Bible had its incongruities and deficiencies, and must have its interpretations shaped accordingly. I find this failure of a full recognition of the Bible as the Book which holy men wrote, 66 as they were moved by the Holy Ghost," in the most evangelical foreign commentators; as for example in OLSHAUSEN, whose writings are, in these respects, a model of what a commentary ought to be. Mrs. M. I have frequently remarked that a text of Scripture which has puzzled all the commentators to explain, has been regarded as perfectly clear and intelligible by a simple, untaught cottager.

Ed. And have you not found even more than this, that the very meaning your cottager has readily assigned to the text has sometimes been the precise signification which men of deep thought and learning have, after long and laborious investigation, themselves decided to adopt.

Mrs. M. So frequently, as to recal to my mind our Saviour's thanksgivings, that the things which were hidden from the wise and prudent were revealed unto babes.

Ed. It shows then, that a child-like, teachable, reverential spirit, ever cherishing a sense of need of the Spirit's aid, and a dependence upon Him, is indispensably required by a commentator, to qualify him for his transcendantly important task.

Mrs. M. We have had such a long discussion, Mr. Editor, about Popery and Tractarianism, that I fear we cannot further prolong our examination of the books on your table.

Aug. We must make more despatch next time we meet.
Ed. Perhaps.

T

BATHURST

CATARACT,

ON THE RIVER APSLEY, AUSTRALIA.

HE scenery around this magnificent cataract would require the genius of a Salvator Rosa to render it anything like justice; and even in attempting to copy it, or to describe it, the utmost stretch of human art can merely produce a faint and feeble outline of that awfully sublime landscape which surrounds the traveller in the wild solitudes of Australia.

From the interesting journal of Mr. Oxley, surveyorgeneral of the colony, who first discovered it, we extract the following description:

"After travelling five or six miles, we arrived at that part of the river at which, after passing through a

beautiful and level, though elevated country, it is first received into the glen. We have seen many fine and magnificent falls, each of which had excited our admiration in no small degree, but the present one so far surpasses anything we had previously conceived even to be possible, that we were lost in astonishment at the sight of this wonderful natural sublimity, which perhaps is scarcely to be exceeded in the Eastern world. The river, after passing through an apparently gentlerising and fine country, is here divided into two streams, the whole width of which is about seventy yards. At this spot the country seems cleft in twain, and divided to its very foundation: a ledge of rocks, two or three feet higher than the level on either side, divides the waters in two, which, falling over a perpendicular rock two hundred and thirty feet in height, forms this grand cascade. At a distance of three hundred yards and an elevation of as many feet, we were wetted with the spray, which arose like small rain. The noise was deafening.

"After winding through the cleft rocks about four hundred yards, it again falls in one single sheet, upwards of one hundred feet, and continues in a succession of smaller falls, above a quarter of a mile lower, where the cliffs are of a perpendicular height on each side exceeding 1,200 feet, the width of the edges being about two hundred yards. From thence it descends until all sight of it is lost, from the vast elevation of the rocky hills which it divides and runs through. We were led to infer that this country must at some period or other have undergone vast convulsions; the different points of this deep glen seem as if they would fit into the opposite fissures which form the smaller glens alternately on either side. The waters are quite discoloured, owing to the nature of the bed over which they run; the soluble particles of coal among the slate tinging them a dark brown."

A VISIT TO THE MADIAIS.

[The following interesting narration is from the official report of the Rev. M. Colombe, Chaplain to the Prussian Embassy at Florence, who has recently been permitted to visit both Francesco Madiai and his wife.---ED.]

To one in the full enjoyment of liberty, it is difficult to form just ideas of the misery of a prison, even the best of prisons. How hard must it be to be torn from liberty, from friends, from home, from all that forms the happiness of life, and to be confined for long years in a narrow, dark cell, where everything in it is, from the damp, covered with mould, and where the sky cannot even be seen; and, above all, how hard to be confounded by an infamous condemnation with malefactors. The blow which has struck the Madiai is the more terrible, as they enjoyed all that domestic happiness which mutual affection, and a moderate independence, acquired by savings from the earnings of both of them, could give. To be prevented, too, from helping to aid each other to bear this heavy burthen, is to them a greater trial than all the privations and all the miseries to which those condemned the discipline of a prison must endure.

But, as I said before, so much unmerited suffering only serves to show the power of Christianity, when it is deeply rooted in the heart. I have found faith, hope and charity in Madiai's cell. I went to take

them consolation, but it was they who edified and comforted me; it was they who, in exchange for a few words of comfort and peace, have given me an example which, please God, shall not be lost, either to my ministration or to myself.

I found Francesco Madiai at Volterra, confined to his bed, very weak, and fearfully thin; but it would be