of the West. I believe that the state of the diocese before my election, the incidents of that call, the local disquietness which were my unfortunate heirloom, the disloyalty and faction which grieved and assailed my venerable predecessor, cloaked, but not abated, have wrought effects which in me and for me are irremediable.'

RELIGIOUS LIBERTY IN FRANCE.-The endeavors of the clergy and nobility of England, by their application to the French Emperor, in behalf of the religious liberty of his subjects, do not yet appear to promise success; no favorable result has been reached. Protestant Churches are still held "in durance vile," and forbidden

the inestimable right of public worship agreeably to the dictates of conscience; and even in the anniversary meetings of benevolent associations, the speakers and framers of the reports are kept in awe by the presence of spies and informers who are ready to speak evil to the government of the things they know not.

A CENTURY PLANT TWENTY-SIX FEET HIGH. -There is now to be seen at Savannah, Georgia, an aloe tree, otherwise called a Century Plant, twenty-six feet high, and containing more than a thousand buds, all of which are ready to bloom. This remarkable tree is a native product of Wilmington Island. Of its history the first fifty years of its existence we are not informed. Since 1804, when it was transplanted upon the island, it has been thriving, the admiration of all, on the farm of Colonel Hunter.

ONE HUNDRED DOLLARS PREMIUM. The Directors of the American Reform Tract and Book Society offer one hundred dollars premium for the best manuscript of a Religious AntiSlavery Sabbath-School Book, of sufficient length to make not less than one hundred nor over two hundred printed pages 18mo.

The Austrian government requests the directors of the railways in the empire to plant young trees of a description indicated, at convenient distances along the lines, intending them to replace eventually the posts upon which telegraphic wires are at present affixed. Can not our telegraph companies profit by this hint.

A volume, entitled " Anti-Slavery Recollections," by Sir George Stephen, has just issued from the London press. It gives a detailed account of the measures by which was effected the abolition of the slave-trade, and sketches the character and services of those more prominent in the anti-slavery controversy during the memorable ten years from 1824 to 1834. Of the character of Wilberforce the author gives the following, to us new, and doubtless correct delineation:

"Wilberforce had his defects, and though others have vailed them, I shall not. A man's excellence, especially when a public man, cannot be appreciated apart from his feelings, as the primary colors lose their brilliancy when deprived of contrast with their complementary tints.

"His essential fault was that of busy indolence; he worked out nothing for himself; he was destitute of system, and desultory in his habits; he depended on others for information, and laid himself open to misguidance; he was too fond of an animated dictionary; he required an intellectual walking-stick. From this habit sprung another failing of no trifling importance

in a public man-he was indecisive; he wanted the confidence which he might have justly placed in his own judgment. It was a common saying of him, so common that you must have heard it, that you might safely predicate his vote, for it was certain to be opposed to his speech. The only other weak point to which I will refer was singular in a man of his refinement-he loved the small gossip of political life, and politically educated in the tone of the last century, felt, perhaps unconsciously, too much deferential regard for rank and power, irrespective, not of the morality, but of the sterling worth of their pos

sessors.

"In a man of less strength of principle than Wilberforce, these faults, though venial, would have impeded all his utility, even if they had not reduced him to the level of the common herd; but he possessed qualities taking the expression in its most comprehensive sense, that neutralized their tendency; in religious duty, he was resolute and inflexible; it was a resolution founded no less on intelligence than feeling; he knew what was his duty to God and man, better than the most orthodox divine that ever adorned the episcopal bench; and what he knew, he practiced and he loved. This was the real secret of that deep veneration with which all men regarded him. In the conflict of party, in the excitement of debate, or the tumult of political strife, men might doubt about his vote on minor issues, but where the interests of morality, or humanity, or religion were involved, there Wilberforce's perception of what was right appeared intuitive, and his vote was certain: neither rank, nor power, nor eloquence bewildered him for a moment then. All the honors, all the wealth, all the seductions that the world could furnish, would not have tempted him to offend his conscience by even a momentary hesitation; he at once rose above all infirmities of habit, firm as a rock upon the spiritual foundation on which he rested. Now am I not right in beginning with his faults? do

they not show his noble virtues in yet bolder relief?"

Our author gives us an opportunity also to correct our estimate of the character of the great agitator:

"You must not be startled when I name O'Connell as the other to whom I must render justice. Never was man so abused, never was mortal so abhorred by a section of the community, as O'Connell. His moral character was unexceptionable even in the judgment of his opponents; his political character was revered by his friends and reprobated by his enemies. I have nothing to do either with the one or the other, but I have occasionally seen him in his domestic character, and there I have seen abundance to love and admire. At present I only refer to him as an abolitionist, and all our party. as such he well merited the esteem and veneration of

"He did us great service by his speeches; so did many others: he was accessible at all hours, and under all circumstances, to the lowest as well as the highest, on abolition matters; so was every member in 1833: but Mr. O'Connell did what no other man could do. He lent the whole of his powerful influence to keep the Irish public, as well as the Irish members, steady to the cause; he brought all his political weight to bear upon it. Ireland needed no agitation on abolition; from Cape Clear to the Giant's Causeway, Ireland was an abolitionist in heart and in action, irrespective of party feeling, whether in politics or religion; and much, nay, most of this was due to Mr. O'Connell. He did it disinterestedly; he made no bargain for reciprocal support; he was content to fight his own battles with his own forces. I believe that, as a divided with him; but he always voted for them, and general rule, the parliamentary abolitionists seldom led on his followers, and compelled them to attend."

The volume will doubtless be republished in this country.

A writer in the California Pioneer says that, on the plank road near Southwick's Pass, an inn or hotel is kept by a native American Irishman, whose sign exhibits the harp of Ireland encircling the shield of the United States with the mottoes:

"Erin go Unum." "E Pluribus Bragh."

CHANGES IN THE ECONOMY OF METHODISM.— The Canada Wesleyan Conference has adopted a regulation which makes provision for allowing a minister, when requested by the people, to remain five years in the same appointment. The New-York East Conference of the Methodist Episcopal Church adopted, at its last session, a resolution requesting the General Conference to modify the rule which restricts the pastoral relation to two years, and to abrogate "the invidious regulation" with regard to cities.

HEREDITARY DISTINCTIONS. The London Literary Gazette, in a review of Irving's Life of Washington, adverts to the author's long and tedious account of the pedigree of the father of his country, tracing up the genealogy of the Washington family to an old English stock, settled in Durham as early as the Conquest. The Gazette naïvely remarks, and the remark is truthful, if not creditable to our boasted independence and sturdy pretensions to universal equality:-"In America, hereditary distinctions, when they can be made out, are made more of in biography than with us in England."

ARITHMETIC APPLIED TO THE CHURCH.-The author of a volume entitled "Twenty Years' Conflict in the Church, and its Remedy," is of opinion that "the reason why peace and unity have forsaken the Church is, that while science has been reformed, religion remains unreformed; and the reason why one party does not prevail over the other party is, that there are faults on both sides." The author proposes his suggested reforms under the arithmetical terms of addition and subtraction. "The additions are:-the Right of Private Judgment, or the Authority of Reason and Conscience-Free Will-Responsibility and Man's Power to Perform Good as well as Evil. The subtractions are:-Apostolical Succession-the Supernatural Efficacy of the Sacraments - Justification by FaithOriginal Sin and Predestination."

INTERESTING CUSTOM IN THE ANCIENT CHURCH. -The first Christians kept the first day of the week in memory of their Master's resurrection, and the customs of the day were such as well befitted a season of glad triumph. No posture of humiliation should sully it or careworn countenance derogate from it. Six days in the week -unless in so far as Saturday was excepted among Oriental Christians-might a man bow in devout adoration before his God, or postrate himself in the agony of contrition, as he recollected his follies, his errors, and his sins. But on the first day of the week no Christian knee was permitted to bend in prayer, nor was a Christian countenance to be anxious. On that day, as the deacon called the assembly to their devotions, it was with the admonition, "Let us stand perfectly erect," and when the recurring year brought with it the anniversary of the Master's resurrection, his followers for the space of fifty days maintained the same upright position in their prayers.

"We observe the eighth day joyously, on which Jesus rose from the dead and ascended into heaven." Epist. of Barnabas, c. 15. (XIII. 10.)

CAMOENS.-The dust of the minstrel of the "Lusiad," who, in 1595, perished in a hospital, as every child familiar with "Anecdotes of the Poets" knows, has lately been sought for in the Church of the ancient Convent of St. Anne, of Lisbon, beneath the high altar of which it was reputed to be deposited sixteen years after his decease, in a brick cenotaph, by Don Gonçalo Continho; and on its being found, a solemn service was performed, on the 15th of May, in the presence of many high and noble persons. The remains were placed in a rich coffin, and confided anew to the keeping of the nuns of St. Anne, till the monument, which will be prepared for their reception, can be completed.

BRITISH WESLEYAN CONFERENCE.-A minister of this body writing to the Canada Christian Advocate, under date of June 8th, says that the Annual District Meetings, preparatory to the Wesleyan Conference, have just concluded their sittings, when statistics are taken, and the way prepared for the decision of all questions by the supreme court, the conference. Many had ardently hoped that we should have been able to report this year an augmentation of numbers; but the painful fact is but too evident that instead of an increase we have a falling off of about three thousand members. This is the

fifth year in succession that the connection has retrograded; and during these five years nearly one hundred thousand members have been lost; notwithstanding, the conviction is all but universal that the connection is in an improved state of spirituality, and there is a less depression than there has been since the reform agitation commenced in 1849.

ONLY ONE BARNUM.-Fanny Fern's exceedingly absurd biographical novelette, entitled Ruth Hall, has been republished in Great Britain. It is noticed at some length in Tait's Edinburgh Magazine. The witty reviewer commences his article in the following complimentary strain:

We

"America is determined to keep us amused. are never left for long together without a 'startling novelty' from the alinighty republic.' 'Keep your eye fixed' said one of her 'newspaperial' bards-

"Keep your eye fix'd on the American eagle,
Whom we as the proud bird of destiny hail;
For that wise fowl you can never inveigle,
By depositing salt on his venerable tail."

But the advice was hardly necessary. What with the Great Sea-Serpent, and Spirit-rapping, and 'Uncle Tom,' and Barnum, we are kept, nolens volens, at the full stare; and, as for 'inveigling that wise fowl,' why, really, we haven't the leisure to think of such a thing, so long as the divine (or, as we ought to say, Jupiterial) animal keeps us on the defensive. Let him turn tail for a minute or two, and give our celebrated Lion time to find his salt-box, and we will see what can be done. But we can't promise him a Barnumwe haven't the article in stock, and don't know where to look for it."

THE CHINESE.-Two volumes, entitled The Chinese Empire, have recently been published. They are from the pen of a Romish priest, formerly, as he styles himself, Missionary Apostolic in China. His opinion on the Christianity of the present Chinese rebellion is, perhaps, modified by his own Roman Catholic predilections; it is, however, worthy of attention :

"We do not give the slightest credit to the alleged Christianity of the insurgents, and the religious and mythical sentiments expressed in the manifestoes inspire us with no great confidence. There exists in all the provinces a very considerable number of Mussulmen, who have their koran and their mosques. It is to be presumed that these Mohammedans, who have already several times attempted to overthrow the Tartar dynasty, and have always distinguished themselves by a violent opposition to the government, would have thrown themselves with ardor into the ranks of the insurrection. Many of these must have become generals, and have mingled in the councils of Tien-te. It is therefore not wonderful to find among them the doctrine of the unity of God, and other ideas of Biblical origin, though whimsically expressed. The Chinese have also for a long time had at their command a precious collection of books of Christian doctrine, compiled by ancient Christian missionaries, which, even in a literary point of view, are much esteemed in the empire. These books are diffused in great numbers

throughout the provinces, and it is more than probable

that the Chinese innovators have drawn the ideas in question from those sources, rather than from the Bibles prudently deposited by the Methodists on the sea-shore.

"The new faith proclaimed by the insurrectional government, though vague and ill-defined, does, nevertheless, it must be acknowledged, indicate great progress: it is an immense step in the way to truth."

THE REV. SYDNEY SMITH.-Two volumes of the memoirs of this clerical wag, well known as one of the originators of the Edinburgh Review, and one of the best prose-writers of his day, have been recently published. They are full of good things, and represent him as an amiable and conscientious clergyman, as well as a politician and a wit. We cull a few extracts for the amusement of our readers. Like the sturdy Johnson he had, or affected to have, a great contempt for the Scotch. In treating of them he said:

"It requires a surgical operation to get a joke well into the Scotch understanding. Their only idea of wit, or rather, that inferior variety of this electric talent which prevails occasionally in the North, and which, under the name of wUT, is so infinitely distressing to people of good taste, is laughing immoderately at stated intervals. They are so imbued with metaphysics that they even make love metaphysically; I overheard a young lady of my acquaintance, at a dance in Edinburgh, exclaim, in a sudden pause of the music, What you say, my lord, is very true of love in the aibstract, but here the fiddlers began fiddling furiously, and the rest was lost."

Of his own fits of absent-mindedness, and those of one of his friends, he says:

"The oddest instance of absence of mind happened to me once in forgetting my own name. I knocked at a door in London; asked, 'Is Mrs. Bat home?' Yes, sir; pray what name shall I say?" I looked in the man's face astonished:-what name? what name? ay, that is the question; what is my name? I believe the man thought me mad: but it is literally true, that during the space of two or three minutes I had no more idea of who I was than if I had never existed. I did not know whether I was a Dissenter or a layman. I felt as dull as Sternhold and Hopkins. At last, to my great relief, it flashed across me that I was Sydney Smith.

"Lord Dudley was one of the most absent men I think I ever met in society. One day he met me in the street, and invited me to meet myself. 'Dine with me to-day; dine with me, and I will get Sydney Smith to meet you.' I admitted the temptation he held out to me, but said I was engaged to meet him elsewhere. Another time, on meeting me, he turned back, put his arm through mine, muttering, I don't mind walking with him a little way; I'll walk with him as far as the end of the street.' As we proceeded together, W passed: "That is the villain,' exclaimed he, who helped me yesterday to asparagus, and gave me no toast. He very nearly overset my gravity once in the pulpit. He was sitting immediately under me,

apparently very attentive, when suddenly he took up his stick, as if he had been in the House of Commons, and tapping on the ground with it, cried out in a low but very audible whisper, 'Hear! hear! hear !'"

Speaking of Macaulay the historian, he said :—

"Yes, I take great credit to myself; I always prophesied his greatness from the first moment I saw him, then a very young and unknown man, on the Northern Circuit. There are no limits to his knowledge, on small subjects as well as great; he is like a book in breeches."

Somewhat similar was his description of Daniel Webster. "He struck me much like a steam-engine in trowsers." And of a Yankee lady to whom he had been introduced, he remarked: "She has the true Kentucky twang through the nose, converting that promontory into an organ of speech.'

Of his friend and coadjutor Jeffrey, he writes: "He has been here with his adjectives, who always travel with him." He disliked the use of expletives, and had a horror of redundant words. On that subject he said, with an allowable hyperbole ::-"In composing, as a general rule, run your pen through every other word you have written; you have no idea what vigor it will give your style."

In a discussion of the merits of the Inferno of Dante, he thus disported himself:—

"He may be a great poet; but as to invention, I knowledge of the human heart. If I had taken it in consider him a mere bungler-no imagination, no hand, I would show you what torture really was; for instance, (turning, merrily, to his old friend Mrs. Marcet,) you should be doomed to listen. for a thousand years, to conversations between Caroline and Emily, where Caroline should always give wrong explanations in chemistry, and Emily in the end be unable to distinguish an acid from an alkali. You, Macaulay, let me consider?-O, you should be dumb. False dates and facts of the reign of Queen Anne should forever be shouted in your ears; all liberal and honest opinions should be ridiculed in your presence; and you should not be able to say a single word during that period in their defense.' 'And what would you condemn me to, Mr. Sydney?' said a young mother. "Why, you should for ever see those three sweet little girls of yours on the point of falling down stairs, and never be able to save them. There, what tortures are there in Dante equal to these ?'"

On the subject of female education, and in view of the partiality of his countrywomen for the military, he writes:

*

"Ah! what female heart can withstand a red coat? I think this should be a part of female education; it is much neglected. As you have the rocking-horse to accustom them to ride, I would have military dolls in the nursery, to harden their hearts against officers and red-coats. * Nover teach false morality. How exquisitely absurd to tell girls that beauty is of no value, dress of no use! Beauty is of value; her whole prospects and happiness in life may often depend upon a new gown, or a becoming bonnet, and if she has five grains of common sense she will find this out. The great thing is to teach her their just value, and that there must be something better under the bonnet than a pretty face for real happiness. But never sacrifice truth."

The following extract from a letter to a little girl blends beautifully simplicity and sober

ness:

"Lucy, Lucy, my dear child, don't tear your frock, tearing frocks is not of itself a proof of genius; but write as your mother writes, act as your mother acts; be frank, loyal, affectionate, simple, honest; and then integrity or laceration of frock is of little import. And Lucy, dear child, mind your arithmetic. You know, in the first sum of yours I ever saw, there was a mistake. You had carried two, (as a cab is licensed to do,}

and you ought, dear Lucy, to have carried but one. Is this a trifle? What would life be without arithmetic, but a scene of horrors? You are going to Boulogne, the city of debts, peopled by men who never understood arithmetic; by the time you return, I shall probably have received my first paralytic stroke, and shall have lost all recollection of you; therefore I now give you my parting advice."

He disliked the Dissenters; and, because he knew no better, wrote many foolish things about the Wesleyans. He was equally severe, perhaps more so, upon the High Church party. In answer to a letter, dated according to the custom of the Puseyites, upon the eve of some Saint's day, he dated his answer-Washing Day-Eve of Ironing Day; and in a letter written in 1841 he says, and with the extract we must close:

"I wish you had witnessed, the other day at St. Paul's, my incredible boldness in attacking the Puseyites. I told them that they made the Christian religion a religion of postures and ceremonies, of circumflexions and genuflexions, of garments and vestures, of ostentation and parade; that they took up tithe of mint and cummin, and neglected the weightier matters of the law-justice, mercy, and the duties of life;

and so forth."

CANONS IN THE WAY.-A writer in the Church Journal, referring to the lack of episcopally ordained and educated ministers in California and Oregon, speaks very plainly on the subject in this wise:

"It is wonderful, and at the same time painful, at least to those who take your view of this matter in relation to the extension of the Diaconate, to see how the very best minds, both of bishops and clergy, are hampered and bound by the traditions and customs descended to us from the English Church. How utterly impossible it seems to be for our bishops, and especially the missionary ones, to leap the fearful gap between us and the primitive Church: to cut away all the traditions of the middle ages, and dip once more at the fountain-head. Our country presents many features of similarity, in a religious point of view, to the times of the first announcement of the Gospel, with this immense advantage to us, however, that the people believe already in the Saviour, and stand ready to be brought into the fold.

"Now let us see how the matter stands in California and Oregon. Bishop Kip concludes his report by saying, It is strange to me to witness the insensibility displayed toward the ultimate interests of the Church in this country. A few years hence California will have expanded into a power with which none of the Western States can compare. By that time other forms of faith and error-or worse, infidelity itself-will have occupied the ground. But let the Church concentrate some generous efforts on this State for only three years, and the Church here will be able to stand alone.' This is precisely what I say. Bishop Kip, his clergy and laity, constitute the Church there: by all means concentrate your efforts.

"But that remark is intended for us. Are we wholly responsible in this matter? Let us see-and in doing so, I propose to view the question from 'primitive ground. What said St. Paul to Titus-For this cause left I thee in Crete, that thou shouldst set in order the things that are wanting, and ordain elders in every city, as I appointed thee.' Here is the whole secret of success in apostolic times. The ministers were selected directly from the people to whom the missionary bishops were sent. Ah! yes, but the Californians are a dreadfully bad set. Well, what were these very Cretans? One of themselves says, the Cretans are always liars, evil beasts, slow-bellies.' Are the Californians worse than these? The bishop says, The town of Coloma contains between six hundred and seven hundred inhabitants.

There is

no place I have visited where there seems to be more interest felt in the Church. Its services have never been performed here, nor is there a single place of worship, of any kind, in the town. There is, however, a little band of Churchmen from the East, who are showing here the happy influence of their early train

ing, having raised a handsome sum for a Church. Could they obtain a clergyman? Now just here is the point-why have they not one? Do you suppose that if St. Titus had that field he would have left those saints without an elder? Could not the bishop, from this little band,' have found at least a deacon? Ah, but the canons will not permit the ordering. Then let them go-a greater authority than the canons is here-the constitution of the Church: the sole rule of faith is above canons. But it will be said, if the canons were not in the way, yet you cannot make a preacher so quickly. Just so; here comes in the miserable tradition again. Now I do not believe I can be gainsayed, when I assert that there are at this moment, and have been anytime these three years, at least five hundred devout laymen in California and Oregon, fit to do the Church's work as deacons, after the primitive pattern. Nay, I will say more. Every principal city could have long ago had its presbyters and deacons, provided Scriptural qualifications only had been demanded of them. Now I am by no means averse to a highly educated clergy; but that the whole body of the clergy were classical scholars, in any national Church, from the apostles' day to the present, I deny. It was not required in the apostolical Church, and is not necessary now."

ETIQUETTE.-Mr. Jerrold, in a volume recluding New Scenes for Old Visitors," puts into cently published, entitled "Imperial Paris, inthe lips of a Frenchman the following sarcastic, but truthful delineation of the tyranny of fashionable etiquette in London:

"In England everything is 'shoking.' Nothing is etiquette. It is not etiquette to use a handkerchiefto spit-to sneeze. What is to be done? Is it etiquette to have a cold? It is not etiquette to speak loud, even in the houses of parliament; to walk in the middle of the street; to run in order to escape the wheel of a carriage. Prefer to be run over! It is not etiquette to close a letter with a wafer, because this is to send people your saliva; nor to write without an envelope. It is not etiquette to go to the opera with the smallest sprig upon the waistcoat or the cravat; to take soup twice; to salute a lady first; to ride in an omnibus; to go to a party before ten or eleven o'clock, or to a ball before midnight; to drink beer at table without giving back your glass at once to the servant. It is not etiquette to refrain a day from shaving; to have an appetite; to offer anything to drink to a person of high rank; to appear surprised when the ladies leave the table at dessert time-that hour which is so charming with us. It is not etiquette to dress in black in the morning, nor in colors in the evening. It is not etiquette to address a lady without adding her Christian name: to speak to a person, on any pretext, without having been presented: to knock at a door quietly; to have the smallest particle of mud upon the boot, even in the most unfavorable weather; to have pence in your pocket; to wear the hair cut close; to have a white hat; to exhibit a decoration or two; to wear braces, or a small or large beard-to do any of these things is to forget etiquette. But that which violates etiquette in England inore than anything else is-want of nerve to ruin yourself-run into debtnobody will wonder; but, above all, be a spendthrift. If, when a foreigner arrives in London, it becomes known that he lodges in one of the economical hotels near Leicester Square, he is lost to certain society. Never will an equipage, nor even the card of a lord, wander thither. The respectability for which the English contend means simply material advantages-it has no relation to moral qualities. In France worship is paid to mind-to talent-to genius; in Italy and Spain it is paid to pleasure; in other places to ambition and glory; in England gold is the presiding deity! As the middle class always envies the upper class, the commercial people spend considerable sums of money in endeavors to rival the ostentation of the aristocracy."

OPEN-AIR PREACHING.-Open-air preaching is beginning to be recommended by the English clergy as being the best means of reaching the minds of many of the people. The Bishop of Winchester recommends it to all the clergy of his diocese.