The

others in having a somewhat higher stern. whole appearance of these boats is dingy and dirty, more so, I believe, than the reality.

We were now approaching the side of the river opposite Kedgeree. Here all likeness to the Don disappeared, and nothing met the eye but a dismal and unbroken line of thick, black wood and thicket, apparently impenetrable and interminable, which one might easily imagine to be the habitation of everything monstrous, disgusting, and dangerous, from the tiger and the cobra de capello down to the scorpion and mosquito, from the thunder-storm to the fever. -The seamen and officers spoke of this shore with horror, as the grave of all who were so unfortunate as to remain many days in its neighbourhood; and, even under our present brilliant sun, it required no great stretch of fancy to picture feverish exhalations rising from every part of it. As we drew nearer to the Sunderbunds their appearance improved. The woods assumed a greater variety of green and of shade; several round-topped trees, and some low palms, were seen among them, and a fresh vegetable fragrance was wafted from the shore. The stream is here intense.-I looked with much interest on the first coco-palms I saw, yet they rather disappointed me. Their forms are, indeed, extremely graceful, but their verdure is black and funereal, and they have something the appearance of the plumes of feathers which are carried before a hearse. Their presence, however, announced a more open and habitable country. The jungle receded from the shore, and its place was supplied by extremely green fields, like meadows, which were said to be of rice, interspersed with small woods of round-headed trees, and villages of huts, thatched, and with their mud walls so low that they look like hay-stacks.

We anchored a few miles short of Diamond Harbour. The current and ebb-tide together ran at a rate really tremendous, amounting, as our pilot said,

to ten and eleven knots an hour. We were surrounded soon after our anchoring by several passage vessels; among these was a beautiful ship of about two hundred and fifty tons, with the Company's Jack and a long pendant, which we were told was the Government yacht sent down for our accommodation.

During this day and the next I made several fresh observations on the persons and manners of the natives by whom we were surrounded. I record them, though I may hereafter see reason to distrust, in some slight degree, their accuracy. I had observed a thread hung round the necks of the fishermen who came first on board, and now found that it was an ornament worn in honour of some idol. The caste of fishermen does not rank high, though fish is considered as one of the purest and most lawful kinds of food. Nothing, indeed, seems more generally mistaken than the supposed prohibition of animal food to the Hindoos. It is not from any abstract desire to spare the life of living creatures, since fish would be a violation of this principle as well as beef, but from other notions of the hallowed or the polluted nature of particular viands. Thus many Brahmins eat both fish and kid. The Rajpoots, besides these, eat mutton, venison, or goat's flesh. Some castes may eat anything but fowls, beef, or pork; while pork is with others a favourite diet, and beef only is prohibited. Intoxicating liquors are forbidden by their religion; but this is disregarded by great numbers both of high and low caste, and intoxication is little less common, as I am assured, among the Indians than among Europeans. Nor is it true that Hindoos are much more healthy than Europeans. Liver-complaints and indurations of the spleen are very common among them, particularly with those in easy circumstances, to which their immense consumption of "ghee," or clarified butter, must greatly contribute. To cholera morbus they are much more

X

liable than the whites, and there are some kinds of fever which seem peculiar to the native race.

The great difference in colour between different natives struck me much of the crowd by whom we were surrounded, some were black as negroes, others merely copper-coloured, and others little darker than the Tunisines whom I have seen at Liverpool. Mr. Mill, the principal of Bishop's College, who, with Mr. Corrie, one of the chaplains in the Company's service, had come down to meet me, and who has seen more of India than most men, tells me that he cannot account for this difference, which is general throughout the country, and every where striking. It is not merely the difference of exposure, since this variety of tint is visible in the fishermen who are naked all alike. Nor does it depend on caste, since very high caste Brahmins are sometimes black, while Pariahs1 are comparatively fair. It seems, therefore, to be an accidental difference, like that of light and dark complexions in Europe, though, where so much of the body is exposed to sight, it becomes more striking here than in our own country.

A VILLAGE SERMON ON THE HARVEST.

GENESIS Viii. 22.

"While the earth remaineth, seed time and harvest, and cold and heat, and summer and winter, and day and night, shall not cease."

THE Bible is full of passages that allude to the usual goings on of a country life; to its crops, its harvests, its sheep-shearings, and so on. We should try, therefore, to link, as it were, Bible thoughts with such sights and occupations as these; for it is a great thing to get the Bible into our minds; to make its thoughts our thoughts; thoughts rising up in our minds of their own accord, and therefore in an easy,

1 The lowest caste.

natural way, yet so as to hallow our very being for the time, and long afterwards. I need not say how different this is from quoting texts, or trying to puzzle a neighbour, or taking comfort from a habit of talking about 'high' doctrines, as they are called. Religion is not talking, but doing and being; not outward skirmishing and flourishing, but an inward and silent warfare; a principle of change, moulding us, more and more, into the likeness of God's children.

I shall to-day endeavour to show you how the great yearly business of harvest, in which so many of you have lately been engaged, may and should bring Bible thoughts and images to your minds. "Now 'every attentive reader of the New Testament, as soon as he hears the word harvest, will be reminded of the harvest which our SAVIOUR speaks of in the parable of the tares. You may remember, that when the disciples asked Him to show them the meaning of that parable, He said, 'The harvest is the end of the world; the reapers are the angels. As therefore the tares are gathered and burned in the fire, so shall it be in the end of the world. The Son of man shall send forth His angels; and they shall gather out them which do iniquity, and shall cast them into a furnace of fire.' Now if, when you have gone out to your daily task of reaping or carrying or gleaning, you had kept these words of our SAVIOUR's well in mind; if every day you had said to yourselves, 'This present harvest is certainly of great importance to our worldly interests, but it is nothing in comparison with the harvest which is to come; that is the harvest to look forward to: God grant me His grace, that during this present harvest I may behave as His child and servant, that I may not fall into condemnation at that dreadful harvest when angels are to be the reapers, and sinners are to be treated like so many hurtful weeds that are fit for nothing but to be burnt:

1 The following passage (to the middle of the next page) is from the Rev. A. Hare's Sermons.

I put it to each of you, my brethren, whether it would not have been profitable to your souls, if you had accustomed yourselves, through the present harvest, never to begin your morning's work without some such seasonable thoughts? Would not much improper talk have been stopt by it? Would not much intemperance have been prevented by it? Would not your hearts have been filled with a purer thankfulness to GoD, Who giveth the increase? In a word, would not this have been a holier harvest to every one of you, if the thought of that last harvest which our SAVIOUR speaks of, had been continually before your minds ?”

"But though this harvest at the end of the world, with the burning of the tares and chaff, and the gathering of the good sheaves into God's barn, which we are told shall then take place, though these are doubtless the first spiritual truths which a reader of the Bible will think of, when he is going to harvest work, yet these are not the only spiritual lessons to be drawn from the time of harvest. There are other very good and useful practical lessons to be drawn from that time besides." For instance, when we think, in an abundant year, of the vast interest with which a fruitful and carefully tilled soil repays what it received, we can hardly fail to remember how great an increase will be expected from the soil of every "honest and good heart," in which the seed of grace has been sown. They who, having heard the word, keep it and bring forth fruit with patience, are to bring forth some a hundred-fold, some sixty, some thirty. The land in the east generally yields, we are told, ten-fold; rarely twenty or thirty: and it is said of Isaac, on one occasion," that he sowed in that land, and received the same year a hundred-fold, and the Lord blessed him," that is to say, this surprising increase was a proof, an instance of God's blessing him. It follows, then, that to return thirty-fold was in the east a great crop; sixty