Englishman, named Grab, underwent the extreme penalty of Lynch law, for setting fire to a hut and suffocating the inmate, an eminent Mormon preacher, named Peleg S. Lyman. Grab was caught in the ruins, which he revisited the next day for the sake of plunder, the unfortunate Mormon being supposed by the incendiary to possess a small quantity of gold. We have it from a quarter on which we can confidently rely, that not a grain of dust was discovered among M. Peleg S. Lyman's remains."

We have ourselves read an advertisement in the Times, announcing that the good-will (if there be such a thing) of an eminent legal firm in Bedford Row, is to be disposed of, the members of it intending to "operate in another sphere.' We sincerely hope that the firm alluded to is not that of Messrs. Snatchem, Grab and Sharper, for if their operations are intended for California, we fear they will arrive too late.

COMMON as is the opinion that the laws of Nature are immutable, a very superficial inquiry will prove that the axiom must be received with large exceptions and restrictions. We may presume the stars to have been formed and fixed in accordance with some general law; yet several, even in modern times, have followed the lost Pleiad, while new ones have appeared; and as to the earth we inhabit, it seems to have been governed by no rule but that of incessant change, though these mutations may, probably, be in accordance with some comprehensive and final scheme, the tendency of which we cannot even conjecture. Judging, however, by what we see and know, we should be justified in affirming that the distinguishing characteristic of Nature is her constant inconstancy, her endless transformations, her almost capricious abandonment of old forms, and her substitution of novelties in inexhaustible and infinite variety. Geological investigations and the exhumation of tropical products in polar regions lead to the conclusion that there must have been a change in the position of the earth with reference to the sun; we know that sea and land have been, and still are, constantly changing places; while numerous fossil remains, those God-written revelations of an earlier world, incontestably prove that the whole Fauna and Flora of that period, with all their boundless and marvellous varieties, have passed away to be succeeded by new organisations equal in the diversity though not in the stupendous magnitude of their forms. It would seem, in fact, as if the process of creation had never ceased, and that the gradual extinction of Nature's old offspring became necessary, in order to afford room for the new families which the prolific mother is constantly bringing forth. Even in our own days the Dodo and the Apteryx Australis are said to have become extinct: is it irrational to conclude that other beings have been called into existence to supply their place and participate in the enjoyment of life? Why may not every day be the birthday of a new animal or vegetable? For my part, whenever I contemplate a flower or a quadruped recently imported from the antipodes, and affirmed to be a fresh discovery, the suggestion that it may in fact be a fresh creation, that it may have just been consecrated by the touch of Nature's plastic hand, that it may be a new present from heaven to earth, exalts and hallows my admiration by infusing into it a feeling of reverence. The remark, that an undevout astronomer must be mad, is equally applicable to an irreligious naturalist.

Of the formative power and infinite inventiveness displayed in the fossil Flora a faint notion may be formed, when we state that 300 species of plants have already been discovered in the coal formations of Great Britain alone, extraordinary in their configurations, and exceeding the luxuriance of the present equatorial climes. Several of these, engraved in the 124th Number of the "Art-Journal," show that the plants and Feb.-VOL. LXXXV. NO. CCCXXXVIII.

N

flowers of the by-gone world, and whose orders are now extinct, must have rivalled in elegance and variety the most beautiful existing products of our forests, fields, and gardens!

ture in the ancient insect world.

Still more signally do recent discoveries attest the prodigality of Na"Recent microscopical investigations," writes the celebrated Dr. Mantell, "have shown that a large proportion of our rocks and strata are composed of animalcules, millions of which are contained in a cubic inch of stone." And it has been ascertained by the same accurate observer, that the chalk formation which constitutes so large a portion of the earth's crust, is an enormous aggregation of shells, so minute as to be singly invisible to the unassisted eye, though his microscope empowered him to trace, classify, and delineate them with perfect accuracy. Of these once-living atoms many varieties are detected, and nothing can be more graceful and diversified than the outlines and markings which they present. As we know that every thing living is doomed to die, so may we now affirm that the whole superficies of the inanimate earth has once been alive, and that its different strata are a succession of countless catacombs. Yes-this fair globe with its over-arching sky is but a vast sepulchral vault. We live, and move, and have our being in a burial-ground, whose walls are the horizon, and the depths of whose crowded graves have not yet been fathomed; and this world-cemetery is made beautiful and glorious, and its dust and ashes revivified by the fertilising processes of decay and death. From generation to generation we

See dying vegetables life sustain,
See life dissolving vegetate again.

Nor does nature, in more recent æras, appear to have experienced the least exhaustion from the incessant exertion of her plastic inventions and undiminished fecundity. The hydro-oxygen microscope has revealed to us a crowd of animalcules in a drop of ditch-water; as many, but of totally different genera, have been detected in an equal quantity of seawater; earth is not less lavish of her vitality now than in the vigour of her younger cycles. Who can see the mysterious and magnificent boon of life conferred upon such myriads of animalcules, for unquestionable purposes of enjoyment, and not feel as deeply impressed by the beneficence as by the power of the Creator?

Blind and benighted as we are, how can we duly appreciate the infinite range and inventiveness of the divine mind, when it is probable that we know not a moiety, perhaps not a tithe of the creation, the bounds of which are undergoing a constant enlargement in every direction with the improvement of our optical instruments? Astronomers find reason to conjecture that our solar system occupies a very subordinate station in the stupendous scheme of the universe, and that the unpenetrated vastitudes of space may be illumined by other suns, surrounded by planets of greater magnitude, and teeming with more profuse vitality than our own. more advance in telescopic art, and a revelation of new celestial worlds may burst upon our astonished vision; while a correspondent improvement of our microscopes may disclose to us myriads of fresh animalcules still more minute and various than any from which we have uplifted the veil that rendered them previously invisible. The imagination loses itself until "function is smothered in surmise," as we attempt to follow out the results involved in these bewildering conceptions.

To account for the miraculous precision with which such stupendous creations are regulated, it has been suggested that the infinitudes of time and space may constitute the sensorium of the Deity, whose omnipresence, combined with omnipotence and omniscience, will afford some clue to a mystery avowedly inscrutable, but the solution of which we may reverently attempt to guess. A grand idea-so grand, indeed, that in the difficulty of bringing it down to the level of human apprehension, it has found only a very limited acceptance. From the paramount, the inconceivable magnitude and importance of the operations constantly claiming the exercise of the divine mind, men hesitated to believe that its powers required to be simultaneously exerted upon all the petty details of each inhabited planet, upon the minute distinctions in the genera of an animalcule, or the varieties in the form and colouring of a weed. Reasoning from the analogy of human governments, they imagined, that while the supreme autocratic authority directed and upheld the grander arrangements of the universe, the management of its inferior processes was delegated to subordinate ministers, whose various natures and attributes were adapted to the different duties with which they were intrusted. This notion, in the abstract, presents nothing irrational, nothing inconsistent with the divine power and supremacy. Remarkable is the fact, that all nations, in ancient as well as modern times, have believed in the existence of supernatural beings, who exercised a direct influence upon mundane affairs, and whose functions rendered them the coadjutors, or, to speak more reverently, the agents of the Deity.

Though there is nothing irreligious in this creed, it has led to a variety of fantastical and even impious superstitions. That the stars, those bright sentinels stationed around the throne of the Supreme, were also, though in a subordinate degree, administrators of his decrees, and exercised a direct influence upon human affairs, found wide credence in a very early age of the world, until it assumed a regular form, under the designation of Astrology. This science of knaves for the deception of fools was divided into two branches, natural and judicial, the former regulating the physical effects of nature, the latter having reference to moral events, and enduing its possessors, as they pretended, with a prophetical power. Superstitions have a marvellous tenacity of life, and simpletons are still found who believe that the stars of their nativity are the inexorable Fates, who decide their whole future destiny, a comfortable doctrine in one respect, since it enables them to plead, in extenuation of their own follies and vices, that "Their stars are more in fault than they."

At a very early age, however, the spirit of Fatalism descended from the sky, and received incarnation either in an animal or human form. From a supposed analogy between certain productions of nature and some of their subordinate deities, the ancient Egyptian priests consecrated these objects, and such types were addressed by the vulgar as symbolised divinities, just as in other countries pictures aud statues receive the homage which should be reserved for the originals whom they represent. From this pregnant fount of idolatry sprang the twenty thousand deities of Greece and Rome, who were, nevertheless, supposed to be the representatives of one supreme authority, by which they were deputed to superintend the various departments of nature, animate and inanimate, human, animal, and vegetable. So numerous an army of celestials could not only afford tutelary and administrative guardians for hills and dales,