And, in truth, though this enemy comes as from the cave of Trophonius, and cannot wreathe a smile over any aspect of business, he is correct in much, has good reason for his snarling, woeworn countenance; for business has "suffered many things of many physicians."

There are those who narrow their activities to the measure of one or two rules or maxims: who at the sight of money, lower the head like the beam of the scales, which stoops although it be made of iron; who certainly obtain their object at the expense of atrophy of soul and heart.

"Never failure followed ill intent.

And base success still sealed each fatal plot."

But these cannot be included in the list of true business men: they blind themselves to its very nature: they do not discern the simplest laws by which they work. Said Seneca, As if any man could be sufficiently instructed in the parts of life without comprehending the sum and scope of it. Which language fitly applies to business, which is a true microcosm of life.

These mean and perverse views, we are aware, are not without a proper and unclean authority. There have been preceptors from of old laying down a parcel of scoundrel maxims, enforcing schemes of watch word phrases with rigid insistence; but they can no more be said to constitute Business than can Cortès, with his lust of gold and consecrated human sacrifices, be given as an illustration of Paul's knight-errantry, or holding to one wife, and adhering to St. Athanasius's Creed, be affirmed to be the all-inall of Christ-likeness. No! we will not yoke together the ox and the ass although there are books popular at this hour giving the lives of men as examples of life and conduct, and commending the dirt and deceit which they cannot conceal of their gettings and doings; although they meekly seek our approbation

"In sordid robes of false humility,"

they shall not get our acknowledgment as being true Business men. Far otherwise, it is a pity that they are not discerned to be, what they verily are, as Jeroboam's clergy, the scum and refuse of the whole land.

Onocrotalos is right in much, we have said, But to argue that all is perversion because some are perverse, will convict no one. As maintained by the Arabian, If a conjurer should say to me, "Three are more than ten, and in proof of it I will change this stick into a serpent," I might be surprised at his legerdermain, but I certainly should not admit his assertion. With all his facts Onocrotalos should not contemn Business throughout, in spirit, body, and all its members. In doing so he may disparage his own perceptions, or, other

v, by leading ʼn se ic of zrá, jemonstrate what Pythagoras afirmei a je de nest importaat vlere in man, The being able a permate us ni z aner mod or bad. But not in so doing na be mench hie mmortai mark that gives vitality to Business. Ee may mine and truse a finev., but its spirit he cannot fm or byre. Beat the ing of Atamins, tried that philosopher, when beng pounded to death, But you will not beat Anaxarchus himself

We rest satisfied under a such calumnies Business can reply, with Antisthenes, upon Plzzo's aspersions, It is a royal privi. lege to do well, and to be evi-spoken of: and, whilst content to ecincide with Gioca, that, Personal interest is often the standard of our belief, as well as of our practice, we do not see that this necessarily implies corruption of mind or obliquity of intent. We bold with the Stoics, that ecvetousness is a perturbation of judg ment, being of an opinion that money is a beautiful object: at the same time we would lighten cur path with the Wisdom of the Son of Sirach, Blessed is the rich that is found without blemish, and hath not gone after gold. Who is he? and we will call him blessed: for wonderful things hath be done among the people. There we have a portrait of the Business Man: one whom the good and great would delight to honour: such as lives at least in our imagination, in our hopes, if not in our streets. Such we shall contemplate, and no inferior being. And in doing so we shall observe more order in our statements than our heresiarch, and deal, with more difficulties than his malice can suggest or his invention devise.

CITY OF GLASGOW BANK SKETCHES.

No. 2.-THE COMPOSITOR'S STORY.

WHILE I was sitting, last December,
Musing o'er the expiring ember,
And, watching on the dark'ning wall
The lamp-light's shadows rise and fall,-
I heard a cry, so shrill and loud,
My soul was by its accents bow'd,
And, starting from my seat, I ran
To find if it were child or man
Who, at my door, subdued by pain,
Was wrestling hard with ceaseless rain,
And, what was my surprise, to see
A man, who stood beneath a tree,
And from its branches, hoped to find
Some shelter from the biting wind!
Beneath my roof he spent that night,
And, ere next day, he took his flight,
He told me how an adverse fate
Had brought him to my unclosed gate.

"I am a Printer to my trade,

And married young, a beauteous maid;
And was as well as well could be,
And almost lived from trouble free,
Till on that day collapsed the Bank,
And it, and I, to ruin sank.
Since that dread time, I've had no food
But what is scanty, coarse, and crude ;
No coat, except that greasy rag
Which on my back hangs like a bag;
No shoes, except a clouted pair,
Which pinch my feet when I them wear;
No handkerchief to wipe mine eyes,
Where constant moisture hangs or flies;
No chair, on which at ease to sit,
Save one, where yawns a ghastly slit;
No table, save a three-legged stool,
Like that on which boys sit at school ;
No hat, except that battered cone
From which the nap has wholly flown;

No pipe, to lull me to repose,
Or drown in dreams my sleepless woes.
And yet, by love of virtue led,

I yet could march o'er heaps of dead,
And conquests gain-much nobler far,
Than those e'er won in Arts or War-
Were it not that a foe more fell
Than ever leapt the gates of Hell;
Than Charon, with his hated head,
Ferrying, o'er the Styx, the dead;
Or furies, with their snake-like tresses,
Baleful eyes, and fiery dresses,
Binds me, with an iron chain,

Which makes me writhe with ceaseless pain

Pain, fierce as that Prometheus bore,
When, rock-bound, on the Scythian shore,
His cries did blend with ocean's roar !
That Foe is Want, and none on earth
To direr evils can give birth.

"Besides all this-I have a wife,
Who could not move to save her life!
Blood she spits at each loud cough,
And yet could eat each day a loaf.
Though all she gets is one thick slice
Drilled here and there by ravenous mice.
And on her breast there lies a child,
With eyes so blue, and clear, and mild,
That Heaven seems pictured in their light,
When first they open after night!
And yet, at times, his cries for food
Have pierced me more than thunder loud,
And made me wish he had not come,
Or, born, been, like his sister, dumb!
Besides this child, there are seven more,
Who sleep upon an earthern floor,
With one thin blanket o'er them spread,
And rain, oft dripping on their head.
Poor children! how I mourn their fate!
And one week past, when it was late,
And the wind was loudly sighing,
And the fire was slowly dying,
And the silence was so deep

I heard them breathing in their sleep,

The thought within me sudden rose,
That I would end at once their woes.

A knife I seized-short, sharp, and bent-
That would each soul at once have sent
Where hunger is not; but, the Moon,
Silvering the blade, awoke me from my swoon.

"Want of Bread! who knows what mean
Those words, but those who have them seen
In the rusted, fireless grate,
In the looks of scorn and hate,
In the wolf-like, famished cry-
"Give us food, or we shall die;"
In the ties of nature sundered,

In curses-thick, and loudly thundered-
In a wife's imploring tones,

Ina young child's dying moans;

In a rotten, creaking stair,

In blankets foul, and coarse, and bare;
In mouldering crusts of dry old bread,
Hard as any lumps of lead!

In a coffin, wherein lies

An infant, with its young, glazed eyes,
And on whose shrivelled, fleshless fingers,
The print of want in death still lingers!
And yet, by evils crushed, like these,
Our priests say: "Lift unto the breeze
Thy banner! March, and win a prize
Brighter than that, in Beauty's eyes."
As will go tell the sheeted dead
To leave their airless, sunless bed,
And, to the winds, their cerements throwing,
Go, where Love's flushed cheeks are glowing.'

Thus spoke the Wanderer. Then, his staff he took
And gazing on me with a wild, sad look

Of sorrow, gratitude, dismay

Went on his weary, lonely way.

Manse of Athelstaneford.

April 28th, 1879.

W.