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HAPPY New Year to you, each and all," is the sincere and hearty congratulation of the Editor to his many readers, known and unknown. Many of you we have greeted thus before, and, through the tender mercy of the Lord, we and you are still spared, while some who read our opening address for 1883 are now no longer upon earth, and among that number we count some of whom we feel confident that they― "Have done with sin and care and woe, And with the Saviour rest."

With all of us life is uncertain, and eternity is coming on; therefore eternal things are of the greatest moment, since we must all appear before the judgment seat of Christ," and we know not how

soon.

We believe that among our readers there are many who have been brought by the Holy Spirit to know and love the Lord Jesus, and that there are others who are anxiously seeking, through faith in His blood, the blessedness of those whose transgression is forgiven, and whose sin is covered." To these we would say, Go on to seek to know Him who has said, 'Him that cometh to Me, I will in no wise cast out;' "while to those who are Christless, prayerless, and careless, we would say, "Our heart's desire and prayer to God for you is, that you may be saved." Think of that word,

Having no hope, and without God in the world';" and oh, that your heart may be turned to seek salvation through the blood of the Lamb!

We likewise expect that the GLEANER will, at the beginning of this New Year, come into the hands of new subscribers, with whom we hope to form an agreeable and a lasting acquaintance; and we desire to assure them all that our efforts and prayers will alike be for their good.

We hope to give you such reading as shall neither be heavy nor dry, while we, at the same time, shall still studiously endeavour to keep our pages free from light and fictitious matter, which promotes a vitiated taste, and unfits the mind for solid and profitable reading. We prefer fact to fiction; and we ever desire to bring before you, as the chief thing, the desirability of seeking to be right with God, whose favour is life, and who pardons and justifies every one that believeth in Jesus.

We wish to counsel and encourage those of you who may be at home, at school, or in situations, and such as have begun to fight the battle of life in a more formidable way, hoping that you may be stimulated by a true motive to always do that which is right to parents, to masters, and to all men, and ever remember that what is worth doing at all is worth doing well. We like to see young people with an amount of self-respect sufficient to make them aim to excel in what is good, and to deter them from mixing with companions who would only sink them low in the scale of moral and social life. Many a young man, by yielding to such influences, has lost all self-respect, made a wretched sacrifice of position, character, and the confidence of friends, and has become a despicable wreck upon the sea of life.

Young friends, beware of the beginning of evil. Look up and look on. Think seriously as to the effect which your present steps may have upon your future life, for as you sow, you may expect to reap.

May the Lord teach you to "cleanse your way, by taking heed thereto according to His Word," for those who love and fear Him shall not become a prey to the evils which fall upon the disobedient and the ungodly, but the Lord will prosper them in that which is right in His sight;

and they shall find in Jesus "a Friend who loveth at all times, and One that sticketh closer than a brother."

We hope that our young Gleaners will read and circulate the SOWER, which we shall endeavour to make as interesting as possible to the young, whose hearts we pray the Lord may open to attend to the things spoken concerning the kingdom of God and His mercy to perishing sinners.

Reader, is Jesus your Lord and King? Have you repented at His feet of your sins? and have you a good hope in His name and blood?

Oh, that we may each see His face with joy in heaven, and, as part of the glorious company redeemed to God by His blood, there unite to sing His love, is the prayer of, Your sincere friend, THE EDITOR.

THE OLDEST TREE IN THE UNIVERSE.

IT hardly seems possible that there is any tree in existence nearly 300 years older than the Christian Era, but according to Knowledge, the Bo tree of the sacred city of Amarapoora, in Burmah, was planted 288 B.C., and is therefore now 2,170 years old. Sir James Emerson Tennent gives reasons for believing that the tree is really of this wonderful age, and refers to historic documents, in which it is mentioned at different dates, as 182 A.D., 223 A.D., and so on, to the present day. "To it," says Sir James, "kings have even dedicated their dominions, in testimony of belief that it is a branch of the identical fig tree under which Buddha reclined at Urumelaya, when he underwent his apotheosis." Its leaves are carried away as streamers by pilgrims, but it is too sacred to touch with a knife, and therefore they are only gathered when they fall. The king oak in Windsor Forest, England, is one thousand years old.

HOW THE MANSION HOUSE

WAS PAID FOR.

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HE Mansion House was built in the years from 1739 to 1753; and a fund of £18,000, which had been accumulated by the fines of Dissenters, was voted by the Corporation towards its cost. These fines had been levied under an Act of the Restoration era, by which every person who accepted an office under the Corporation without taking the Communion according to the rites of the Established Church was subject to a fine of £500. An earlier Act requires every man who is elected as sheriff to pay a fine of £400 to the Corporation if he declines to serve. In the reign of George II. it occurred to a shrewd lawyer that these two Acts could be worked together to the great disadvantage of Dissenters and the great ad vantage of the City purse. Accordingly, a Dissenter was elected sheriff. As he could not conscientiously take the Sacrament, he chose the alternative of declining to serve, and paid his fine of £400. Another Dissenter was immediately elected, and took the same course. The election of Dissenters was repeated till forty-five had paid the fine for refusal to serve. The Dissenters were then roused to resistance, and the forty-sixth refused either to serve or to pay. An action was brought against him for the recovery of the fine, but the judge held that the Act which disqualified a Dissenter relieved him of the duty. The City appealed to the House of Lords, but the decision of the court below was upheld. The City, however, refused to disgorge the money it had already illegally wrung from the forty-five men it had fined, and the sum of £18,000 was voted to the building fund of the Mansion House; which, says Samuel Sharpe, consequently remains as a monument of the unjust manner in which Dissenters were treated in the last century." Samuel Sharpe," by P. W. Clayden.