perly attended to, might be turned to practical advantage in almost every branch of science and art.

Few of our readers, who have not made themselves conversant with the history of insects, will, perhaps, believe, that among them are to be found miners, masons, carpenters, and upholsterers, who were perfect in their different trades six thousand years ago! The common spider has made every body familiar with his proficiency in the art of weaving: a similar insect, who has taken up his abode in the water, might have suggested the idea of the diving bell many centuries before it was discovered: and if we had our senses about us, when wandering in the fields of a fine evening in summer, the honour of inventing the air balloon would not have belonged to the French; we might have derived the principle of it from the little spider, who lifts himself into the air upon his tiny web of gossamer, an elevation which he could not otherwise have any chance of attaining. The bees have, perhaps, been more frequently observed and watched in our gardens, than any other creature of the insect race. Yet how few have followed them into the hive, and there learned how much may be done in a given time by division of labour; how by ingenuity of contrivance, many mansions and storehouses may be erected with the greatest possible economy of space, and how, by mutual assistance and general subordination, thousands may live together in affluence and peace. Before Babylon was thought of, the social tribes of ants had constructed towers, and cities, and domes; had raised fortresses, and built covered ways, with all the art of an experienced engineer. The vulgar idea is that these insects feed upon corn. They do no such thing. They take it to their habitations, and break it up amongst the other materials of their edifices, but their food is of a much more select description. Some of the ant tribes feed chiefly upon liquor, which is yielded to them by the aphis, whole flocks of which insect, if we may use the expression, they appropriate to themselves, tend and support, as we do our flocks of sheep and our herds of cattle. But what, perhaps, is not the least surprising passage in the history of ants is this, that there are races of them which have their negro slaves regular whites, who, reposing in indolence themselves, compel the less fortunate nation of blacks to do for them all the drudgery which they require. The wasp, who is pursued with unrelenting hostility by every body that see him,-the terror of all nurses,-is, nevertheless, a most industrious and most excellent manufacturer of paper.

These are a few of the curiosities of history, belonging to insects, which would repay, in the way of amusement, the attention of the most careless reader. But the transformations which insects undergo, furnish materials for reflection of a still more important kind. A deformed, leaf-devouring, loathsome looking thing crawls along our path in the spring, and if we do not extinguish the little spark of life that warms him, he sports about our garden before the summer is over, in the form of a beauteous butterfly, decorated with a pair of wings so tastefully painted, that no artist can rival the splendour of their colouring. There is in the South of Europe an insect called the ant-lion, which, though apparently the most helpless of

all creatures, has a most formidable appearance. It contrives, by laying pit-falls, to live the life of a murderer for two years, during which period it resembles a wood-louse. This, however, is but its state of probation, as a larva. When the appointed time arrives, it repents of all its former habits, and retires into the earth, where it surrounds itself with a case, the inside of which it ornaments with a pearl-coloured satin, of the most exquisite delicacy and beauty, the produce of its own silk and loom. In this elegant hermitage the penitent remains about two months, when not only his form, but his nature, is completely metamorphosed; he puts on four wings, and re-visits the world, a creature of purity, innocence, and gaiety, as a fly of a very brilliant description. Assuredly there are, in these changes, a pledge and a warning for man, of that great transformation that awaits him when his appointed moment arrives. If it be said that this death and burial and resurrection, under another form, of insects, be necessary to the propagation of their race, we must only therefore the more admire the goodness of Him who has ordained such a law, from which man cannot fail to derive the hope that he, also, after descending to the earth, may rise a newly-formed and purified creature, and destined for higher worlds than that from which, in his larva state, he now draws his support. We have only room here to say that this work is of the most ineresting character, and ought to be universally read.

POETRY.

(For the Repository.)

"TIME'S BUT THE PASSAGE TO A BETTER WORLD.”

BY REV. JOSEPH RUSLING.

MAN is not destined long to stay
Where first he breathes, perhaps a day,
Or hour alone!

This life is but a passing place,

To worlds beyond, we run the race
And soon 'tis done.

Why should we then indulge a sigh
If ills we meet, or pleasures fly,
These cannot last!

"Tis but a momentary strife,

We breathe, and then we end our life,
And all is past.

As flow the rivers to the sea,

So time glides swift from you and me,
"Tis gone how soon!

Ourselves, and more, a hapless race,
Shall lowly lie in death's embrace,
Perhaps e'er noon.

This world is but the wreck of souls,
Where the rough sea in tumult rolls
Its fearful waves,

But heaven a house for us hath reared,
Rich with celestial bloom prepared,
Beyond the grave!

Life's genial current, stay it must,
And earth again reclaim our dust,

"Till time shall cease;"

Then, ah! how sweet, the sound I hear,
Good tidings," such as angels bear
From realms of peace-

That when we shall resign our breath,
And in submission bow to death,
We hope to find

A pure and happier scene of bliss,
Where we shall greet the sons of peace,
Of heav'nly mind.

Why then complain of transient things,
Time lends to life his wide spread wings,
To waft us on;

Thus by strong sweeping pinions borne,
More fleet than dews of early morn,

Fly then

We soon are gone.

ye moments, swifter far,

Than the pale gleam when shoots a star,
There's naught to lose;

Life, in ethereal grandeur waits,

And when we pass the Empyrean gates,

THERE, is repose.

TO THE EDITOR OF THE MONTHLY REPOSITORY.

BY REV. JOHN DOW.

THE incipient numbers of your work, design'd
To please, to comfort, and improve the mind,
Have met my eye-and from a brief review,
I'm led to say, "Your good design pursue :"
To give a relish to the mind of youth,
For useful reading and for love of truth,
Is nobly done such labours justly claim
A grateful tribute, meed of modest fame.
Knowledge, deriv`d from entertaining facts,
Inspires pleasure, and a zest contracts,
Gives an impetus to the expanding mind,
And prompts to virtuous acts of ev'ry kind:
Hence stores of various matter, cull'd with care,

Compose a cabinet of jewels, where
The mental pow'rs, if virtuously inclin'd,
Behold their lustre, and a treasure find.
From the first pages of the work in view,
I think 'twill greatly please, and profit too,
Will illustrate the noble object sought,

And prove, that " reading is the food of thought,”
I recommend to all who books explore,
This cheap appendage to their fam❜ly store,
May its contents reverbrate from the tongue,
And prove a blessing to both old and young!

EDUCATION.

BY JOHN BOWRING.

A child is born-Now take the gem and make it
A bud of moral beauty. Let the dews
Of knowledge, and the light of virtue, wake it
In rich fragrance and in purest hues;

When passion's gust and sorrow's tempest shake it,
The shelter of affection ne'er refuse,

For soon the gathering hand of death will break it,
From its weak stem of life-and it shall lose
All power to charm; but if that lovely flower
Hath swelled one pleasure, or subdued one pain,

O who shall say that it has lived in vain,
However fugitive its breathing hour?

For virtue leaves its sweets wherever tasted,
And scattered truth is never, never wasted.

SUNBEAMS AND SHADOWS.

"Oh! life is like the summer rill, where weary daylight dies;
We long for morn to rise again, and blush along the skies.
For dull and dark that stream appears, whose waters, in the day,
All glad in conscious sunniness, went dancing on their way.
But when the glorious sun hath woke and looked upon the earth,
And over hill and dale there float the sounds of human mirth;
We sigh to see day hath not brought its perfect light to all,
For with the sunshine on those waves, the silent shadows fall.
Oh! like that changeful summer rill, our years go gliding by,
Now bright with joy, now dark with tears, before youth's eager eye.
And thus we vainly pant for all the rich and golden glow,
Which young hope, like an early sun, upon its course can throw.
Soon o'er our half-illumin'd hearts the stealing shadows come,
And every thought that woke in light receives its share of gloom.
And we weep while joys and sorrows both are fading from our view,
To find, wherever sunbeams fall, the shadow cometh too!"

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