THE LAST OF THE PLANTAGENET KINGS. suppose? By Pope, inspired by Bolingbroke! It is like Balaam wishing to die the death of the righteous. But whatever was their origin, here are the lines, which happily paraphrase a Scripture truth, showing how the Christian "Pursues that chain which links the immense design, Joins heaven and earth, and mortal and divine. Learns from this union of the rising whole The first, last purpose of the human soul; And knows where faith, law, morals, all began, All end, in LOVE OF GOD, and LOVE OF MAN." To these three examples other memorable Scripture summaries could be added. Take, for instance, that wonderful breviary of devotion, commonly called the Lord's Prayer. Rightly used, and rightly understood, this is a most complete and catholic directory, as well as a comprehensive form of prayer, embracing adoration and worship, confession and petition, the utterance of all our thoughts and desires to "our Father in heaven." Take, again, that glorious cluster of the fruits of the Spirit, the outgrowth of true faith and living union to Christ: "Add to your faith, virtue; and to virtue, knowledge and to knowledge, temperance; and to temperance, patience; and to patience, godliness; and to godliness, brotherly kindness; and to brotherly kindness, charity." Let the devout student examine the exact and full meaning of these words, with the help of his Greek New Testament concordance. He will then better see the force of what the apostle adds, in saying, "For if these things be in you and abound, they make you that ye shall neither be barren nor unfruitful in the knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ" (2 Peter i. 5-8). 215 habits led them to moralize on the afflictions of the one thing I say, He destroyeth the perfect and the The same thing is taught in the New Testament. "There were present at that season some that told him of the Galileans, whose blood Pilate had mingled with their sacrifices. And Jesus, answering, said unto them, Suppose ye that these Galileans were sinners above all the Galileans because they suffered these things? I tell you nay. Or those eighteen upon whom the tower in Siloam fell and slew them, think ye that they were sinners above all men that dwelt in Jerusalem? I tell you nay." After such an authoritative declaration from the Lord of truth, it would be presumptuous indeed for us to infer, simply from the manner of a man's death, the character of a man's life that because he fell in battle and had a dishonoured burial, therefore he must have surpassed other men in wickedness. But while all this is true, it is also true, that when we know from other sources what a man's character has been, we are justified in giving a moral meaning to the providences attending the end of his days. God's moral government embraces the present and the future,-time and eternity; and though the full reIn the salutation of the same apostle (1 Peter i. 1, 2), wards and punishments of mankind belong to the how comprehensive the description of those whom he world to come, no doubt many of the events of human addressed" Elect according to the foreknowledge of life bear a retributive character. Knowing beforeGod the Father, through sanctification of the Spirit, hand a man's obedience to God's will, we are justified unto obedience and sprinkling of the blood of Jesus in esteeming his prosperity as a blessing connected Christ: grace unto you, and peace, be multiplied." with that obedience; and knowing beforehand a man's Here is a brief summary of truth, resembling that disobedience to God's will, we are justified in congiven by the apostle's "beloved brother Paul, accord-sidering the calamities of his life as punishments coning to the wisdom given unto him." "For whom he nected with that disobedience. We must not infer did foreknow he also did predestinate to be conformed from the providential dispensation itself that it is to the image of his Son, that he might be the first- either a reward or a penalty; but we may infer, that born among many brethren. Moreover whom he did it is the one or the other from the previous conduct of predestinate them he also called; and whom he called persons so visited, when that conduct is looked at in them he also justified; and whom he justified them he connexion with their circumstances. also glorified." This is the substance of that statement of the believer's privileges, the ground of rejoicing in that precious chapter, the eighth of Romans, which "begins with no condemnation, and ends with no separation." THE LAST OF THE PLANTAGENET KINGS. Take for example the case of Ahab. "And a certain man drew a bow at a venture, and smote the king of Israel between the joints of the harness: wherefore he said unto the driver of his chariot, Turn thine hand, and carry me out of the host; for I am wounded. And the battle increased that day; and the king was stayed up in his chariot against the Syrians, and died at even, and the blood ran out of the wound into the midst of the chariot. And there went a proclamation throughout the host about the going down of the sun, saying, Every man to his city, and every man to his' own country. So the king died, and was brought to Samaria, and they buried the king in Samaria. And one washed the chariot in the pool of Samaria, and the dogs licked up his blood. and they washed his armour, according unto the word of the Lord which he spake.' Now, if we knew nothing of the character of this king from other parts of his history, it would be unjust to infer from his perishing in battle, and from the incident of the dogs licking up his blood, that he must PLANTAGENET KINGS. THE LAST OF THE have been one of the worst kings that over sat on the throne of Israel. But when we find, from the rest of his story, what a very bad man he was, on that ground we should feel warranted in believing that in such a death, providence punished him for such a life. We are certain we are right in so construing the fate of Ahab, when we hear Elijah, the man of God, saying, "Because thou hast sold thyself to work evil in the sight of the Lord, behold I will bring evil upon thee, and will take away thy posterity. . . . Him that dieth of Ahab in the city the dogs shall eat." 217 imprisoned him, and John, who, like Richard, murdered his nephew to secure his throne-both were the subjects of signal chastisement at the hand of God. The first had his life so darkened by the shipwreck of his only son that he never smiled after the melancholy event; and the second had a reign of trouble and sorrow, which shortened his days, and his miserable death-bed is familiar to everybody. As we said before, not from their calamities ought we to infer their sins; but taking their sins and calamities together, we have a moral lesson which it becomes us all to heed. Such incidents are openings in the vail that hangs over the throne of God. Ho judgeth righteously. The wicked shall not go unpunished. We here see in time what we are quite sure obtains in eternity. We have brought before our eyes specimens of the judicial proceedings of the invisible world. Sooner or later the doom must come— He made a pit and digged it, and is fallen into the ditch which he made." His mischief shall return upon his own head, and his violent dealing shall come down upon his own pate. "Evil shall hunt the violent man to overthrow him." We do right to remember what we are taught in the Bible, when we ponder passing events, or study the records of our own country. It is a serious error to separate God's treatment of kings and great people now-a-days, or in the past history of England, from God's treatment of kings and great people in former days-the days of the Ahabs and Jeroboams. The principles of the moral government of the Almighty" are always the same. In Hebrew times, he did not fully punish men's crimes in the present life, but he often did so in part. In English times it is just the same. The last of the Plantagenet kings, Richard III, slung on the back of a horse, and carried to his grave, not only without kingly honours, but in shame and ignominy, brings before us a well known and terribly dark page in the history of England. The moral signification of the Bosworth catastrophe is worth our study, and to be understood aright, it must be examined in the light of the principle we have laid down. From Richard's falling on the field, as he did, and from his being borne to his burial, as he was, we should not be justified in concluding that he was worse than preceding sovereigns. His poor nephews died a dishonoured death in the Tower, and were huddled into a grave at the bottom of the staircase leading from their chamber; that was no proof that they were sinners above all the young princes of the Plantagenet line. We know well enough from their whole history, and that of their wretched uncle, that they were the victims of his ambition. Here a deed of horrid wrong was permitted, and no reflection can be cast on the character of the sufferers. It is quite otherwise in the case of Richard. He, the instigator of that murder, really the perpetrator of it for the men who rolled up the poor boys in the bed clothes, and suffocated them with pillows, were but the hands moved by his will and word-may be justly regarded as meeting a righteous doom in the terrible mêlée of the Bosworth fight. He had treasonably dethroned the youths, of whom he was the natural guardian, and now, as he fought for life, he declared his friends had betrayed him, and with a hoarse death voice, he groaned out, "Treason, treason." He had stolen the crown from the head of another, and now it was hacked and hewn from his own brow. His body was found in the field covered with dead enemies, and all besmeared with blood. It was thrown carelessly across a horse; was carried to Leicester amidst the shouts of the insulting spectators; and was interred in the Grey Friars' church of that city. Most righteous retribution! Putting his life and death together, we cannot refrain from exclaiming, "Verily there is a God that judgeth in the earth." It is remarkable that the two other kings of England, who gained the crown by crimes-Henry 1, who seized it from an elder brother, and then blinded and * Hume's History. 66 "Except ye repent," says the Son of God, "ye shall all likewise perish." Those memorable words, taken in connection with those already quoted, are most significant. People sometimes repeat those words as if we were to infer men did not deserve the calamities they meet with. They are used to set the popular mind at rest, when some signal catastrophe occurs. As if our Lord had said, Don't suppose that such events have anything to do with the sins of men. They proceed on other grounds altogether. They are simply the development of physical law." But when he says, Except ye repent ye shall all likewise perish," it is plain he means something quite different. He means indeed that we are not to infer from the visitation, that the sufferers were worse than others; but he also means that there is a moral element in such visitations upon "sinners," that, not without desert, do men meet with such events; and that there is moral retribution for sin in store for every one of us 66 except we repent." an The lesson of our picture belongs not to kings, and princes, and magistrates alone; it belongs to everybody. All injustice, wrong, dishonesty, fraud, avarice, and rapacious ambition, in their myriad forms, are hereby rebuked, and the perpetrators thereof are threatened. The picture and the story tell us, that " inheritance gotten hastily at the beginning is not blessed at the end." They recall to mind a fact-related at the time of the railway mania-how a man, who had been carried down the stream of unprincipled speculation, and who found himself, after his illgotten wealth, plunged into poverty, put an end to his life, and left a scrap of paper in his desk, with this passage on it" As the partridge sitteth on eggs and hatcheth them not; so he that getteth riches and not by right, shall leave them in the midst of his days, and at his end shall be a fool." Circuitous roundabout ways can never bring us, in the end, to security, peace, and enjoyment. The straight path is not only the right one, but it is the safest and best. Richard III, when he had stolen the crown and done the deed of blood, attempted the expiation of his great offence. He gave money to the church, had masses said for the souls of his nephews, established a college for priests, loaded his friends with favours, and strove hard to make himself popular in all possible ways. He is also represented to have said on the morning of his fatal battle: "Although in the adoption or obtaining of the garland, I was seduced and provoked by sinister counsel to commit a detestable act; yet I trust I have by strait penance and salt tears purged the offence. This abominable crime I require you, of friendship, as cleanly to forget, as I daily do remembor to lament the same." But all in vain. He could not expiate his offence. No penance, no tears could wash away his scarlet-coloured guilt. There were inevitable moral consequences to follow such a course as his. Temporal penalties in some shape were sure, even though, by a right repentance, he obtained mercy of the Lord. There are kinds of wrong-doing which must disturb a man's peace all his days-which must rouse moral indignation against him-which must make him enemies-which must recoil in terrible retribution upon his head. There is, however, a pardon to be obtained for all sin, which shall cut off the eternal penalties of a man's offences, though he may have to walk humbly and in shame before his fellow-men, all his days. But it cannot be obtained by penance, by giving money to the church, by almsdeeds of any kind, nor even by a thorough moral reformation. The guilt of sin can be removed only through Jesus Christ our Lord. His blood "cleanseth from all sin," from its guilt, and from its power as well. The only right repentance is the repentance which is connected with simple earnest faith in him, the Divine Mediator, who "put away sin by the sacrifice of himself, and who ever liveth to make intercession for us." ICEBERGS. THE term icebergs has commonly been applied to the glaciers occurring in Spitzbergen, Greenland, and other arctic countries. It is also as commonly extended to the large peaks, mountains, or islets of ice that are found floating in the sea. It is the latter kind of icebergs we purpose to describe. and even lower, a distance of at least two thousand miles from the place of their origin. Icebergs commonly float on a base which is larger in extent than the upper surface. Hence the proportion of ice appearing above water is seldom less in elevation than one-seventh of the whole thickness; and when the summit is conical, the elevation above water is frequently one-fourth of the whole depth of the berg. Perhaps the most general form of icebergs is with one high perpendicular side, the opposite side very low, and the intermediate surface forming a gradual slope. When of such a form, Sir John Ross found that the higher end was generally to windward. Some icebergs have regular flat surfaces, but most usually they have different acute summits, and occasionally exhibit the most fantastic shapes. Some have been seen that were completely perforated, or containing prodigions caverns, or having many clefts or cracks in the most elevated parts, so as to give the appearance of several distinct spires. On some icebergs, where there are hollows, a great quantity of snow accumulates; others are smooth and naked. The naked sides are often filled with conchoidal excavations, of various magnitudes; sometimes with hollows the size of the finger, and as regular as if formed by art. On some bergs, pools of water occur stagnant; on others, large streams are seen oozing through crevices into the sea. In a high sea the waves break against them as against a rock; and, in calm weather, where there is a swell, the noise made by their rising and falling is tremendous. When icebergs are aground, or when there is a superficial current running to leeward, the motion of other ice past them is so great that they appear to be moving to windward. Fields of ice, of considerable thickness, meeting a berg under such circumstances, are sometimes completely ripped up and divided through the middle. Icebergs, when acted on by the sun, or by a temperate atmosphere, become hollow and fragile. Large pieces are then liable to be broken off, and fall into the sea with a terrible crash, which, in some places, produces an echo in the neighbouring mountains. When this circumstance, called calving, takes place, the iceberg loses its equilibrium, sometimes turns on one side, and is occasionally inverted. The sea is thereby put into commotion, fields of ice in the vicinity are broken up, the waves extend, and the noise is heard to the distance of several miles; and sometimes the rolling motion of the berg not ceasing, other pieces get loosened and detached, till the whole mass falls asunder like a wreck. Icebergs occur in many places in the arctic and antarctic regions; some of them of astonishing magnitude. In the Spitzbergen Sea, indeed, they are neither numerous nor bulky. compared with those of other regions; the largest that Captain Scoresby met with not exceeding a thousand yards in circumference, and two hundred feet in thickness. But in Hudson's Strait, Davis's Strait, and Baffin's Bay, they occur of a prodigious size. Ellis describes them as sometimes occur- Icebergs differ a little in colour according to their ring of the thickness of five hundred or six hundred solidity and distance, or state of the atmosphere. A yards. Frobisher saw one iceberg which was judged very general appearance is that of cliffs of chalk, or of to be "near fourscore fathoms above water.' One white or grey marble. The sun's rays reflected from berg is described by Sir John Ross as having nine them sometimes give a glistening appearance to their unequal sides, as being aground in sixty-one fathoms, surfaces. Different shades of colour occur in the and as measuring 4,169 yards (paces) long, 3,689 yards precipitous parts, accordingly as the ice is more or broad, and fifty-one feet high. The weight of this less solid, and accordingly as it contains strata of iceberg was estimated, by an officer of the Alexander, earth, gravel, or sand, or is free from any izupurity. at above 1,292,000,000 tons. In the fresh fracture, greenish grey, approaching to emerald green, is the prevailing colour. In the night, icebergs are readily distinguished, even at a distance, by their natural effulgence; and in foggy weather, by a peculiar blackness in the atmosphere, by which the danger to the navigator is diminished. As, however, they occur far from land, and often in unexpected situ ations, navigators require to be always on the watch for them. The most abundant source of icebergs known in the arctic regions is Baffin's Bay. From this remarkable sea they constantly make their way towards the south, down Davis's Strait, and are scattered abroad in the Atlantic to an amazing extent. The banks of Newfoundland are occasionally crowded with these wonderful productions of the frigid zone; beyond which they are sometimes conveyed by the operation of the southerly under-current, as low as latitude 40° north, The greater part of the icebergs that occur in Davis's ICEBERGS. Strait, and on the eastern coast of North America, notwithstanding their profusion and immense magnitude, seem to be merely fragments of the land icebergs, or glaciers, which exist in great numbers on the coast forming the boundaries of Baffin's Bay. These glaciers fill immense valleys, and extend, in some places, several miles into the sea; in others, they terminate with a precipitous edge at the general line formed by the coast. In the summer season, when they are particularly fragile, the force of cohesion is often overcome by the weight of the prodigious masses that overhang the sea; and, in winter, the same effect may be produced by the powerful expansion of the water filling any excavation, or deep-seated cavity, when its dimensions are enlarged by freezing, thereby exerting a tremendous force, and bursting the berg asunder. Pieces thus, or otherwise detached, are hurled into the sea with a dreadful crash. When they fall into sufficiently deep water, they are liable to be drifted off the land, and down Davis's Strait, according to the set of the current; but, if they fall into a shallow sea, they must remain until sufficiently wasted to float away. A work has recently been published by an American clergyman, the Rev. L. Noble, containing most interesting descriptions of icebergs. Mr. Noble made a summer voyage to Labrador and around Newfoundland, in company with a well-known American painter, Mr. Church, some of whose works have been exhibited in this country. The voyagers had opportunities rarely enjoyed of studying the works of the Lord and his wonders in the great deep. The first sight caught of icebergs was a stirring moment : "Icebergs! icebergs! The cry brought us upon deck at sunrise. There they were, two of them, a large one and a smaller: the latter pitched upon the dark and misty desert of the sea like an Arab's tent; and the larger like a domed mosque in marble of a greenish white. The vaporous atmosphere veiled its sharp outlines, and gave it a softened, dreamy, and mysterious character. Distant and dim, it was yet very grand and impressive. Enthroned on the deep in lonely majesty, the dread of mariners, and the wonder of the traveller, it was one of those imperial creations of nature that awaken powerful emotions, and illumine the imagination. Wonderful structure! Fashioned by those fingers that wrought the glittering fabrics of the upper deep, and launched upon those adamantine ways into arctic seas, how beautiful, how strong and terrible! A glacier slipped into the ocean, and henceforth a wandering cape, a restless headland, a revolving island, to compromise the security of the world's broad highway. No chart, no sounding, no knowledge of latitude avails to fix thy whereabout, thou roving Ishmael of the sea. No look-out, and no friendly hail or authoritative warning can cope with thy secrecy or thy silence. Mist and darkness are thy work-day raiment. Though the watchman lay his ear to the water, he may not hear thy coming footsteps. We gazed at the great ark of Nature's building with steady, silent eyes. Motionless and solemn as a tomb, it seemed to look back over the waves as we sped forward into its grand presence." The first attempt to paint "an island of ice" is thus recorded: "To the north and east, the ocean, dark and sparkling, "After Icebergs with a Painter." By the Rev. L. Noble. Sampson Low, Son, and Co. 219 was, by the magic action of the wind, entirely clear of fog; and there, about two miles distant, stood revealed the iceberg in all its cold and solitary glory. It was of a greenish-white, and of the Greek-temple form, seeming to be over a hundred feet high. We gazed some minutes with silent delight on the splendid and impressive object, and then hastened down to the boat, and pulled away with all speed to reach it, if possible, before the fog should cover it again, and in time for Church to paint it. The moderation of the oarsmen and the slowness of our progress were quite provoking. I watched the sun, the distant fog, the wind and waves, the increasing motion of the boat, and the seemingly retreating berg. A good half-hour's toil had carried us into broad waters, and yet, to all appearance, very little nearer. The wind was freshening from the south, the sea was rising, thin mists-a species of scout from the main body of fog lying off in the cast -were scudding across our track. James Goss, our captain, threw out a hint of a little difficulty in getting back. But Yankee energy was indomitable: Church quietly arranged his painting-apparatus ; and I, wrapped in my cloak more snugly, crept out forward on the little deck,-a sort of look-out. To be honest, I began to wish ourselves on our way back, as the black, angry-looking swells chased us up, and fung the foam upon the bow and stern. All at once, huge squadrons of fog swept in, and swamped the whole of us, boat and berg, in their thin, white obscurity. For a moment we thought ourselves foiled again. But still the word was, On. And on they pulled, the hardhanded fishermen, now flushed and moist with rowing. Again the ice was visible, but dimly, in his misty drapery. There was no time to be lost. Now, or not at all. And so Church began. For half an hour, pausing occasionally for passing flocks of fog, he plied the brush with a rapidity not usual, and under disadvantages that would have mastered a less experienced hand." On another occasion, in calmer weather, a nearer view of an iceberg could be safely taken :— The eye "We pass directly under the great face, the upper line of which overlooks our topmast. Every curve, swell, and depression have the finish of the most exquisite sculpture, and all drips with silvery water as if newly-risen from the deep. In the pure, white mass there is the suspicion of green. Every wave, by contrast, and by some optical effect, nearly black as it approaches, is instantly changed into the loveliest green, as it rolls up to the silvery bright ice. And all the adjacent deep is a luminous pea-green. follows the ice into its awful depths, and is at once startled and delighted to find that the mighty crystal hangs suspended in a vast transparency, or floats in an abyss of liquid emerald. We pass on the shadow side, soft and delicate as satin, and changeable as costliest silk; the white, the dove-colour, and the green playing into each other with the subtlety and fleetness of an aurora borealis. As the light streams over and around from the illuminated side, the entire outline of the berg shines like newly-burnished silver in the blaze of noon. The painter is working with all possible rapidity; but we pass too quick to harvest all this beauty: he can only glean some golden straws. A few sharp words from the captain bring the vessel to, and we pause long enough for some finishing touches. He has them, and we are off again. An iceberg is an object most difficult to study, for which many facilities, much time, and some danger are indis |