But now the sounds of population fail :
No cheerful murmurs fluctuate in the gale,
No busy steps the grass-grown footway tread,
But all the bloomy flush of life is fled;
All but yon widow'd solitary thing,
That feebly bends beside the plashy spring:
She, wretched matron, forced in age, for bread,
To strip the brook with mantling cresses
spread,

To pick her wintry faggot from the thorn,
To seek her nightly shed and weep till morn;
She only left of all the harmless train,
The sad historian of the pensive plain.

There, where a few torn shrubs the place disclose,

The village preacher's modest mansion rose.
A man he was to all the country dear,
And passing rich with forty pounds a year;
Remote from towns he ran his godly race,
Nor e'er had changed, nor wish'd to change his
place:

Unskillful he to fawn, or seek for power,
By doctrines fashion'd to the varying hour;
Far other aims his heart had learn'd to

prize,

More bent to raise the wretched than to rise. His house was known to all the vagrant train;

pain:

wild,

"still occasionally visible in the streets, is that of the Elizabethan boatmen, even to the brass badge which was then worn by every retainer. The Blue-Coat boys rejoice in the semi-monastic robes of the age of Edward VI., the young founder of their school; and the plain mob-cap and long white gloves of Queen Anne or the earlier Georges. The University dress of the present year varies little from that worn soon after the Reformation, except that the square cap has stiffened and widened, and the falling collar has been clipped into traditionary bands. The judge's coif is a curious absurdity borrowed from the silk cap worn by monkish

The wigs introduced from France by Charles II. are retained by the same judges, by our barristers and coachmen. Our footmen still exult in that powder which gave a heightened lustre to Reynold's beauties. The gipsy hat of the same period is worn by the market-women in the west of England. Laborers now wear the deepflapped waistcoats and knee-breeches of the Third George, and the smock of a very early age; and one is sure to meet in a day's walk in London the Hessian boots so fashionable during the youth of the Regent. The beef-eaters at the Tower wear the costume of Henry VII.'s body guard, and our grooms the doublet of James I."

THE DEAD SEA.

unnecessary de

I.

One of the first in the enlightened band of travelers who, during the early part of the present century, have done so much to unvail this mysterious region to the Christian world, was SEETZEN. This intrepid man visited the Dead Sea en route to Kerak and Petra, at a time when traveling in Palestine was far more hazardous than it now is. To increase the chances of safety, he assumed an oriental disguise, and chose a sheikh as his companion and confidant. As they were obliged to make their observations by stealth, and conceal the papers containing their scanty records, the information derivable from this source is necessarily brief and imperfect.

On a fine May morning, in the year 1818, a considerable party might have been seen emerging from the gate of Hebron, and taking the south-eastern road, that led through Bethlehem and the wilderness of Tekoa to the southern end of the Dead Sea. The principals in the equestrian company consisted of Captains Irby and Mangles, and Messrs. Legh and Bankes, accompanied by both Frank and Arab attendants, all of them being attired in the picturesque costume of the Bedouins. The Englishmen, to carry the disguise still further, were addressed by fictitious oriental names. About mid-day the travelers obtained from an eminence a fine view of the southern extremity of the sea. Stimulated by the spectacle, they pressed on with ardor, and reached the great southern plain by six o'clock; in the shel

ter of a ravine on the western side of which they baked their evening meal, and spent the night. Rising at dawn on the following morning from their rocky couch, they passed round the southern end of the sea to the eastern side, which they found well wooded and cultivated. Continuing their course northward, on their way to Wady Kerak, they passed through a district inhabited by the Ghorneys—a wild, half-savage-looking tribe of Arabs, who have abandoned a nomadic life, and settled down to the tillage of the soil. After a temporary bivouac in the thicket which shelters the reed-built dwellings of this people, and partaking of their hospitality, the party proceeded toward the opening of a ravine through which the perilous road to Petra winds. Here our travelers disappeared, and, for a period of eighteen days, we see no more of them on the borders of the silent lake. At the expiration of that date, however, having in the interval, at the peril of their lives, inspected the extraordinary monuments of the ancient Nabatheans, they returned and completed the exploration of the southern extremity of the sea. During their researches in this neighborhood, they stumbled upon the vestiges of an ancient city, which Irby and Mangles conjectured to be the ruins of Zoar.

After this expedition, seventeen years rolled by without any fresh recorded attempt, of any importance, to penetrate these shores. The next case led to no practical results. It was attended by the death of the traveler, Costigan, who attempted to navigate the lake.

Only three years elapsed from the occurrence of this melancholy event, before the shores of the lake were trod by the feet of two eminent pilgrims from the New World, urged on by scientific and religious motives. We allude to the well-known American travelers, Messrs. Robinson and Smith. The fruits of their noble mission of research and discovery in Bible lands are in the hands of most of us, and need no commendation. It was on the 17th of July, 1837, that Dr. Robinson left NewYork, with the intention of accomplishing the fondly-cherished dream of his early manhood. Having spent a short time in England, taking counsel with some veterans in oriental travel, and wandering for two or three weeks in the classic lands of the Levant, he took ship for Egypt. While