able in such arrangement is this, that the deficiency of liquid food takes place, generally speaking, only in those districts where solid food is abundant. It seems as if the common Father, while He considered it too severe a trial to cause the necessity of employing man's ingenuity in providing both for meat and drink at once, saw proper, where the stimulus to exertion was removed by a spontaneous abundance of the one species of food, to supply that stimulus by a natural deficiency of the other.

The kind of industry and skill to which the deficiency in question has given rise, is various, depending on the nature of the supply to be obtained; and here too there are some peculiar adaptations. If it is to be collected from the heavens in the periodical falls of rain, clay or other impervious materials are provided by nature for retaining it in tanks, while means are afforded for its being purified by filtration, or preserved and rendered salutary, in being converted, by admixture with other substances, into a liquor, not readily subject to decomposition. If it must be sought for at considerable depths, it either springs up to the surface, as I have said, in the form of what are called Artesian wells, or is forced to ascend by the very curious, but familiar and convenient apparatus of the pump, the principle of which depends on the pressure of the atmosphere, a natural property which was long but little understood, even after it had been applied to practice.

It is remarkable to what extent regions otherwise barren and uninhabitable, are rendered fit habitations for human beings, by means such as these. The faculties of man are thus successfully exerted, and his ingenious toil rewarded. As the powers of the mind are expanded, and the population of the world is increased, new encroachments are thus made on the desert places of the earth; the wilderness is caused to blossom as the rose, and the boundaries of man's abode are extended.

There are yet other provisions made by the Creator, for supplying a deficiency of liquid for quenching thirst.

Some plants which grow in arid soils are wonderfully provided with an agreeable and salubrious liquor, secreted from their vessels. The cocoa nut, and the pitcher plant, may be mentioned as familiar instances of this, not less obviously beneficent than they are singular.

The power of distilling sea-water by art, is another method by which, in extensive localities, the want of wholesome drink may be remedied. This is but an imitation of the natural process; and it is not to be forgotten, that all the supplies of fresh water with which the earth is replenished, are derived from the brine of the ocean, where the liquid exists in a state unfit for the sustenance of both vegetable and animal life. We should, indeed, be wanting in gratitude to the Supreme Designer, if we did not recognise in that provision, by which the water of the sea, when evaporated and formed into clouds, is separated from those noxious particles, with which, doubtless for wise purposes, it is in its great receptacle naturally combined.

FIFTH WEEK-TUESDAY.

HUMAN FOOD.-MILK.

THERE is a provision in nature for the support of every young animal that comes into existence. The various tribes of the snail or caterpillar are ushered into being on the leaves of the plant best suited to the supply of their wants; and not a few of the insects that fill the air with their joyous hum, have spent the first period of their lives in the element of water, which at once protected them from outward injury, and furnished the nutriment that was to mature their frames for future exertion. No preparation, however, that has been made for the support of infant existence, is more wonderful than that

fluid from which the human race, in common with all the brute creation, and some even of the inhabitants of the ocean, derive their earliest nourishment.

Milk is neither a vegetable nor an animal substance, but a compound of both; and in this it differs from all other food. It consists of oil, curd, and sugar, which are compounded in different proportions, according to the nature of the animal from which it proceeds. Thus, the milk of the cow and sheep contains a greater proportion of the caseous and more nutritive matter, and that of the ass and mare more of the oily and saccharine.

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It is delightful to observe, in this sweet and nutritious beverage, the care which has been taken by Him who tempers the wind to the shorn lamb," to provide for the helplessness of the young, both of man and beast. Who can behold the eagerness with which a child, newly born, applies its little lips to the breast, without raising his thoughts in wonder and admiration to the "Parent of all," by whose wisdom and tenderness it has been taught thus to support itself in life? Were it not for this provision, it would inevitably die. Nothing can supply its place. You may feed an infant with the spoon, and thus sustain it for a few days, or perhaps weeks; but its heart-rending cries, and its gradual pining away, will testify, during the whole of its perhaps ephemeral existence, that it is denied the aliment intended for it by its Creator. Mark the instinct of the young of the lion, the tiger, and other beasts of prey. They do not roam at large, like their harmless compeers; but, their eyes being at first unopened, they remain in dens till they become sufficiently strong to combat their enemies, and find food for themselves. So long as they are too feeble to join in the chase, or strike the death-pang through the panting victim, Providence has inclined them to be stationary, and to await the return of their dams, for the satisfaction of their hunger. Nor is it unworthy of remark, that, as the carnivorous animals have a much smaller quantity of milk than the other mam

malia, they bring home their prey alive, that their young may suck its blood. Look, again, at the lambkin or the calf. When it begins to feel the pangs of hunger, it is not left to make a painful and fruitless search among the vegetable tribes, till it finds a pasture sufficiently tender for its delicate organization; but its most grateful food is close at hand,—it goes to it at once, and without fail,—it receives it as instinctively as it is offered by its dam. Thence it derives its strength, until its continually unfolding powers become strong enough to bear the food common to the species in more advanced life. Observe the young of cows, and other graminivorous animals, how they followtheir mothers in the pastures where they feed, gradually learning to crop the young clover, or the tender grass. In the safe and pleasant fields, nothing can injure them, defenceless though they be. The sunny slope and smooth enclosure afford them ample space for the exercise of their limbs; and there are few fairer pictures of innocent enjoyment, than their graceful gambols in the meadow, drawing vigour, as they leap and run, from the soft spring-breezes, or basking in the most perfect repose beneath the genial beams of the sun. Many beautiful emblems of the Christian life have been furnished by such scenes as these. The happy pastures prepared by "the Good Shepherd" for his flock,—the calm delight they experience while resting in the sunshine of his smile,-their growth in spiritual strength and beauty beneath the breezes of the "heavenly wind," even the influences of the quickening Spirit,—all these are shadowed forth in the fatherly provision which he has made for a feeble and short-lived race, destined for the use of man.

All quadrupeds, from the majestic elephant to the light squirrel and the humble mole, are mammalia; and, widely though the habits of their being in many respects differ, the property of sustaining their offspring by their own milk, is common to them all.* It is impossible to

* The whale also belongs to this class. "She generally," says Gold

consider the lacteal system with any degree of attention, without recognizing in it that wondrous Mind, and that plastic Power, which we have already perceived in so many of the works of Nature. How is it, we ask with surprise, that the determination of the milk to the breast takes place precisely at the time when it is required, and continues until it is required no more? "If I had been to guess beforehand," says Paley, "I should have conjectured that, at the time when there was an extraordinary demand for nourishment in one part of the system, there would be the least likelihood of a redundancy to supply another part."

But, as the same author justly remarks, “the lacteal system is a constant wonder." There are few instances in which contrivance for a kind and benevolent purpose is more distinctly to be perceived, than in the formation of the reservoirs from which the young of mammalia derive their sustenance. The breasts are what are called by anatomists, conglomerate glandules,―composed of a vast number of little knots or kernels, each of which has its secretory vessel, in which the milk is formed. By a very beautiful process, these are made to unite into many small separate trunks, with cellular substance lying between, which, joining, constitute a vessel of sufficient capacity to contain a considerable quantity of the delicious fluid, thus gradually distilled. From this it has, of course, a constant tendency to flow forth, and the young, in applying their mouths to the breast, might have been consequently in danger of choking from the copiousness of the supply. To prevent this, however, the vessel, before being attached to the nipple, is contracted to such a degree, as to render suction necessary, in order to the extraction of the milk.

Again: the number of breasts is proportioned to the

When she suckles

smith, "produces one young one, and never above two. her young, she throws herself on one side, on the surface of the sea. In some the breasts are white; in others speckled; in all filled with a large quantity of milk, resembling that of land animals."