any of God's works, shows more beauty than ever. There is, however, another light; and as we are beginning our conversations for the year, we must not neglect that. Reach down the Prayer-book,—it is not on the top-shelf,and read the well-known, but not exhausted, collect,—the one appointed for the second Sunday in Advent.

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George. Blessed Lord, who hast caused all holy Scriptures to be written for our learning; grant that we may in such wise hear them, read, mark, learn, and inwardly digest them, that by patience and comfort of thy holy word, we may embrace, and ever hold fast the blessed hope of everlasting life, which thou hast given us in our Saviour Jesus Christ. Amen."

Minister. And, amen. The Scriptures were not given, we should always remember, for the vain disputations of a merely human criticism, but to make us wise unto salvation. This object, in all our examinations, let us always keep in view. Now for the passages which you wish to see illustrated.

George. I have been thinking, Sir, of those which refer to the top or roof of the house. Our Lord says, "Let him which is on the house-top not come down to take any thing out of his house." (Matt. xxiv. 17.) And Peter is said (Acts x. 9) to have gone up upon the house-top to pray." Their houses must have been very different And then, why did they select this particular

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from ours.
locality for such purposes as are referred to ?

Minister. It is scarcely possible to take up the work of any traveller in Palestine without having your questions answered. Instead, however, of referring to older travellers, or even to that invaluable work, (for so it is when properly used,)" Harmer's Observations on divers Passages of Scripture," I will give you the opportunity of reading the statements of one of the most recent writers. This volume is just published. Read its title-page.

George." Letters from Palestine: written during a Residence there in the Years 1836, 1837, and 1838. By the Rev. J. D. Paxton."

*12mo., pp. 263. C. Tilt.

Minister. An American Missionary, who writes sensibly, Christianly, and agreeably. Now that you have the book, turn to the seventh page, and read. It is his second letter, dated shortly after he had landed at Beyroot.

George. "I have met with several things which struck me with some force, as illustrating Scripture. The roofs of the houses are flat, and a way is made to ascend to the top, which is a most pleasant place for a walk in the cool of the evening. 'Samuel called Saul to the top of the house.' (1 Sam. ix. 26.) A number of the houses have a kind of a tent on the top, made of reeds, &c., in which they sit, and I believe sleep. They spread Absalom a tent on the top of the house.' (2 Sam. xvi. 22.) There is usually a small railing, or elevation, round the edge, to prevent any from falling over; and the law of Moses required them to make a battlement for this purpose. (Deut. xxii. 8.)"

Minister. Here is the Bible. Turn to that last passage, and read it.

George. "When thou buildest a new house, then thou shalt make a battlement for thy roof; that thou bring not blood upon thine house, if any man fall from thence."

Minister. See the sacredness which the law of God attaches to human life, and the fences with which it was guarded. They who are under the law of God, are not allowed so much as to be careless on the subject. He whose negligence occasioned the loss of life, brought the guilt of blood upon his house. But turn to the thirteenth page.

George. "Most, if not all, of the houses here are of one story-a few, indeed, that stand on the hill-side, have a small room under the elevated side of the main floor. The floors are uniformly, as far as I have seen, made of clay, as is also the roof. They wet it, and make it into a kind of mortar, and have a heavy stone roller with which to make it smooth. For the roof, pieces of timber are laid across, mostly a few strong beams, then across them smaller pieces of boards, and flat stones; and on these the earth is laid, in a wet state, and the roller

made to pass over it, until with that and their feet. they make it hard and smooth. All the roofs are flat, having some little channels to collect the water, and a low place on one side to let it off. There is a way of ascending to the top, which, in large houses, is a fine place for walking and taking the air. These roofs do very well in dry weather; but in the rainy season the water, it is said, comes through, and gives much annoyance to the inmates."

Minister. It would not be very difficult, you perceive, for the friends of "the sick of the palsy," mentioned by St. Mark, to take off the covering,-whether clay or tiles,and let down the man into the presence of Christ.

George. I perceive, Sir, that in hot climates the roofs would be pleasant for the air, and that they would afford opportunities for retirement. But a text just occurs to me in which the house-top is mentioned for a purpose the very opposite to retirement. Christ says, "What ye hear in the ear, that preach ye upon the house-tops." (Matt. x. 27.)

Minister. A person advancing to the front, the house being one story high, would have a great advantage in addressing persons in the street. How common it is now, I need not tell you, for persons to address a crowd from a balcony; or from the window of the room above the ground-floor. But there are a few lines more, I think, illustrative of another passage.

George. Yes. Mr. Paxton says, "These flat roofs and their earthen materials illustrate what was meant by the grass upon the house-tops. Grass does often spring up in the wet season; but the heat of the sun withers it, and it comes to nought."

Minister. Thus Isaiah says of those whom God had delivered into the hands of Sennacherib: " They were as the grass of the field, and as the green herb, as the grass in the house-tops, and as corn blasted before it be grown up.” And the Psalmist, of the opposers of Zion: “Let them be as the grass upon the house-tops, which withereth afore it groweth up: wherewith the mower filleth not his hand, nor he that bindeth sheaves, his bosom.”

George. I see the importance of understanding even these more minute allusions of Scripture. Perhaps I shall have some others, if you allow me the opportunity of another conversation.

Minister. I shall do it with pleasure. I assure you that I look with as much gratification as you can do, on the texts thus placed in the microscope.

AN EASTERN CITY.

GRAND CAIRO is altogether an eastern city; the appearance and manners of which are strangely different from all our western nations. Its streets are usually from three to six or eight feet in width, though a few of the principal thoroughfares are rather larger. The houses only present blank walls to the streets, except here or there a grated window, which nearly touches or overhangs the opposite dwelling. Their stairs are situated within the court, where all the windows are placed, and which is often handsomely adorned. But no beauty appears from without, even in the palaces of Turkish nobility. As the people generally prefer walking in the middle of the street, (though only the lower orders use their legs,) a servant runs before his master in order to make way for his horse or ass, driving all foot-passengers before him in an unceremonious manner, and shouting, "To the right," or, "To the left;""Your feet," &c. Not only the different quarters of the city, but all the principal streets, are furnished with gates, which are closed and fastened at night; whilst piquets are stationed in the chief thoroughfares. No person is allowed to go abroad after a certain hour of the evening without a lantern, that so it may be seen who he is, and what he is doing.

Having occasion one night to pass to another part of the city, I rode upon a friend's donkey, and was accompanied by his servant carrying a large lantern: for the size of the light here bespeaks the importance of the personage. Whenever we entered into any new street, "Who goes there?" was vociferated by the sentinel-soldier. (I almost

fancied myself in a military camp.) "An Englishman," was my attendant's reply; upon which the guard came running up, and looked to see if it were really the case. Ever and anon, we were stopped by a barred or locked door, at which we had sometimes to knock a long time before the keeper awoke, or whilst a soldier went to fetch the key; but upon two or three occasions, the door was not opened at all, and we had to take a circuit by other streets and passages. I began to fear lest I should be abroad all night in the streets, and was heartily glad when at length I reached my lodgings, after nearly two hours of this unpleasant perambulation. The city seemed a complete wilderness, as destitute of living creatures, (except the sentinels and dogs,) as if it were buried in death; and this took place at nine o'clock in the evening. —Macbrair's Sketches of a Missionary's Travels.

ATHENS AND THE PARTHENON.

(From Lamartine's Travels in the East.)

FROM the midst of the ruins, which were Athens, and which the cannon of the Greeks and Turks have pulverized and scattered over the whole valley, and over the two hills to which the city of Minerva extended, a mountain rises precipitous on all sides. Enormous walls surround it, built at their base with fragments of white marble, higher up with the wreck of ancient friezes and columns, and terminated in some places by Venetian battlements. This mountain resembles an enormous pedestal, hewn out by the gods themselves for supporting their altars. Its summit, levelled to receive the floors of the temples, is scarcely five hundred feet in length by two or three hundred feet in breadth. It commands all the hills that formed the ancient ground of Athens and the valleys of Penthilicus, and the course of the Ilissus, and the plain of the Piræus, and the chain of dales and peaks which curves and extends as far as Corinth, and finally, the sea, strewed with the islands of Salamis and Ægina, where shine on the summit the pediments of the Temple of Jupiter Panhellenicus. This