not been able to banish from her mind, the scripture and hymns which had been taught her there. "Cast thy bread upon the waters, and thou shalt find it after many days." And now, my dear young friends, let me entreat each of you, faithfully to examine your heart; and unreservedly to submit it to the divine inspection. What has the past year done for you? Perhaps it found you a careless wanderer from the way of peace; has it since seen you, brought back to the Shepherd and Bishop of your soul? Or if you had already, through distinguishing mercy, believed; has it beheld you in any measure, established, strengthened, settled; growing in grace, and in the knowledge of your Lord and Saviour? Let us feelingly adopt the language of the hymn, "Searcher of hearts! O search me still; Is Jesus formed and living there : Say, do his lineaments divine, In thought, and word, and action shine? Thus may we commune with ourselves, and with our God: and oh, may the blessed result be, an experience of the inward witness of the Spirit, saying, 'Thou art my servant, I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee.' S. S. S. BOROUGHS. As this word is now applied to many of the principal towns in England, to which the "Reform Bill" has conferred the right of returning a member to Parliament, the following note will not be unacceptable. Mounts, from the ancient Saxon, signify burroughs or borrows, a name generally confined to such as were thrown up or formed by art for sepulchral monuments. Verstigan says, “It was usual among our old Saxon ancestors that the dead bodies of such as were slain in the field were not laid in graves, but lying on the ground were covered over with turves, or clods of earth; and the more in reputation the persons had been, the greater and higher were the turfs raised up over their bodies. This, some used to call "buriging," some "beorging," and others "buriging" of the dead, and whence we yet retain our speech of burying the dead, that is, hiding the dead. And as these byrighs or beorghs, (hiding places) seemed as hills, the name of byrgh or beorgh (now bergh) became in Germany the general name of a mountain, more than the name of hil or dunn formerly used. This will explain the names of places in England ending in bery, bury, and burrow, properly signifying to shroud or to hide. Burgh or burrow is derived from hence, placed first to towns or cities which were called so from having been fenced about with walls of turf, or clods of earth, for men to be shrouded in, as in forts or castles. Where the word bury is the termination of a city, it signifies a high or chief place." (Grose's Antiq.) "The words burrow, berg, burg, burgh, derived from the Saxon bung, byng, signify," says Johnson, "a city, tower, or castle." All places, that in former days were called boroughs, were fenced or fortified. B. V. A COMPARATIVE VIEW OF THE INLAND SEAS AND PRINCIPAL LAKES OF THE WORLD. (With Two Maps.) In the first plate our readers cannot fail to notice the vast Caspian Sea with its surface of 118,000 square miles, and the Black Sea with a surface of 113,000 square miles.-Compared with them, the largest British lakes appear but specks. In the second Map the vast lakes of North America are very observable. These depositories of water are scattered through the world by our bountiful Benefactor, and are reservoirs for watering the earth, and for replenishing the clouds, as well as for affording the means of communication with the various places that surround them. These and other interesting Maps will be found in the Geographical Annual, an instructive book and suitable present for the young. |