every emotion was for a time absorbed in gratitude to Him, who had so gently removed her father and her friend. The shadow of grief was slow in lifting itself from her spirit. Indeed, it is doubtful whether its effects ever wholly passed away. Veiling her sorrows, that they might not darken the pathway of the remaining objects of her affection, she still labored for the improvement of the pupils, whose education she conducted, sought to be the stay of her widowed mother and sister, and by every means in her power promoted the welfare of the fatherless children. The reading of serious poetry formed the principal solace, of the few intervals of leisure which she allowed herself, but its composition was laid aside, after his departure, who had been her prompting spirit. Somewhat more than two years after this event, she was taken ill of a fever. The first attack seemed slight, but her discriminating mind, apprehending the result, arranged every minute circumstance of care and occupation, like one who returns no more. "I have no longer any wish for life," said she, "but for my dear Mother's sake." As the disease developed its dark features," Lay me," she whispered, "when I am dead, by the side of my father." Apprehending that the deliriums, so often incidental to the disease, might overpower her, she drew her sister down to the pillow, and murmured, "I have many things to say to you,-Let me say them now, or, perhaps, I may not be able. You know how much I have loved you. Seek an interest in our Saviour. Promise me that you will seek religion, that you will prepare to follow me. For, oh! I never before felt so happy. Soon I shall be in that world. "Where rising floods of knowledge roll, And pour and pour upon the soul." And So, with many other kind and sweet words, and messages to absent friends and communings with the Hearer of Prayer, passed away, on the 26th of March, 1816, at the age of 24, as lovely a spirit as ever wore the vestments of mortality, so lovely that the friend, who from life's opening pilgrimage, had walked with her in the intimacy of a twin-being, can remember no intentional fault, no wayward deviation from duty, and no shadow of blemish, save what must ever appertain to dimmed and fallen humanity. ΤΟ ΤΟ With pride to you I yield the meed A statue's brow, luxuriant hair, A glowing form, a graceful air; If hearts can wear a brighter grace Of noblest spirits, you shall be The "Queen of Love and Beauty"-meet To bring the conqueror to your feet: Woo'd by the eagle mind alone! Most fondly sought,—most proudly won! THE ECONOMY OF DEW. BY PROFESSOR SMITH. Ir seems as if a rightly constituted mind could experience few higher pleasures than that of studying with minute interest the wonderful adaptation of things in the world of matter; of tracing the Divine finger in the arrangements of the elements in their various forms, and the subtle workings of God's vast machinery. Among the various beneficial phenomena of nature, the dew scems to reveal some of the most interesting and poetical. It is rarely thought of among us, in temperate climates, as a kindly and necessary agency; in part because its effects among us are not as striking as elsewhere, and because we depend on other natural phenomena for a kindred and more extensive result; but chiefly because it performs its mild functions in the still dark hours of night and with such unfailing and common-place regularity. But when our attention is voluntarily turned towards the subject, we find it to be one that will repay not a little consideration. So constant and yet invisible are the processes by which it does its work and is itself formed: so changeable and accommodating are its operations: so universal is the diffusion of its results; that science scarcely suggests any single plan of nature, which the fancy loves more to follow with subtle tread up to its causes or far away among the thousand varieties of its effects. It causes are in one sense simple; in another, stupendous. They are regular in their occurrence, few in number, familiar to common observation, and necessary for other results than the one in question. In this view they may be called simple. At the same time they are a part of the grandest machinery of nature; the most indispensable and beneficent and magnificent demonstrations of Divine Wisdom in the adaptation of the physical universe to its own laws and to the wants of man. On these accounts, they are stupendous beyond calculation. We allude to the revolutions of the sun and earth, and to the perpetual and universal presence of the atmosphere. It is generally understood now, that dew neither falls nor rises. The former expression has been so long in harmony with the popular understanding of meteorology, that we shall never get it out of our language. The sun will "rise" and "set" while the English tongue lives, and just so, the dew will "fall." The claim that the dew rises was long stoutly asserted by philosophers, in the good old days when May-dew bleached linen and was capable of being distilled in spirit: when "butter"-dews, which hardened into a substance like sulphur, and smelt like graves, were deposited in Ireland. The earth was represented as perpetually sending up exhalations, lighter than the air and kept in a rarefied state by the sun, until, at its setting, they became cold and condensed and fell back to the earth. We all know, now-a-days, (so abundant and conclusive have been experiments,-the experiments of Dr. Wells and others in 1814, illustrative of the fact,) that dew is the moisture of the atmosphere condensed into water by contact with bodies colder than itself. The revolving earth turns one side of itself away from the beams of the sun, and the ground and the grass and the rock and the tree, together with the air that rests upon them all, begin to lose, by constant radiation, the heat imparted by the solar rays. The light, even and delicate atmosphere, penetrated through and through with the heat of the sun, loses somewhat slowly its high temperature, while the solid substances which make up the earth's surface relinquish their superficial warmth more rapidly. Actual experiment has shown that a difference of fifteen degrees of temperature has existed between the ground and the air a few feet above it at the same time. In consequence of this, the warmer atmosphere which is in close proximity to the colder substance of soil and stone and vegetable matter, becomes instantly, upon contact, chilled and too cold to retain its floating moisture, and resigns it just as in summer, the dampness of the . warm air is often observed to be condensed into a humid mist and large drops on a tumbler of iced water. This common household experiment is a complete illustration of the ordinary phenomena of dew. The dampness also of caves, cellars and densely shaded places illustrates the fact. The warmer air, which comes from the region of sunshine, is suddenly cooled, and its moisture is condensed by contact with the cold surface of the sunless recess, and drips in dew on the sides of the cavern, and impregnates the atmosphere with a deadly dampness. : As dew is then condensed atmospheric vapor and depends upon the unequal temperature of the air and the crust of the earth, it must be affected by other meterological phenomena. Of course, fogs and rain absorb the moisture of the air and leave none to be deposited in dew. Clouds, too, affect its deposition, for they reflect back to the earth the heat radiated from it and prevent the rapid decrease of temperature necessary to the formation of dew. The greatest depositions of the condensed vapor will therefore be, where skies are most constantly serene and where the excessive heat of the sun by day, leaves for the night a violent and extensive change of temperature. Although we do not design to discuss the meteorology of dew as a branch of science, we have thought it proper to state the foregoing theory and facts, as necessary to illustrate our leading topic of natural economy. While we omit then a large class of valuable and entertaining facts respecting the phenomena discussed, we shall probably introduce other scientific memoranda. Now, then, we will consider the economy of time and place, developed from the foregoing facts. It is plain that the nightly deposition of dew is invaluable, for then, in the absence of the sun, its fertilizing moisture can lie long enough upon vegetation to be productive of some result. If sunshine and dew came together, the latter would be either totally useless or productive of some disaster; such, perhaps, as breeding decay in plants: which the almost invariable separation of sunlight and moisture in nature's processes gives us reason to apprehend would be the result. We see, also, that the most extensive deposition of dew will be in those countries, where it is most necessary and useful. For instance, in tropical climates where not a cloud defaces the sky for months at a time, and not a drop of rain falls, the blistering heats of the torrid day will be followed by a violent re-action when the sun is withdrawn. This sudden and extreme change of temperature will be the occasion of excessively rapid radiation of heat and very heavy dews will be deposited. Thus the deficiency of rain is supplied in a measure by the extraordinary deposition of atmospheric vapor, and it is always seen that the seasons of long drought, being serene, are most plentifully refreshed by profuse dews. In India and Guinea, while day and night are cloudless for nearly |