subdue temper on the present provocation. If, without tak ing up the burden of the future, we would always make the single effort at the present moment, while there would, at any one time, be very little to do, yet, by this simple process continued, everything would at last be done.

14. It seems easier to do right to-morrow than to-day, merely because we forget that when to-morrow comes, then will be now. Thus life passes with many, in resolutions for the future, which the present never fulfils.

15. It is not thus with those, who, "by patient continuance in well-doing," seek for glory, honor, and immortality. Day by day, minute by minute, they execute the appointed task, to which the requisite measure of time and strength is proportioned; and thus, having worked while it was called day, they at length rest from their labors, and their works "follow them."

16. Let us then, "whatever our hands find to do, do it with all our might," recollecting that "now is the proper and accepted time."

LXXXVII.-SONG OF REBECCA THE JEWESS.

SCOTT.

1. When Israel, of the Lord beloved,
Out from the land of bondage came,
Her father's God before her moved,
An awful guide, in smoke and flame.
By day, along the astonished lands,
The cloudy pillar glided slow;
By night, Arabia's crimsoned sands
Returned the fiery column's glow.

2. Then rose the choral hymn of praise,
And trump and timbrel answered keen;
And Zion's daughters poured their lays,
With priest's and warrior's voice between.
No portents now our foes amaze,
Forsaken Israel wanders lone!

Our fathers would not know Thy ways,
And Thou hast left them to their own.

3. But present still, though now unseen,
When brightly shines the prosperous day,
Be thoughts of Thee, a cloudy screen
To temper the deceitful ray:

And oh where stoops on Judah's path
In shade and storm the frequent night,
Be Thou long-suffering, slow to wrath,
A burning and a shining light!

4. Our harps we left by Babel's streams,
The tyrant's jest, the Gentile's scorn;
No censer round our altar beams,
And mute are timbrel, trump, and horn.
But Thou hast said, the blood of goat,
The flesh of rams I will not prize :
A contrite heart, a humble thought,
Are mine accepted sacrifice.

LXXXVIII.—ELIJAH'S INTERVIEW.

THOMAS CAMPBELL.

1. On Horeb's rock the prophet stood, The Lord before him passed;

A hurricane in angry mood

Swept by him strong and fast;
The forest fell before its force,
The rocks were shivered in its course:
God was not in the blast;

'Twas but the whirlwind of his breath,
Announcing danger, wreck, and death.

2. It ceased. The air grew mute,—a cloud
Came, muffling up the sun,

When through the mountain, deep and loud,
An earthquake thundered on;

The frighted eagle sprang in air,
The wolf ran howling from his lair:
God was not in the storm;
'Twas but the rolling of his car,
The trampling of his steeds from far.

8. 'Twas still again,-and Nature stood
And calmed her ruffled frame,
When swift from heaven a fiery flood
To earth devouring came;
Down to the depth the ocean fled;

The sickening sun looked wan and dead;
Yet God filled not the flame;
'Twas but the terror of his eye,

That lightened through the troubled sky.

4. At last, a voice all still and small
Rose sweetly on the ear;

Yet rose so shrill and clear, that all
In heaven and earth might hear;
It spoke of peace, it spoke of love,
It spoke as angels speak above;
And God himself was there;
For O! it was a father's voice,
That bade the trembling heart rejoice.

LXXXIX.-ROADS AND BRIDGES OF THE
ANCIENT PERUVIANS.

WILLIAM H. PRESCOTT.

1. Those who may distrust the accounts of Peruvian industry will find their doubts removed on a visit to the country. The traveler still meets, especially in the central regions of the table-land, with memorials of the past,―remains of temples, palaces, fortresses, terraced mountains, great military roads, aqueducts, and other public works, which, whatever degree of science they may display in their execution, astonish him by their number, the massive character of the materials, and the grandeur of the design.

2. Among them, perhaps the most remarkable are the great roads, the broken remains of which are still in sufficient preservation to attest their former magnificence. There were many of these roads, traversing different parts of the kingdom; but the most considerable were the two which

extended from Quito to Cuzco, and, again diverging from the capital, continued in a southern direction towards Chili.

3. One of these roads passed over the grand plateau, and the other along the lowlands on the borders of the ocean. The former was much the more difficult achievement, from the character of the country. It was conducted over pathless sierras buried in snow; galleries were cut for leagues through the living rock; rivers were crossed by means of bridges that swung suspended in the air; precipices were scaled by stairways hewn out of the native bed; ravines of hideous depth were filled up with solid masonry; in short, all the difficulties that beset a wild and mountainous region, and which might appall the most courageous engineer of modern times, were encountered and successfully overcome.

4. The length of the road, of which scattered fragments only remain, is variously estimated, from fifteen hundred to two thousand miles; and stone pillars, in the manner of European mile-stones, were erected at stated intervals of somewhat more than a league, all along the route. Its breadth scarcely exceeded twenty feet. It was built of heavy flags of freestone, and in some parts, at least, covered with a bituminous cement, which time has made harder than the stone itself. In some places, where the ravines had been filled up with masonry, the mountain torrents, wearing on it for ages, have gradually eaten a way through the base, and left the superincumbent mass-such is the cohesion of the materials—still spanning the valley like an arch.

5. Over some of the boldest streams it was necessary to construct suspension bridges, as they are termed, made of the tough fibres of the maguey, or of the osier of the country, which has an extraordinary degree of tenacity and strength. These osiers were woven into cables of the thickness of a man's body. The huge ropes, then stretched across the water, were conducted through rings or holes cut in immense buttresses of stone raised on the opposite banks of the river, and there secured to heavy pieces of timber.

6. Several of these enormous cables, bound together, formed a bridge, which, covered with planks, well secured and defended by a railing of the same osier materials on the sides, afforded a safe passage for the traveler. The length

of this aërial bridge, sometimes exceeding two hundred feet caused it, confined, as it was, only at the extremities, to dip with an alarming inclination towards the center, while the motion given to it by the passenger occasioned an oscillation still more frightful, as his eye wandered over the dark abyss of waters that foamed and tumbled many a fathom bene ath

7. Yet these light and fragile fabrics were crossed without fear by the Peruvians, and are still retained by the Spaniards over those streams which, from the depth or impetuosity of the current, would seem impracticable for the usual modes of conveyance. The wider and more tranquil waters were crossed on balsas-a kind of raft still much used by the natives-to which sails were attached, furnishing the only instance of this higher kind of navigation among the American Indians.

8. The other great road of the Incas lay through the level country between the Andes and the ocean. It was constructed in a different manner, as demanded by the nature of the ground, which was for the most part low, and much of it sandy. The causeway was raised on a high embankment of earth, and defended on either side by a parapet or wall of clay; and trees and odoriferous shrubs were planted along the margin, regaling the sense of the traveler with their perfumes, and refreshing him by their shades, so grateful under the burning sky of the tropics. In the strips of sandy waste which occasionally intervened, where the light and volatile soil was incapable of sustaining a road, huge piles, many of them to be seen at this day, were driven into the ground to indicate the route to the traveler.

9. All along these highways, caravansaries, or tambos, as they were called, were erected, at the distance of ten or twelve miles from each other, for the accommodation more particularly of the Inca and his suite, and those who journeyed on the public business. There were few other travelers in Peru. Some of these buildings were on an extensive scale, consisting of a fortress, barracks, and other military works, surrounded by a parapet of stone, and covering a large tract of ground. These were evidently destined for the accommodation of the imperial armies, when on their march across the country.