suasions reiterated from time to time in your ears by your faithful minister; by the friendship I entertain sincerely and disinterestedly for each of you, I entreat you, nay, I demand of you, in the name of my Saviour and my Master, that you neglect not these solemn truths. Religion is a reality; it is not a cunningly devised fable; the scoffer may scorn, the hypocrite may be unfaithful and deceptive-the formalist may be wavering and undecided—the young may neglect their immortal souls; but religion -the gospel-is still "the power of God unto salvation to every one that believeth." Oh, let me persuade you to be decided on the Lord's side. Break away, and for ever discard, everything which keeps you in doubt and indecision. Let the spell, the charm, which binds you to worldly objects and earthly pursuits, be broken, and be prepared at once and for ever to give up your youthful hearts to the Saviour of sinners. Study daily divine truth, attend diligently the means of grace, try the consolations and joys of the religion of the Saviour-a religion which has landed millions already, safely and securely, in the eternal world, and the reception of which will make you happy in life, calm and tranquil in death, and eternally secure throughout the ages of a glorious immortality. "O! swifter than a courier are my days, THE Dromedary is only a distinct species of the camel; the one going under the name of the Bactrian camel, or the camel with two hunches, and the other being kuown as the Arabian camel, or dromedary, with one hunch. The former is limited to Persia, Thibet, Turkestan, Tartary, and China; while the dromedary extends from India to Arabia, and along the northern regions of Africa. The dromedary has its name from the extreme rapidity with which it travels; being to the camel what a racer is to a draught horse. The Arabians call it the maherry, or et heirie; and, expressing in their figurative language the swiftness of its course, they say, "When thou shalt meet a heirie and say to the rider, 'Peace be between us; ere he shall have answered thee, 'There is peace between us,' he will be far off and nearly out of sight; for his swiftness is like the wind." It is on this account, as well as for the merchandise that it carries, called "the ship of the desert." Mr. Morgan, in his History of Algiers, states, that a dromedary will traverse as much ground, in a level country, in one night, as any single horse can in ten. The Arabs affirm, that it makes nothing of holding its rapid pace, which is a most violent and hard trot, for four and twenty hours at a stretch, without showing any signs of weariness, or inclination to bait; and that, having swallowed a ball or two of paste, made of barley meal and the powder of dried dates, with a bowl of water or camel's milk, the untiring animal will seem as fresh as at first setting out, and continue running at the same incredible rate for as many hours longer, and so on from one extremity of the desert to the other, supposing his rider could hold out also. Seventy or a hundred miles in the twentyfour hours, and continued at the same rate for successive days, is by no means an unusual speed in travelling. A journey of upwards of six hundred miles has thus been accomplished in the short space of five days Mr Morgan was once in a party in which one of these dromedaries ran against some of the swiftest Barbary horses, of the true Libyan breed. These are proverbial for their fleetness; they are shaped a little like the greyhound, and will sometimes run down an ostrich. Mr. Morgan says, "We all started like racers; and at first, most of the best mounted among us, kept pace pretty well; but our grass-fed horses soon flagged. Several of the Libyan and Numidian coursers kept pace till we, who followed upon a good roundhand-gallop, could no longer discern them. After the dromedary had been out of sight about half an hour, we again espied it flying towards us with an amazing velocity, and in a very few moments was amongst us, seemingly nothing concerned, while the horses and mares were all on a foam, and scarcely able to breathe, as was a tall and fleet greyhound that had followed." Blest with these useful and essential animals, the Arabs want nothing, and fear nothing. In a single day they are able to traverse a tract of fifty leagues into the desert, and thus easily escape the reach of their foes. All the armies of the world would perish in the pursuit of a troop of Arabs. But the treasure they possess in their camels and dromedaries is often abused, in the crimes that these animals enable their riders to commit. Seated on these swiftfooted creatures, the Arabs arrive at the confines of the desert, and rob the first passengers they meet, pillaging the straggling habitations, loading their camels with the booty, and, when pursued by a force greater than their own, they accelerate their hasty retreat; passing over, in eight days the enormous distance of three hundred leagues. During all that time of fatigue and travel, they do not unload their camels; they only allow them an hour of repose, and a ball of paste each day. In this manner they proceed sometimes for a week or more without meeting with water; and when they approach a pool or spring, the dromedaries scent the water at the distance of half a league. Thirst redoubles their pace, |