prince, began to think that the height of his own prosperity could no more secure him from future adversity, than the wealth of Croesus had saved him from his sad fall into unexpected misery; and therefore, in a just sense and apprehension of those sad changes which often fall to the lot of mankind, he pardoned Croesus, set him at liberty, and gave him an honourable place about him.

Solon was born about 638 years before Christ, and lived to the age of about eighty years. He died universally beloved as an example of virtue and a benefactor of his country.

Remarkable Places.

STONEHENGE.

IN a former number we gave our young friends an account of some of the remarkable Barrows or burying-places of ancient Britons and other peoples; also of the Druidical altars found in various parts of England, especially a large one we saw in Guernsey about three years ago. We would now introduce to our young readers an ancient monument, which is the largest in the kingdom-the one at Stonehenge. It stands in the middle of a flat area, near the summit of a hill six miles distant from Salisbury. It is enclosed by a circular double bank and ditch nearly thirty feet broad, after crossing which we ascend thirty yards before we reach the work. The whole fabric consisted of two circles and two ovals. The outer circle is about 108 feet in diameter, consisting, when entire, of sixty stones-thirty uprights and thirty imposts, seventeen standing and seven down, three and a-half feet asunder, and eight imposts. Eleven uprights have their five imposts on them by the grand entrance. These stones are from thirteen to twenty feet high. The smaller circle is somewhat more than eight feet from the inside of the outer one, and consisted of forty smaller stones (the highest six feet), of which only nineteen remain, and only eleven are standing. The walk between these two circles is 300 feet in circumference. The adytum, or cell, is an oval formed of ten stones (from sixteen to twenty-two feet high), in pairs. At the upper end of the adytum is the altar, a large slab of blue coarse marble, twenty inches thick, sixteen feet long, and four broad, pressed down by the weight of the vast stones that have fallen upon it. The whole number of stones-uprights, imposts, and altars is exactly 140. The heads of oxen, deer, and other beasts, have been found on digging in and about Stonehenge, and human bones in the adjacent barrows. But what was the origin and what was the purpose of this remarkable structure ? The truth is that it is too old for history: it has outliyed all records of its origin,

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and antiquarians can only form conjectures more or less probable. Some suppose it to have been a sepulchral monument of of Boadicea, the famous British queen, which is very unlikely. Others think it was a Roman temple: and this seems equally improbable. Dr. Charlton thought it was a work of the Danes, who were two years masters of Wiltshire. But the most likely opinion is, that this remarkable ruin was once a British temple, in which the Druids performed their worship and offered their sacrifices. Indeed, Mr. Grose thinks the structure was the metropolitan temple of Great Britain, and he translates the words choir gour, "the great choir or temple."

Whatever was its origin, it carries us back to a period before Christianity had come to this country, and it shows us what our forefathers were in the days of heathen ignorance. Their architecture was massive, but rude, and their religion superstitious and sanguinary. Let us thank God that the times are wonderfully improved since the stones of this structure were laid; for instead of ignorant, cruel, and bloody superstitions, we have the glorious light of the Gospel, with its Bible, its Sabbath, its sanctuaries, its schools, and its ministers. Blessed be God, "the lines are fallen unto us in pleasant places, and we have a goodly heritage."

A HOLIDAY IN SWITZERLAND.

II. BENIGHTED.

AFTER refreshing ourselves at Chatillon, we started on foot up the Val Tournanche about four o'clock. The road for a time is about the roughest and most tedious that you could ever wish to tread. Indeed, you may always know when you are approaching a Swiss village, by the wretched roads. You stumble at every step over great loose boulders, that seem to have been laid on the path for the set purpose of endangering the shins of pedestrians or upsetting vehicles—if it be possible for vehicles of any kind to pass. If, moreover, there has been a downfall of rain, or if (as is very generally the case) a little mountain torrent finds its way amongst these stones, there is the additional inconvenience of their being in a certain state of greasiness and wetness, which makes a fall by no means an uncommon event. This is all bad enough in daylight, when you can see to pick your way; but when, as in this case, we were for hours walking in darkness, you can imagine somewhat the tediousness of the walk.

For a time we enjoyed the magnificent views of Italian scenery that are obtained from the Val Tournanche; but there is the disadvantage of having constantly to turn round to get these, if you be ascending this valley. Often, however, I think we made the superb views an excuse for resting on some grassy bank or hillside covered with ferns; for the path was so steep in places, and the heat so intense, that five or ten minutes' walking sufficed to knock us up. But it was not long before we began to find out that we had indulged too

freely in these rests by the way. The sun had ceased to shoot his beams through the interlacing branches of the vast pine forests, before we emerged from them into the narrowing valley; the cold grey twilight was everywhere except on the mountain summits, and we were yet so many miles from our destination that it was evident we should be benighted.

Now, though there may be no great peril, especially if you have a good guide, yet there is something that is not altogether pleasant in being overtaken by night in a lonely valley that you are utterly unacquainted with, and where at every step you are in danger of slipping into a huge torrent or falling over a precipice; and this was just the position in which we were placed. Darkness came on so rapidly that soon the great peaks on either side seemed to lose their graceful form, and became distorted into giant-like things that frowned down upon us from their lonely home near the stars. Often, too, we heard strange sounds as the darkness deepened; and though, perhaps, the noises were harmless enough in themselves, yet imagination was busy, turning these into the gambols of wild birds or brutes that even now are sometimes found in these Swiss valleys and mountains; and, of course, a sound that in open day you would think only the rustle of grouse among the brushwood, your imagination at night turns into the flapping of the wing of the eagle, the lämmergeyer, or the gerfalcon; and the goat or deer taking an evening ramble among the rocks becomes to the excited imagination nothing less terrible than a lynx or brown bear, or some other animal of the kind, known as inhabitants of these parts. Indeed, in feudal times, the Alps were famous as the scene for bear-hunts, when men, with packs of trained dogs, used to sally forth over cliff, and ridge, and deep ravine, in quest of Bruin; and many a bloody battle ensued between the barking assailants and the shaggy monsters that prowled in the recesses of those Alpine heights. And it does not at all lessen the romance of the thing when the guide suddenly stops, and lays hold of your arm, and takes you along a narrow ledge of rock, where you have to walk in single file, and where a false step would send you dashing and bounding from rock to rock into the brawling torrent beneath. We soon began to feel that, what with imaginary perils and real difficulties, and more especially with very fatiguing climbings and descents that were more trying still, we should be glad to fling ourselves down anywhere for the night; but there was no place in which a lodging could be found. Once we came to a poor little châlet beside a mountain torrent, and we sent the guide to see if refreshment could be obtained; but the good people of the house had evidently all been gore to bed some time. Yet they heard the knock, and struck a light, and the whole family-man, wife, children—all turned out in such a variety of costume, or lack of costume, that was almost alarming. However, when they found we were benighted, they kindly gave us refreshment, though they could not take us in. It was a picture that would have made an artist a fortune, could he have seen us there, with the glare of the candle bringing into view us poor tourists taking from the hands of the timid half-dressed children the cups of goat's milk, and the parents looking on with curious but hospitable eyes, that were yet not thoroughly open; and to

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see how the whole family broke out into joyful smiling, when one or two of the children had placed in their hands a piece of money that would be to them, in their mountain home, almost a little fortune!

After all the fatigue we had felt up to this time, the really heavy part of the walk only began after we had said " Good-night" to the hospitable cottagers. Often in the darkness we stumbled over "the pine-tree's withered branch," that lay across our path just as it had been swept down from the mountain-sides above us by some tremendous avalanche. Many were the questions that we put to John Baptist as to the time it would take to get to the end of our journey, and whether the road would be as heavy all the way. I am almost afraid that he disguised the truth on these matters, in order to keep up our courage, for he would say that we should reach the end in about an hour, and when we thought that time must have transpired, and asked how long now, he would answer very mildly that in about threequarters of an hour more we should be there, and that we should soon come to an easier road; which, again, was a fib on the part of John Baptist, for every moment the path seemed to get steeper, and one could almost have imagined the stars overhead seemed closer, and yet no sign of a house appeared. I think we should almost have given up all hope of lodging anywhere but on the cold ground, if John Baptist had not pointed out something black a little higher up, which he said was our resting-place. So, putting forth what little strength we had left for a last effort, we toiled on in silence now, for we had found out that we only caused our guide to very much modify the truth about the distance, when we asked questions about it. Poor fellow! he evidently felt, in his great pity for our weary limbs, that there couldn't be much harm in this, and no doubt he thought he could make that all right with his priest, the next time he went to confess. The last reply we got was to the effect that about five minutes more would bring us to the end. Yet it was about half an hour after that we stumbled over some huge stones-sure sign of a village at hand-then up some steep steps, and John Baptist was hammering away at a door. For some time not the slightest result was produced except the noise, and it seemed as though the end of all the toilsome march would be a night on these cold steps; but by-and-by a shivering form opened the door and struck a light, and though the man had evidently walked out of bed and to the door half asleep, the sight of tourists caused him to open wide his eyes; and soon we were seated in a comfortable kitchen, with a fire crackling on the hearth, and eggs, honey, bread, and tea were on the table in a few minutes. If you ever want to enjoy thoroughly a homely meal, and feel thankful for a rest, just take our walk of that night under like circumstances; and if then your appetite needs tempting with delicacies, and if you complain that you can't sleep, even on a bed of the hardest and most suspicious kind, you will never make a Swiss tourist, and had better stay in the land of beefsteaks and feather beds.

It was midnight when we turned into our beds, and between four and five in the morning the tall, gaunt form of the Baptist marched into our room and roused us from our slumbers, assuring us that if we wished to get across the St. Theodule to Zermatt that day we must

not spend another moment in sleep, or the ice would be rendered too dangerous by the heat of the sun to permit of our crossing. It was about the greatest hardship in the way of getting out of bed that I remember feeling; and it was with the utmost difficulty that we refrained from requesting John Baptist to go back to his bed of straw, somewhere downstairs, and forget all our orders as to getting us out of bed; but these guides are tyrants in their way, and as they never seem to want sleep-they must do all their sleeping in the winterthey have no pity for others. It was evident that our guide meant to carry out our commands, for he had got our boots and was rubbing them with the ends of tallow candles, which Swiss guides always carry in their pockets, with their matches, pipes, knife, nails, string, and a few other articles of a miscellaneous kind.

Finding it was of no use resisting the Baptist, we dressed as quickly as our aching, shivering limbs would allow us, and descended to a breakfast of the same fare as our supper had been, and were soon out in the bracing air, going at a quick step up the Val Tournanche. And our first feeling was one of regret that our journey hither from Chatillon should have been in the night; for we must have missed some very romantic scenery, both behind us in the Italian valley, and in the diversity of mountain scenery on either side of the stream by the side of which we had walked on the previous night, and, as it seemed to us then, not without some danger of slipping into the swollen rapid torrent.

Bemarkable Books.

THE HEPTAGLOT LEXICON.

OUR young friends must not be alarmed by these hard words. Just spell them, and remember them, and your Editor will, in a minute or two, make them quite plain. Both words are Greek. "Heptaglot" means seven tongues or languages; and the word "lexicon" means dictionary; and thus the words put together mean "A Dictionary of Seven languages." A book of this kind was published just 200 years ago, by Dr. Edmund Castell. It was intended to be a companion to the "London Polyglot" published by Dr. Walton, a description of which we gave in the JUVENILE INSTRUCTOR for August. It contains the Hebrew, the Chaldee, the Syriac, the Samaritan, the Ethiopic, the Arabic, and the Persian languages, with notices of numerous words derived from these in other tongues. The explanation of each word is given in Latin; and there is also a short grammar of each of these seven languages, arranged in parallel columns, showing both the baimony and diversity of their construction. This lexicon does not contain an explanation of either Greek or Latin, as it is intended for scholars who are supposed to have previously acquired the classical languages. The whole work fills two large folio