triumph before him: whenever he raiseth himself, the mighty are afraid; wherever he advanceth, ruin is there. If a mere creature is capable of spreading such alarm and dread, how greatly is the Creator himself to be feared, who can turn the most harmless inhabitant of the ocean into a ravenous alligator, or a horrid cro codile! who can arm every reptile of the ground with all the force and rage of a lion!

It is impossible to enter on the muster-roll those scaly herds and that minuter fry which graze the sea-weed, or stray through the coral groves: they are innumerable as the sands which lie under them, countless as the waves which cover them. Here are uncouth animals of monstrous shapest and amazing qualities; some that

Job xli. 22. NT 1995. Mæror,' says Bochart, præcedit tanquam metator escomes, tumidique anteambulo regis.' Terror and anguish are a kind of advanced guard to this monarch among the reptiles: or they go before the monster as the man bearing a shield went before the Philistine giant. The original word occurs in no other part of the divine book. I cannot recollect any expression which so fully represents its meaning as Homer's Kodcov, or Xenophon's yaupiaobai; both which are intended to describe the ardour and action of a high-mettled prancing steed. The whole paragraph is a sketch of the crocodile's picture: it exhibits a few circumstances, culled from that inimitable description extant in the book of Job, which are given either in the sacred writer's own words, or else in a paraphrastic explanation of their sense.

Monstrous shapes. Such as the sword-fish, whose upper jaw is lengthened into a strong and sharp sword, with which he sometimes ventures to attack the ships, though armed with thunder; and is capable of piercing their sides, though ribbed with oak. This may be called the champion of the waters, who, though never exceeding sixteen feet in length, yet, confiding in a weapon at once so trusty and so tremendous, scruples not to give battle even to the whale himself. The sun-fish has no tail; seems to be all head; and was it not for two fins, which act the part of oars, would be one entire round mass of flesh. The polypus, remarkable for its numerous feet, and as many claws, by which it has the appearance of a mere insect, and seems fitted only to crawl: at the same time an excrescence, arising on the back, euables it to steer and pursue a steady course in the waves, so that it may pass under the twofold character of a sailor and a reptile. Horace intimates that the British ocean is famous for producing seamonsters:

Te belluosus qui remotis

Obstrepit oceanus Britannis,"

Amazing qualities. Among these may be reckoned the torpedo, which benumbs on a sudden, and renders impotent whatever fish it assaults; and which is a more extraordinary property, strikes even the fisherman's arm when he offers to lay hold on it

have been discovered by the inquisitive eye of man, and many more that remain among the secrets of the hoary deep. Here are shoals and shoals of various characters, and of the most diversified sizes, from the cumbrous whale, whose flouncings tempest the ocean, to the evanescent anchovy, whose substance dissolves in the smallest fricassee. Some, lodged in their pearly shells, and fattening on their rocky beds, seem attentive to no higher employ than that of imbibing moist nutriment. These, but a small remove from vegetable life, are almost rooted to the rocks on which they lie reposed; while others, active as the winged creation, and swift as an arrow from the Indian bow, shoot along the yielding flood, and range at large the spacious regions of the deep.

Here is the tortoise, who never moves but under her own portable pent-house: the lobster, which whether he sleeps or wakes, is still in a state of defence, and clad in jointed armour: the oyster, a sort of living jelly, ingarrisoned in the bulwark of native stone, with many other kinds of sea reptiles, or as the psalmist speaks, things creeping innumerable." I am surprised at the variety of their figure, and charmed with the splendour of their colours. Unsearchable is the wisdom, and endless the contrivance of the all-creating God! Some are rugged in their form, and little better than hideous in their aspect. Their shells seem to be the rude production of a disorderly jumble, rather than

with a temporary deadness. By this means it possesses the double advantage of arresting its prey and securing itself. The cuttle-fish, furnished with a liquid magazine of a colour and consistence like ink; which, when pursued by an enemy, the creature emits, and blackens the water. By this artifice the foe is bewildered in the chace; and while the one vainly gropes in the dark, the other seizes the opportunity and makes his escape. The nautilus, whose shell forms a natural boat: the dextrous inhabitant unfurls a membrane to the wind, which serves him instead of a sail; he extends also a couple of arms, with which, as with two slender oars, he rows himself along when he is disposed to dive, he strikes sail; and, without any apprehension of being drowned, sinks to the bottom: when the weather is calm, and he has an inclination to see the world, or take his pleasure, he mounts to the surface; and, self-taught in the art of navigation, performs his voyage without either chart or compass, is himself the vessel, the rigging, and the pilot. For a more copi ons illustration of this amusing and wonderful subject, see Nat. Displ. vol. ii. Psalm civ. 25.

the regular effects of skill and design: yet we shall find, even in these seeming irregularities, the nicest disposi tions. These abodes, uncouth as they may appear, are adapted to the genius of their respective tenants, and exactly suited to their particular exigencies. Neither the Ionic delicacy, nor the Corinthian richness, nor any other order of architecture, would have served their purposes half so well as this coarse and homely fabric,

Some, on the other hand, are extremely neat; their structure is all symmetry and elegance; no enamel in the world is comparable to their polish: there is not a room of state in all the palaces of Europe so bril liantly adorned as the dining-room and the bed-chamber of the little fish that dwells in mother of pearl; such a lovely mixture of red, and blue, and green, so delight. fully staining the most clear and glittering ground, is no where else to be seen: the royal power may covet it, and human art may mimic it, but neither the one nor the other, nor both united, will ever be able to equal it.

But what I admire more than all their streaks, their spots, and their embroidery, is the extraordinary provision made for their safety. Nothing is more relishing and palatable than their flesh: nothing more heavy and sluggish than their motions. As they have no speed to escape, neither have they any dexterity to elude the foe. Were they naked or unguarded, they must be an easy prey to every freebooter that roams the ocean. To prevent this fatal consequence, what is only clothing to other animals, is to them a clothing, a house, and a castle: they have a fortification that grows with their growth, and is a part of themselves. By this means they live secure amidst millions and millions of ravenous jaws: by this means they are imparked as it were in their own shell; and, screened from every other assault, are reserved for the use and pleasure of mankind.

This is the birth-place of cod, the standing repast of Lent: this is the nursery of turbot, for its exquisite relish justly styled the pheasant of the waters. Hence comes the sturgeon, delicious even in pickle, and a re gale for royal luxury; hence the flounders, dappled

with reddish spots, and a supply for vulgar wants. Here dwell the mackarel, decked, when hauled from their native element, richly decked, with the most glossy dies. The herring, whose back is mottled with azure, and his belly sleek with silver. The salmon, in plainer habit, but of larger substance and higher esteem than either or both the preceding: these, when shotten and lean, wander wildly up and down the vast abyss; when plump and delicate, they throng our creeks, and swarm in our bays; they repair to the shallows, or haunt the running streams. Who bids these creatures evacuate the shores, and disperse themselves into all quarters, when they become worthless and unfit for our service? Who rallies and recalls the undisciplined va grants as soon as they are improved into desirable food? Who appoints the very scene of our ambushes to be the place of their rendezvous, so that they come like volunteers to our nets? Surely the furlow is signed, the summons issued, and the point of reunion settled by a Providence ever indulgent to mankind, ever studious to treat us with dainties, and load us with benefits.

We have wondered att our Saviour's penetration and power: his penetration, which, though the sea was at a distance, and walls intervened, discerned the fish that had just swallowed a piece of money; his power, which, without any delay, brought the lawless rambler, charged with the silver spoil, to Peter's hook: but is it not equally wonderful to observe such innumerable multitudes of finny visitants annually approaching our shores, and crowding our banks; which furnish our ta bles with a wholesome and delicate repast, at the same time that they yield to our nation a revenuet more cer. tain, and no less inconsiderable, than the mines of Peru?

These approach, while those of enormous size and tremendous appearance abandon the shores. The latter might endanger the fisherman's safety, and would

Psalm 1xvill. 19. + See Letter VIII. p. 196. We are told by the aforementioned author, that the banks of Newfoundland alone bring in to the proprietors of that fishery a revenue of several millions every year; and they will, in all probability, be an unimpaired resource of treasure when the fichest mines now wrought in the world are choked up or exhausted.

certainly scare away the valuable fish from our coasts. They are therefore restrained by an invisible hand, and abscond in the abysses of the ocean; just as the wild beasts of the earth, impelled by the same overruling power, hide themselves in the recesses of the forest. A ship, infected by a pestilential distemper, is obliged to keep off at sea, and not permitted to enter the port till she has performed her quarantine: in like manner these monsters of the deep, whose very business is destruction, are laid under a providential interdict, only with this very desirable difference, that, as their presence would always be pernicious, they are never suffered to come near, their quarantine is perpetual.

'Ask now the beasts, and they shall teach thee; and the fowls of the air, and they shall tell thee: or speak to the earth, and it shall teach thee; and the fishes of the sea shall declare unto thee,' that the Lord is gra. cious, that his tender mercies are over all his works, that to us he is superabundantly and profusely good, having ordered all things in the surges of the ocean, as well as on the surface of the ground, for our rich ac commodation, and for our greatest advantage.

One circumstance relating to the natives of the deep is very peculiar, and no less astonishing. As they neither sow nor reap, have neither the produce of the hedges, nor the gleanings of the field, they are obliged to plunder and devour one another for necessary subsistence; they are a kind of authorized banditti, that make violence and murdert their professed trade: by this means prodigious devastations ensue;; and, without proper, without very extraordinary recruits, the whole race must continually dwindle, and at length be totally extinct. Were they to bring forth, like the most prolific of our terrestrial animals, a dozen only,

Job. xii. 7, 8. The earth is represented as bearing witness to the immense benignity of the blessed God. Some minutes, or a short abstract, of her testimony on this occasion, may be seen in Letter VI.

To this, I believe, the prophet alludes in that remarkable expression, Thou makest men as the fishes of the sea:' thou sufferest men to commit, without restraint or control, all manner of outrages. What should be a civil community is a scene of oppression; the weakest are a prey to the strongest, and every one seeks the destruction of his neighbour. Habak. i. 4.