202 THE CHRISTIAN NATURALIST. 



more steady and rapid developement of vegetation, 

 than in our own climate.* 



Winter, therefore, is to be considered as a necessary 

 part of that system of providential arrangement under 

 which we live ; and though nature may now appear to be 

 idle, she is, as an ingenious Naturalist observes, busily 

 employed. * Silent in her secret mansions, she is now 

 preparing and compounding the verdure, the flowers, 

 the nutriment of spring : and all the fruits, and glorious 

 profusion of our summer year, are only the advance of 

 what has been ordained and fabricated in these dull 

 months.' 



Many are the reflections to which the observance of 

 these things will give birth in every mind that is truly 

 awake to a sense of gratitude to God, who thus in 

 the system of nature displays himself as the same 

 benevolent Being, who, in the system of man's 

 redemption, brings the greatest blessings out of the 



* We give here a brief Calendar of the vegetable year of 

 Lapland and Siberia, — 

 July 1 Snow gone. August 2 Fruit ripe, 



9 Fields quite green. 18 Snow, and from 



17 Plants at full growth. that time Ice and Snow, 



25 Ditto in flower. till the 23rd. of June 



when they begin to melt. 



