KIDD'S OWN JOURNAL. 



25 



with blocks of ice, they survive the inclement 

 season, amid all the horrors of a Polar winter, and 

 sleep comfortably, wrapped in their furs, on a bed 

 constructed of the same material. Inured as he 

 is to his icy climate, the Esquimaux enjoys a 

 comfortable warmth beneath his dome of snow, 

 and feels no envy of those who enjoy our temperate 

 climates, or bask beneath the perpetual sunshine 

 of southern latitudes. 



Thus do we find the balance of nature harmo- 

 niously preserved amid the utmost diversity of 

 changes, and no single law operating without its 

 use. The long winter of the Polar regions is 

 followed by a brief but most vigorous spring and 

 summer. Within a week after the melting of the 

 snows of Iceland, the fields are green ; and in 

 less than a month most of the plants are at ma- 

 turity ; so that where the sleep of nature is most 

 prolonged, she is seen to awaken with a pro- 

 portionate vigor, and to hasten the accomplish- 

 ment of the processes of vegetation during the 

 brief season of activity that remains. The same 

 is frequently seen, though in a less degree, in our 

 own milder climate. Occasionally a cold, pro- 

 tracted spring, threatens to mar all the labors of 

 the husbandman. The trees refrain from shooting 

 forth their leaves, the cereal plants are arrested 

 in their progress, and the season seems passing 

 away without the development on which the 

 realising of all its hopes depend. 



But on a change of weather, and the supervening 

 of a very few days of warmth, the compensating 

 powers of nature becoming immediately apparent, 

 a sudden burst of vegetation takes place, as if 

 nature, by one great effort, sought to make up for 

 lost time, and a very brief period suffices to restore 

 the hopes of the most despondent. In this, also, 

 we cannot fail to recognise a remarkable pro- 

 vision of the Creator ; for meeting the peculiarities 

 of a variable climate, and securing the fulfilment 

 of the Harvest Covenant : 



He marks the bounds which winter may not pass, 

 And blunts his pointed fury ; in its case, 

 Russet and rude, folds up the tender germ 

 Uninjured, with inimitable art ; 

 And, ere one flowery season fades and dies, 

 Designs the blooming wonders of the next. 



Are we not all longing for this sudden 

 burst of vegetation ? And oh, how we will 

 enjoy its unfolding beauties ! 



A Brage-Beaker with the Swedes. By 

 W. Blanchard Jerrold. Nathaniel 

 Cooke. 



^-The author of this book has' been to 

 Sweden and back ; and he has recorded pro 

 bono the result of his journey, which forms a 

 neat volume of some 250 pages. 



The second title of the book is "Notes 

 from the North, in 1852." This gives a 

 better idea of it than the first. Those who 

 are fond of lively gossip, and to hear pleasant 

 travelling companions tell of their remarkable 

 adventures, &c, will be amused by a perusal 

 of Mr. Jerrold's pages ; nor will they fail to 

 laugh heartily at some of his illustrative 

 sketches — for instance, the one at page 52, 



representing the author "packed up," ready 

 for travelling. It reminds us of old Martha 

 Gunn, who, some forty years agone, used, to 

 bob our juvenile head and little body under 

 the waves at Brighton, — herself waiting for 

 us, open-mouthed (we shall never forget her 

 hug), behind the wooden wheel of that huge 

 bathing-machine. 



To give an idea of the author's style, we 

 subjoin his description of the " packing up " 

 ceremony, — also a hint or two as to the 

 delights of travelling in Sweden :— 



When travelling in Sweden, 1 found the pack- 

 ing of luggage a secondary matter to the packing 

 of myself. The weather was not cold on the night 

 we left Helsingborg, and I felt a kind of vague 

 disappointment, having screwed up my courage to 

 endure a frightful number of degrees below 

 freezing-point. Yet the Captain warned me not 

 to forsake my furs, and to pack myself up for 

 regular Swedish weather. I began and ended 

 thus. First, I gave myself a substantial breast- 

 work of flannel ; secondly, I hugged myself in a 

 thick pilot waistcoat, which I buttoned up to my 

 throat; thirdly, I drew on a thick pilot coat: 

 fourthly, I turned about my neck a woollen scarf; 

 fifthly, I drew on a second coat, as thick as any 

 double blanket; sixthly, I pulled on close over 

 my head a thick cap ; seventhly, I sat down while 

 a sympathising bystander hauled on a pair of 

 snow-boots lined with fur; eighthly, my huge fur 

 frock, which reached to my heels, was thrown over 

 me, and my arms drawn into the sleeves. Thus 

 bandaged, I made my way by slow degrees into 

 the carriage waiting at the hotel doors, that dark 

 and stormy night, to take us on our way north. 



My companions followed me in a similar de- 

 scription of packing. How we wedged ourselves 

 into that carriage, with two or three carpet-bags, 

 and other luggage that could not be stowed out- 

 side ; how Poppyhead's india-rubber leggings 

 turned up every ten minutes, to the discomfort of 

 one of us ; how we requested one another to move 

 a leg, or remove that arm from those ribs ; how we 

 deplored our fate as the carriage rolled and tumbled 

 over horrible roads on that dark night, — are 

 matters of detail which I will pass over lightly, 

 though they did not pass lightly over me. But 

 one grievance I must insist upon inflicting on the 

 reader. When we had got about two miles away 

 from the town, we discovered that one of the front 

 windows of the carriage was wanting, and that 

 the rain was pouring in upon my devoted back. 

 An explanation with the driver drew from him the 

 cool reply that the window was broken ; but that 

 we need not mind it, it would let in the air. This 

 impertinent observation roused even Poppyhead 

 from an incipient doze to make an indignant 

 remark. But the matter could not be mended on 

 the high road ; so we went forward, and the rain 

 played its worst upon my well-covered back. The 

 carriage was so small, that it was impossible for 

 all of us to stretch out our legs at once. This in- 

 convenience led to a solemn convention, which 

 bound each of us to take his turn of the convenient 

 posture, and to yield it up at a proper time. We 

 occupied two hours of that dreary night arranging 

 and re-arranging the luggage, which kept 

 tumbling about the vehicle ; at the end of which 



