From God, our heavenly Father,
A blessed angel came,

And unto certain shepherds

Brought tidings of the same; How that in Bethlehem was born The Son of God by name. O tidings, &c.

Fear not, then said the angel,
Let nothing you affright;
This day is born a Saviour,

Of virtue, power, and might,
So frequently to vanquish all
The friends of Satan quite.
O tidings, &c.

The shepherds at those tidings
Rejoiced much in mind,
And left their flocks a-feeding

In tempest, storm, and wind,

And went to Bethlehem straightway, This blessed Babe to find.

O tidings, &c.

But when to Bethlehem they came,
Where as this infant lay,

They found him in a manger
Where oxen feed on hay,

His mother Mary kneeling
Unto the Lord did pray.
O tidings, &c.

Now to the Lord sing praises,

All you within this place,

And with true love and brotherhood Each other now embrace,

This holy tide of Christmas

All others doth deface.

O tidings, &c.

THE APPROACH OF CHRISTMAS.
BY JOHN GAY.

WHEN rosemary, and bays, the poets' crown,
Are bawl'd in frequent cries through all the town;
Then judge the festival of Christmas near,-
Christmas, the joyous period of the year.
Now with bright holly all your temples strew,
With laurel green, and sacred mistletoe.
Now, heaven-born Charity! thy blessings shed;
Bid meagre Want uprear her sickly head;
See, see! the heaven-born maid her blessings
shed;

Lo! meager Want uprears her sickly head;
Clothed are the naked, and the needy glad,
While selfish Avarice alone is sad.

SUMMER TOIL, AND WINTER CHEER. (From Poor Robin's Almanack.)

Now after all our slaving, toiling,
In harvest or hot weather broiling,
The scorching weather's gone and past,
And shivering winter's come at last.
Good fires will now do very well,
For Christmas cheer begins to smell.
Those that in summer labored hard,
Are for a Christmas storm prepared ;
And from their store are able now
To feast themselves and neighbors too,
With pork and mutton, veal and beef-
Of country feasting, these are chief;
But those that yet would farther go,
May have a hollow bit or so,
Pig, capon, turkey, goose and coney,
Whatever may be had for money;
Such plenteous living's their enjoyment,
Who truly follow their employment,
While slothful, lurking, idle drones
Do scarce deserve to pick the bones.

Holy Mount, which once bore the Temple

them.

We may not be able to determine the exact spot where Christ was crucified, or point to the cave in which, for part of three days, his body lay; nor is the locality from which he ascended to heaven ascertainable. The Scriptures are silent, and no other authority can supply the information. But we know that in the Holy Land

looked Jerusalem-we know that Mount Gerizim still overhangs the Valley of Shechem-that there is the hill where once stood Samaria-that there is Nazareth, within whose secluded vale our Lord so long awaited the time appointed for his public ministry-the plain of Gennesareth, and the Sea of Galilee-the mountains to which he retired-the plains in which he wrought his miracles-the waters which he trod, and the Jordan, still rolling its

consecrated waters to the bituminous lake where the wicked cities stood; and, knowing all this, we can look upon Palestine as something more than mere masses of ruins, invested with countless traditions -as something, in fact, inseparably associated with a literature which excels in sublimity all the ethics, and philosophy, and poetry, and eloquence of the remainder of the ancient world.

As the scene of the solemn events which marked the dawn of Christianity, every foot of Palestine is hallowed ground; and when we come to reflect on the divine character of the religious system thus inaugurated on its mission and immortal tendencies-all our surprise at the enthusiasm―at some periods the absolute delirium—which prompted the pilgrimages of the middle ages, vanishes. Christianity had taken a firm hold of the public mindit had reached the heart, and in the first bursts of gladness, a loftier, purer feeling than curiosity induced the furore which led to those extraordinary invasions now known as the Crusades. They were natural and incidental to an age of mental deprivation. We who live in an age of intellect and books, do not need such a stimulus—we can bring distant places before our mind's eye without traveling to them in person; and we will undertake to say, that those who read diligently know more of the world without their own sphere, than those who travel leisurely, merely to write learnedly. The facilities afforded by modern literature have brought a knowledge of the most remote places to almost every fireside; therefore this is not an age of pilgrimages. If we want to be introduced to the principal features of the Holy Land, our wish can be gratified without taking a passage in a Levantine steamer the artist and the writer can bring them before us with almost magical celerity; and as Bethlehem-next to Jerusalem-is the most interesting place in the Holy Land, we thought our readers would gladly accept an illustration, accompanied by some description, of that scene of the Saviour's nativity.

Bethlehem is a village situated on a rising ground, about six miles from Jerusalem. The first view is imposing. The village appears covering the ridge of a hill on the southern side of a deep and extensive valley, and reaching from east to west. The most conspicuous object is VOL. V.-42

the monastery erected over the supposed cave of the Nativity;" its walls and battlements have the air of a large fortress. From this point the Dead Sea is seen below, on the left. The road winds round the top of a valley, which tradition has fixed upon as the scene of the angelic vision which announced the birth of our Lord to the shepherds; but different spots have been selected, the Romish authorities not being agreed on the subject. The number of inhabitants in Bethlehem is about three hundred, the majority of whom gain their livelihood by making beads, carving mother-of-pearl shells with sacred subjects, and manufacturing small tables and crucifixes. The monks claim the exclusive privilege of marking the limbs and bodies of the devotees with crosses, stars, and monograms, by means of gunpowder-a practice borrowed from the customs of heathenism; for Virgil expressly mentions it in the fourth book of the "Æneid." But at Bethlehem, as well as Jerusalem, the puerilities and mummeries of the priests sadly interfere with the harmony of the associations that are clustered in and about this interesting locality. The monastery being built on a rock, the legend has been concocted, that the stable in which Christ was born was a grotto cut in the rock.

The ancient tombs and excavations are occasionally used by the Arabs as places of shelter; but the gospel narrative affords no countenance to the notion that the Virgin took refuge in any cave of this description. On the contrary, it was evidently a manger belonging to the inn, or khan; in other words, the upper rooms being wholly occupied, the holy family were compelled to take up their abode in the court allotted to the mules and horses, or other animals. To suppose that the inn, or the stable, whether attached to the inn or not, was a grotto, is to outrage common sense. But the New Testament was not the guide which was followed by the mother of Constantine, to whom the original Church owed its foundation. The present edifice is represented by Chateaubriand as of undoubtedly high antiquity; yet Doubdan, an old traveler, says that the monastery was destroyed in the year 1263 by the Moslems; and in its present state, at all events, it cannot lay claim to a higher date. The convent is divided among the Greek, Roman, and Armenian

Christians, to each of whom separate parts are assigned, as places of worship and habitations for the monks; but, on certain days, all may perform their devotions at the altars erected over the consecrated spots. The church is built in the form of a cross-the nave being adorned with forty-eight Corinthian columns in four rows, each column being two feet six inches in diameter, and eighteen feet high, including the base and the capital. As the roof of the nave is wanting, the columns support nothing but a frieze of wood, which occupies the place of the architrave and the whole entablature. Open timber-work rests on the walls, and rises into the form of a dome, to support a roof that no longer exists, or that perhaps was never finished. The remains of some paintings on wood and in mosaic are here and there to be seen, exhibiting figures in full face, upright and stiff, but having a majestic effect. The nave, which is in possession of the Armenians, is separated from the three other branches of the cross by a wall-so that the unity of the edifice is destroyed. The top of the cross is occupied by the choir, which belongs to the Greeks. Here is "an altar dedicated to the Wise Men of the East," at the foot of which is a marble star, corresponding, as the monks say, to the point of the heavens where the miraculous meteor became stationary, and directly over the spot where the Saviour was born, in the subterranean church below! A flight of fifteen steps, and a long, narrow passage, conduct to the sacred crypt or grotto of the nativity -which is thirty-seven feet six inches long, by eleven feet three inches in breadth, and nine feet high. It is lined and floored with marble, and provided on each side with five oratories, " answering precisely to the ten cribs or stalls for horses, that the stable in which our Saviour was born contained." The precise spot of the birth is marked by a glory in the floor, composed of marble and jasper, encircled with silver, around which are inscribed the words, "Hic de Virgine Maria Jesus Christus natus est." Over it is a marble table or altar, which rests against the side of the rock, here cut into an arcade. The manger is at the distance of seven paces from the altar it is in a low recess, hewn out of the rock, to which you descend by two steps, and consists of a block of marble, raised about a foot and a half above the

floor, and hollowed out in the form of a manger. Before it is the altar of the Magi. The chapel is illuminated by thirtytwo lamps, presented by different princes of Christendom. Chateaubriand has described the scene in his usual florid and imaginative style.

It is adorned with

"Nothing can be more pleasing or better calculated to excite devotional sentiments, than this subterraneous church. pictures of the Italian and Spanish schools, which represent the mysteries of the place. The usual ornaments of the manger are of blue satin, embroidered with silver. Incense is continually burning before the cradle of our Saviour. I have heard there an organ, touched by no ordinary hand, play, during mass, the sweetest

and most tender tunes of the best Italian composers. These concerts charm the Christian Arab, who, leaving his camels to feed, repairs, like the shepherds of old, to Bethlehem, to adore the King of kings in the manger. I have seen

this inhabitant of the desert communicate at the altar of the Magi, with a fervor, a piety, a devotion, unknown among the Christians of the West. The continual arrival of caravans from all the nations of Christendom-the public prayers the prostrations-nay, even the richness of the presents sent here by the Christian princes-altogether produce feelings in the soul,

which it is much easier to conceive than to describe."

Such is Bethlehem, the humble village rendered illustrious by the grandest circumstance in the whole range of human experiences-a circumstance which brought the despised and savagely-neglected poor nearer to their Maker, and, in the course of the development of its purposes, changed the aspect of the whole world, by imparting to it that spirituality of sentiment of which before it had been wholly destitute. It was a revelation of which we have yet but the glimpses; but which, nevertheless, we can distinctly perceive, is gradually producing conditions which will not only ultimately make the inhabitants of the whole earth one family, but which now, in their cumulative action, are rendering mankind more industrious, more virtuous, more confident, more intellectual, and more happy.

Ir the tree do not bud and blossom, and bring forth fruit in the spring, it is commonly dead all the year after; if in the spring and morning of your days, you do not bring forth fruit to God, it is a hundred to one that ever you bring forth fruit to him, when the evil days of old age shall overtake you, wherein you shall say, you have no pleasure.-Brooks.