But now comes the question. Am I certain my present ideas of the Greek Church are correct ?—and it is to obtain a satisfactory answer, Madam, that I now appeal to you, or your correspondents. Gladly would I know something of the present state of the Greek church-not so much of its practice, which I believe is notoriously low and degraded, but of its formularies, its written doctrines and laws, as held by all its authorities. For I suppose every one will acknowledge a difference between a church however fallen in practice, whose laws do not forbid the efforts of an enlightened servant of God, and another which requires from its ministers adherence to doctrines essentially false. Have I been wrong in supposing the Greek church to be of the latter description?-wrong in believing that it teaches the saving efficacy of the sacraments and of ascetic selfrighteousness, the intercession of the saints and especially of the Virgin-the substitution of penance for repentance, of priestly absolution for the forgiveness of God, with many other distinctive features of the Romish faith. Have I been wrong in supposing, that there exists in the authorities of that church power to silence, or expel any who presume to teach opposing truths-and that there exists in its formularies some test analogous to the thirty-nine Articles which would effectually prevent any enlightened Christian from taking orders in it?

I should be much obliged for any definite information on these points, for I fully believe it would be the means of conveying new knowledge to a large majority of educated English readers. The Greek church is so distant from us, and so unconnected

with us, that few have ever thought of investigating its present condition and doctrines.

And I should be glad, I confess (though this is not my primary object in writing) if any one personally interested in Assaad, and the Society of which he is the agent, would clear up the difficulties of the subject; would tell us what he is doing in Syria, and how he is doing it: would [reconcile his efforts and agency with Mr. Herschell's statements; would say frankly what was the nature of the instruction (whether merely intellectual or religious) which he gave his twenty-two boys for two years, and which was so easily amalgamated with the teaching of the Greek church; and lastly would give some reason for the reserved and uncandid tone of Assaad's addresses, and tell us why the principal instrument of this hoped-for reformation in a fallen church, should hide from us the deep evils, to remedy which he sought our aid; giving us amusement rather than information, and pleasing the ear by words which failed to enlighten the understanding.

Q.

THE OTTER.

We have a duty to perform: often an onerous, sometimes a thankless, and not unfrequently a very painful duty. Nevertheless, seeing that we must give account to God for the use made of every talent entrusted; and in an especial manner for the due exercise of such measure of influence as he has seen good to invest us with among the readers of our periodical, we will endeavour to perform it faithfully. On the present occasion we are constrained to raise a protesting and a warning voice, which we most heartily wish had power to penetrate to every corner of the empire, dissuading the sisters of our race from being led by any example, however elevated, into the abandonment of that tenderness of character with which God has generally invested them: as though it was, as indeed we firmly believe it to be, His gracious purpose that woman should ever interpose to soften the rougher feelings of man, and to restrain his severity towards the poor dumb creatures that we see around us, subjected to the many bitter sufferings brought into the world by woman's sin.

The fact referred to in this paper is too notorious to need much introductory or explanatory matter. Her Majesty the Queen, (whom God preserve from all evil!) has been sojourning for a short time in Scotland, enjoying the pure delight of daily contem

plating the mighty works of God in scenes of the most magnificent character, where grandeur, beauty, harmony combine to bespeak the glorious power and the inexhaustible mercy of Him who framed them. Scenes so far remote from the strife and the turmoil of men's busy haunts, that in reposing among them, a gentle spirit might almost manage to forget that the world is at war with God and with itself: might realize the coming blessedness of earth when that unnatural warfare shall cease; when the wolf and the lamb shall dwell in peace together, and none shall hurt or destroy. We do not wish to darken the shades by dwelling too long on the lights of the picture suffice it to say that under some influence of which we know nothing, the royal lady was induced to consider one thing wanting to complete the fulness of enjoyment in this lovely and magnificent spot. What that was we cannot say, for we are unable to find a word rightly to express it without giving offence. Sport we will not call it; but by such a perverted term we believe it was spoken of by the evil advisers of our Queen.

When the graceful deer, wild in all the gladness of their mountain liberty, and gambolling more in playfulness than in fear, before the steps of men employed to drive them to the slaughter, or stalking in majestic grace, pursued their leisurely way into the snare-when these, being thus brought within a secure aim, were shot by the Prince Consort, under her Majesty's eye, there was at least this consoling point, that the lovely and noble victims were slain outright, and slain also for food; and probably with far less suffering than the other animals, sheep and oxen, that are cruelly goaded over many miles of

highway road, and finally slaughtered in the city shambles. The gratification attending the spectacle of a death-struggle in any creature whatever, and more especially in that most splendidly beautiful creature the stag, we cannot appreciate as a matter of taste, or a matter of nerve, or a matter of science, or a matter of triumph, we are wholly inadequate to judge of it. As a matter of necessity we have witnessed it; we have witnessed DEATH, and we know that, so far as bodily suffering is concerned, so far as the extinction of glowing life, and the substitution of grim and ghastly death goes, there is a similarity in its accompaniments calculated to impress with awful emphasis the humiliating truth on man's reluctant mind, that he and the creatures whom he slays are brethren of the dust; formed from the same material elements, and to them, in sad equality, destined to return. Still, as regards the poor stag, death by a gun-shot wound is so far, so very far more merciful than the savage hunt, that if venison must be had, we pass no censure on the man who thus brings down the noble creature by a sudden, and it is to be hoped an instantaneous stroke.

But, unhappily, we have worse things to record; painful, revolting, and such as we must and we will present in a truthful aspect to our readers, lest by any means they should overlook the danger of pleading high human example for an act in itself irreconciliable with their relative duties in softening and restraining the harsher propensities of man, and in mitigating the sufferings of those helpless creatures that are unable to plead for themselves.

The otter is a poor little timid animal, about two feet in length, with a long tail, and an odd, but