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Nothing removes a soul so far from human sympathy as self-repression, especially for any merely human end! The night creeps reluctantly westward; the gray owl wings back to his shady corner; the adventurous snail, half-way up the palm-tree, glues himself to the bark and turns in for a nap. The crocodile has resumed his old position on the rock in the pool, and the flower petal floats on the water.

So I sat down to rest and presently I saw a great serpent, the bigness of a palm-tree, come fleeing towards me, with all her might, whilst her tongue for weariness hung from her mouth a span's length and swept the dust as she went.

The aspect of the place improved, as, after crossing the Esplanade or plain, the carriage drove along roads cut through palm-tree woods, and at length, when I reached my place of destination, I thought that I had never seen any thing half so beautiful.

"The vine is dried up, and the fig-tree languisheth; the pomegranate-tree, the palm-tree also, and the apple-tree, even all the trees of the field, are withered: because joy is withered away from the sons of men." Chancing to take a memorable walk by moonlight some years ago, I resolved to take more such walks, and make acquaintance with another side of nature: I have done so.

When fully ripe the color of the berry turns to a pale yellow and the outer skin is easily removed. The "husked" berries are used for making the white pepper of commerce. Sago is also an important product of Sumatra. It is the starchy pith of a kind of palm-tree the sago-palm. The pith is dried, ground to a powder and washed in order to remove the stringy fibre.

Each panel occupies a space thirty feet long by ten in height, and the bas-reliefs project three or four inches. There is a chief, dressed in a girdle, and with a head-dress of feathers just like those of the Red Indians of the north. Below the girdle he terminates in a scroll. In the middle of the group is what may perhaps be a palm-tree, with a rabbit at its foot.

"I am but a woman, and have often blamed myself for being soft and weak; but as sure as I am faithful to your dead father who you are no more like than a bramble is like a palm-tree so surely will I tear my love for you out of my heart if you if you Now I see! now I know! Answer me-murderer! Where are the seven arrows with the wicked words which used to hang here?

Imagine a room hung with ordinary school slates, imagine that all these slates have been gilt, and that some have been adorned with gold tassels instead of the usual sponge, and into each let there be introduced a dome, a camel, a palm-tree, or any other conventional sign of the East.

And that thou mayest know that I say to thee truth, set thy staff in the earth by the house, and thou shalt see to-morrow that it shall bear flowers and fruit." And anon he vanished from his eyes. And then Christopher set his staff in the earth and when he arose on the morrow, he found his staff like a palm-tree bearing flowers, leaves and dates.

"Do they suppose that a Frenchman is afraid of them?" and so, with an ostentatious sign of the cross, he took his place upon his knees beside the others. Foul, bedraggled, and wretched, the seven figures knelt and waited humbly for their fate under the black shadow of the palm-tree. The Emir turned to the Moolah with a mocking smile, and pointed at the results of his ministrations.