WONDERFUL DELIVERANCE FROM SHIPWRECK. mind, at the announcement that the whole ship's company have safely arrived in England again; while this tale of shipwreck reminds us how many calamities there have been and must be which will not end so happily. The story itself is picturesque even among the long and varied stories of disaster at sea. The ship, after making a prosperous start from England towards Sydney, had been thirty-five days out, and was near Pernambuco on the Brazilian coast, on the 7th of October. At eight P.M. on that evening there was a cry of Breakers ahead!' and, before the vessel could answer her helm, she struck upon the fringe of the reef. It was high tide when she took the rock, and, though cargo and gear were instantly thrown overboard, and the spars aloft cut away to ease the ship, the tide fell faster than she could be lightened, and then she lay on the crags. As the tide receded the waves moved the ship backwards and forwards upon them, grinding her bottom; but there was no hopeless leak till the after-part of the ship settled, and broke away the stern post; then she was all open abaft, and the Duncan Dunbar was a wreck. Let anybody who does remember a particularly snug night on the 7th of October picture this one. Black, wild, desolate water; the ship flung to and fro like a groaning, writhing creature; the sea birds screaming in the darkness; and no choice for the people on board but to wait till dawn should reveal whether there was a patch of the fatal reef above water to land upon, if the vessel could hold together till daylight broke-for such was the position of the passengers and crew of the Duncan Dunbar. Nobody could be sure whether even a chance of safety remained. But if the spot on which they had struck should turn out to be that marked on the Syren Beacon, the officers knew there ought to be dry rock or sand; and should the vessel stand the night out, this barrier remained between death and the crowd of women, children, and men, who passed all those hours rolling backwards and forwards on the reef, while every wave that broke over the decks seemed to be the last that the battered ship could stand. Descriptions and contrasts will not revive the terrors and the truths of a night like that; and yet the old, old story is told; the conduct of the English women was beyond praise. It is impossible,' says the report, to speak too highly of the conduct of the ladies at the time the vessel struck, and during the whole of that most fearful night. Not a scream was heard, and with perfect resignation and quietness they awaited the termination of that trying WONDERFUL DELIVERANCE FROM SHIPWRECK. state of things, whether it should result in their preservation, or their being swept into the dark and horrid waters around us.' After that there is no need, and there ought to be no need, to say how the men behaved. At dawn, surely enough, two banks of sand were to be seen through gaps in the breakers; miserable patches of soil, which hardly merited the description of dry land; yet they were life to look at. By seven. A.M. everybody was transported to the inhospitable resting-place; and the tiny islets being covered with pigweed, large earwigs, and land crabs, it was clear that the tide seldom or never washed over the entire surface. A lieutenant once saved the lives of his crew by keeping them from leaving a rock which they had reached at night from a wreck, by feeling in the dark that samphire grew upon it. The passengers and crew of the Duncan Dunbar felt they had now a little respite, if they could get provisions from the wreck, and the attempt to obtain the necessary food was successfully made; water, biscuits, beer, wine, and ship's beef were rowed and rafted to the sandbanks. There were besides upon them innumerable birds, which were too unaccustomed to men to move out of the way on their approach. Death, therefore, was no longer imminent; but the ladies dined on nearly raw meat and biscuit, and the men had to sleep on the open sands among the land-crabs and large earwigs. On the 11th Captain Swanson, who seems to have behaved like a sailor throughout, started in one of the lifeboats, to which they had fitted a mast and sails on the reef, with the purpose of reaching Pernambuco, taking with him one passenger and six seamen —those left on the reef working in their absence to get all they could out of the ship before she broke to pieces. During the interval five vessels passed in view, but failed to make out the forlorn party on the low sand-bank. On the 17th-after nine days of this wholesale Robinson Crusoe-like life-a steamer was seen approaching, which turned out to be the Oneida. Captain Swanson had been picked up, after heavy weather, by a vessel, and taken into Pernambuco, which was found to be two hundred and sixty-nine miles distant. The rest can be guessed. The good steamship soon picked off the castaways. The three little palm trees, the land-crabs, the large earwigs, were again left, with the sea-birds, to the winds and waves. Safe in life and limb, not a soul lost, the passengers and crew of the Duncan Dunbar have been brought back again to England, which they left more than POETRY. sixty days ago. The officers think that at spring tides, with a northerly wind, the sea would wash clear over the islets. If that had been so, or if Captain Swanson's lifeboat had been swamped, the story of the Duncan Dunbar, instead of being this gallant tale of seamanship, endurance, and old Saxon self-help, would have been comprised in the brief phrase, “and has not been heard of since." Poetry. ABIDE WITH ME. ABIDE with me. Fast falls the eventide ; Swift to its close ebbs out life's little day; Come not in terrors, as the King of kings, Thou on my head in early youth didst smile, I need thy presence every passing hour; I fear no foe with thee at hand to bless; Where is death's sting? Where, grave, thy victory? Hold thou thy cross before my closing eyes, Heaven's morning breaks, and earth's vain shadows flee; LYTE. ANECDOTES AND SELECTIONS. Anecdotes and Selections. THINK OF THE EVENING OF LIFE, of the vanishing of all mortal things, of the shadow that death will cast, of the soul's departure through that mysterious shade, of the morning on the other side, of the sunless city, the cloudless skies, the stormless shores, the happy multitudes, the swelling songs, the wonder, the rapture, and the rest. Think any such thoughts with prayer and faith, and your soul must be lifted at least somewhat above the dust and drudgery of this vexing and down-dragging world; must be drawn away from its cares and defilements; and as you grow stronger and happier among these superior things, you will say gladly, "The Saviour has led me to-night into one of his quiet resting-places; this is the rest and this is the refreshing wherewith he causeth the weary to rest." LANTERN-BEARERS.-"Let your light shine," said the Saviour. The light of some men-like Paul, Luther, and Wesley-shone strongly like that from a high lighthouse. Other men's light may be only like a candle in a lantern; and yet he who bears it may show the way. Thomas Dakin, a Greenwich Pensioner, was one of these. He gave away 100,000 tracts every year, and when he died his pockets were found stuffed full with them. Reader! mark the words " your light." Have you any? use it. Have you none? Christ will give thee light. Ask him. "POKER, TONGS, AND SHOVEL."-Sidney Smith, who was not very nice in religious matters, hated swearing. Being in company with some young fellows much given to that wicked habit, the witty parson, in talking with them, often made use of the words, "poker, tongs, and shovel." They could not at first tell why he did so, but they found out at last that he did so to show how ridiculous as well as foolish their conduct was. THE SHEPHERD'S SONG.-This Twenty-third Psalm is the nightingale of psalms. True, it is small and of a homely feather, and was first sung from a bush in the fields of the village of Bethlehem, only an obscure spot; but it has filled the air with joyful echoes which will never die out, but echo and re-echo as long as this world goes rolling round the sun. Blessed be the day when this Psalm was born! STOPPING THE SWEARERS.-It is said of Rowland Hill, that once on returning from Ireland, the captain of the ship swore at the mate, and the mate at the captain, and both of them at the wind. "Stop! stop! it's my turn now," cried Mr. Hill; and they did until they found he would not swear at all; neither did they again during the voyage. THE FIRESIDE. THE PENNY POST BOX. The Fireside. OUR HOME IN EARTH AND HEAVEN. It is not the walls of the building in which we live that makes our earthly home, but the company of those we love. A little boy, about six years old, was returning from school one day. He bounded into the house, exclaiming, as he hung his cap up in the entry, "This is my home! my own home!" A lady, on a visit to his mother, was sitting in the parlour. She said to him, "Willie, the house next door is just the same as this. Suppose you go in there and hang your cap up in the entry, would'nt that be your home as much as this?" 66 "No, ma'am," said Willie very earnestly, "it would not." Why not?" asked the lady. "What makes this house more your home than that?" Willie had never thought of this before. But after a moment's pause, he ran up to his mother, and throwing his arms round her neck, he said, "Because my mother lives here." It is the company of those we love which makes our earthly home; and it is just so with our heavenly home. A Sunday school boy lay upon his dying bed. His teacher sat on the bedside, holding the hand of his scholar. "I'm going home to heaven," said the boy. "Why do you call heaven your home?" asked the teacher. "Because Jesus is there." This dear child loved Jesus. He felt that it was the presence of Jesus that would make heaven feel like home to him. This would make him happy there. And if we love Jesus as we ought, we shall feel so too. When we think of him, we shall be ready to say: ""Tis where thou art is heaven to me, The Penny Post Box. A CHEAP WAY OF DOING GOOD. GOD is good, and doeth good. Jesus Christ went about doing good. Every good man and woman loves to do good. I suppose most of your readers are such as cannot spare much money or time in trying to do good. Well: here is a very cheap and easy way. A good book, full of good things, is likely to do good. Pioneer is one of these. The |