The Dorset County Express and Agricultural Gazette.
Dorchester, Dorset, England, 1869-01-19 00:00:00

THI Prince sod Pane's@ of Wales arrived at Berlin
on Sunday evening, and were reeevied at the nilwey
by the Crown Pile's of pnew.. The Prinse
soPerhaed from his family as Hamburg, and now
Mom& to the Haat.

TRUZ.—To speak harshly to a person or serissinasy
Is like striking • harpsichord with your fist.

Be punctual and methodical in Wainer, and never
proLtastinate.

PRESENTLY.—Nover say you will do presently
what your reason or your conscience tells you should
be done now. No man ever shaped his own dentin'
On the destinies of others, wisely or well, who dealt
much in " prosentlies" bock at Nature. She never
postpones. When the time arrives for the bads to
open, they open —or for tho leaves to fall, they fall.
Look nnwards. The shining world' above never put of
their risii•gs or their settings. The comets even.
erratic as they are, keep their appointments; and
eclipses are always punctual to the minute. There
are no delays in any of the movements of the Ind.
Term, which have been pre.dotormlned by the ab-
solute fiat of the Creator. Procrastination among
the stars might involve the destruction of innumer-
able systems ; procrastination in the operations of
Nature on this earth might remit in lamina, pesti-
lence, and the blotting out of the human race. Man,
however, being • free agent, can postpone the per-
formance of hi, duty; and he does so too frequently,
—sometimes to his own dertruction. The drafts
drawn by indolence upon the future are pretty sure
to be ilinhonoured. Make "Now" your banker. Do
not say you will economise presently, for promptly
you may be bankrupt; nor that you will repent and
make atonement presently, for preeently you may
he judged. Bear in mind the important fact, taught
alike by the history of nations, rulers, and private
individuals, that in at least throe cues oat of five,
presently is too late.
Tug WOMIIIIP OP POWICR.—A supreme regard for
science and the worship of powor go hand in hand
that knowledge is power has been esteemed the
grandest incitement to study. Yet the antidote to
the disproportionate cultivation of science is simply
power in its crude form—breaking out, that is, as
brute form. When 11601100, isolated and glorified,
has produced • contempt, not only for vulgar errors,
but for the truths which are incapable of scientific
proof, then, as we see in the French Revolution, the
wild begat in man breaks from its den, and chaos re-
turns. But all the noblest minds in Europe looked
for grand things in the aurora of this uprising of the
priapic To the terrible disappointment that followed
wears indebted for the training of Wordsworth to
the priest/wood of nature', temple. So was he possessed
with the hops of booming deliverance for the nations
that he spent many months in Frame during the re-
volaUon. At length he was forood to gook safety at
Louis. Dejected even to hopelessness for • time, Ise
believed in nothing. How could there be • God that
ruled in the earth, when such a rising sun of promise
was permitted to set in such a ass I But for a man
to worship himself is by far a much more terrible
thing than that blood should flow like water; the
righteous plague of God allowed thing, to go just as
they would fora time. Bat the power of God cams
upon Wordsworth-1 cannot my as it had never aims
before, but with an added insight which made Lim
recogniae in the fresh gift all that he had known and
felt of such in the past. To him, as to Cowper, the
benignities of mature restored pesos sod calmness
and hope--suffioient to enable him to look back and
gather wisdom. He was first troubled, then quieted,
and then taught. Such presence of the Father has
been an infinitely more active power lathe redemp-
tion of men than men have yet become capable of
Perceiving. The divine expressions of Nature, that
Is, the face of the Father therein •isible, began to
heal the plague which the worship of knowledge had
bred. And the power of her Wog grew from the
comfort to prayer, as will be mania the poem I shall
ere. Higher than all that. Nature can do in the gay
of direct lessoning, is the production of such ktlly
moods as result In hope, conscience of duty. and hup•
plication. Those who have never felt it have to be
told there is in her such a power—yielding to which,
the meek inherit the sert.h.—XngLuairS Antiphon, by
George Macdonald.

QUIST TlEMOw're—EWwwwwwlre.—Quiet thoughts
of evergreens; not unnaturally them take for their
first theme the time of winter, and the persons that
are gone. In the summer the °moos are thick, a-itl
the overgrows" am hid; close muffled intim nobrok o I
masses of oak, and maple, and alder. Bat wander
aortae the kill path when the summer security Las
pared into the autumn panic, and when the autumn
panto Lao passed into the winter hush, and look
across the withered foroglopes at the atript woods,
smitten just now with a smile of saulight The light
and transient leaves are down ant drifted and lust;
but how distinct here and there the dark evergreens
dot the thick fringe of pale, naked woodland, and
stand out detected at ODOe here and therein the wide
spreading of copse; the blue pines, the black yew,
the varnished holly, the glistening box, the dark.)
green spruce fir. In the leafy days of June they
might essay ho overlooked, but not so now, whoa the
crowding and shortlived leaves of the busy summer
have rustled down, and a clear diviiion is made be
tween the lasting and the transient For so it as in
the landscape of the mind ; we have our summer
sermons, when the myriad trifles close in and merge on
gravities of life; and the slighter interests seem et
such times to compete is our regard with the solemn
red endarit g memories. 1 hen Bente winter leisure
comes, aad thoughts luok over the scenery, and In, the
loaves et the idle hours are fied, and here and there
grave and everlasting remembrance stands out dis
tinct and particular iu the gad but sunlit landscape.
Life has its ever-springing foliage, ever-falling,
pushed aside by 13OW thoughts, and interests, aml
pleasures which crowd upon the boughs; soon thin,-
selves to give place to fresh but eq,ally transient ho-
preesionawoys, and griefs, lint it has its evergt ern' ;
marks in khO latilacape, which, ii, hoers sad days of
crowding exoitemeists and cares, may seem obliterated
and forgotten but which are ever in their place, and
in the fallow hours appear again, time after time, just
where aad as they wore, with the old huo, with the
old shape, iiithe old place t things that abide amid
much that pastes sway, things that over recur, amid
mush Mi at is easily forgotten. 0 friends and brothers,
look back at the landscape, as you stand on the hill
top cif life; look back at the familiar scenery: and
amid the myriad naked branches, how here and
there aerials familiar trees that keep their green,
that have, for these years, kept their green, stud the
wide prospect You know just where to look fur
them; they change little or not at all from year to
year; there they are; hue, shape, position, varying
not; this is a darkness, that has a brighter gleam ;
however this bet they stand changeless, amid change;
there they are, if you look for them, amid the fah
leafage of summer; there they are, grave and sedate,
amid the gold and scarlet of autumn; there they are,
in the bare and dread landscape of winter. Many
transient and short-lived events anti feelings there
are in life; but those there are which, in the summer
and in the winter, suffer no change, but are ever.
green for *pr.—Quist Thoughts.
CONOILANSIISTM4I THE NOOK nt CHTNA.—One of
the great pesuliar festival of the Chinese eomes in
the eighth rowed; and lingually called the " Antal*.
sal Festival!' It lasts from the eleventh to the
fifteenth. It incurs eery Deer the middle of autumn,
according at the Chinese reckoning. The moonris •
prominent object of attention and congratulation at
this time. At Canton, it is said, offerings are marls
to the moon en the fifteenth. On the following day,
young people amuse thrmielves by playing what
called ponying' or 'oongratillating" the moon.
At this city, in the observance of this festival, the ex-
pression "rewarding the moon" is more frequently
used than "irongratulating the moon." It is • com-
mon saying that there is " a white rabbit in the moon
pounding out ries." The dark and the white spots
on the moon's face suggest the idea of that animal
ensraged in the useful employment of shelling rice.
The notion is prevalent that the moon is inhabited by
a multitude of beautiful females, who are called by
Ito name of an ancient beauty who once visited that
planet; but how they live or what they do is not a
matter of knowledge or of common fame. To the
question, Is the moon inhabited, discussed by some
Western philosophers, the Chinese would all answer
in the affirmative. Several species of trees and of
Rowers are supposed to flourish in the moon. Some
say that one night in the ancient times, one of the
three souls of the originator of theatrical plays
rambled away to the moon, and paid a visit to Lunar
Palace. Ile found it filled with Lunariang engaged
In theatrical performance.. lie is said to have re-
membered the manner of conducting fashionable
theatres in the moon,and to have imitated them Golds
return to thislearth. About the time of the festival of
the middle of autumn the bake-shops provide an im-
mense amount and variety of cakes; and many of
them are circular, in imitation of the moon at the
time, and are from six to twelve inches in diame-
ter. Some are in the form of a pagoda, or of • horse
and rider, or of a fisher or other animals which please
and cause the cake to be readily sold. Somata these
[neon cakes have a white rabbit, outraged with his
pounder, painted on ono side, together with a lunar
beeuty, and some trees or shrubs; on others are pain-
ted gods or goddesses, animal, flowers, or persona,
according to fancy. The toy shops at this time are
abundantly supplied with& variety of playthings. And
it is customary to illuminate the two large pagodas
in the city for several nights previous to the 16th of
the tith mouth: provided the necessary amount of
money is subseribed, and the eights are not too windy.
The plan sometime" is to hang a lantern at each cor-
ner of the pagodas for several stories, commencing
at the top. After midnight of the evening of tho
fourteenth, if the weather is fine, multitudes of Chi-
nese visit the tops of the throe highest hills in the
place, two of which are located inside and ono outside
the city walls, for the purpose of burning incense to
heaven and earth. Oil two of these hills are built al-
tars, which are made use of by some; on the other
hill there is a temple erected in honour of the divin-
ity often simply called the Pearly Emperor, to which
some of the worStippors resort to burn incense.
Homage is paid to heaven and earth, the divinities,
the father and mother of all things. This adoration by
the burning of incense is performed by the light of
the moon or at least by torchlight, and before day-
break. emit numbers of wooden image., painted
seas to resemble the features of a small child, are
exposed for sale in shops for several days previous
to this festival. Those for boy, and girls are alike,
except in the shape and painting of the top of the
head. Sometimes little pieces of wood, without being
'hinted, but with black marks on them for the eye.,
nose, and mouth, are used in place of the costlier and
more pretty images. Parent, who have had a child
burn to them since the festival in the eighth month
of the preceding year purchase one of those imagos
to represent this child-. The child's name is written
on the back of the image, and it is used to represent
the child in superstitious and idolatrous ceremonies
performed on the day or evening of the fifteenth, and
on mauy other occasions. Many familia, on this day
are at the expense of presenting before the image of
a popular goddess of children, usually called Mother,
worshipped in their dwelling-houses, various offer-
ing" of food in her honour. Many females goon this
day mad burn inoonse in some of her temples, and
pray for male offspring. At thew times, all of the
Images repreirouting .children belonging to the fa.
Emily are brought together and used in the ceremony
performed at home. These images are preserved
with taro mail the children are sixteen years old,
wean the persons bemuse men or women, having
passed out of childhood according to Clauses, law.
After this period no p.irtioular notice is taken of the
Image. But if the child should die before 16 years
of rit.t, it is customary to bury the image which repre-
sents the child in his grave, or, rather, in the lam
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