Page:Monthly scrap book, for January.pdf/6

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6
THE MONTHLY

successively his hat, jacket, handkerchief, and every other article in his possession, when the brute pausing at each, gave the sailor always a certain advantage, and enabled him finally to regain the vessel.

Though the ferocity of the bear is such, that he has been known to feed on his own species, yet maternal tenderness is as conspicuous in the female, as in the other inhabitants of the frozen regions. There is no exertion which she will not make for the supply of her progeny. A she-bear, with her two cubs, being pursued by some sailors across a field of ice, and finding that, neither by example, nor by a peculiar voice and action, she could urge them to the requisite speed, applied her paws, and pitched them alternately forward. The little creatures themselves, as she came up, threw themselves before her to receive impulse, and thus both she and they effected their escape. Cab. Library.



AN AWAKENED CONSCIENCE.

The following remarkable circumstance is extracted from the "Life and Diary of the Rev. Ebenezer Erskine," just published; and is a very striking instance of the principle within us responding to the voice of inspiration.

At one time Mr Erskine, after travelling, towards the end of the week, from Portmoak to the banks of the Forth, on his way to Edin-