Not uninteresting is it to note that in the past few years a great transformation has taken place in the embellishment and adorning of the Scotch "Kirk," in that gifts of pipe organs from our ScotchAmerican benefactor, Andrew Carnegie, are now the ornament of not a few Scotch places of worship; gifts which formerly were considered as "a very fine box of whustles, but an awefu' way of spending the Sabbath." "Tempora mutantur et nos mutamur in illis" (The times change and we change with them).

The most fascinating source of Scotch anecdote is the argumentative encounter between the minister and his people. "I see, Jamie, that ye tak a wee bit nap in the kirk," said a minister of Glasgow to one of his elders. "Can ye no tak a wee bit snuff wi' ye, a pinch o' it wad wak ye up?" "May be it wad," said James, "but put ye the sneeshin' onto yir sarmon, moderator, that'll sarve the same purpose."

Dr. Gilchrist, when minister of the East Parish of Greenock, met one of his parishioners one day who informed him that he had taken seats in an Episcopal chapel because he had changed his religion. "Indeed," said the doctor, quietly, "I never kenned ye had ony."

It was this same minister who was asked by a member of his flock if he could not unmarry him, as his domestic infelicities made his life miserable. "'Deed," said the poor man, "she's waur than the deevil." Dr. Gilchrist entered a protest to that being possible. "'Deed, sir," was the reply, "dinna the Bible tell ye that if ye resist the de'il he flees frae ye, but if ye resist her she flees at ye?"

At the outbreak of the Boer war, a captain of the Gordon Highlanders was reprimanded by his superior officer for

having, upon embarking, a very battered hat, and was recommended a new one. "Na, na,' bide a wee," said the captain, "whar we're gain', faith, there'll soon be mair hats nor heads." This is illustrative of true Scotch repartee with which one still meets in the common life of the Scotch glen.

The critics of our Calvinistic system in this day and generation unjustly charge the theology and religion of the Scot with undue asperity and narrow bigotry. When we think of our standards which are maligned by men who have not historic imagination enough to appreciate them, and sneered out by ethical sentimentalists who have not soul and brain enough to comprehend them, we are driven to the thought that we are living in an age of complacent, incredulous Sadduceeism, whose shallow indifference has doubts about everything religious, and whose mean materialism lets us live as if we were mere creatures ebbing and flowing with the tide.

In protest to such a charge witness Burnbrae's answer to the factor who, upon the authority of his groom, tells this conscientious and just man that the Free Church of Scotland was a result of downright bad temper. "A' wudna say onything disrespectfu', sir, but it is juist possible that naither ye nor yir groom ken the history of the Free Kirk; but ye may be sure that sensible men and puir folk dinna mak sic sacrifices for bad temper." Here we have not simply a picture of Scottish life and character, but a picture of one of the commonplaces of our Presbyterian history. "From scenes like these old grandeur springs, That makes her loved at home, revered abroad."

Scotia's

THEODORE ROOSEVELT.

BY HARRY GRAHAM.

Behold him! Squarely built and small, With hands that would resemble Liszt's,

Did they not forcibly recall

The contour of Fitzsimmon's fists;
Beneath whose velvet glove you feel
The politician's grip of steel.

Accomplished as a king should be,
And autocratic as a Czar,
To him all classes bow the knee,
In spotless Washington afar;
And while his jealous rivals scoff,
He wears the smile-that-won't-come-off.

And since his sole delight and pride

Are exercise and open air, His spirit chafes at being tied

All day to an official chair; The bell-boys (in the room beneath) Can hear him gnash his serried teeth.

In summer time he can't resist

A country gallop on his cob; So, like a thorough altruist,

He lets another do his job. In winter he will work all day,

But when the sun shines he makes Hay.

At intervals throughout the day

He sprints around the house, or, if His residence is Oyster Bay,

He races up and down the cliff; While seagulls scream about his legs, Or hasten home to hide their eggs.

In martial exploits he delights,

And has no fear of war's alarms; The hero of a hundred fights

Since first he was a child (in arms); Like battle-horse, when the bugles bray, He champs his bit and tries to neigh.

A lion is his crest, you know,

Columbia stooping to caress it; With vi et armis writ below,

Nemo impune me lacessit;

His motto, as you've read already,
Semper paratus-always Teddy!
-From the Metropolitan Magazine for
July.

Scribner's Magazine for July contains an article on the negro problem, by Thomas Nelson Page, which summarizes in very vigorous fashion the conclusions to which his investigations have brought him.

John Fox, Jr. (waiting like the other correspondents in the East for transportation to the front) writes an amusing article from a health resort in the mountains near Yokohama, in which he gives a glimpse of a charming type of educated Japanese woman, who knows English and French, plays the harp and the piano, and discusses literature and language.

Captain Mahan describes the campaign on Lakes Ontario and Erie in 1813.

Roger Peacock, whose story of adventure in the west of Canada and the Rockies of the United States, "Following the Frontier," made such a success, is one of Canada's leading poets. A recent volume of Songs of the Great Dominion devotes more pages to Mr. Peacock's poetry than to that of any other contributor.

What has been accomplished in the field. of electric power transmission during the past fifteen years has been due largely to the stimulus of American talent and enterprise. American engineers installed the first commercially successful long-distance electric power transmission plant in 1892, in California-the Pomona plantand with that as an index to future possibilities there were developed in the United

romantic opening to the story. When, in less than a year, the young wife is taken away, leaving a tiny daughter, Lord Stair's grief is almost overwhelming, and he leaves Scotland and spends five years in travel. On his return he makes the acquaintance of his daughter, whom he finds a very winsome, but also a very wilful little maiden. Her intellectual power is wonderful-indeed, almost beyond the power of description or belief.

Soon after her father's return he relates this incident: "Entering the hall one morning I met the little creature coming from the stairway, dragging an enormous book behind her as though it had been a go-cart. She had put a stout string through the middle of the volume, and with this passed around her waist, was making her way with it toward the library.

"Jock,' she said, backing at sight of me, and sitting down upon the great volume, as though it were a footstool, 'did you ever read a book called Old Testament?'

"Not so much as I should,' I answered, realizing with a strange jolt of mind, that it was the Bible she was dragging after her.

"I got it in the attic,' she said, as she climbed upon my knee, and I thought at first it was a joke-book, and after I thought it was a fairy-book; but as I go on, there seems more to it.'"

She received a man's education, and her friends and advisers were almost exclusively men; the result of this training was shown in her business ability, knowledge of the affairs of the world, and particularly in her skill in legal questions. Yet she was truly a woman, with a woman's instincts, charity and deep love, and

deals most skilfully with her many admirers.

Mrs. Lane's wonderful imagination and power of description are shown most strikingly in Nancy's meeting with Robert Burns. Although she is introduced. to him under another name, he recognizes her, and they have a "swap o' rhyming ware." "Take your own gait," says Burns, "I'll follow." So Nancy began rhyming, and Burns was ready with his part. We quote a few lines, which will give every Scotchman a desire to read all. Nancy :

"At break o' day, one morn in May,

While dew lay silverin' all the lea,” Burns:

"A lassie fair, wi' golden hair,

Came laughing up the glen to me." Nancy:

"Her face was like the hawthorn bloom, Her eyes twa violets in a mist," Burns:

"Her lips were roses of the June,

The sweetest lips that e'er were kissed."

66

My sweetest lassie, tell me true.'" Burns:

"My name is Pleasure, sir," she said,

'And I have come to live with you.'

There are many other interesting incidents given in the book, and all the principal characters are strong and well described. It is a most fascinating, imaginative story from beginning to end, and only Scottish characters in historic Caledonia could be used in such a wonderfully dramatic style. The good type, fine paper and attractive binding reit easily takes its place among the most flect great credit upon the publishers, and popular and original books of the season.

R.