I cannot help thinking, that the donkey would be a very useful creature in the colony. Though rather an untractable democrat, insisting on having things his own way, he is a hardy, patient fellow, and easily kept; and though very obstinate, is by no means insensible to kind treatment, or incapable of attachment; and then, as an _exterminator of Canadian thistles_, he would prove an invaluable reformer by removing these agricultural pests out of the way. Often have I gazed upon the _Canadian thistle_--that prolific, sturdy democrat of the soil, that rudely jostles aside its more delicate and valued neighbours, elbowing them from their places with its wide-spreading and armed foliage--and asked myself for what purpose it grew and flourished so abundantly? Surely, it must have some useful qualities; some good must lie hidden under its hardy structure and coat of mail, independently of its exercising those valuable qualities in man--patience and industry--which must be called into active operation in order to root it out, and hinder it from destroying the fruits of his labour. The time, perhaps, may arrive when its thick milky juices and oily roots may be found to yield nutricious food, or afford a soothing narcotic to alleviate the restless tossings of pain. I firmly believe that nothing has been made in vain; that every animate and inanimate substance has its use, although we may be ignorant of it; that the most perfect and beautiful harmony reigns over the visible world; that although we may foolishly despise those animals, plants, and insects, that we consider noxious, because their real utility has never been tested by experience, they are absolutely necessary as links in the great chain of Providence, and appointed to fulfil a special purpose and end. "What shall we do for firewood when all the forests are burned?" was a very natural question asked us the other day by a young friend, who, with very scanty means, contemplated with a sort of horror the increased demand for fuel, and its increasing price. Tupper has an admirable answer for all such queries:-- "Yet man, heedless of a God, counteth up vain reckonings, Fearing to be jostled and starved out by the too prolific increase of his kind, And asketh, in unbelieving dread, for how few years to come Will the black cellars of the world yield unto him fuel for his winter. Might not the wide waste sea be bent into narrower bounds? Might not the arm of diligence make the tangled wilderness a garden? And for aught thou can'st tell, there may be a thousand methods Of comforting thy limbs in warmth, though thou kindle not a spark. Fear not, son of man, for thyself, nor thy seed--with a multitude is plenty: God's blessing giveth increase, and with it larger than enough."