Thy shores are empires, changed in all save thee,-- Assyria, Greece, Rome, Carthage, what are they? Thy waters wasted them while they were free, And many a tyrant since; their shores obey The stranger, slave, or savage,--their decay Has dried up realms to deserts:--not so thou, Unchangeable, save to thy wild waves' play-- _Time writes no wrinkle on thine azure brow:_ _Such as Creation's dawn beheld, thou rollest now!_ Thou glorious mirror, where the Almighty's form Glasses itself in tempests; in all time, Calm or convulsed--in breeze, or gale, or storm, Icing the Pole, or in the torrid clime Dark-heaving, boundless, endless, and sublime-- The image of Eternity--the throne Of the Invisible; even from out thy slime The monsters of the deep are made; each zone Obeys thee: thou goest forth, dread, fathomless, alone! Childe Harold. _Canto IV._ [Sidenote: APOSTROPHE TO THE OCEAN.] I will conclude this "first lesson" with the following beautiful remark of an eminent living philosopher:[J]--"To discover order and intelligence, in scenes of apparent wildness and confusion, is the pleasing task of the geological inquirer; who recognises, in the changes which are continually taking place on the surface of the globe, a series of necessary operations, by which the harmony, beauty, and integrity of the Universe are maintained and perpetuated; and which must be regarded, not as symptoms of frailty or decay, but as wise provisions of the Supreme Cause, to ensure that circle of changes, so essential to animal and vegetable existence." [J] Dr. Paris. [Illustration] MORE THOUGHTS ON A PEBBLE. "Not a mote in the beam, not an herb on the mountain, not a pebble on the shore, not a seed far-blown into the wilderness, but contributes to the lore that seeks in all the true principle of life--the beautiful--the joyous--the immortal." Sir E. Bulwer Lytton's _Zanoni_. PART II. More thoughts on a pebble!--is not the subject exhausted? have not all the hieroglyphics impressed on the flint been interpreted?--can Science, like the fabled wand of the magician, call forth from the stone and from the rock their hidden lore, and reveal the secrets they have so long enshrined?--Gentle Reader! but one page of the eventful history of the pebble has been deciphered; I proceed to transcribe this natural record of the past, explain its mysterious characters, and present to thy notice the marvels they disclose.