Whene'er we leave the beaten, well known way.
We need a faithful guide by night and day.
The foolish man all caution will deride;
He wants no sage ^dvice; he wants no guide
Across the fields, across the trackless snow
He goes: he sinks into the depths below.
 

In the engraving annexed we have a wintry scene—we see a man sinking into a stream, or lake of water. This traveler, confiding altogether in his own judgment, attempts to "make a journey across the country in the winter when the fields are covered with snow. He has been advised to go round by the road which has been somewhat beaten, but as the distance is much shorter across the fields, he is determined to take this latter course. The snow has covered the face of the country as with a mantle. The miry sloughs, the pools, and streams are frozen over, and hid from observation. Our traveler, elated with the prospect of soon arriving at his journey's end, presses forward. The way appears plain and unobstructed. The cautions he has received in his case appear to have been needless. But, all at once, as he treads through the light snow on the thin ice of the deep pool, he is in a moment plunged into the depths below.

Thus, the traveler, by trusting to appearances, has been wofully deceived. The truth of our proverb has been often illustrated by many events which have taken place both in ancient and modern times. It has often happened that when nations, or individuals, have arrived at the summit of power—when their mountain, to appearance, seemed strong and immovable, then it was, by some sudden and unforeseen occurrence, they were hurled from their position, and became humbled in the sight of all.

Some striking illustrations of the deceitfulness of outward appearances have taken place in modern times. Witness the overthrow of the great Napoleon, the greatest captain of the age, who, apparently, was about to sway the destinies of the world, by his formidable legions collected from the most powerful nations of Europe. View his defeat, primarily by the rigors of a Russian winter, his exile, and his death on a barren rock of the ocean.

View also the deceitfulness of appearances in the recent case of Louis Phillippe, who was considered the "most prosperous, the most powerful, and accounted the ablest sovereign in the world. His numerous and dutiful children, his brilliant alliances of them recently concluded, his immense private fortune, and eleven or twelve palaces, unequaled for magnificence, a splendid army of four hundred thousand, a metropolis fortified and armed to the teeth against the world, the balance of Europe, the causes of people and kings, the issues of peace and war were apparently in his hands." From this elevation he became, in the course of a week, a wanderer and a vagabond in his own dominions.

A thief passes for a gentleman, when stealing has

made him rich. A thread-bare coat is armor proof against robbers. A wise man makes more opportunities than he finds. A woman's work, and washing of dishes is never at

an end.