deplorable. An old Methodist simply but truly described the country at this period, and of his correct narrative we will here give a free translation.

The land, he tells us, was dark indeed. Scarcely any of the lower ranks could read at all. The morals of the country were very corrupt; and in this respect there was no difference between high and low, layman and clergyman. Gluttony, drunkenness, and licentiousness prevailed through the whole country. Nor were the operations of the church at all adapted to repress these evils. From the pulpit the name of the Redeemer was scarcely heard; nor was much mention made of the natural sinfulness of man, or of the influence of the Holy Spirit. On Sunday mornings, the poor were more constant in their attendance at church than the gentry; but the Sunday evenings were spent by all in idle amusements. Every Sabbath there was practised a kind of sport, called in Welsh Achwaren-gamp, in which all the young men of the neighborhood had a trial of strength, and the people assembled from the surrounding country to witness their feats. On a Saturday night, particularly in the summer, the young men and women held what they called Nosweithian cann, or singing eves; that is, they met together and amused themselves by singing in turns to the harp, till the dawn of the Sabbath. These things, with the performance of rustic dramas, would occupy sometimes the whole of the sacred day itself; while a set of vagabonds, called the Bobl gerdded, or walking people, used to traverse the villages, begging with impunity, to the disgrace alike of the law and the country. With all this social sprightliness, the Welsh were then a superstitious, and even a gloomy people. They still retained many habits apparently derived from paganism, and not a few of the practices of popery. Their funerals, like those of the Irish, were scenes of riot and drunkenness, followed by prayers for the release of the deceased from the pains of purgatory. Such was the superstition of the people, that when Methodism was first introduced among them, many of the peasantry expressed their horror of the new opinions by the truly Popish gesture of crossing the forehead; and when Wesley first visited them, he pronounced them "as little versed in the principles of Christianity as a Creek or Cherokee Indian." To this declaration he added the striking remark, that, "notwithstanding their superstition and ignorance, the people 'were ripe for the gospel,' and most enthusiastically anxious to avail themselves of every opportunity of instruction."

As an illustration of the truth of the remark we have just introduced from the discerning Wesley, we may mention an incident which occurred in 1736. At this period dissent itself was reduced so low in the country, that there were only six dissenting houses of worship in all North Wales. One Sunday, Mr. Lewis Rees, a dissenting minister from South Wales, and the father of Dr. Rees, the author of the celebrated Cyclopedia which bears his name, visited Pwllheli, a town on the promontory of Slëyn, in Caernarvonshire, and one of the few places in which the Independents still had a chapel. After the service, the congregation, collecting around him, complained very sorely that their numbers were rapidly diminishing, that the few who yet remained were for the most part poor, and that every thing connected with their cause looked gloomy. To which the minister replied, "The dawn of religion is again breaking out in South Wales," referring them to the fact, that already a distinguished man—Howel Harris—had risen up, going about instructing the people in the truths of the gospel. Such was the character of the times when God was raising up agents to revive and extend his cause. We shall before long return to Wales with lively interest.

"Such," says the eloquent Robert Hall, "was the situation of things when Whitefield and Wesley made their appearance, who, whatever failings the severest criticism can discover in their character, will be hailed by posterity as the second reformers of England. Nothing was farther from the views of these excellent men than to innovate on the established religion of their country; their sole aim was to recall the people to the good old way, and to imprint the doctrines of the Articles and Homilies on the spirits of men. But this doctrine had been so long a dead letter, and so completely obliterated from the mind by contrary instructions, that the attempt to revive it met with all the opposition that innovation is sure to encounter, in addition to what naturally results from the nature of the doctrine itself, which has to contend with the whole force of human corruption. The revival of the old, appeared like the introduction of a new religion; and the hostility it excited was less sanguinary, but scarcely less virulent, than that which signalized the first publication of Christianity. The gospel of Christ, or that system of truth which was laid at the foundation of the Reformation, has since made rapid advances, and in every step of its progress has sustained the most furious assaults."

It ought here to be stated, as illustrating the providence of God in preparing the British empire for the reception of the gospel, that the revolution of 1688 introduced the spirit of toleration, and in 1714, the very year of Whitefield's birth, Anne, the last English sovereign of a persecuting spirit, died, and the throne was assumed by George I., the first prince of the house of Hanover. The way of the Lord was thus prepared for bright illustrations of his mercy.

Rising from the beautiful valley of the Severn, and on the borders of that noble stream, reposes in antique glory the affluent city of Gloucester, with its regular streets, and its majestic cathedral and other relics of bygone days. In that city the traveller may examine three spots which will long be interesting to the student of ecclesiastical curiosities. The first of these is the ancient church of Mary de Crypt, where reposes the dust of Robert Raikes, the founder of Sunday-schools; the second, is the little stone which, in a pensive-looking inclosure, marks the site on which the truly noble-minded and Protestant Bishop Hooper was burnt, an early martyr of bloody Mary's reign. There wicked men stood around to light up the flames, and to mock his sorrows; but as we stand and look, we exult in the subsequent triumphs of truth.

The third spot, and the one to us at the present moment the most interesting, is the Bell inn or hotel, yet standing, though enlarged and beautified since the period of which we write. There Whitefield—the saint, the seraph, the "angel flying in the midst of heaven, having the everlasting gospel to preach to them that dwell on the earth"—first breathed the vital air. Venerable city, we will rejoice that though within thy walls one glorious luminary of salvation was extinguished, another "burning and shining light" was raised up to diffuse joy and happiness over the two most influential quarters of the globe, and a third has since been given to suggest the simple plan by which millions of the young have already acquired the knowledge of salvation.

George Whitefield, the sixth son of Thomas and Elizabeth Whitefield, was born December 16, 1714, old style. Concerning his father and mother he writes, "The former died when I was two years old; the latter died in December, 1751, in the seventy-first year of her age, and has often told me how she endured fourteen weeks' sickness after she brought me into the world; but was used to say, even when I was an infant, that she expected more comfort from me than from any other of her