tower; in the centre of the quadrangle will be a large fountain, and around it trees will be planted. Here, it is hoped, the industrial classes will be able to buy wholesome food at a moderate price. Miss Coutts has also erected " model dwellings" near the grounds of her residence; "Holly Village," with its houses of yellow brick, others of white brick, and some with stone dressings, forms a very pretty appendage to "Holly Lodge," Highgate. We are glad to find, and no sane person could have ever doubted it, that the building of decent dwellings for the poor is a success, commercially considered. Philanthropy has begun a work which commerce may safely take up and finish. The great opponents and slanderers of model dwellings are the shameless owners of squalid property in our large cities, who see that their days of greed are numbered, and that for a far less sum than has for years been extorted from them the poor may be comfortably and respectably housed. The great difficulty with which the humbler classes in London have to contend is the almost fabulous price of land; but this difficulty can be got over by the help of public companies. It has to a great extent been got over by the Improved Industrial Dwellings Company, of which Sir Sydney H. Waterlow is the mainspring. company, at its last half-yearly meeting, reported that its capital had doubled within the past year, and now amounted to more than £80,000. The houses erected by them had never lacked tenants, who heartily appreciated the various advantages offered by their wholesome and cheaply-rented dwellings. The directors regarded their success as clearly demonstrating that failure would never attend any well-organised scheme to improve the dwellings of the poor. They are now content to rely entirely upon the commercial aspects of the question, and they are arranging for more extensive operations, through the assistance of loans from Government. This What is still needed is the erection of a class of house suitable for those who have lately been evicted from their miserable dwellings to make way for City improvements. During the present year as many as sixteen thousand tenements will be pulled down in London, and it is estimated that about one hundred thousand persons would thus be sent adrift. The houses doomed have long been known as fever dens and cholera nests, and one is glad to know that a clean sweep will be made of them, but common humanity requires that there should be accommodation found for those evicted. It is useless to offer them surburban residences and cheap trains. They must live near their work, near the fruit and fish markets. They can afford to pay sufficient rent to make it worth the while of any company to put up houses for their use. As matters are, however, we drive them out of one neighbourhood only that they may introduce the evils of overcrowding into another. On the whole, we think this question of providing decent dwellings for our industrial population should engage the attention of Christian men more than it hitherto seems to have done. It is almost an impossibility for men and women to be good in the fever dens in which so many of them are compelled to live in London. If we could make a poor man's cottage a welcome home to him, we should "outbid the house of gin," and do much in preparing the way for "godliness, which is next to cleanliness." THE BOOK OF MALACHI. (B. C. 420.) INTRODUCTORY NOTE. A COMPARISON of the Book of Nehemiah with this prophecy shows that Malachi was contemporary with that eminent governor of Judah, to whom he seems to have sustained the same relation as that borne by Haggai and Zechariah to Zerubbabel a century earlier. Malachi's prophecy is largely founded upon the writings of Isaiah, as Zechariah's is upon those of Jeremiah. Much of the interest of this book centres in the fact that it formed the keynote of the teaching of John the Baptist, the "man sent from God," whose ministry is in it foretold. We have the same call to repentance, the same exhortation to the relative duties, the same announcement of the coming of the Messiah to sift the wheat and burn the chaff as those which echoed in the wilderness four centuries later. Hence, though not the most modern of all Old Testament scripture (part of II. Chronicles being of later date), it forms a real and most important link between the scriptures of the old and of the new covenants. The name by which the Baptist designated Christ, "He that should come," seems taken from Malachi, and in the self righteousness and unbelief here depicted we see the germs of the Pharisaism and Sadduceeism of after days. The book may be divided into seven sections. The prophet (§ 1) assert's God's love to restored Israel in contrast with His rejection of desolated Edom: condemns (§ 2) the irreligion of the people, and especially of the priests: reproves the people (§ 3) for breaking the Divine covenant by their divorces and intermarriages with the heathen, for which the example of Abraham is no excuse: announces (§ 4) the advent of the Lord, preceded by His messenger: blames the people (§ 5) for neglecting to pay tithes, grounding promises of blessing on repentance: denounces scepticism (§ 6), promising a reward to faith: and again (§ 7) foretells the day of wrath, exhorts to preparation for it by adherence to the law, promises the coming of Elijah, and threatens the land with a curse if his message should be rejected. THE BURDEN OF THE WORD OF THE LORD TO ISRAEL BY MALACHI. § 1 (c. I. 2-5). Lo, I have loved you, saith the Lord of Hosts; And yet ye say, "How hast thou shown thy love ?" Esau was Jacob's brother, saith the Lord, A home for jackals of the wilderness. And when the Edomites shall, boasting, say, Our ruined house," thus saith the Lord of Hosts, § 2 (I. 6--II. 9). Behold a son his father doth regard, A servant fears his master. Am I, then, A master? Where is, then, the reverence due? Present them now unto your Governor! Polluted is the table of the Lord; Its fruit, its meat alike deserve contempt. Lo, what a weariness!" ye say, and lift A scornful head: so saith the Lord of Hosts. Ye brought! Shall I, the Lord, be pleased with these? Who keeps within his flock the unblemished male, Yet vows, and to the Lord doth sacrifice An offering corrupt. Thus saith the Lord, Is terrible among the nations round. And now, ye priests, this message is for you! ye hear not, and lay it not to heart, If To glorify my name: thus saith the Lord, Then shall ye know that I, the Lord, have sent And I, the Lord, have made you mean and base § 3 (c. II. 10-16). Have we not all one Father? Is not God, An evil thing is done in Israel And in Jerusalem! The holiness Of God the Lord, the nation whom he loved, To wife the daughter of a heathen god. Him who doth this the Lord will cut him off From Jacob's tents, both him who keepeth watch A sacrifice unto the Lord of Hosts. This also have ye done, with countless tears Ye have o'erwhelmed the altar of the Lord, Through them who weep and moan; for which no more Doth God regard your offering, nor receive A gift with pleasure at your evil hands. Yet do ye say, "Why is the Lord displeased?" Behold the Lord was witness to the vow Made to the wife whom thou didst love in youth, To whom thou yet hast thus unfaithful proved; But what sought they? They sought a holy seed. And him who violence and wrong doth hide, Behold, the Lord is weary of your words, The way before me, and the Lord, ye seek, |