MYSTERIOUS are the ways of God to man! We would willingly believe, nay, we dare not disbelieve, that God's dealings with man are always just; that whatever direction his journey through life may take, or terminate when or how it may, it will not be by a chance road, nor will its end have been undesigned. If indeed our existence terminated at that journey's end, we might well believe that having placed man in his infant cradle God's care and regard for him at that moment ceased, and that his future weal or woe was a matter to Him of utter indifference, and we might even feel tempted to think that He took pleasure in the contemplation of the pain and misery and bewilderment that but too often would be the helpless creature's lot.

Or again, when we might see the young but highly gifted and carefully trained struck down at the very threshold of active life—those gifts and qualities that might have largely contributed to the well-being of others and to the advancement of good in the world, apparently created for nought, wasted for ever—we not unnaturally might contemplate the creation of such a life just as we should look on the act of a human being who should devote the utmost care and skill and labour to produce a valuable and useful machine, and who should destroy it as soon as complete.

We are led to these reflections by the sudden and, humanly speaking, untimely end of Mr. JOHN WALTER, the eldest son of Mr. JOHN WALTER, M.P., the well- known proprietor of the ' Times' news- paper, who lost his life on the 24th of December last in the attempt to save one of his brothers and a cousin who had fallen into the lake in his father's park at Bearwood by the breaking of the ice.

On seeing the accident he had rushed to the margin of the still unbroken ice, and judiciously lying on it at full length and extending his arm to their aid, he was the means of affording them momentary support; but the ice again giving way, he was himself immersed, together with another brother who had also rushed to the fatal spot; and although the help was not long in coming which saved his brothers and cousin, and although he was himself a good swimmer, he had already succumbed to the chilling shock, and a life of the highest promise, as far as this world is concerned, was closed for ever.

It may be asked why, amongst the many deaths which annually occur from accidents, or even in the performance of similar acts of humanity, and which pass unnoticed by us, we should select this especial one, which happened, not on the stormy sea or the surf-beaten shore, but on the still and ice-bound surface of an inland lake ? The query, however, scarce needs reply, for has it not already appeared in the general interest and sympathy which has been awakened throughout the country by the especially affecting circumstances which surrounded the melancholy incident ? Mr. JOHN WALTER, Jun., who was only 25 years old, was a young man of much promise, having great natural ability, being highly accomplished, and gifted with an honourable, upright, and religious mind.

He had only two days previous to his death returned from a tour of eighteen months' duration in Europe, Asia, and America, and in our distant Australian colonies, to further qualify himself for his future responsible career, not merely as an English gentleman and future landowner, but as, in all probability, a Member of | Parliament, and chief proprietor of the ! most influential public journal in the world.

He was, in fact, as typified in our first remarks, the apparently complete and perfect machine, ready to commence the important work of life-long duration; but the Great Maker of the machine had ! perchance another though to us an unknown work for it to perform, and hence it was removed from the intended sphere of its earthly duty.

Although the scene of its removal was not on the sea or the wave-washed shore, yet it was a life given away to save I another, and we feel that without inconsistency we may be permitted thus to j tender our respect for the memory of the I departed and our sympathy with his 1 sorrowing relatives and friends.