how neatly you manage, no slopping nor rattling. I don't think I could do it so well." "Nor do I think I

could cut a hedge, plough a field, or manage great strong horses as you do, Richard." Lucy wished her husband to feel at ease, and at home at once, so with womanly tact she began to re-arrange their furniture, asking his opinion as to the effect. "Don't you think this pretty little table the young gentlemen gave me, looks best in that snug corner? And see how well the large bible that master gave you looks upon it. The prayer and hymn-books that mistress gave me should lie on each side; and here is the pretty mat that Miss Mary worked on purpose for me, and the flower-vase Miss Anne gave me, to stand on the Bible, full of flowers. Don't you admire it all, Richard? And now for my work-box, dear little thing! Do you remember when you bought it and gave it to me, you said, 'Lucy, don't let the needles and scissors get rusty.' I must put it where I can see it whilst you are away at work, to remind me I must not be idle. Don't you think beside the clock, on the mantel-shelf, will be a good place for it? The clock will go tick! tick! tick! Lucy Lucy Lucy!' it says, I do not stand still,' and the box will say, 'do not let my scissors and needles rust for want of use.' Now, what shall go on the other side of the clock? Oh! to be sure, the teacaddy your brother William gave me, and called me 'sister;' that shall tell me your relations are mine, now." "How you chatter, Lucy! Do you mean to do all the talking of the house, our house? how grand it sounds! I feel quite a gentleman! our house, our furniture, my wife!” "If I do all the talking, I have not quite all the pride, Mr. Gentleman," said Lucy, playfully.

It was agreed, that the warm and principal meal should be the tea in the evening, when Richard returned from work, and that he should take his dinner in a basket to eat at noon. He much enjoyed his large cup of hot coffee with his breakfast, and during the day, while he worked, the words and tune of the hymn, Lucy and he had sung together at prayers, so "ran in his head" as he called it, that he frequently hummed

them over to himself, and he told her on his return, that he really liked her plan very much, and would willingly take his turn in reading; he had fancied it would make him dull; but it made him cheerful, and he could work better.

When Sunday came, and the neatly dressed young couple attended their usual place of worship, Richard found that their daily home prayers had fitted him to enjoy the public service. He had generally been a regular attendant, but too often a mere hearer, listless, careless. Now, he had got a good-tempered, neat, industrious wife kneeling by his side, and a comfortable home to receive him, his heart was full of gratitude; for he felt that God was indeed our Father, his Father; and he prayed to become more worthy of all the blessings God had given him.

Richard and Lucy's natural feelings of pleasure and pride in the proprietorship of what they had earned, were not a little increased when brother William came over from the town where he worked, to spend Sunday with them, and expressed in warm terms his admiration of their home, and how he wished he might have just such a wife and home as Richard. "Then you must work hard for both, as Richard did." said Lucy, laughing, "nothing that is worth having will come unsought." "How is it then when people are born rich?" said William. "But are they born happy," asked Lucy, "and do riches keep, or make people happy?"

In the afternoon the parents of both the young people came to see them. The two mothers, whose maternal love led them anxiously to scrutinize the new member of their respective families, showed that each was pleased with her son's or daughter's choice, by their closer intimacy, and the warm praise each bestowed on the other's child. The fathers gave each other hearty shakes of the hand as they admired their children's comfortable new home. There never was a happier party, or one more mutually pleased with each other, than that assembled round the Sunday tea-table of Richard and Lucy Clark; and he, the husbandhousebond, in the old homely Saxon of our ancestors— may be pardoned, if honest and openly avowed pride

mixed with his thanks to heaven for his home happiness. There were grateful hearts at that Sunday evening service. Fathers and mothers, with eyes wet with joyful tears, knelt side by side. They had sown the seeds of truth and honesty in their children's young hearts, and they now were reaping the harvest.

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When the hour came for William to leave, Lucy would not hear of his going back that night. She would make him a couch on some chairs, and he could reach the shop as soon as working-time began, after their usual early breakfast. So the great Bible was brought forward; and after a few verses from the sermon on the mount, with which Lucy had commenced her daily readings, they sang a Sabbath hymn of thanksgiving together, and then the Lord's Prayer, and a kind "good night!" Well," thought the young brother, "if this is a young man's home, and this his Sunday, it is much better than standing in lots together at corners of streets, and smoking, or eating sweets, and wishing the public houses were kept open all day. And the reading and singing is not dull, as some people might fancy; it is much better than swearing, and laughing at nothing. I begin to believe that one may be merry and wise at the same time." William Clark found, too, that the short prayer and hymn in the morning did not hinder work; and after a hearty breakfast, he walked briskly back to his work, singing to himself the hymn in which he had joined, Bowring's beautiful "God is Wisdom, God is Love!" softly, but so intently, that he did not greet with much pleasure an acquaintance going the same road, who commenced a conversation on their usual topics.

The feelings aroused by this visit never died away. William Clark had always the character of being a steady lad; but after that Sunday he felt something higher and nobler awakening in his mind; he had now a fixed aim and object in life; and he never forgot Lucy's smiling reply, "You must work: nothing, worth having, comes unsought." He resolved to win and earn for himself a home like that of his brother Richard, a home that might become a stepping-stone to our Father's house of many homes in heaven.

Thus, Richard and Lucy Clark became the happy means of embellishing God's earth with two really blessed homes; blessed, because honoured by God with the power of doing good—for a very small part of doing good is that performed by merely giving money-and, who can tell, how the sight of such calm and holy home happiness may have influenced and improved their neighbours? There is a converse to the proverb, "Evil communications corrupt good manners;" yet the good and wise do not improve the wicked and foolish by yielding their principles of duty and right, but by a firm and gentle adherence to what is good, true, and just. Still, the good and wise do not walk through "the strait gate and narrow way that leads to our better life," with sour lofty looks, intent only on keeping their own spotless robes unsullied;—they help on with sunny smiles and gentle kindness their fellow-travellers. Christ never stooped to conciliate sinners, by acting in accordance with their ideas; he pitied the sinners, but he loathed their sins. We can see, as we read the Gospels,— the dear, the beautiful records of his short life, how the society of our Lord improved his constant companions—all but the wretched Judas, who loved gold better than his good and gentle Master-how John, the proud, the ambitious John, who longed for a throne next that of the "Lord Christ," became meek, gentle, and loving, the duteous son of Mary, after his master's death; and we learn that his last words to his church were, “Children, love one another!" and Peter, ardent, excitable, and like persons of such temperament, subject to sudden impulses, though for a moment he lost courage in the hall of the high priest of his nation, became afterwards so calm, firm, full of high, unbending, quiet courage, maintaining his truth and integrity before Jewish and Gentile tribunals.

Perhaps, dear readers, we may at some future time, trace the onward and upward progress of our friends, Richard and Lucy.

J. A.

OUR young readers will doubtless like to have a short account of George Stephenson, whose life has just been written in a big book. He rose by his own industry and perseverance from being a poor labourer in a coal pit, to a very high station of usefulness and honour.. Railways and steam-carriages are now so common, that to the very young, they must appear as having always been, and boys and girls may never have thought about the inventor of them. George Stephenson was the man who contrived them, and brought them to perfection. His perseverance, under great difficulties, is an example to all, but especially to those who have to teach and support themselves, and make their own: way in life. No one would think of calling George Stephenson a lucky man, for his success seemed to rest mainly upon his own talent and industry. His genius was the gift of God, but had he not been sober and righteous and industrious, this great gift would never have been of any value to him.