or ten months old; but yours may be of a longer standing."

Mine, sir," said he, “is more than as many years; but I am still hopeful. My lameness proceeds from a decayed part of a bone in my thigh, and I am now on my way to consult a friend on the propriety of having an operation performed."

"I trust, sir," replied I, "by your demeanour, that you are looking forward with steadiness and courage to whatever may be required of you."

"Oh yes," said he, "I am not at all afraid. The operation will be attended with little or no pain; and if my surgeon recommends me to lose the limb, it shall come off at once. If he says I ought to take chloroform, I will take it; if he says I ought not, I will not. The fine weather is coming on now, and as I shall have, I suppose, to lie in bed some time, the sooner it is done the better."

"Will you allow me, sir," said I, "as a lover of truth, and an observer of mankind, to speak freely with you? I never see a quality that I estimate highly, without being anxious to discover the germ from which it springs. You appear to be possessed of great resolution; may I ask you whence it proceeds? Some time ago I was in company with a Christian man who was about to lose his foot. Though apparently a retired and

timid character, he was as calm, as collected, and seemingly as free from fear as you are. As a pious man, he looked confidingly to his heavenly Father for support in his hour of trial, and found it, so much so that his surgeons were astonished at his steadiness and composure. Tell me, then, sir, does your courage and steadiness proceed from confidence in your heavenly Father, or from the natural stamina of your constitution, and the force and decision of your character?”

"I know what you mean, sir," said he, rather quickly; "I believe in God; but my resolution springs from my own heart. I have hitherto always been equal to every exigency, and doubt not that it will always be the same.'

I ventured mildly to suggest that he was indebted to his heavenly Father for the natural courage of his heart, as much as he of whom I had spoken had been for strength in the hour of trial, and expressed my ardent hope that, should he be called on to suffer, the same merciful and almighty support would be extended to him. Should these remarks, by any accidental circumstance, ever meet his eye, though they will remind him of his conversation with a stranger, they cannot make known to him half the affectionate sympathy his affliction awakened in my mind.

I might go on thus for an hour, relating occur

rences connected closely or remotely with my sprained ankle; but enough has been said to furnish you with another illustration of this tripartite truth, that affliction is oftentimes a blessing to ourselves, that it greatly excites our sympathy towards our fellow-sufferers, and that it may be borne not only with patience, but also with thankfulness and praise.

THE MUFFLED KNOCKER.

Do you see that muffled knocker? I observed it last week, and the week before; it is tied up with an old black glove. When I first passed by it, a servant knocked at the door; it gave a low dull sound that fell on the ear drearily.

A muffled knocker, silent as it is, tells a tale that finds its way to the heart. Sometimes it is of an infant, who having just entered the world, is about to leave it. Sometimes of a child brought home from school with a parched lip, a blood-shot eye, a beating heart, and a rapid pulse with fever.

At other times it is of a husband, whose haggard eye is fixed on his wife, and babes about to be left to a cold-hearted world. Well! "A Father of the fatherless and a Judge of the widows is God in his holy habitation."

But it is not of a babe, nor a schoolboy, nor of a husband in his prime, that the muffled knocker yonder speaks; Abram Ball has not only passed threescore years and ten in the world, but, by reason of strength, completed fourscore.

They say that Abram Ball is on his death-bed, and yet that he is covetous of life. What a picture is that of an old man and death wrestling for a few grains of sand! It was on the Monday of the week before last that a servant went from the house in haste for Mr. Cope, the surgeon and apothecary, and soon after Dr. Downes, the physician, drew up in his carriage. The very next day the knocker was tied up, and ever since then a boy in livery has made an afternoon call with draughts, and pills, and potions.

More people have called at that house the last fortnight than ever called at it before in a month during the time that Abram Ball has lived there. Every one treads lightly on the step, lifts up the knocker slowly, and lets it fall again so gently that no one answers the door until the knocking has been repeated. What is said at the door is said in a whisper.

The old gentleman, they say, is worth a mint of money, and not a few are looking forward to a share of it. But Abram will not part with a sixpence while he can keep it in his clutches. Happy for Abram had he attended to the words, "Better is a little with the fear of the Lord, than great treasure and trouble therewith." got the treasure and the trouble too. flowing bags will not give him the breath that he

He has

His over