secret thoughts; read the 5th, 6th, and 7th chapters of St. Matthew, and then look within, and try your human nature by the standard inculcated there."

"Oh, perfection; but you know that is impossible, no one can expect that.'

"What does the last verse of the 5th chapter say?",

Rosamond did not know, and she opened the Bible and looked. Closing it again almost immediately, she said, in rather an annoyed tone,

66

Oh, there is no use in my ever arguing with you, you have always a text ready, and I hav'nt the Bible at my fingers' ends as you have."

She resumed her pen, and continued her work in silence, until the door was gently opened, and a little voice said,

"Rosy, I know my hymn now, will you hear me?"

"Yes, my darling," was the immediate answer, and little Alfred coming in, repeated two or three simple verses, on the love of the Saviour to little children. On concluding, he was covered with kisses by his sister, who promised to follow him directly to his garden, where he was anxious to consult her about some seeds he wanted to plant, for in his estimation nothing could be done rightly without Rosy.

"I think that dear child repeated his verses as if he quite understood and felt the meaning of them," said Madame de Saligny, when Alfred had left the room.

"Yes, I am sure he does, he is a little angel, if ever there was one upon earth. I think you would be puzzled," continued Rosamond, smiling, "to find out any of the dreadful wickedness you talk of, in him."

"And yet he requires the blood of Christ as much as you or I. Had not the Saviour died, he would have been for ever lost."

Rosamond made no answer; she disliked getting the worst of an argument, and she felt she could not meet Madame de Saligny on her own ground: but that night she thought long and deeply on the subject of the tract she had been translating, and on what had afterwards passed between her and her friend. She tried to grapple with the subject with her own unassisted powers, she did not ask for the light and aid of the Holy Spirit, and her mind remained darkened and her heart hardened as to the corruption of her own nature, and the Consequent need of a Saviour.

Repeated conversations on religious subjects with Madame de Saligny, before the latter left Scotland, had the effect of making Rosamond read the Bible with much more earnest attention than

she had ever done before; but as yet the veil was not taken away, she was not humbled before her God: the cry, "God be merciful to me, a sinner," and "Lord, I believe, help Thou mine unbelief,”. these, in the intensity of their entreaty, were unknown to her. But Madame de Saligny hoped and prayed. Unknown to her, her own daily life was having its effect on Rosamond.

Though I cannot see things as she does," thought the latter to herself, "she is true, at all events. I wish I were more like her. No wonder mamma loved her so dearly."

Among the last things that Madame de Saligny said to Rosamond, was to repeat what she had warned her against on more than one occasion.

"Do not make an idol of your little brother; oh, do not love him too much."

And Rosamond answered,

'Oh, it is impossible to help loving him with my whole heart, you do not know what it is to have had him with me ever since the very day he was born; and being without a mother, the poor little fellow loves me better than any one; you can't think how he twines himself round one's heart, with his little endearing ways, and he is so affectionate." "I can very well fancy it," said Madame de Saligny, with a sigh, "he is engaging child I ever saw."

certainly the most

She paused for a

minute, and then went on, "I know it is in love that God has denied me my strongest earthly wish; I have so longed for a child: but it might have proved a snare to me, and drawn away my heart from Him who must have the first place."

"But surely it is not wrong to love one's own flesh and blood."

"Oh no, no; but we must never give that love to the creature which belongs only to the Creator; we should ever be able to say, 'Whom have I in heaven, but Thee; and there is none on earth that I desire beside Thee.'"

This was quite an unknown language to Rosamond, and she remained silent.

"In raising up idols for ourselves," continued Madame de Saligny, "we do but raise up shrines of sorrow; change and disappointment are written on all that belongs to earth."

"Oh," interrupted Rosamond, "I don't fear any change in my darling Alfred, he will always love his own Rosy, and I am sure I could not live without him."

66

My dear girl, do not speak so; we none of us know what we may be obliged to live without. It is right and natural you should love him dearly; but, watch and pray against the sin of inordinate affection, it is one to which a nature like yours is peculiarly prone.

"Farewell, dearest Madame de Saligny," said Rosamond, with her dark eyes swimming in tears; "I am sure I shall never forget your kindness and all your good wishes for me; but I fear I shall never be like you, try as I will.”

"Do not take me for your standard, my dear child; remember your favourite little poem, 'Excelsior.'"

"Yes," said Rosamond, with almost a sigh; “but I fear your 'Excelsior' and mine are different." "Do not let them be so," whispered her friend in her last embrace, before she got into the carriage.

M. and Madame de Saligny were truly “likeminded, having the same love," and they had both deep interest in, and warm attachment to, the family at Glenmona; they talked of little else but them on their first day's journey.

"It was great happiness to me to perceive, even through Colonel Leicester's great reserve, much religious feeling, and I am sure sincere love of God," said Monsieur de Saligny to his wife.

"Yes, I believe it, and I think much increased since his wife's death. I only regret that he keeps himself so greatly shut up; I do not think that even to his children he talks on those subjects which should be the most interesting and important to all."

"Such want of communion on these things is a

D