"I SHALL be very happy-won't you -when we have a little money laid by," said Philip Clayton's pretty wife, as she poured out tea for him in their cheerful little parlor, through whose open window stole the soft breath of summer, laden with the fragrance of the sweet-briar that fringed the grass-plot, and the honeysuckle that draperied the rustic porch.

“I am very happy now,” replied Clayton, smiling, as he glanced from the fair face that looked on him to the laughing boy who was romping with a spaniel on the grass.

:

Well, and so am I," said Mrs. Clayton, smiling also it would have been strange if she was not happy, with a husband who loved her devotedly, and no sorrow or danger glooming on the sunny horizon of her life. "But you know what comfort and satisfac

I mean-it will be a great tion when we are able to lay up something as a provision for the future. And think what a pleasure it will be to find the interest coming in at once to help us!"

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No, no " laughed Clayton; "to carry out the thing properly we must not spend the interest, but lay that up also to accumulate into a large fortune by the time we are three or fourscore years old. But come, Hetty, let us not concern ourselves so much about a future that may never come. If it does come, God will, I trust, enable us to provide for it; but the blessings of the present are ours to enjoy and be thankful for. So give me another cup, and then let me hear that song you sung me yesterday; it has been echoing in my ears all day; and every line I wrote seemed to be accommodating itself to the tune."

So the song was sung, and others followed, drawing the child dancing in from his gambols to hear the music, and the evening passed pleasantly as it was wont to do, making Mrs. Clayton forget, in the happiness of the present, her anxiety for the future.

Years passed by, and found and left as great and yet greater happiness at the little cottagefor other childish voices made its walls resound with merriment, and not one blessing had been recalled, to leave a shadow on remembrance;

and, moreover, the cherished wish of Henrietta seemed on the point of being realized; for the first five hundred dollars were very nearly amassed, by their care and frugality, out of Philip's salary from the banking-house where he was a clerk; and already his over-anxious wife reckoned the interest, as the small yet welcome addition to their income which should enable the second five hundred to be more quickly collected.

On the other side of the clear stream which glided quietly through the village stood a house, whose inmates had known far less of prosperity than was the portion of the Claytons. Yet there had come a brightness over their prospects; and after many misfortunes, Richard Allen thought that the clouds had passed at length, and the long delayed sunshine was gleaming forth; for a situation as clerk promised him not merely a competence, but the means of setting his son, a fine boy of fifteen, forward in the world. He had been but six months in his situation, and twice that time in the neighborhood, where he was of course but little known, though that little was calculated to win respect; and of all, Clayton perhaps knew and liked him best.

One evening they were leaning over the bridge that spanned the stream, watching Frank Allen as he altered, and worked at, and launched, and guided on its course, the little boat which Harry Clayton six years his junior -was unable to make sail down the stream, and they smiled to see how the child clapped his hands with delight, and how pleased Frank was to aid the ignorance and awkwardness of his little companion.

"Strange," said Allen, "that as men we should lose the feelings which seem inherent in us in childhood and in boyhood. In those years our first impulse is to help those who are weaker or more inexperienced than ourselves. But as time passes, those feelings die away and are forgotten; and how seldom it is that we find men pleased and eager to extend a helping hand to those who are less fortunate than themselves! How much more frequently do they appear to exult in their advantages all the more that others are without

them! And if they do aid a feebler brother, is it not usually done coldly and reluctantly, as an acknowledged but disagreeable duty, instead of with the pleasure and alacrity which characterized our boyhood's exertions to help those who needed?"

"There are exceptions," replied Clayton, "and I would wish to think they are numerous."

"So would I," said Allen, "and they ought to be numerous; for surely every year of our lives shows us more and more how dependent men are on their fellow-creatures, in some shape or another: it seems designed to teach us mutual kindness, charity, and forbearance; but the lesson is too often unheeded, and sometimes read backwards to serve a different end. But don't think me a grumbler, or a misanthrope, because I say this. I know there is much good in the world; but I cannot help saying that there might be, and ought to be, much more."

"I suspect we need only look into our own hearts to own the truth of that," said Clayton, smiling. "But here comes Mrs. Allen, and I know my good little housewife has been impatiently waiting for us this hour past."

And so she had been; for with all her prudence and frugality, Mrs. Clayton was very proud of her cakes and her preserves, and the Allens were at all times among her most welcome guests. There were but themselves this evening; and long was it remembered, and often in after days Henrietta would tell how, when they were going away, Mrs. Allen went back to kiss the children a second time as they slept, and how Mr. Allen said, as he shook her hand,

"What a very, very happy evening we have passed!"

She and Philip stood at the door until their friends crossed the little bridge homewards: they watched the crescent moon sink behind the distant hills, and then, closing the door upon the dimmer light which gleamed in starry rays on bough and stream, there soon was rest and silence in the cottage, as everywhere around.

It might have been two hours after when the loud barking of a dog awakened Clayton. His first idea was that it was broad daylight, so bright a light was shining through the window. But in another moment he was conscious that the glow was redder than that of the reddest morning. And springing to the window, he saw flames bursting from the Allens' house.

Clayton hurried to the spot. A crowd was beginning to gather around the house, but its inmates still slept. Efforts were made to arouse them to a knowledge of their danger, which became every instant more imminent, so rapidly

the flames spread and strengthened, and the door was forced open at the same moment that a wild shriek rose from within; but suffocating smoke rolled through the doorway, and flames darted their forked tongues round the staircase, and nobody dared to enter.

Mrs. Allen was speedily seen at a window. "A ladder-a ladder!" was loudly called for but there was none at hand; and while some ran off to the nearest place to get one, the unhappy woman cast herself down upon the gravelled walk to escape the fiery death she dreaded. She was taken up insensible, and carried to the cottage which she had quitted in health and happiness so few hours previously. In another minute Allen, who had gone to arouse his son, came with him to another window. The ladder had arrived, and was quickly planted at it, and he was observed desiring Frank to descend.

"Allen! Allen! save yourself; your wife has escaped!" cried Clayton.

The last words never reached the ear they were addressed to; but were lost in Allen's answering cry of "No, no !--my wife, my wife!' as he disappeared to seek the partner of his many years' wanderings and misfortunes.

"Allen! Allen!" was echoed in twenty voices to call him back. But a crash followed-some part of the flooring had fallen in, and he was never seen again.

Wildly the flames rose and fell, despite the quantities of water from the stream which had been so lavishly cast upon them, flickering, and dancing, and soaring up towards the sky, whose stars were now invisible; and casting a broad, red radiance on the crowd, the wide, smooth meadows and the waters of the quiet stream. Frank Allen sat on the grass, gazing on the fiery mass which blazed, and hissed, and crackled, above the form he had so loved and honored Just old enough to feel to its full extent the anguish of that moment without the capability of endurance which added years might have imparted, he watched the remorseless flames with an intensity of grief which forbade all attempts at consolation, and resisted every endeavor to withdraw him from the spot.

The night passed, the fire began to die out, and the rising sun found a heap of smouldering ruins where he had left a happy dwelling; while beneath them lay what had then been a living and breathing form, in full health, and all the strength and energy of manhood's prime. Then Clayton led away the sorrowing boy to his own home, where for the first time he learned that his mother, whom he had thought safe and well, was suffering greatly--it soon proved dying-beneath the same roof; and the dawn of another day found Frank Allen

alone-an orphan and destitute, without a relative or a friend from whom he had a right to claim protection or assistance.

But this thought did not at first come to grieve him, for all considerations of self were lost in deep and overwhelming sorrow; and he alone was careless of his future lot, while the whole village was busy talking over it, and wondering what it would be. There had been some doubt, too, about the funeral, when it was known that the Allens left nothing; but Clayton set that at rest at once by charging himself with the expenses; and when that day was over, Frank Allen's fate was the undivided subject of conversation.

It was a long walk which Philip Clayton took that night. When he returned, he found Frank Allen still watching the heap of ruins with which he thought all the happiness of his life had fallen for ever. And even so Clayton mused; his own Harry, yet younger and more helpless, might have mourned over the desolation of his home, and been cast upon the coldness and the charity of strangers. But his mind had been made up fully during that long and solitary walk, though indeed the purpose had been gathering there stronger and stronger all the while.

Yet he feared to tell his gentle, loving Henrietta, for he knew that though she had tended Mrs. Allen as though she had been a sister, and wept with Frank, and strove to soothe and comfort his grief with all a woman's tenderness and softness, still money was too dear to her to be easily parted with, even for the sake of one whom she pitied and sympathized with so deeply. But Philip was resolved; and though on hearing that he was going to pay two hundred and fifty dollars as an apprentice-fee for Frank, to secure for him proper instruction in the line for which his father destined him, his wife shed more tears than words of his had ever caused her to shed before, and reproached him bitterly with throwing away the money they had so slowly gathered, he still was firm; for the memory of Allen's words came as a bitter reproach to human nature, in which he could not bear to share.

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"You ought to think of your children!" said Henrietta, pressing the youngest to her bosom, as if to guard it from some evil which his father's act was drawing down upon it.

"I do think of my children," replied Philip, with much emotion, as he took the other little one in his arms, and glanced out at the field opposite, where Harry was vainly striving to draw Frank from his sorrowful contemplation of the sad dark spot Lefore them. "I do think of my children; and that, if there were nothing else,

would bid me act as I am doing. For I think, Hetty, that one of our beloved ones might have been left desolate as Frank has been. And I think also, Hetty, that we know not how much they may yet be dependent on the kindness and bounty of others. And this thought alone would make me do to Frank as I would should be done. unto my own children."

"But this will only make them poorer, and more likely to be so dependent," urged Mrs. Clayton, in a tone of feebler remonstrance.

"Ob, Hetty," said her husband, "I wonder that with so much of love there can be such devotion to Mammon in that kind little heart! Do you forget that poverty and riches depend on a mightier will than ours?"

Then I suppose it must be so," sighed Henrietta. "But it must be a long while yet before we can have any money out at interest."

Clayton did not answer; but he had learned to know this was indeed a bitter disappointment. However, the letters were written, inquiries were made, and by using every exertion he got Frank most advantageously situated in a mercantile house, in the East India trade.

Five or six months after, Clayton received a letter by some encountered vessel, full of the outpourings of a young heart's gratitude; and a year after there came another, but it was the last In another year Clayton wrote to the owners, when he heard that the ship had been chartered and employed in going from one part of India to another, and had not returned, but that no accident to Frank Allen had been reported. So as his own letters to Frank remained unanswered, Clayton supposed that his young charge had grown weary of gratitude. Yet, though Henrietta sometimes drily intimated that it was an unmerited return for all his kindness, Philip never regretted the part which he had acted, for he wanted not gratitude and thanks, but merely the consciousness of doing right, and the approval of his own heart. This was pleasanter to him than the gratification of her darling wish-the having money at interest, which had been at last attained—was to his pretty, gentle, and amiable, but anxious and calculating wife.

How quickly years glide away, and how soon people are forgotten when they are no longer seen! It took little time for a Frank to pass from everyone's remembrance but the Claytons'. And then Clayton moved to a distant city, where a higher salary was given him by another bank, and he and his were soon forgotten.

The fleeting years were pleasant to the Claytons. Their children grew up fair and promising. Already Harry was in a solicitor's office; the

younger boy, William, was to be a medical man, and the little Violet was as lovely and modest as her name-flower. And Henrietta had another happiness-they had laid by many hundreds now; and it was not merely the usual interest that was received for them, for Clayton had been admitted to a share in the concern, and the sum that he invested returned him a per centage far larger than that given to depositors.

But sunshine cannot last for ever The first cloud was a change in Clayton's health. A severe illness, followed by a stroke of paralysis, left him with his powers of mind unimpaired, but so infirm as to preclude all hope of future exertion. Then what comfort it was that they had so well guarded against an evil day. And what a satisfaction that Clayton had obtained the shares in the stock, now that he could do nothing to make an income; and the mere interest of their savings would have been very little for their support. But within a couple of years the bank broke, and all was lost, the shares which had seemed such a blessing only serving to make ruin more complete; for he was involved in the liabilities, and the policy of insurance, which had always rendered his mind easy on his wife's account, was taken from them.

Still there were their sons-Harry, two-andtwenty, and William, seventeen--who were eager to exert themselves for their parents and sister. The younger's prospects of course were altered; but a situation in the custom-house was obtained, enabling him to be at once an assistance to the family. And Harry was in high hopes that he should get into practice as an attorney, for which he was now qualified. He appeared to be doing so for a few months; but he shortly after met with a severe fall, which inflicted a spinal injury, with which he might linger on for years, but only to grieve over the thought of being a burthen to those he hoped to have supported.

William's small salary was now their only resource. To add to it, Violet went out as a teacher, though her youth made her reward but trifling. So passed another year, and still Harry, at nearly four-and-twenty, lay a dead weight on the struggling efforts of his young brother and sister, without a hope of recovery or-he would often have said, but for fear of grieving those who loved him-even a hope of death. Clayton retained much of his former cheerfulness, and strove to support the spirits and courage of his son under this painful trial; while for his sake also the fond mother checked her own repinings, and strove to give to their humble dwelling the comfort and the home-look which it formerly wore.

One day the captain of a ship at the custom

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"It is Philip Clayton," replied the youth.

"It must be the same-and you are William !" exclaimed the sailor, grasping his hand. "Tell me only that all are well."

A shade came over William's face.

"My father is not in good health, and my brother is ill," he answered, sadly.

The joyful look of the sailor was dimmed also. "You will take me to see them," he said "I have often longed for an opportunity; and hoped if ever this hour arrived, I should find no sorrow with those I have always remembered as being so happy."

In half an hour William's duties were over, and they left the custom-house together. Young Clayton did not ask his companion's name, nor did the sailor tell it; though before their walk was ended, his anxiety to know all about his old friends had gleaned almost their entire history from William's ingenuousness. Yet, though somewhat prepared, it was a shock when Mr. Clayton stood before him, weak and tremulous, stricken with age before his time; and he saw Harry, the once merry and light-hearted, lying powerless and moveless on a couch, with the light of youth fading from his eye, and its spirit dying out of his bosom.

"An old friend?" repeated Clayton inquiringly as he gazed intently on the face of his visitor.

"Yes; an obliged and deeply indebted one, and a grateful one too, Mr. Clayton,” replied the sailor. "6 Have you quite forgotten Frank Allen, who owes everything to your kindness?"

A feeling came over me at the first that it could be no other," said Clayton, giving him a cordial welcome, which was warmly echoed round.

An hour swept away all the clouds which appeared to hang over Frank's conduct to his old friends; for he had often written, but receiving no answer, had fancied that Clayton never wished to hear from him; and when, years after, he returned to the village, he learned that they had left it and could gain no further tidings. His own fortunes had been prosperous during the fifteen years which had elapsed since Philip Clayton acted so kind a part to him-for talent and diligence had won him the favor of all he served and

sailed with; and so he had risen until, two years 'before, he obtained the command of a ship.

"And now I will not call it chance that brought me to this port." he said; "it was some higher influence guided me here, and told me at once when I heard the name to-day that one of my old friends was near me-though it certainly was not William that I thought of seeing."

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‘Ah, you would think of me," observed Harry, with a mournful smile, “But my father and mother have but one son to work for them."

"No, Harry," replied Allen, crossing over to the friend of his boyhood and taking his hand; "they shall have two sons to work for them; and in good time I trust that you may join us as the third. But all I have I owe to your father's generosity-he acted towards me as a father; and deeply grieved shall I be if he will not allow me to be as a son to him. Surely, surely, Mr. Clayton," he continued earnestly, "you will not refuse to the boy whom you protected-whom your bounty placed in the way of winning far more than a competency-you will not refuse to him the power of proving his gratitude for all that you have done for him! To be a son to you and Mrs. Clayton, and a brother to your children -this is all I wish, and it would indeed be to me a happiness."

It was the truest gratitude that prompted the desire, and bade him exert all his eloquence to win, as he did at length, the privilege of devoting himself as a son to the protector of his boyhood. For Henry especially, his heart was grieved; to see him, young and gifted, wearing away the spring-time of his life in suffering and sorrow, pained him deeply; and he earnestly sought other and better advice upon his case than the Claytons' means had enabled them to com. mand. At length a hope was given that a partial recovery at least might be attained.

With this hope, and the blessings of his early

friends, Frank Allen, at the end of some weeks, went on his voyage, happy in the consciousness that he left lighter hearts than he had found. And when, months after, he returned, there were bright smiles to greet him back, and something of the old light beginning to beam in Harry's eye, for the dreary period of hopelessness was past, and he had the prospect that in another year he might once more tread the green turf, and look upon the sparkling streams; and, above all, essay again to support himself, at least, instead of remaining in the helpless and child-like dependence which had so weighed upon his spirit.

The prospect was not deceptive, and before Frank left them next, its promise was in part fulfilled, and young Clayton was able to move about, with assistance.

Philip, your two hundred and fifty were put out to far better interest than all the other money we ever saved: the rest is gone, but this remains to bless us. Little thought I when I so opposed you, how rich a return your generosity would receive!"

"Nor I either," answered Clayton; "I never thought of nor sought return. But it has come to cheer us in the hour it was most needed; and now, as I look on those two, how it brings back that last evening when Allen and I stood watching our boys; now, as then, his was the helper of mine; and I could almost think the very smiles of old, with all boyhood's cloudless joy, was on their faces."

He guessed not yet the cause of those smiles, nor that Frank had just told Harry how his own deep, true love had won that of Violet, and that ere long he hoped to claim by right the titles of son and brother in the family of his adoption.