At length, through the mercy of him who, though for wise purposes he sendeth grief, "yet still hath compassion," and will not crush the bruised reed, she was enabled to turn for consolation to the sacred Book. She searchcd the Scriptures-she read the divine promises with attentive heart-she believed and was comforted. "When thou passeth through the waters I will be with thee, and through the rivers, they shall not overflow thee; when thou walkest through the fire, thou shalt not be burned, neither shall the flame kindle upon thee: for I am the Lord thy God, the Holy One of Israel, thy Saviour." She was now, indeed, passing through the waters of affliction; she had to buffet the strong waves of adversity; but He whose command can hush the angry billows, did, in the sweet but powerful accents of his word, speak peace to her soul. Like the three Hebrew youths whom the tyranny of adespotic king had consigned to a fiery furnace, heated seven times hotter than it was wont, she found in this, her fiery trial, that the Son of God was with her. His presence comforted and supported her; the divine promise was realized-" My grace is sufficient for thee; as

thy day is, so shall thy strength be." These, with many other passages in the holy and blessed Word, poured forth their healing virtue. The balm was infused into her inmost soul. She felt its power; she no longer drooped in despondency, but, resigned to the will of heaven, commenced the active discharge of the important duties she had undertaken to perform.

B*

1

CHAPTER III.

"By degrees

The human blossom blows; and every day
Soft as it rolls along, shows some new charm.
Then infant reason grows apace, and calls
For the kind hand of an assiduous care."

Thomson.

WE must, for the sake of connexion, retrace our steps, and carry our readers back to the period when Mrs. Neville received her grandchildren. She was not then an inhabitant of the lodge; but resided in a cottage at a little village near the domain we have alluded to. In the mean time, she provided for her own wants, and those of the little ones, by taking in clothes to wash, and by doing needlework: in short, by any little piece of industry by which she could procure the supply necessary for their support. Her grandchildren Elizabeth and Margaret Neville, were very young, and, of course, unable to yield her any assistance: Elizabeth was only seven, and Margaret six years of age. They shed many tears for

the loss of their parents, but the kindness of their grandmother soon dried them up; and when they beheld her tears flow, and heard her exclaim, "My son! my son! would to God I had died for thee," they would cling around her, and climbing her knees, clasp their little arms about her neck, and bid her not cry any more, for they would be good children, and always love and obey her. The sorrows of youth are evanescent; the buoyancy of their spirits soon enables them to soar above their grief; it is but like the cloud in a summer's morn, which the brilliancy of the sun soon chases from the hori

zon.

"No sense have they of ills to come-
No cares beyond to-day."

The good woman loved to see them happy; and while they gambolled upon the green, or in sportive festivity dressed themselves with daisies and wild-flowers, she inwardly blessed the God of her mercies, who had spared these little ones to comfort her declining years. She taught them to know their "Creator in the days of their youth," and obliged them by her example, as well as by her precepts, to bend the

before his throne.

knee in humble prayer They were the best behaved little girls in the village; and you might see, by their quiet and orderly behaviour in the house of God, that they were taught to venerate the Sabbath.

Mrs. Neville was very anxious to have them instructed in reading, but alas! she could not spare the requisite expense from her scanty earnings; for not being of a strong constitution, she could not do so much work as many other persons, and when she received her little pittance, it was but just sufficient for the supply of their bodily wants. She sighed when she passed the village school, and heard the hum of youthful voices, and beheld the dame seated in the midst of her little groupe, all busily engaged in conning their tasks. Her own education had been very scanty: when she was a child,' the blessings of education were not at all known or participated in by the poor; even the middling classes possessed them in a very limited degree. She would not have been able to read at all, but for her great estimation of the sacred book; but her desire to become acquainted with this rich treasure of divine truth, enabled