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undue love for it which does the mischief. God gave cattle and lands and worldly wealth to Jacob, and Joseph, and Job, and Solomon; and gave the riches as rewards and tokens of His favour-which He would scarcely have done if wealth was in itself an evil.”

"Dear! dear!" muttered he; "it's years and years since I thought about those old Bible names-years and years!"

It is not my habit to thrust religion down people's throats— perhaps I am wrongly backward in properly speaking out— but here was a clear opening for saying a word in my Master's cause; so I remarked,

"It is a wonderful thing that if we forget to think about the Bible, or of Him by whose Divine will that Bible was written, yet God never forgets us, but waits close to us, ready to answer us if we choose to turn to Him with a word of feeble prayer for His aid."

"It would be wonderful if it were true."

The words were so low I could scarcely catch them above the deafening noise and turmoil of the streets.

"You know it is true, as well as I know it!" I said. Neither of us spoke for a while. Presently my friend asked,

"Sir, are you a clergyman ?"

'No; indeed."

He looked at me with the same keen look which I had noticed before.

"Excuse me, sir, but are you an Englishman ?"

"Well, a kind of an Englishman," I answered, smiling; "an Irishman, that is."

He struck his hand upon his knee.

"God bless you, sir !" he cried-but more as an exclamation than a blessing, however-" God bless you! and I'm an Irishman too! but I've never stood in Ireland."

"How's that?" I asked, more and more interested. "Sir, I'll just tell you

my parents were Irish.

how it is. I was born in Sicily, My father was a gentleman, my

mother a lady. He was consul at Palermo, and there I was

reared. Then-then-in short, sir, I took to bad ways. Ι fled from my home; I wandered wide and far; I got desperately wounded in a drunken fray in France; I sank and sank until I almost came to beg my bread. Now I drive this 'bus."

Abruptly as he spoke, his manner could not wholly hide the deep feeling which lay beneath. He turned his face aside, but I fancied I could see the water glistening in his eyes.

"I don't know why I talk like this to you," he said; “I beg your pardon, sir.”

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Nay," I replied, "you have interested me greatly. In all your wanderings have you not been to Ireland ?”

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No, but I long to go there! Sir, it is a strange instinct, that love of a man for his country! It's a queer thing that I, who never stood upon its sod, should yet have no dearer wish than to go to Ireland."

"It strikes me as being more beautiful than strange,” I said. "I have never seen the face of my Father which is in heaven, nor ever got a glimpse of His glorious kingdom, yet I love Him, and I love His land, and long beyond all things to see Him, and to know what may be the beauty of the things which He has prepared for me. Wander as you may, your heart turns to Ireland still; and I, however held in bondage here, yet look and hope and sigh for the land which is mine by the free gift of the Saviour."

Had I said too much? He understood me, I could see, and I did not think he could be vexed at my speech. I took courage.

"And heaven is yours by equal right with mine," I said; "and God Himself will not dispute our claim if we plead our heirship in His Son."

He did not reply. We had reached the City now, and were crossing the Holborn Viaduct; presently my journey would be at an end, and my new friend and I would part, most likely for ever.

"Will you tell me your name?" I said.

"My real name is forgotten now, sir; it would be useless to repeat it. I call myself Bob Dillon now."

"And have you been at your present work long?"

"More than five years. I have married a wife in my own sphere of life, and she and I try to keep an honest home for our little ones; but we began low, and we have found it something of a pull up-hill as yet. It will be long before I can squeeze the money for a trip to the old country," he added, with a smile.

"Will that be your first holiday?"

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Ay, sir, surely; I nearly went this year. My master is a right good-hearted man; he knew how I wished to cross the Irish Sea, and when it came my turn for a holiday, he handed me three pounds over and above my wages, and bid me go to Ireland, and spend it there. It was very generous, wasn't it, sir ?”

"Yes; but you did not go?"

"I told him I could not leave the wife and the children just then, but he bade me keep the three pounds all the same. Very kind, he was !"

“Well, Dillon, if you ever do reach our country, come and see me." I drew my card-case out as I spoke.

"Here I

is my address, and you shall have a hearty welcome. should be proud to do the honours of our land to such a true son of Old Ireland."

His swarthy face had flushed as he noticed me putting my hand in my pocket, but when he saw that I offered him not silver, but a slip of cardboard, he took it eagerly. I could not have offered him money after what he had told me. "Bank!" shouted the conductor, and I prepared to descend from my perch. 'Good-bye, Dillon," I said,

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shaking hands with my new friend heartily.

"Good-bye, sir, and God bless you!"

Somehow, those words sounded very differently from what they had done half-an-hour ago. They had been only a form then, they were uttered like a prayer now.

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That omnibus drive took place three years ago. A little while since I received a letter, written in an ill-formed hand by one evidently unaccustomed to the task of wielding It was signed, "Ellen Dillon."

a pen.

The writer told me she was the wife of the man to whom I had talked during a journey from the "Royal Oak" to the Bank; she said she wrote according to a promise made to her dead husband.

"He bid me say, sir, that he never forgot your words. He will never be able to meet you in Ireland, but he has claimed to enter the other country you spoke about; and he found your words were true about God being at hand to listen to us if we turn to Him in prayer. That was his message, sir; he made me learn it by heart, so that I might write it out to you. He was killed by an accident, sir quite sudden-but he bid me say he leaves me and the children comfortably off."

That was the letter. There were splashes, as of tears, upon the last page. There was no address, so that I could not reply to it, and I was sorry that it was out of my power to see if my friend's meaning as to the words "comfortably off" was the same as mine. It would have been a pleasure to me to give aid to those Bob Dillon had loved.

But though all links are broken between us here, I shall look to meet him, washed and purified from the stain of his once wild life, in the "other country "-the land that is very far off, and yet so near.

Patience.

ATIENCE is the guardian of faith, the preserver of peace, the cherisher of love, the teacher of humility. Patience governs the flesh, strengthens the spirit, sweetens the temper, stifles anger, extinguishes envy, subdues pride; bridles the tongue, refrains the hand, tramples upon temptations, endures persecutions, and consummates martyrdom. Patience pro

duces unity in the church, loyalty in the state, harmony in families and societies; comforts the poor, and moderates the rich; makes us humble in prosperity, cheerful in adversity, unmoved by calumny and reproach; teaches us to forgive those who have injured us and to be the first in asking forgiveness of those whom we have injured; delights the faithful, and invites the unbelieving; adorns the woman, and approves the man; is loved in a child, praised in a young man, admired in an old man; is beautiful in either sex and every age.—Bishop Horne.

"Must I Die ?"

T was asked, in accents of terrified surprise, by one whom I last knew in health and strength; a fair young companion, whose graceful appearance caused her to be admired by all who saw her. She was to be highly educated, and she was to be accomplished, but, in the midst of all the busy plans for her advancement in this world's knowledge, illness overtook her; slight at first, but so suddenly passing into a fatal disorder, that, before her parents had suspected danger, the doctor drew the mother aside, and whispered that her little girl could not live. The poor child overheard the whisper, and exclaimed, "Must I die?"

I know no more of my little companion, except that she lived but a very short time after this, and that her name is to be seen on a tombstone in the crowded churchyard of the fashionable watering-place where she lived. Let us leave her to the tender mercies of the God into whose presence she was thus unexpectedly called, and think of this solemn question only as it regards ourselves.

Must I die? Yes, I must; the sentence has gone forth--it comes as a voice from Eden: "Thou shalt surely die;" and "Dust thou art, and unto dust shalt thou return." Therefore, since God's Word is true, I must die; I do

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