take, "God first," and I have no fear for you in the present or future.'

The boys sat down again in their places -boy-like they did not care much for the parson's preaching,' as they called it, and yet the two little words sank down into both hearts, almost without their knowing it; and as Bob Ray sat in his mother's kitchen that night, eating his hunch of bread and dripping, he wondered what good his motto was likely to be to him; whilst Fred Harvey, who was slinging a blanket. in hammock fashion in his attic, to get into practice for his sea-life, caught himself whispering God first, God first,' and was very much surprised to find he was thinking of it.

A week later and the young sailor was away from his native land, leaving sad hearts in his cottage home. Fred carried with him a Prayer-book and a pocket Bible, as the clergyman's parting gift, and he fully meant to keep the promise which he had given to use them; but it was indeed hard sometimes. The crew were mostly bad, drinking men: terrible oaths were often heard, and Fred was many a time in danger of falling into their evil ways. Yet the two words of his motto warned him; and, strangely enough, in many a time of temptation they started up in his mind, as if some one spoke them there, and with God first, God first,' ringing in his ears he could not, he dared not, sin so terribly.

he was captain of his own vessel, he remembered gratefully Mr. Ashley's words when he was only a school-boy, and dated his success from the time when he had taken G 'God first' to be the motto and guide of his life.

Meanwhile, Robert Ray grew up from youth to manhood: but those years made a grievous change in him. He started with good intentions and fair chances of doing well in life, but he was weak and wavering; and when temptations came (as they will to all of us) he fell under them. Only this once' might have been the motto given. him, to judge by the way in which he acted - for thus he excused himself on every occasion of weakness, thus he hid from himself the bad habits he was forming. Poor Robert-he was always 'going to do right, but never taking the first step; but he was always falling, under the plea of yielding for once-only once!"

But his early teaching was not to be in vain. God in mercy meant to bring him back after his wanderings; and one day, when he was not sober, Robert fell from a ladder, and was carried home insensible, and, as some thought, dead. For days there seemed small chance of his recovery; but at length a change took place, and the doctor said that he would do,' and smiled cheerfully at his poor, sorrowful mother, who bent over him so anxiously. In the long weeks of weariness and slow recovery which followed Mr. Ashley often visited Robert Ray, speaking to him of the past, trying to lead him to true repentance, so that his sins and shortcomings might be pardoned for Christ's sake.

'And did you never think of your motto? did those two little words never come to your mind?' asked the clergyman one day when Robert had been going over the tale of his past reckless life.

But he shook his head. "I minded it at first a bit, sir, but other chaps laughed at me and so I gave it up: it's been "God last" with me. But I'm sorry now, and I'll try and make up for it for the time to come.'

And he kept his word; for, after rising from his sick bed, Bob Ray learned to mistrust his own strength and to depend more humbly upon God for help to do right. So, in the end, he took up the old motto for the rule of his life, and with God first' always in his thoughts, he became an upright and godly man, and he lived to gather his own boys around him and to tell them the story of his early days, and how it was in the shadow of death that he had come back to the Saviour, Whom he had so long despised and forgotten. M. F. S.

WE

AN IDLER TAUGHT. HEN I was young, says an old Frenchman, we had a schoolmaster who had a way of his own for finding out lazy boys.

One day he said to us,

'Boys, I wish you would be more attentive to your lessons: the first one who sees his companion careless, with his eyes raised from off his book, must tell me at once, and I will see then what ought to be done.'

'Ah,' I thought to myself, 'there is that Jean Simon close to me, whom I don't like at all. I will watch him well, and the first time I see him idle I will tell the master directly.'

It was not long before Jean raised his head. At once I informed the master.

Indeed!' he replied; and how did you find out that Jean was not attending to his work?'

'I saw him, sir!'

SAYING AND DOING.

NE evening two brothers, who used to go to school together, asked their father to give them a holiday the next day. He said, 'I cannot, because it will put you back in

your studies; so be sure you go to school.' One of the brothers said, 'Yes, I will;' but the other said he would not, and his father was very angry with him.

The next day the one who had said 'Yes,' played truant, but the one who had refused went to school. Then the father said to them in the evening, Both of you are in the wrong; but you who promised to go and broke your promise are the worst of the two.'

Our Father in Heaven speaks to us every day, and says, 'Do My will;' and whenever we kneel down and say 'Thy will be done,' we answer God and say, 'Yes, I will.' Now, if we say we will do God's will, and yet do not try to do it, are we not like the boy who first made a promise and then broke it?

Some people never pray to God at all, and never promise to do His will. Perhaps you are inclined to say, "They are very bad people.' But if you promise and do not try to keep your promise, are you not worse than they?-Parables for Children.

AMONG LIONS. (Concluded from p. 180.)

CHAPTER VI.

E all of us can remember some very bright spot in our lives, some little time in which an unusual amount of happiness seemed to be granted to us; and, as is natural, these very bright times oftenest date themselves far back, in

our childhood or youth.

It may be the week's visit to a farmhouse of city children, or the companionship of cheerful little friends to desolate children; it may be the few days when we went a tour with father and mother, or when we had the use of Cousin Jack's pony; it may be one thing or another, but there it lies, gleaming in the landscape behind us of our past lives, that pleasant time of long-ago.

And this was Bell's bright week, one which would make a mark in her life; her master or uncle, whichever he might be, gone away, and a new tone given to her life by the discovery that there were people in the world who were kind to her and fond of her; and the greater discovery still, that some one called God, high above the topmost trees and the singing larks, cared for her and watched over her.

Mrs. Pottinger, the sickly woman she called aunt, never left the cart or its immediate neighbourhood, yet she offered no objection to the child attending school regularly; nay, she even combed the tangles in Bell's hair as she was wont to do on show-days, that the child might appear neat and tidy in a morning at the schoolhouse.

She was a poor, hunted, worried creature, afraid to speak, and looking for

nothing better in the world than to be let alone. How it got about no one knew, but certainly it was reported that Mr. Pottinger beat her. Perhaps Bell or the man with the pipe may have said so, but no one could trace it to them; and even to her kindest visitor, Mrs. Pottinger would hardly make a remark except on the weather or the lions.

Once Mr. Swayne asked her to try and persuade Mr. Pottinger to send Bell to school, or even leave her at Moor with Miss Brett, who had volunteered to keep | her and train her as her little maid; but the poor thing trembled and said she dare not: he would only swear and -But there the poor woman stopped.

'I'll be good to her while I live,' she said, with an effort, and I'll get her a bit of schooling when I can, since you are so kind; and before I die you shall hear from me.'

The poor woman spoke almost hopefully of dying, she seemed to have known no bright spot in her life, and in a feeble way to look forward to that brightness only in the future.

She was very ignorant, though not quite such a heathen as little Bell; she had once said prayers, she told Mr. Swayne, and she would again, only her memory was so bad she was afraid she could not recollect them for long but when Mr. Swayne repeated the Lord's Prayer to her her wan face lit up a little; that was the prayer, she said, she had known as a girl, she thought she could mind that if Mr. Swayne would say it once

more.

And then he talked to her as he would have done to his youngest class in the school, and left her with the silent prayer that the Great Teacher and Comforter would visit her and instruct her, the poor forlorn creature!