AMONG LIONS.

(Continued from page 239.) NCE again Alice attacked her father with the request,-Might she not nurse too, like Miss Brett?

This was refused. 'Be content, dear,' said Mr. Swayne,' with

taking care of me; you have plenty to do -all the letters to write, and the house affairs to think of,' and he smiled a poor, tired smile.

But Alice went away and cried impatient tears. 6 They won't let me do good when I wish it,' she said, aloud, though there was no one to hear; taking care of the house and father is nothing."

It might be nothing, or very little, but Alice did not do it; and indeed it rather worried Mr. Swayne amid his cares, to be rebuking his wayward child and meeting a discontented face, where all might have been bright for him. If it had not been for Miss Dawkins, even his simple comforts might have been neglected, for Alice was so taken up with her desire to do good on a large scale, that she was careless of such little matters as seeing to hot coffee and change of clothes for her father.

Miss Dawkins tried in her gentle way to put the little girl's head straight, but to no avail; when Alice became certain she was not to be allowed to share Miss Brett's cares she wept bitterly, and shut herself up in her room a whole day.

A restless night followed, and in the morning she woke to find Dr. Darell by her bedside.

'She ought to have gone with the children,' he was saying to Miss Dawkins; her father ought not to have let her remain.'

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Is it the fever?' said Alice, waking up. 'Oh, dear, I am so sorry; it is my fault, not father's.' And too late the poor child broke forth into a torrent of reproach of herself, her obstinacy in begging to remain, and her discontent when she got her way. It flashed upon her now, dull and stupefied with the coming fever as she felt, how troublesome she had been, and for many a day after she lay and moaned out her remorse, when her mind had long ceased to exercise any control over her words. She had made her bed hard, and she was lying on it now, adding to other people's troubles instead of relieving them.

CHAPTER XII.

MORE people than Alice, too, were reproaching themselves in Moor Rectory; Mr. Swayne himself was shut up in his study for two whole hours, a thing unknown for some time in those busy days, full of thought and trouble.

Darell was right. I ought to have sent the child away,' he was saying to himself; but she was so set on staying, and I lacked firmness to vex her at the moment. What a thing it is for children to be motherless! If poor Emily had been alive, she could have settled all quietly and distressed no one.'

Poor Mr. Swayne! It was not the first time he had found himself at a loss in the last three years. Dr. Darell was the best comforter in the present instance.

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'Don't you worry yourself with thinking that this might not have been, Mr. Swayne,' he said, cheerily; for to tell you the truth, little Miss Alice has such a strong will of her own, that she would most likely have fretted herself into a fever if you had sent her away with the little ones. And now we have her safe upstairs, we'll soon bring her round.'

But with all the skill and nursing at command, it was hard work fighting the fever, and many eyes were dim with watching before Alice rose from her sick-bed.

She did not seem to have much of her strong will left her, poor child, as she lay on a sofa by the window, too weak for anything more than watching the butterflies flit by, and counting time only by the food and medicine brought her.

For some days past she had missed her faithful nurse, Miss Dawkins, and the first gleam of returning thought and care for anything than her own sick self made her ask where she was. 'Had she caught the fever?'

Mr. Swayne hastened to assure her. 'Oh, no! she was only gone down the village helping to nurse a sick child.'

'Have many had the fever ?' asked Alice, then.

'Yes, dear,' he answered, a little sadly, and tried to turn the conversation; he did not like to think of the gaps in his little flock.

"Who?' pursued Alice, tell me, please : any other of the Greggs? And did Selina get well?'

'Dear, I would rather not talk of this till you are better,' said her father.

thrusting themselves into the sunshine of daily life.

Suppose it had been just a little different-not one grave more or less in Moor churchyard--but just an exchange, Selina living, and she dead. And it might so easily have been; Selina looked a strong girl of seventeen, able to struggle through anything, while Alice was but a child, with only a child's power of endurance.

So it seemed to the outward eye, which also might have seen in Selina, only a poor, rough, half-educated woman; for she had had very early in life to leave school for service, while Alice had had counsel, and instruction, and example to guide her right. all her life. Alice trembled at the thought. Yes, she was one of those to whom much had been given, and from whom much would be required. And yet how would it have been had she now been called away suddenly like Selina?

Ah! there was more comfort in thinking of Selina's past than her own, Alice felt. Just a poor maid-of-all-work, striving to do her duty from Monday morning till Saturday night, kind to the seven little children around her, and respectful to the master and mistress she served so honestly. This was her character from home, Alice knew; and then she thought of her as she saw her at Moor in church on Sundays, joining so heartily in the hymns and prayers she had known from childhood, listening with an anxious look to the sermon, a look which brightened when the subject was simple enough for her to understand, and clouded when it was too difficult for her. She always came to the catechising and sat with the children, though she seldom auswered any question. She never was sharp, she said, but she liked to listen.

(To be continued.)

Father, I hear Thee say

Our sighs are heard and known, We need no wings to fly away

To some far-distant throne.

But may a child draw near,

Alone, without a guide?

And will the Highest bend His ear,
And draw the veil aside?

Yes: bow in faith thy knee,

Thy hands to God upraise;

So shall His throne come down to thee, And wrap thee in its blaze.

Then strength for every day

Give me, O Lord most high;

I'm old enough from Thee to stray,

And not too young to die. How many, blithe and strong,

Behold the rosy morn,

And die before the evensong
Is warbled from the thorn!

My Saviour, while I may,

Thy loving child I'll be; Take selfishness and pride away, And make me worthy Thee!

WISE SAYINGS.

G.S. O.

A LIFE of idleness is not a life of

happiness. Only the active and the useful are happy. We may depend upon it that the most miserable people in the world are those who have nothing to do.

If the young would remember that they may one day be old, and the old that they have been young, the world would go on better.

To rise from adversity to prosperity the ladder must be ascended gradually and carefully many in their haste to get rich take two steps at a time, and so tumble down headlong.

ORANGE PEEL.

'And as re would that men should do to you, do ye also to them likewise.'-Luke, vi. 31. OME boys sat eating oranges

on a gate by the side of the road, and throwing the ped just anywhere it happened to fall. They were laughing and talking, and enjoying the fruit, and never noticed that any one was coming towards them. But a cheery Hullo, young gentlemen!' made them look round and see Mr. Leigh, the squire of the parish, and they took off their caps respectfully.

'You seem to be having a regular picnic,' he said. 'I wonder whether you have a spare orange for me?'

"Yes, sir,' answered George Allen, promptly. I've only just begun to pee! this; and I've had one already.'

'Thank you!' and Mr. Leigh took the offered orange and went on stripping off the peel, which, however, he piled bit by bit on the gate-post, and when he had finished he went across the road and threw it into the ditch that ran along that side.

The boys watched him curiously, and Herbert Wrigly said, with ready politeness: 'Why didn't you ask one of us to do that. sir. I didn't see what you were about.'

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Nay, my lad,' was the answer; 'I could hardly ask you to do for me what you don't think it worth while to do for yourselves.'

'We never thought of it, sir. But, to be sure, the peel does look untidy, strewing all about like this. Only what does it matter on a public road?'

That makes it matter all the more, I should say,' returned the squire. On a