private road fewer people pass; and besides, there are gardeners and boys there to tidy up and set things to rights.

'Yes, sir. But I don't see that it signifies here. One might as well begin to pull up the weeds and plant flowers along the way-side.'

'Come, come, that's a little unfair,' laughed Mr. Leigh. We are not called upon to make a public road as trim and gay as a gentleman's garden; but we needn't block it up with all sorts of rubbish, nor throw obstructions in the way of passengers. I wasn't thinking of the untidiness, but of the danger. Did you never hear of an accident caused by a trip over orangepeel? In a town you'd get sharply pulled up, I can tell you, for throwing it about like this.'

'We didn't mean any harm,' said a chorus of young voices.

But as much

'No, I'm sure you didn't. harm is done in the long run, I take it, through thoughtlessness as through malice or bad intention. If one of your near relations-your father or mother, say—got killed in a railway accident through the carelessness of one of the servants on the line, you wouldn't feel inclined to make the excuse for him that he meant no harm. It is the consequences we have to look to. If we endanger the lives or limbs of others by some act not wrong in itself, then the act becomes wrong, and we are bound not to do it. This is part of our duty to our neighbour. We owe a good deal of our safety and comfort to the thought and care of people we don't know, and probably shall never see; the least we can do is to give a little thought and care in return: don't you think so?'

'Yes, sir; we'll never throw orange-peel about again,' answered the boys.

"You never would, I believe, if you had

felt the evil of it as I have: it is this which makes me speak so warmly. I dare say you remember a young lady who was staying with us at the Hall last summer. She used to drive about in the open carriage with Mrs. Leigh; but you didn't often meet her in the fields or lanes, because she is lame, and has to go about on crutches. And it all came from a slip over a bit of orange-peel when she was a child: one of the knee-caps was hurt, and she has been lame ever since, poor girl! She bears it very patiently, and always says the person who threw the peel meant no harm. that doesn't make it much better for her— does it? If we loved our neighbour as ourselves, we should think of him a little oftener, I fancy. You lads would hardly forgive yourselves if you should happen to be the cause of an accident such as my niece suffers from.'

But

I'll tell you what, sir, we'll pick up all these bits,' cried Herbert Wrigly, jumping from off the gate and setting about the work at once.

The others followed his example, and soon a complete clearance was made. The squire looked on with approval.

you

That's right!' he said. Always act upon any advice that seems good to you. There's no use in agreeing to a thing if you don't help to carry it out. You looked sorry enough just now when I was telling about my niece. See you bear her in mind when you are about to fling a stone, without looking well if any one is in the way; or when you are tempted to make a slide upon a foot-path, or, shall we say, to drop orange-peel about. Boys are by nature thoughtless, I suppose; but Christians are bound to think of others as well as of themselves; and to do to others as they would wish others to do to them."

EMMA RHODES.

THE PELICAN.

HE Pelican is a sea-shore bird, found in many parts of Asia, Africa, and Europe. Its plumage, when full grown, is nearly all white. Its wings at full stretch are sometimes as much as twelve feet across. The most curious feature in the Pelican is the pouch in its throat, in which it stows away its food till the hour of retirement and of eating comes round.

The Pelican may often be seen on the ledge of a rock, a foot or two above the surface of the water, sitting in pensive silence during the whole day. From time to time, as an unlucky fish comes within reach, it darts its bill into the water with unerring aim, secures its prey, drops it into its pouch, and resumes its wonted stillness, until the time comes when it flies away to some lonely spot inland to feast on the contents of its pouch. It is this habit of seeking some remote spot where to feed that leads David to say in the psalm (Ps. cii. 6), 'I am like a pelican in the wilderness.'

In the Book of Leviticus (xi. 18) the Pelican is named amongst the birds which the Israelites were forbidden to eat, as being unclean.

There is a popular tradition that the Pelican tears open her breast and feeds her young ones with her own blood; and so from ancient times the Pelican has been used as an emblem of the atoning sacrifice of the Lord Jesus Christ, Who gave up His own life upon the Cross to save sinners.

In stained-glass windows, or in the wood carving of old churches, as well as of modern ones, the pelican in her piety,' as the emblem is called, may often be seen.

GUNPUTTI AND THE MOUSE

UCH days as Sundays in India are unknown to the people themselves; their way of having Sundays being to keep certain holidays at different times of the

year, when they worship their heathen gods, and make it also a time of feasting and pleasure. There are so many of these idols, and such tales connected with them, that it would be easy to fill a large book with all sorts of stories about them, but you must be satisfied this time with hearing of Gunputti, one of those gods that the poor Hindoos think a great deal of.

Mr. Gunputti is only a little fellow, but supposed to have the head of an ele phant, and sometimes, also, is made with four arms instead of two, and is the god of wisdom. During their great holiday, which lasts several days, the Hindoos entertain their friends; and the Brahmin priests come to their houses, and say their prayers for them to an image of the god, which the people of the house have already bought for a few copper coins. Presents are made to the priests, and sweetmeats given to the guests, for you must remember that Hindoos do not eat meat, but only rice and vegetables; and this great treat is sweetmeats made of powdered cocoa-nut and sugar, with almonds, and other good things.

Well, now, no doubt you are beginning to wonder what it is about the mouse! Gunputti was very fond of riding abou on a mouse, and one day he fell off-very silly of him! but then he was but a very small person, and I dare say a mouse would prove rather a difficult animal to ride. They say that the moon, which was shining very brightly just then, was so amused

that she laughed very rudely, and made Gunputti so angry that he quite lost his temper, and used very bad language to her, and finished by saying, that in future anybody who looked at the moon on his birthday --which is in August, or the beginning of September-should have very bad luck, and no end of troubles.

The Hindoos, who are so silly as to believe in this mischievous, bad-tempered, little fellow, are very careful on his birthday never to look at the moon. If they do by accident see it, they begin to be rude and cross to somebody else, and so provoke them that they beat and scold them well; and then they think that Gunputti will be satisfied, and not punish them any further for disobeying his commands and looking at the moon on his birthday.

R. M.

THE CHARTERHOUSE.

N the great city of London there are homes for fatherless and motherless little boys, and fatherless and motherless little girls; homes for cripples, and old men and women who are not able o support themselves; homes for widows, nd homes for the deaf and the dumb; and mong the rest we have the Charterhouse, hich is a kind of home where a certain umber of old gentlemen, who have lost eir own means of support, may find a me where they can end their days in mfort.

Army men, who have fought for their untry, and have lost an arm or a leg, met with some other injury, are to be and there. Physicians and authors, wea-d with the bustle of the world, are to be

found among the eighty inhabitants of the Charterhouse.

The ground on which the Charterhouse now stands has seen many changes. A long time ago-535 years ago—in the reign of Edward III., it was bought by a noble knight, Sir Walter de Manny, who had fought bravely against the French in the great battles of that day, and by him it was devoted to the pious purpose of interring the dead after the dreadful plague which raged at that time, and which was commonly called the black death.'

Afterwards Ralph Stratford, a Bishop of London, bought three acres more of land, which he added to it, and enclosing the whole with a brick wall, he built a chapel there, and called it Pardon Churchyard.' He then devoted it to the use of burying criminals who had been executed. These poor people were carried in what was then called a friar's cart,' which was tilted and covered all over with black, and had inside a little bell hanging up, which used to keep on ringing, so that everybody knew what was in the cart as it passed by.

The ground has been used for many things since; among others, it has been an hospital, and now it is the Charterhouse, which is perhaps the best of all, because our care is more needed for those who are living than for the ashes of those who are departed from us, and have gone to their everlasting home.

The inmates of the Charterhouse are fed and lodged, and are allowed a cloak towards their clothing, and twenty pounds a-year for pocket-money.

A wonderful story is told us of a youth who lived in the beginning of this century, and who used to sweep crossings. He swept one opposite a large goldsmith's, near Regent Street. His appearance was noticed by the owner of the shop. He