Of the boy I learned nothing; for after having been informed that their ways had chanced to come together, I made no inquiry, and only as his obedience, good-humor, and active industry showed him to be, did I think of him. Indeed, the cradle that rocked him and the future into which he was hastening, had never engaged a moment of my time till one morning at the accustomed stall I found aunt Peggy, as Fred designated her, alone.

sorry attempts at play. Women that seemned to have lost all gentle attributes of womanhood, screeched or growled their displeasure from over their washing-tubs along the alleys or from stitching benches at the windows. Houses miserably old, and crowded from top to bottom-as appeared by the white-faced men and women who crept up from under ground to see or feel the sunshine, and the many night-caps at the garret windowsleaned against each other, or stood wedged together, and seeming to have sunken half their original dimensions in the ground. Among these I noticed one habitation, a little more substantial than the rest, having an area about the basement for the admission of light, and the wooden steps leading to the battered door washed clean. Having rapped on the upper door in vain I descended to the basement, where I noticed, beside the entrance, a sign of “fashionable dress-making,” and in the window two or three glass jars, one containing a few sticks of candy, another some spools of coarse cotton, and the third in part filled with cucumber pickles, in the bottom of which the dead flies had settled to the depth of an inch, and over which was a coating of white mold. The window contained also a pound or two of tallow candles, melted and stuck together, some bars of yellow soap, two boxes of "pearl powder,” and a side of ribby smoked pork. The door was opened by a young woman with a very slender waist, decayed teeth, thin hair, patched out above either ear and kept so by a quantity of white wadding, and having a greasy silk skirt adorned with flounces of a violently contrasting color. I caught a glimpse of a baby-sitting on a rag-carpet that was glazed and trodden into one smooth and shining surface-having a little mousecolored hair near the back of the neck, and the top of the head coated with what resembled bran and ashes-this little creature was amusing itself with a couple of uncooked pigs' feet, or legs rather; and of an old woman, the tags of whose petticoat dangled about her ankle as she punched the fire with her foot, for she seemed to be tending a kettle in which was a quantity of meat boiling; and I noticed she worked her mouth in anticipation of the feast, as a pair of calf's eyes looked out upon her from the cloud of steam. The young lady closed the door abruptly, and without answering my inquiry, on learning that I required no fashionable dress-making, and I had recourse to the upper door again, almost assured that Peggy Butler was a resident of the house.

There was an anxious look in her face, and a hurried disposal of fruits and vegetables that told me all was not right; and on inquiry I learned that little Freddy had been run over by a fine carriage the evening previous, and was lying at home alone, maimed and bruised, the extent of his injuries not yet known. All that day I kept thinking of the lad, wondering how badly he was hurt, and whether he would recover, or if he died, how he would be buried and where; for in some sort the boy had endeared himself to me, and I went over mentally all my acquaintance with him-how sometimes I had seen him without shoes of frosty mornings, and at other times swaying from side to side of the path under a burden too heavy for him. Much of our talk together came back to me, and I found a precocious wisdom, on his part, in the memory of it, which, till then, had never impressed me. As we always do, I kept hoping the accident was not so serious as aunt Peggy feared, and so the day went by and the night. I went early to the market in the morning, but the stall was empty, and each picture I tried to make of a boy, with a shining face, was displaced by the white and settled look of death. A walk of a mile in the sharp air of a November morning brought me to the lodgings of the stricken Peggy Butler. They were not in a nice, open street, and entered by a broad flight of steps and ample and well-lighted hall, but access was had to them through crooked and narrow streets, where the gutters were choked with thick, stagnant water, and pots, and barrels, and baskets of decayed and decaying refuse, making all the air heavy and unwholesome. Many carts stood along the side-walks, and cellars with open windows, partly above ground, neighbored each other, through the apertures and windows of which the noses of cows and horses were thrust; dirty children, to be counted by hundreds, swarmed along the filthy side-walks-some with red gluey eyes, some with crooked legs, some with mouth askew, and some with heads having the appearance of mange dogs-quarreling, crying, paddling

held in her apron some clean-smelling linen, which she seemed to have just brought from the line. A bright ring glittered on one finger and showy earrings dangled below her turban, showing her altogether to be neither poverty-stricken nor untidy.

She put down the bundle of washed clothes and led the way up the narrow stairs, carpetless, but scoured white almost as the lime-washed wall, and pointing to the near door with a smile, as though she had received a service, descended with a propriety and quietude which showed me that she possessed that inimitable something before education and above education, and without which the highest cultivation is but imitation after all.

I afterward found my first impression quite correct, and Caty Smith proved to be not only an excellent washer and ironer, but also a model of amiability and polite manners.

Aunt Peggy met me at the door, the tears in her blue eyes and the patient smile quite gone from her lips. She had not been at the market that day, she told me, and she didn't feel as if she should ever care to go there again; if she had no body to work for nor to care for, what was the use? I tried to cheer her, but at best I am a poor comforter; and I no sooner looked upon little Freddy than I knew she had not overestimated his perilous condition. It was not the arm tied straight in splinters, nor the bandaged forehead, nor yet the sunken eyes; but an indefinable expression and seeming that told me he was lying very near to death. He was in no pain; that was all past, and with quickened spiritual apprehension foreseeing the end, he lay calm as an infant rocking to sleep. He smiled when he saw me; said he was glad I was come, for that he could not talk much now, and aunt Peggy was lonesome. I told him I hoped he would be well in a few days and make her company again. He said he would like to get well to work for her, for that his true mother could not have been kinder to him than she had been; but that he was not so much afraid of death as he had been of the dark night many a time, and now that his arm was so hurt that he could not carry the basket, it was better he should go where there were no baskets to carry; and seeing how distressed aunt Peggy was, he called her to the bedside and asked her who it was that watched with him before I She answered no one had been there but good Caty Smith; but the boy assured her with great earnestness that waking out of sleep at daylight there sat by the bedside a young man, whom he described very minutely-the color of his hair,

came.

his garments, and even the ring which he wore on his left hand. Peggy Butler seemed startled at the description, the tears dried up in her eyes, and questioning him further on the supposition, as I supposed, that she knew who the young man must have been, the answers corresponded in every particular with her suggestions. "Strange, strange," she repeated, when the child concluded by saying the young man spoke not at all, but smiled sweetly and often, and as he looked on him seemed to vanish away, and it was only light where he had been. "Strange, strange," and she fell to weeping more bitterly than before. The boy put his arm about her neck, and drawing down her face kissed her, and saying, “Don't cry, O don't cry!" fell asleep, and never woke any more; for while he slept the angel, of which he was not afraid, stole him away very softly.

The noonday sunshine came into the room and lay on his pillow, and good Caty cut from her own flower-pot all the blossoms it had and laid them on his bosom, and having whispered some words to Peggy, tied on a brave orange turban, and went away.

I kept my place at the bedside, though the need was all past, while the bereaved woman walked wildly up and down the room, wringing her hands and moaning piteously. In about an hour Caty returned, and shortly after a stout old gentleman, accompanied by a hearse and a fine coffin-little Freddy was laid in it and carried away. When Peggy had in part subdued the violence of her grief, and while Caty, who seemed to be her friend and confident, went quietly about putting the house in order and out of view the coat, and hat, and other things that had been Freddy's, she uncovered her eyes, and, as some sad solace for her grief, told me the story of her life.

She had lived in the country when a child, and grown to be a woman there, and all the brightest memories of her life were connected with briery hedges and green hay-fields, meadow-runs and orchards, and the fresh-smelling furrows of newlyplowed fields: there her good mother had lived and died-there her brothers and sisters had grown from playmates to workmates, and so to men and women, and had found other mates and made themselves new homes, where, with children about them, some of them were living still, old men and women now.

"But there is one thing," she said, "which more than all the rest endears my past life to me, and at the same time keeps me from returning to it: I had a lover once-he is buried there."

After a few minutes she went on, "When he

died it seemed to me I could not live there any longer. I thought to get away from myself, but the experience of twenty years has shown me how foolish any such attempt is. Work and the little good I have had it in my power to do, have been all my solace."

"If your brothers and sisters are still living," I said, "it seems to me it would be for your comfort to return to them."

She shook her head mournfully and answered, "No; I should have been happy but for them. Joseph Williams was the son of a well-to-do neighboring farmer-healthful and full of hope and courage-generous and cheerful, ready always to give up his own plans and prospects for the pleasure of others, and yet to laugh all the same and not to appear to have any thoughts for himself at all; so by degrees every body came to think Joseph had no wishes of his own, and the more he did the more it seemed was expected of him, till he scarcely had any privileges or pleasures at all. We saw each other sometimes, and loved each other a great deal, but my brothers and sisters would not hear of our marriage. He has not an acre of land,' they said, 'and what are you to do-live in a hut and come home to father to get petticoats for your children?> Even his good qualities they turned against the young man, saying, 'Why did he not work for himself and accumulate something, and not stay drudging for his father, who already had enough. And often when we could hear him whistle or sing across the fields they would say, Jo was wasting his time and trying to make Peggy hear how well he could whistle or sing, and that he would be a long time in felling a tree if he minded tunes so much. But for my part I could never see that his whistling and singing hindered his work at all; for there was never a young man in the neighborhood that could plow or chop with him, and as for horses, he could manage a team or ride with the best of them. But at last my folks would not see any good thing in him at all, and would repeat all his enemies said about him in my hearing, adding their own coarse comments, as though he were no more to me than to them. This was all hard to bear, but I said never a word, still loving him all the same in spite of their talk. Years and years went by so, for Joseph's father was a man greedy of gain, and desirous above all things that his son should marry a woman who had money or land; and when Joseph said that he would never marry any body but me, he put the time away and away, and though he did not positively say it should not be, the blessed day seemed never to come the nearer.

Joseph must stay with him till another field was paid for, and when that was done till a new fence was made, then till more cows were bought, then the house must be painted, and when that was done he had not house enough, and so from one thing to another it went, for it appeared that the more the old man got the more he wanted. At last the fall of the year came that Joseph was twenty-eight years old and I twenty-five. Often and often he would have broken away from every thing and married me, but still all the long years I said no, for my brothers sneered and my sisters called me selfish to love another better than them, and I had all the while hoped that a better time would come, and, indeed, it seemed a little nearer, for my sisters, without ever asking my pleasure, or thinking of it once, were married to please themselves; my brothers, too, had chosen mates, and though none of them seemed any more willing than formerly that I should marry Joseph, still I felt less obliged to sacrifice my own wish now than I used to feel. Every body began to call me an old maid, and my own folks would rally me and ask why I did not marry this one and that, just as if Joseph were not in the world. The fall, as I said, was come; old Mr. Williams was called a rich man, and had at last consented to our marriage, for he did not dislike me except that I was poor-Joseph had a new cart painted bright, and a horse of his ownand had promised him half the profits of the next year's crop. His father had a purse full of money in the desk, but said his son must earn for himself, as if he had not earned all that was called his father's, or nearly all.

"One day when I sat scheming about our future happiness, one of my brothers came in and said carelessly, 'That scamp of a fellow, Jo Williams, gets worse and worse. He is too lazy to whistle now;' and as I said nothing he continued, "he is lying across on the next hill sunning himself like a black snake.'

"I would not listen to more, but tying on my bonnet went right to the field where he was, for I knew at once that he was ill, else he would not have been lying on the ground. I was not mistaken; his face was burning hot and his eyes looked heavy and dull, and though he tried to laugh and say it was nothing, I knew better and feared he would be very sick. We talked a long time to each other of our love and of the time when we should be married; but at length he said he must plow again, for that a part of the crop he was about to sow was to be his, or ours, as he said, with a smile. I tried to dissuade him, for I knew he was not well enough to work; but

he would not admit it, and went to work again the same as though he were ever so strong.

"All the rest of the day I was very miserable, often going up to the garret and looking across the hill to see if still he kept at work, and each time I saw him, though I did not hear him whistle, and it seemed to me he walked with feeble steps. My dreams were troubled that night, and I slept little; when, however, the sun came up, it seemed to shine so brightly I thought no one could be sick, and for a while kept about the house thinking of the time I was to have a house of my own. I was afraid to go up stairs to see whether Joseph were in the field, but kept trying to think he was, till I could endure the suspense no longer. He was not to be seen; the plow was in the furrow and only half the field broken up. I shaded my eyes and looked long and earnestly every-where I had ever seen him, but all seemed lonesome and as if something was wrong; his young horse stood near the door-yard leaning his head toward the house, as if looking for his master, and I could see no sign of cheer- | fulness any where. Twenty times that day I left my work and went to the upper window, but saw nothing to encourage me. Night came, long and miserable enough, and morning, which seemed no better. I dare not go to inquire, for it would have been thought a very immodest thing, and so I suffered, O so much, all that day and night, and the next and the next, and for more than a week, when one of my brothers told me, as though it were a mere matter of news, that Jo Williams had caught cold lying on the grass and was not expected to live.

"I could not have the mournful comfort of crying; but it seemed to me as I went about the house that my heart was bleeding itself all away. No one pitied me, and no one sympathized with me; but the same duties were expected, and the same cheerfulness as ever.

"At length one night came word that Joseph was very bad and had sent for me, and, mindless of the darkness and the rain that was falling, I went as fast as I could. He was so changed I would not have known him but for the smile, which was just the same. He told me not to leave him again; said he should not need me long. He didn't blame any body,' he said; 'but if he had taken more rest as he went along, the rest that knew no breaking would not have come to him so soon.'

"I had not been by him long when he complained of being cold, and when I pressed his hands close to my bosom he smiled and said they were warm enough; and so they were, for he

VOL. XT.-15

never knew any thing after that. The next day we buried him; his coffin was carried in his own little cart; and when I could not hear him speak nor see him smile any more, I wished I, too, might die and be laid by him, but death would not come for all my calling, and by and by the thought came to me that any where would be better than the place that constantly reminded me of him; so, under pretense of visiting a distant relative of our family, I came to this great city, ignorant of every thing that was esteemed most by my relations.

"I need not disguise the truth, they were rich and proud, and," she hesitated, and after a moment added, "not such people as I had been used to at home. There was a young lady in the family who looked down upon me more than the rest, if that were possible, treating me always as though I was made of something else than flesh and blood, never speaking to me unless to order me to wait upon her in some way. This treatment I would not once have borne, but now my spirit was broken, and I cared for nothing save to have a place to stay while I should live, where nothing would remind me of my lost hopes. So I told my relations I would stay in the kitchen with the servants and assist in the house work if they would allow me something to wear and eat.

one.

"I scarce went above the basement from month to month, so I do not know whether it were true or not, but it was told us that Miss Sophia-that was the name of the haughty young lady-was gone from home. I had reasons for believing that she was concealed in the house; I said nothing, and my suspicion was not dreamed of by any One day my relation, the person who came to-day and carried away little Freddy, asked me if I would not like to keep house by myself, and go into some little business of my own, talking very kindly with me, and saying it grieved him to employ me as a menial, and that he would assist me to such sum as I should require. Joseph had always delighted in a garden, and for that reason more than for any other, I engaged in my present employment. I had not been a fortnight in my new home, which was at first very comfortable, even pretty, when a loud ring surprised me one night, and on opening the door I found a basket containing a baby. I took it in, of course, and early the following morning, as if quite by accident, my relative called to see me; and though he had never loved children, and was not given to liberality, insisted on my keeping the baby, offering to assist me till the boy grew of years to work for me."

She was prevailed upon, and the old man

kept his word for several years, but his visits grew fewer and his assistance less and less, till finally she was left dependent upon herself, and with little Fred, as she called the foundling, not large enough to assist her. She had now a hard struggle, and was forced to go from one place to another, each time finding her home a little less comfortable, till at last she had taken rooms where I found her, and where Frederick, just beginning to help work and make company for her, was taken away.

It was the carriage and horses of the person I saw that ran over the boy, as he was hurriedly crossing the street in the dark: "And so it is," said Peggy, "the sins of the fathers are visited on the children." That it was the ghost of her lost Joseph the dying boy had seen, Peggy had no doubt. It seemed to her, she said, that she had heard from him out of heaven, and from the fancy, if it were a fancy, she derived the greatest satisfaction.

Poor little Freddy! I knew then nor ever nothing more of his history, but troubling fancies helped me to account for the rich man's helping Peggy to a home, and for his giving the dead orphan burial. Heaven grant that he may have found a father, and forgive those, whoever they were, who added the sin of abandonment to the sin that was before.

While Peggy was telling me the story of her life and that of her orphan charge, Caty had been moving softly about, making no obtrusive remarks and offering no officious consolation; and now that the working was done, she lighted the candle, for the night was come, and taking from the shelf a Bible read, "Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid." And so in that humble room I left the women together, seeking consolation in the shadow of that Rock to which, some time or other, if we will not voluntarily go, we are driven for consolation. Blessed are they by whom that time is not put off.

GO TO GOD.

WHEN perils overhang your estate or your children; when disease and death threaten to dissolve your dearest ties; when false affection blights your hopes; when the burdens of life press you; when trifles vex you-go to God. When you think of your sins; when you feel the motion of your indwelling corruptions; when you fluctuate between hope and fear touching the question of your spiritual adoption-go to God. Go-and tell your troubles. Go-cast your care upon

him.

EMPLOYMENT OF LITTLE CHILDREN IN

HEAVEN.

S every ransomed and glorified spirit will A have its appropriate employment in heaven, it has often been asked-on what will little children be everlastingly engaged?-what sphere, or rank, will they occupy in the realms of light? "An infant's soul-the sweetest thing on earth, To which endowments beautiful are given, As might befit a more than mortal birthWhat shall it be, when midst its winning mirth, And love, and trustfulness, 'tis borne to heaven? Will it grow into might above the skiesA spirit of high wisdom, glory, powerA cherub guard of the eternal Tower, With knowledge fill'd of its vast mysteries? Or will perpetual childhood be its dowerTo sport forever, a bright, joyous thing, Amid the wonders of the shining thrones Yielding its praise in glad and treble tones,

tender dove beneath the Almighty's wing?" Nothing is said directly on this subject in Divine revelation: something, however, may be drawn inferentially from inspired and celestial representation.

The principal employment of the blessed in heaven-which constitutes no small portion of its conceivable beatitude-is that of worship and adoration. 'And they rest not day and night, saying, Holy, holy, holy, Lord God Almighty, which was, and is, and is to come." Rev. iv, 8. In the Apocalypse we are frequently taught that each glorified spirit will have a particular sphere appointed him, and each will be engaged on that particular employment which is congenial to that sphere; consequently, little children will occupy a sphere peculiar to themselves. We can hot tell by what process their latent powers will be drawn out, expanded, and elevated, to meet celestial requirement. Those checks and obstructions which impede the development and action of the powers of the mind on earth, will be unknown and unfelt in heaven. And who can tell how readily and completely the mind will then burst forth, like the bud under the bright and warm rays of the sun, into an astonishing beauty and vigor? Where there are no barriers, that immortal principle of our being must unfold its noble powers at once, and exert itself with a freedom and enthusiasm which would throw into the shade the proudest and brightest earthly philosopher. As little children are eminently fitted to take a conspicuous part in the everlasting services of the celestial sanctuary, we reasonably conclude that they will be chiefly engaged, with others, in hymning, with glowing rapture, the wonders of redeeming love. They will sustain in heaven a