LONG ENGAGEMENTS

Long engagements are to be deprecated. Quite often they come to nothing. As a rope stretched out too long grows thin at its weakest part, so the engagement which is protracted over years finally becomes a burdensome thing,

or the love of one or the other seems to wear out; and, yet, I knew a couple. who were engaged for forty years. They never married. Promptly at eight o'clock in the evening of a certain night in the week, the young man's horse was seen tied at the

gate of his lady-love. Time passed; the brown. hair and the golden hair both grew white; the young people were transformed into middle-aged and then into old people, and they were lovers always, he treating her with a grand courtesy and politeness, she most friendly and beautiful in her devotion to him; but they never married. Nobody knew why. It was supposed that they thought that while each had money enough to live on alone, neither had quite enough to make it prudent for them to join their fortunes. If this were so, they were a pair of cowards. Nothing mercenary should enter in to defeat the plans of true love. Love, thank God, is independent of dollars and cents. It can and does often flourish in the poor man's cabin; it sometimes flies from the rich man's palace.

66 NOTHING MERCENARY SHOULD ENTER INTO THE PLANS OF TRUE LOVE"

Hail! ye small sweet courtesies of life, for smooth do ye make the road of it; like grace and beauty, which beget inclinations to love at first sight, it is ye who open the door and let the stranger in.-Sterne.

THE MOTHER OF D. L. MOODY

No woman was ever more loved and honored by a son than was Mrs. Betsey Holton Moody. Of her Mr. Moody said: "It is a great honor to be the son of such a mother. I do not know where to begin; I could not praise her

D. L. MOODY'S MOTHER

enough. In the first place, my mother was a very wise woman. In one sense she was wiser than Solomon; she knew how to bring up her children. She had nine children, and they all loved their home. She won their hearts, their affections; she could do anything with them.

"Whenever I wanted real sound counsel I used to go to my mother. She so bound her children to her that it was a great calamity to have to leave. home.

"There was another remarkable thing about my mother. If she loved one child more than another, no one ever found it out. Isaiah, he was her first boy she could not get along without Isaiah. And Cornelia, she was her first girl; she could not get along without Cornelia, for she had to take care of the twins. And George, she couldn't live without George. What could she ever have done without George? He stayed right by her, through thick and thin. She couldn't live without George. And Edwin, he bore the name of her husband. And Dwight, I don't know what she thought of him. And Luther, he was the dearest of all, because he had to go away to live. He was always homesick to get back to mother. And Warren, he was the youngest when father died; it seemed as if he was dearer than all the rest. And Sam and Lizzie, the twins, they were the light of her great sorrow.

"I remember the first thing I did to earn money was to turn the neighbors' cows up on Strowbridge Mountain. The money went into the common treasury. And I remember when George got work, we asked who was going to milk the cows. Mother said she would milk. She also made our clothes, and wove the cloth, and spun the yarn, and darned our stockings; and there was never in all those years, any complaining.

"That dear face! There was no sweeter face on earth. When I got within fifty miles of home I always grew restless, and walked up and down the For sixty-eight years she lived on that hill, and when I came back after dark I always looked to see the light in mother's window. When I got home

car.

on the Saturday night she died, I was so glad I got back in time to be recognized. I said, 'Mother, do you know me?' She said, 'I guess I do!' I like guess.' The children were all with her when At last I called, Mother! mother!' No an

that word, that Yankee word,

she was taking her departure.

swer. She had fallen asleep; but I shall call her again by and by.

66

Now I have the old Bible-the family Bible-it all came from that book. That is about the only book we had in the house when father died, and out of that Book she taught us. And if my mother has been a blessing to this world, that fountain."

it is because she drank at

THE WELFARE OF SERVANTS

These seem to be regarded as necessary evils, and yet they should be comforts. If you can once get a servant to regard you as her friend, your task is half done. You can never make a friend of your servant by treating her familiarly, and joking and gossiping with her. She may, at first, be pleased with this, but she will lose her respect for you. Suppose that you had with you a young girl, the daughter of a friend, would you allow her to have associates of whom you knew nothing, and to go out in the evening with young men, and stay until nearly midnight, without knowing where she was going, and the character of her escort? Extend, then, the same surveillance and authority over the young servant girl, who is as much a member of your family as your young lady visitor, without the careful culture to keep her from evil; and who, perhaps, has not a friend in the whole country capable of advising her. She will resent it, you say. That is very probable. Young girls, of all classes, resent the authority that interferes with their pleasures. But that is not a sufficient reason for giving them a loose rein to do as they please. When the servant goes out in the evening, insist upon her return before the regular hour of closing the house; and, if she is young, inform yourself of the character of her associates, and what families she visits. Teach her how to dress in a neat and becoming manner. Show her how to select goods, and to harmonize colors; if possible, sometimes go shopping with her. Take pains to induce her to safely invest her surplus money, instead of spending it on cheap jewelry and cotton laces. Put into her mind the ambition to excel in her work.

Some ladies do not allow any "followers" at all, but this is going to the other extreme. An occasional visit from a young man of good principles will do your servant no harm. It helps a servant very far towards doing well when her mistress takes an interest in whatever most engages her thoughts and affections. She has her hopes and ambitions; her cares and sorrows; and, above all, she has her family ties; and sympathy and affectionate interest are as dear to her as to other women.

able.

Try, too, as far as your means will allow, to make your servant comfortIt must be somewhat discouraging to a woman who has finished a hard

day's work to go up on a cold winter night to her room where the temperature is forty degrees, and to go shivering to sleep on a “lumpy" mattress on which she could not sleep at all if she were not so tired. Even if your means are somewhat straitened, you can, by the exercise of a little ingenuity, manufacture articles of furniture that will be quite comfortable, and will give the room an attractive appearance. Above all, there should be a good bed.