with the thought that Jesus knew all about his sickness and wants, and how weak he was. So he said his accustomed prayer, adding, "and God bless my teachers!" Then his mind wandered, and consciousness never returned.

A few mornings before the commencement of his illness, his father took him for a walk up the Cemeteryroad. At the top of the hill they sat down; and Willie sang "Catch the Sunshine." The next time they two went up that road together, the father returned without his boy; and his head was so bowed by sorrow, that he

NARRATIVES

THE JEW AND HIS DAUGHTER. A MINISTER, in a pleasant and muchfrequented rural district, was preaching to his people, when he saw a man enter having every mark of a Jew in his face. He was well-dressed, and his looks seemed to tell that he had been in great sorrow. He took a seat, and listened in a serious and devout manner, while a tear was often seen to wet his careworn cheek.

After the service, the Minister went up to him, and said, "Sir, do I not address myself to one of the children of Abraham?" "You do," he replied. "May I ask how it is that I meet a Jew in a Christian church?" The substance of the Jew's account was as follows. He had been well educated, had come from one of our principal manufacturing towns; and, with his books, his riches, and a lovely daughter of seventeen, had found a charming retreat on the fruitful banks of the river which ran through the neighbourhood in which he was now residing. He had recently buried his wife, and he knew no pleasure but in the company of his beloved child. She was, indeed, worthy of a parent's love. Her mind was well informed, her disposition amiable, she could read and speak with

caught no glimpse of the "sunshine" in which his little one dwells for evermore.

O! I sadly miss those sympathetic eyes, so quickly moved to tears or smiles, which seemed such an inspiration to me in teaching. But, thank God, our little earth-star is not lost, only hidden by the light of heaven. It cannot now wander from the centre of true happiness. Here he has known hunger, and sorrow, and pain; but the Shepherd has gathered to His bosom the weary little lamb.

I thank God for one who will welcome me at heaven's gate. ANNIE.

INCIDENTS.

ease various languages; and her manners pleased all who saw her. Νο wonder, then, that a doting father, whose head had now become sprinkled with grey, should place his whole affection on this lovely child. Being a strict Jew, he brought her up in the closest conformity to the principles of his religion.

It was not long since his daughter had been taken sick. The rose faded from her cheek, her eye lost its fire, her strength decayed, and it was soon too certain that death was creeping upon her frame. The father hung over her bed with a heart ready to break with anguish. He often tried to talk with her, but could seldom speak except by the language of his tears. He spared no expense or trouble in getting medical aid; but no human skill could extract the arrow of death, now fixed in her heart.

The father was walking in a wood near his house, when he was sent for by his dying daughter. With a heavy heart he entered the door of her chamber. He was now to take a last farewell of his dying child; and his religion gave him but a feeble hope as to a meeting hereafter.

The child grasped the hand of the parent with a death-cold hand. "My father, do you love me?"

"My child, you know that I love you, -that you are more dear to me than all the world beside."

"But, my father, do you love me?"

'Why, my child, do you give me pain Have I never given you any proof of my love ? "

"But, my dearest father, do you love me ?"

The father could not answer. The child added, "I know, my dear father, you have ever loved me: you have been the kindest of parents, and I tenderly love you; will you grant me one request? O, my father, it is the dying request of your daughter! will you grant it."

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My dearest child, ask what you will; though it were the whole of my property, whatever it might be, it should be granted; I will grant it."

"My dear father, I beg you never again to speak against Jesus of Nazareth."

The father was dumb with surprise. "I know," added the young girl, “I know but little about this Jesus, for I was never taught; but I know that He is a Saviour, for He has made Himself known to me since I have been sick, even for the salvation of my soul. I believe He will save me, though I have never before loved Him. I feel that I am going to Him, that I shall ever be with Him. And now, my dear father, do not deny me; I beg that you will never again speak against Jesus of Nazareth. I entreat you to obtain a New Testament, that tells of Him; and I pray that you may know Him; and, when I am no more, you may bestow on Him the love that was formerly mine."

The labour of speaking here overcame her feeble body; she stopped, looked up, pointing above her face with her forefinger, and in this manner her

soul took its flight to that Saviour whom she loved and honoured.

The first thing the parent did, after he had buried his child, was to procure a New Testament. This he read; and taught by the Spirit from above, is now numbered among the meek and happy followers of Christ.-Sunday Teachers' Treasury.

THE YOUNG HOLLANDER.

A SHORT time since it was my privilege to be a visiter to a Sunday-school in Brooklyn which used to claim my willing services every week. After the opening exercises, the Superintendent asked me to take charge of a class whose teacher was absent. It consisted of six little girls. Among them was one deformed child, of whose age I could not judge, for suffering had made the face prematurely old, and the poor bent figure was no index of the years. I was not impressed pleasantly, at first, by this poor girl, whose features were heavy, and their expression dull; but, as I proceeded with the lesson, I found that she was the most intelligent pupil in the class. Those dark, sad eyes grew bright, as I spoke of the love that passeth knowledge. Those toil-hardened hands knew their way through the Book of God, and in almost every instance it was Katherine, the child of poverty and pain, who found the references first, whether they were in Isaiah or John.

She was a Hollander, and I shall never forget how luminous her face became when I asked her if such was not the fact. "I not speak English goot, I know," she said, smiling; "I only have been in this land tree years."

It is a very good test of familiarity with the Scriptures when one can readily turn to any portion of them. When I see a charming, bright-eyed girl looking for Hosea in the New Testament, or hunting up Leviticus among the Prophets, I am very much

afraid that her gilt-edged Bible is kept for show rather than for use. When a boy who is reading Virgil, and studying mathematics, does not know where to look for the Ten Commandments, and has to search all over the Gospels for the Lord's Prayer, I am fearful that his other studies are crowding out the best study in the world. I thought that the little Dutch girl might teach a lesson to many who are clothed in "purple and fine linen"-that one she had herself learned in Christ's school, "Search the Scriptures."-SundaySchool Times.

"DON'T YOU LOVE HIM FOR

THAT, FATHER?"

ONE Sabbath evening, the father of two little children had placed one of them on each knee, to ask them what they had heard in the infant-school that day. He was not a professor of religion, although he had a pious wife. The little children began to tell him, in their own way, of the beautiful home in heaven that Jesus had left because of His love to men. Looking full in her father's face, the little girl said, "Jesus must have loved us very much to do that; don't you love Him for it, father?" They then went on describing the trials and sufferings of the Saviour, and she again asked the question, "Don't you love Him for that, father?" and when they spoke of His death on the Cross, the little one asked the third time, "Now, don't you love Him, father?" The father had to put the children down, and go out of the room to hide his emotion. He con

fessed to the writer afterwards, that he felt more under the artless questioning of his little children than he ever felt under the most powerful preaching in his life. He soon afterwards united with the Church of God.

Does your father love Jesus? Can you not ask him? Do you pray for him? Do you show by your life that you love the Saviour?- Hammond's "Little Ones in the Fold."

HOW THE CORDS OF LOVE MAY DRAW.

A LADY was converted; her husbana was opposed to religion; but he said to a friend, "My wife obeys me cheerfully in everything, except when she thinks her duty to God is concerned." The friend said, "I will lay you a wager that she would not obey you in such a case as this: you shall invite me and half a dozen more to sup with your wife at a very late hour, when you know she has retired to rest." "I take the bet," he said. The party arrived after midnight. He sent word to his wife that several friends had come to sup with him. She rose immediately, had the supper prepared, and received them kindly. The man who lost the wager said to her, "How could you keep your temper ?" She answered, "Unless my husband's heart become changed, this is his only heaven; and, therefore, I wish to make it as happy to him as possible." When the husband heard it, he said, "This must be true religion," and he began to read, and think, and pray for himself; and God put a new spirit within him.

JESUS IN THE TEMPLE.

(Luke ii. 43-50.)

THE words, "When they had fulfilled the days," imply that the parents

of Jesus remained in Jerusalem until the close of the feast of unleavened bread. That feast being over, they set out on their return to Nazareth. Another company, probably of youths,

had set out before them; and, as Jesus had, perhaps, associated with these youths before, Joseph and Mary naturally supposed that He would be with them now, and therefore were not at all anxious respecting Him, though He was not under the immediate notice of their eye. But He tarried behind. Jerusalem and its Temple had attractions for Him of no ordinary kind; and, whilst His parents were again on the road to Nazareth, He was in one of the Temple-courts, "sitting in the midst of the doctors, both hearing them, and asking them questions." Let us pause here, and try to realize the scene. These doctors were some of the Rabbis, or teachers, who were accustomed to sit in an apartment of the Temple, holding disputations concerning the law. They were not necessarily members of the Sanhedrim; but, in all probability, several of them were such. The title "Rabbi" only began to be used during the reign of Herod the Great; and took its rise in connexion with the two schools of Shammai and Hillel, between which there was much difference of opinion on questions of the most foolish kind. The Rabbis, among whom Jesus was found, were probably sitting in a room connected with the court of the women; for beyond that court females were not allowed to pass. It was next to the court of the Israelites, and was entered by one of those gates which stood respectively on the north, south, and east of the Temple.

How Jesus obtained access to the doctors we are not informed; but He may have been introduced by one of their number with whom He had previously engaged in conversation. And though, at this time, the disciples of the Rabbis usually stood when in their presence, Jesus was admitted to a seat among them; for, by His conversation and deportment, He had won their confidence, and gained their high

esteem. It must not be supposed that He addressed them in a bold and domineering manner: "that," as Olshausen observes, "would have been an anomaly which the God of order would never have exhibited." No; but as a Child He heard them, and asked them questions. They were, perhaps, reading a roll of one of the books of Moses, or of the prophets, and giving their comments upon it; and Jesus listened, and then asked them for yet further light. In rightly asking questions the profoundest wisdom is frequently displayed: and the questions of Jesus related to none of the frivolous matters in dispute among these doctors, to none of the foolish traditions of their fathers; but were of so grave a nature as to excite the astonishment of all who heard them, and to lead them, in their turn, to ask questions of Him. Here the Gospel of the Infancy again obtrudes its follies, and says that one of the doctors asked Him if He had studied astronomy, and another if He was acquainted with philosophy and physics; on which He gave them the most wonderful replies! What a contrast to the beautiful simplicity of St. Luke! He says nothing as to what the questions were. it, then, be wrong in us to hazard a conjecture? May we not suppose that His questions related to the Messiah, and to the prophecies respecting Him found in the Psalms, Isaiah, and Daniel? This, surely, was one of the great themes which now began to occupy His deepest thoughts; and to learn the views of these Rabbis respecting Him "of whom Moses in the law, and the prophets, did write," would, we conceive, be His earnest wish. Nor is there anything incredible in the fact that one so young should thus converse with these learned Rabbis. According to his own account of himself, Josephus was so precocious a youth, that, at the age of fourteen, he was frequently asked by the high priest and principal men

Will