of everything else you were ignorant; but if ignorant of Christ it will avail nothing though you knew everything beside."

GEO. WILSON, M.A., F.L.S.

A Sailor's Thoughts Homewards.

DARKrey foam behind, before us black as jet:

ARK was the night, the slippery deck was wet;

"Yet one more surly night, and day will come-
O welcome day! for it will bring us home.

"Four weary months, and many a storm had we-
Loud roaring storms, and many a rolling sea.
What matters! all is past; no more we roam
The wild sea ways: one good run brings us home.

"We've passed the Cape of Storms, we saw the North,
Pallid as Death, send his white armies forth.
Some lie where green waves toss the wrack, and some
The grey mists hold,-but we are close on home.

"What if this angry night should prove the worst:
We shall have work when yon black sky has burst.
All's well, if to the shore we ne'er should come-
All's well, my heart, there is a better home.

"Whose voice was that !-my lad, don't lose your head,-
My mother's voice!-were she not with the dead.
All's well!-the sailor's way lies through the foam,

The best and shortest to the sailor's home.

"I've learned the love of God upon the sea;
He's made the watery wastes a school to me.
Glad will my heart be should my Master come
Even this wild night,-we'll go together home."

W.

From a picture by GAINSBOROUGH..

The Sisters.

LONG the verdant woodland ways
The little maids are going,

The clouds are drifting overhead,
The breezes light are blowing:

And all along the mossy glades
The primrose flowers are springing;
While overhead, and out of sight,
The lark its song is singing.

A peaceful and a happy scene,
With ne'er a shade of danger;
As Nellie rides on Dobbin's back,
Just fresh come from his manger.
But sure, we think the little maid
Might be a trifle bolder,

She scarce can need, on such a steed,
Her sister's hands to hold her.

No fear of Dobbin's sudden start
At sight of hare or rabbit;
Composure is his state of mind,
And quietude his habit.

No wild beast haunts the woodland way,
No tiger fierce or leopard;

That noise she hears,-a bleating lamb, That's wandered from the shepherd.

In fact, the fears of little Nell

Have nothing for foundation;

For what she dreads has place alone
In her imagination.

And yet the elder child no way
The younger's dread despises,
But steadies her with loving arms,
And soothes each fear that rises.

Till one by one these terrors vain
Are from her bosom banished,
And, like a morning mist that fades,
The last of them has vanished.

Methinks from this both you and I
A lesson might be learning;
In this fair picture on the page
A parable discerning.

For oft when something new and strange

Is on our path appearing,

We trembling pause in sudden dread,

A fancied peril fearing.

At each new turn, to feeble faith,
Some thought of fear arises;
And simple duties then appear
Like dangerous enterprises:

Until, in human weakness, we
Are led to trust Another,
And lean upon the loving arm
Of Christ, our Elder Brother.

Ah, then at last we come to learn
How vain were our surmises,
And that the way He takes is safe
From terrors and surprises.

Where He doth go, no ill can come,
No enemy or stranger;

And they who walk with Him are safe
For evermore from danger.

R. R. THOM.

The Carpenter's Shed.

CHAPTER VI.

HE ticket-of-leave man Mrs. Grainger had noticed the first time she had been present at the evening meetings became one of the most constant at

tendants at the shed, though rarely indeed could he be induced to speak a word to any one there. But one evening, as Frankie was giving out the hymn-books, the man laid his hand on the open, boyish brow, and muttered to himself: "Only to think I was once as young and innocent as that! It don't seem possible now!"

Frankie looked up, well-pleased to have some notice taken of him. "I like you," he shyly said, "but I don't know your name.”

It's Ned," answered the man, forgetting he was speaking to a child.

Frankie seemed perplexed.

Uncle Ned?" asked the boy.

“Then shall I call you

"Yes, yes; Uncle Ned," he huskily replied; the name sounded strangely sweet to him.

"Then, Uncle Ned, I'll come back to you soon: and mind you keep a place for me.”

The boy went on distributing his books, and coming to Mrs. Grainger, told her where he intended to sit. Then, Frankie," said she, unfastening a tiny bunch of primroses from her dress, "take these to 'Uncle Ned,' and see if he would like them." The child obeyed, but the man no sooner caught sight of the flowers than the tears came into his eyes.

I saw lots of them growing last spring," he whispered low to the astonished boy, "but I couldn't pick them then." Frankie little understood the reason why; but seeing the trouble in his new friend's face, he slipped his own small hand into the man's rough palm, and squeezing it hard in sign of sympathy, soon afterwards fell asleep, with his head resting against that strong protecting arm.

But Ned Hartley himself remained wide awake, and in keenest self-reproach gazed first on the peaceful face of the child, and then on the simple beauty of the flowers still held within his hand. How strongly these contrasted in his mind with the stained and evil life that ought never to have been! and the man caught himself wondering whether with such a father as Frankie now had, he himself could possibly have become the man he was. Yet still, however that might have been, he knew himself to blame for much of the folly and crime that had marred the whole of his past, and it was with a feeling akin to despair he told himself that though others still might have the time to make their lives fair and useful if they would, but very few opportunities could now remain to his grey hairs.

But at length Ned's wandering attention was arrested by a remark that fell from the lips of Robert Davidson, a man who had lately come from a country station on the line to spend a few days with his London brother; and who coming thus from a place where most of the men possessed