The postmistress, a kindly-hearted spinster of middle age, who knew everybody miles round, and their affairs too, measured off the two yards of muslin without speaking, and then, as she rolled it up, she fired her shot.

"Mrs. Douglas had six bottles of port-wine sent her last week as a present from her brother-in-law. Mrs. Mitchell's terrible weak just now, and a drop of good wine 'll help her a deal."

Widow Carter's face, as she took her roll of muslin, was a study; but I did not care to stay and triumph over her discomfiture, so, with a hasty "good morning," I slippel past her and through the open door on to the village green.

Well did the Good Master show his knowledge of human nature when He said "Judge not." We are all so ready to do it. On the surface, Widow Carter was safe enough in her strictures. We all knew that Mrs. Douglas, though a lady by birth, was in such straitened circumstances that even table-beer was not often seen in her house, and we none of us knew that she had a brother-in-law rich enough to send her such a present. We are simple folk in our village, of primitive ways and economical ideas, and half-adozen of port-wine seemed an almost regal present; but still we might have given her the benefit of a charitable doubt, before setting it down to "stuck-up "-ness. It would be very well for all of us, if we could determine that before pronouncing judgment on our friends and neighbours, or before even criticising their actions unkindly, we would at least try and look below the surface, and discover something more of the reasons that guide or compel their actions. We should so often find that causes we had never suspected, motives of which we knew nothing, existed for the conduct we disapprove, that in time we might learn to obey that emphatic command, "Judge not."

A year or two before Mrs. Douglas came to our village, an old lady lived in the white cottage on the far side of the green, who was the subject of a good deal of talk. It got about when she first came to live amongst us, as such

things will, that her husband had left her £1,000 a year for life. I believe her lawyer told our minister, and he used to be very bitter upon her for giving so little to his charities, though I'm bound to say she was very good to the poor about. But the minister wanted to build a coffee-room for the working-men, and he was very angry that Mrs. Bruce did not put down £50. She only gave him £5, and he lifted his eyes and hands expressively when he told me.

"It's astonishing," he said, "that people with money should be so chary of giving it for good purposes. She cannot spend half her income.”

Well, I suppose she could not. There were only herself and two old servants, a man and his wife, and though she kept a little pony and chaise and lived comfortably, and gave her little tea and supper parties in return for the hospitalities of her neighbours, it was all very modest and simple in style. Four times a year she used to go to London, and always stayed away four days. We supposed she went up to draw her money; but though she was very kind and friendly, she never talked to any one about her private affairs; at the same time there was no appearance of mystery.

But one fine autumn morning I heard the church bell clang out whilst I was at hreakfast, and learned, to my great surprise, that Mrs. Bruce was dead. She had been ailing slightly for some days, but we none of us thought about it as really serious. A week later we all knew why she had only given £5 to the coffee-room. She had not been hoarding her money.

By her will half her money was left to her nephew, the only relative we had ever seen or heard her speak of; the other half was left in the hands of trustees for the benefit of her "dear afflicted friend and schoolfellow." By degrees we learnt the history of this old schoolfellow, to whom Mrs. Bruce had been such a true and faithful friend. She had gone mad from trouble, loss of children, followed by loss of fortune. Her husband had unhappily committed suicide,

and this last blow had turned the unhappy wife's brain. Quietly and unostentatiously Mrs. Bruce had taken charge of her girlhood's friend. For several years she had spent half her income in placing her poor friend under the best medical advice, and where she could be certain of the tenderest care. Her journeys four times a year were to see this afflicted friend, and learn if any hope had dawned of a return of reason. Her quiet life in our secluded village enabled her to meet all the heavy expenses of her charge without too conspicuous retrenchment, or the cutting down of other little kindly actions. I think there were few amongst us who had not in our hearts thought Mrs. Bruce mean, for not having spent her big income more freely in village matters, even though we did not say so. There was nothing, on the surface, that could absorb such an income, and we all concluded she liked to save it, the most charitable amongst us only going so far as to say, "Well, it is her own, to save or give away as she pleases; it is no business of ours." I don't think one of us ever gave her the credit for a moment of giving freely yet secretly; of not letting her left hand know what her right hand did. My thoughts went back to that little excitement in our quiet lives as I crossed the green after Widow Carter's hasty judgment on Mrs. Douglas, and I resolved again in my own mind that I would try and remember these two lessons I had learned, and be slower to judge my neighbours or form an opinion upon their actions. "For now we see through a glass darkly," and the thoughts and intentions of the heart are hidden from our view. We cannot penetrate them. Reader, let us all try to think kindly of each other, and believe the good until the evil is proved.

ELLEN HOPKINS.

DISTANT mountains, pure and blue,
And as some earthly heaven fair,
What paints your groves so soft a hue,
And breathes such sweetness in the air?
Is it the sun that bathes in glow

Each far off scene before, behind?
No, 'tis no radiance from below,
It is the power of the mind.

I know yon distant hill is bare,

And hard as this on which I stand; I know a chill is in the air,

That floats along yon golden strand;
And yet my willing heart they charm,
Fair symbols of a fairer shore,

Dear Land! secure from hate and harm,
I seem to see thy coasts before.

Oh to fly forth, like happy dove,

Which leaves some stormy clime, and steers Her course to summer's home above

And far beyond the place of fears:

To reach at last the untroubled calm,
Where love informs the expanded mind,
Where life's deep wound has found its balm,
And pain and sin are left behind.

Ah fading dream! I may not leave
This narrow life of many a care.
Ah fond regrets! stern truths bereave
The soul of joys she fain would share.
Yet would I learn that land is blest,

Most blest of all in earth and heaven,
Where I may serve my Lord, and rest

In thoughts of Him, and sin forgiven.

Spare me the luring dream! I love

To visit, even in dreams, my home: But give the heart which would not move From duty's place till He shall come. Himself the way to that fair clime,

He shall my journeying soul prepare: He has appointed all my time;

He knows, and He will bring me there.

W.

I

KNEW Frank Redford from his birth, and I was very fond of him. His father and mother lived in the little town of Meldish, where I was a minister for a great many years; and they were amongst the most regular attendants on my ministry I ever had. They