put into her new barouche, and driving us all on to the ground. The morning was dull, foggy, and disagreeable, but our military enthusiasm kept us warm, and our difficulty in deciding on the exact spot of ground designed for the review made it all the more interesting. Clementina

was certain it was where the reviews had been held before, but Theresa had private information this ground had been taken away from them, and that we must go up to the gate of a certain large turnip-field, vividly impressed on the memory of all of us by reason of the unpleasant odour that exhaled therefrom as we passed it the day before, owing to a right of road that had been opened through it over rotten turnips on a humid ground. Theresa was right, as she always is. We heard their delightful guns popping away through the mist at the very moment the savoury turnip-steam again assailed our nostrils. It was clear we must go right through the turnips to get at the ground on which they were practising. You might have thought a soup-kitchen, of a very low description, was already established there, such a steam the greens gave out-such a warm, moist, pungent atmosphere. We came upon Symthe de Symthe quite by surprise-"sunbeams breaking through the mist"-he called it; but I think privately he was a little annoyed as a rusty-looking private was just wiping down his "charger" with a wisp of damp-looking hay, that noble animal having lost his footing in the mud, and rather blemished his beauty by the thick coating with which he had bedaubed himself. It is true we could not see all the geography of the field, as there was a large puddle and a gate facing us which refused, under any persuasion, to allow itself to be opened; but now the gallantry of Mr. Cousin shone forth conspicuously. Raising himself in his saddle-girths, and pointing in a commanding manner to two of the soldiers, he ordered them "to come forward, and make way for the ladies!" It was well that John had the good sense to get off and hold the horses' heads, or they and the soldiers would inevitably have come into collision. As we went in floundering knee-deep in mud through the remains of the shattered gate, and found ourselves really on the field for practice, the drafts from the regiment made it look somewhat ridiculously small, and it struck me that both the men and their garments were rather "seedy;" but, as our cousin said, "it was necessary to keep up discipline in these stirring times, and perhaps they were rather 'worn' on the strength of it." They went through their "evolutions," however, in a wonderful manner, the swords flashing, the guns firingthe legs all going together-and of course we applauded at each new act. Clementina said, indeed, she did not see what there was in it to bring us all out of our beds on such a wretched morning; but I know she was disappointed because young Robson was not on the ground; and as for Theresa, she did not know whether they or Symthe de Symthe were most to be admired. She told us, after leaving the ground, that she thought she was cut out for a military life, and hoped we did not imbibe the foolish prejudices some people had against widowers; but we did not agree with her at the time, all our dresses having come "limp," and there being some very unorthodox spots of mud on our new French bonnets. Of course we told our cousin Symthe de Symthe what beautiful order his regiment was in, and how much we were charmed and edified by all we had seen; but to you, dear public, to whom our hearts are opened, we have no hesitation in confessing that there was base metal in the sounding gold even in the glorification of a militia review.

ADVENTURES OF BENJAMIN BOBBIN THE BAGMAN.

BY CRAWFORD WILSON.

CHAPTER XXVI.

THE COUNTRY CURATE.

"SPEAKING of clergymen," said Mr. Cripps, in his mild tones, "I'll tell you a fact that of late years happened under my own observation." He evidently desired to change light subjects; he considered them unfitted for the Sabbath evening.

You are all aware that I am not the youngest individual in the room. I've ran already nearly two-thirds of the race allotted to men in the present generation. My hair, like many of our worldly friends, began to fall off from me when I commenced descending into the vale of years. But as it is not of myself but of a dear friend I mean to speak, I shall not trespass upon your patience by a lengthened preface that can be of no possible interest to you, but commence at once with the hardships endured by my uncomplaining friend.

I

When at school, some thirty-five years ago, I had the good fortune to gain the esteem of the senior boy; he was my elder by six years. was twelve, he eighteen. He was of a very steady cast of character reflective, generous, amiable, and docile almost to a fault; passionately fond of reading, gifted with most extraordinary retentive faculties, possessed of great concentrative powers, indomitable perseverance, and extreme fortitude and patience under difficulties. He was the only son of a widow, whose little stipend barely sufficed to give him a good classical education, and keep herself and daughter in a respectable position. He was exceedingly attached to her, and laboured severely to advance himself (as he knew that that was her heart's dearest wish), with the Church for his goal.

As I was also of a retiring nature he took great notice of me, pitied and cheered my dulness and stupidity, aided me in my tasks, and delighted in conversing with me. I have sat by his side and listened to him-boy as I was-for hours, in a secluded corner of the playground, whilst he read or expounded passages from history or Seripture that to me were as sealed books until his simple method of explaining them made all clear to my comprehension. I cared not for play when he was disengaged, nor for the nickname of "Tom Morton's Dervise," with which my schoolfellows branded me. I loved him and his society, looked upon him with awe and reverence, and only felt happy when we were together. But the time came when he had to leave the school, and with it a misfortune to himself and his family of which they never dreamt. His mother had commissioned her solicitor to raise a sufficient sum of money upon her slender annuity to put her son through his collegiate examinations, but the wretch mortgaged the full amount heavily, and decamped. Poor Tom! it nearly broke his heart. It is a sorry omen when a young man, full of hopes, strikes his legs against such an obstacle as ruin at the first step he takes from his school, in this world of trouble. Another man would have been crushed by the calamity, but Tom had others to live for

besides himself, and the hopes of ultimately being enabled to assist his darling mother in her difficulties inspired him with ardour, and gave him renewed energies. He entered the college as a sizer, a petty tutorship aiding him in preserving a proper seeming; struggled manfully to keep his head above water, and minister to the few comforts of the widow's fireside.

Two years passed by-two years of patient labour, of incessant application, midnight study, and self-privation. Two of those years that oftentimes leave the wrinkles of twenty on the brow, sear up the heart, wither the affections, and metamorphose the spirit as well as the ance of a man. Such had they been to him-but his darling object was attained, the goal reached, his ambition gratified. He was ordained.

appear

A short time subsequent to his ordination he was appointed to a curacy in a country village, at the annual salary of seventy pounds. He was a faithful steward, toiled incessantly in his vocation, and was soon universally beloved. Now, a' greater preacher than the Reverend Thomas Morton ever was, has said, that "it is not good for man to dwell alone;" doubtless he felt the truth of that doctrine, and availed himself of the advice given by St. Paul to Timothy in his first epistle, as though it had been written especially for his own guidance, where he says, "Let the deacons be the husbands of one wife, ruling their children and their own houses well." One deacon only to each wife of course was meant, and one wife took honest Tom Morton to his own bosom and fireside. A neighbouring clergyman officiated in my friend's little church, and before its altar knelt its godly curate by the side of as pure and lovely a young creature as ever joined in the sacred responses, or blushed at the first wedded kiss.

She was dowerless; but what of that? Her heart was a fortune in itself, and he would not exchange his confiding Lydia for the wealth of a thousand Golcondas.

Poor curates who marry dowerless young ladies have, however, an unhappy knack of fulfilling, too literally, one of the first commands given to man-viz., "Grow fruitful, and multiply, and replenish the earth." Be that as it may, my friend regularly, for some years after marriage, about Christmas time, opened the Church's prayer-book at that part of its liturgy headed "Baptism of Infants," an unconscious cherub requiring the sacred rite at his hands, and as surely, when the ceremony was concluded, leaving the church with the curate's surname. It seemed unaccountable to Tom, yet so he went on, Christmas after Christmas, reading in public, "Blessed is the man who hath his quiver full of them," and at each occasion of the kind, another Morton was added to his family, and another mouth required a spoon.

Some nine years after his marriage, his aged mother and sister, having no other resources left, gave up their home in London and went down to reside with him. The news of their arrival fell upon the occupants of the little cottage like an avalanche. Tom was sorely puzzled : few of life's necessaries, and not one of its luxuries, were at his disposal. He knew not how to manage, but his wife was an angel. So, leaving the matter in her hands, he looked upon it as a sacred duty, and never murmured. They mutually resolved to make the widow welcome, and they succeeded, for two upright hearts went with the resolution.

Five sons and four daughters, in regular gradations, bloomed beside the parent trees, depending for the means of existence upon the curate's beggarly stipend. Another year rolled over, and his sister earned some trifle by teaching the children of the working classes, so that her earnings, with his salary as aforestated, was the wherewithal the poor fellow had to feed and clothe thirteen souls. But he had a good heart, worked ever indefatigably in his holy calling, and with a firmly-rooted trust in Providence, hoped on, but never repined:

And bless'd are those
Whose blood and judgment are so well comingled
That they are not a pipe for Fortune's finger
To sound what stop she please.

Notwithstanding the straitened circumstances of my friend, and the desire that his amiable wife had ever shown to reduce expenses, the advent of a little visitor was prognosticated. The oracle proved faithful to the letter, for in the autumn following the baptismal service was again read, and half a score juvenile Mortons were to be found congregated around his humble board.

CHAPTER XXVII.

CHARITY AND RESIGNATION.

A FEVER, immediately after the circumstance I have just related, broke out in the neighbourhood, and many fell victims to that fearful scourge and desolater. Tom's mother was the first who died of it; and soon afterwards three of his little ones slept beside her, beneath the fading daisies in the churchyard that they had tended but a week before. Heavy was the poor curate's heart, but courage was in his soul; and yet nothwithstanding his own private calamities-no weather ever hindered him from ministering to the stricken amongst his flock, preaching to them the "glad tidings of great joy." Night after night, day after day, in sunshine or in rain, did he leave his mourning family for the chamber of contagion, bringing comfort to the poor traveller bound for the dark valley of the shadow of death. His senior in the parish had fled at the outbreak of the malady, throwing upon the shoulders of the righteous Morton all its duties and consequent dangers. Still he struggled on manfully, cheerfully, faithfully-always at his post, like a trusty sentinel, and never deserting it.

Beside the bed, where parting life was laid,

Where sorrow, grief, and sin, by turns dismay'd,
The reverend champion stood,

and knelt, and prayed, and comforted, until

Mercy came down the trembling wretch to raise,
And his last faltering accents whispered-praise.

The malady slowly abated. Hope once more plumed her ruffled wings in the village. Smiles, long cast aside, again bloomed in the cheeks of youth, and health, and rustic beauty. But, alas! the sexton had been busy. Many of the pews in the little church were empty, their owners sleeping the sleep that knows no waking. Many well-known faces ceased to present themselves; the damp earth was their pillow, and the green turf their covering. Often, often, often had the curate read "I am the resurrection and the life" over the body of a dear brother or sister just

departed. “Dust to dust, ashes to ashes," with its melancholy accompaniment, had daily been echoed by the last hard beds, hollowed out from the breast of earth, as lasting niches in the catacombs of eternity.

The Sunday immediately succeeding the retreat of the fever poor Tom preached his last sermon. I was present. How striking his deliveryhow fervent his prayers-how absorbed his flock. "Work while it is

called to-day, for the night cometh when no man can work," was his text. Skilfully he handled it-ably, eloquently; few dry eyes were there. Mine were like fountains overflowing.

When he retired to the vestry he complained of fatigue, and as we returned to his little home he leaned heavily upon my arm, holding the hand of his dear wife in his own. Many times during our short walk I felt his hand beat gently upon my arm, as he said again and again, "Work while it is called to-day." "James," he said, addressing himself to me, "I was for some time last week of two minds.

"About what, Thomas ?" I inquired. "About this day's sermon.

I was divided between two excellent texts. I wished to improve the occasion-to show the uncertainty of life-the certainty of dissolution-the only narrow path to the ladder of life eternal and the righteous mercy and long-suffering of our God." He paused, so I asked:

"What was the other text ?"

"Behold, I stand at the door and knock.' I shall preach from that, God willing, this evening."

But poor Tom did not preach that evening, for he was stricken. That night the fever parched up his flesh and tortured his active limbs. The good, the pious, the benevolent Thomas Morton raved, ere long, in all the frenzy of delirium. He knew no one-not even his wife, who never, even for a moment, during the fourteen days of his distempered reason, was absent from his chamber. There, like some pure spirit delegated by Omnipotence to cherish a suffering servant, was she day and night to be found, watching his slightest movements with the jealous eyes of augmented affection-moistening his pallid lips, or bathing his burning temples, ever praying for his recovery fervently, yet with that perfect resignation which always characterises the truly pious, closing each heartfelt supplication with "not my will, but Thine, be done." His face was as a book to her, wherein she constantly studied, anticipating every change it expressed ere the wish connected with it was born, and shedding a halo of peace and holiness around the sick man's pillow.

When the fever had passed away and he awaked to consciousness, meeting those dear eyes that had always been bent over his, fondly searching for returning recognition, the first words that greeted her ravished ears were "God bless you, my darling Liddy." He could not articulate more, but his heart went with them; and then, for the first time, she wept-wept big tears of thankfulness, and devotion, and love, kneeling by his bedside, and kissing his wasted hand.

Well, poor Morton recovered slowly from the disease, but the hardships he had previously undergone, when in the exercise of his vocation, enervated his constitution. Consumption ensued: a harassing cough, accompanied by the rupture of some vessels in his lungs, brought him daily lower and lower, until the bed again became his portion. His mind

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