In the midst of the pleasant bustle of leave-taking, Mrs. Danforth sought me out. "I believe we are compatriots," said she, holding out her small, jeweled hand, with her usual mixture of hauteur, languor, and cordiality,—“I am glad there is somebody to whom I can say 'How queer!' over these Shiloh people. Do they not amuse you mightily?"

"A little, sometimes; but they command my esteem,

too."

"Oh! yes, of course," (with the slightest perceptible dryness of intonation.) "I have no doubt they are very estimable people,-all of them;-particularly that queer old maid whose vocabulary seems to suffer from what she would probably call a 'suffusion worse dumb-founded.' I believe I am the first comer in Shiloh, by a day or two, so I shall have to call upon you. May I come any time?

"Certainly. I do not think reception days are in vogue here. And I have not the least wish to introduce them; I am only too glad to dispense with the fashionable code and the minor proprieties, for a time. I have some thought of sending the fripperies after the code. I went to Clay Corner, and bought me a calico dress, this morning;-do not marvel if I return your call in it."

"Allow me to suggest that you make it after the Vocab ulary's pattern, with a sunbonnet to match," said she, with an irresistibly comic face. "I hope you do not need to be told that I shall be glad to see you,in that or anything else. Good morning, or good evening—or whatever it is,―really, if there be one thing more marvellous than another about these people, it is the hours they keep." And Mrs. Danforth smiled and bowed herself out.

We reached home while the sun was yet an hour high. Mrs. Divine was standing in the doorway.

"I have the honor," said I, making her a low courtesy, "of introducing to you the Secretary of the Ladies' Sewing Society of St. Jude's Parish, Shiloh."

"Indeed!" she answered, giving me a keen look, “so Priscilla got you in, after all! I told her she wouldn't. I thought she wasn't going the right way to work; I had a notion that 'All open and above-board' was your motto. But I'm real glad all the same;-you'll make a good one. How did it all happen?"

I thought of Mala's short, persuasive speech, and was silent. But Mrs. Prescott opportunely launched into a spirited account of the afternoon's events, and the silence passed unnoticed.

H

X.

THE MORNING SERVICE.

HAT a day it was!

One of those fresh, exuberant days of dawning summer,—never quite so perfect as on Sunday,-when thought involuntarily goes back to the story of creation, and God's pleasure in His finished work. When all things visible seem so fresh, so pure, and so glad, that we are fain to believe our Earth has entered upon a new and better cycle of her existence ;-one wherein all the old wrongs are to be righted, all the old wounds and defilements healed and cleansed;-and so we take courage and thank God. And no matter if Monday, coming with its hard hands full of work and its stern brow full of care, dispels the illusion! -we shall not be the worse for our cherished faith in the world's improvability, nor our momentary persuasion that the " good time coming" was come. Both the one and the other will make us patient to wait, and earnest to labor, for its advancement.

I spent the hour before service with a volume of George Herbert's quaint poesy in my hand,-wherein such Divine fire often breaks up through such a homely crust of expres sion; and was helped, possibly, to a deeper comprehension than usual by nature's leafy commentary, lying open outside my window. By and by, I descried small groups of country-folk, on foot and in wagons, slowly wending their way churchward, across the far-off bend of road beforementioned; Uncle True and his chair, too, setting forth on

their snail-paced pilgrimage, came into view just beyond the garden-fence;-so, putting the finishing touches to a designedly plain and simple toilet, I went down to the "out room," where Mrs. Prescott and Alice, with their bonnets on, were assisting Mrs. Divine to don hers.

The faces of the elder ladies clouded so noticeably, at sight of me, that I was moved to ask, in some perplexity, "What is the matter?"

"Nothing," said Mrs. Prescott, shortly, closing her lips firmly over the cause of her disapproval; which, nevertheless, seemed to escape from them, unwittingly, the next moment. "I thought you would have dressed up more."

And Mrs. Divine added, "You wore a finer gown than that to Society, yesterday."

"I am sorry," said I, "if you think my attire is not worthy of the occasion; but I supposed that the congregation would be dressed very plainly, for the most part, and I did not want to look like a popinjay among respectable fowls."

"Umph! there's no danger of your outshining Mrs. Danforth, I guess," said Mrs. Prescott, relaxing her severe features a little. “But, I can tell you, we country folks like to have city people wear their fine feathers when they come among us; if they don't, we suspect they think we ain't worth wasting them on."

"But, Mrs. Prescott, I don't think God's house is the place to wear 'fine feathers.'

Here Mrs. Divine took up the subject in her usual crisp, decided tones. "I suppose, Miss Frost, if you were going to see Queen Victoria, now, or the Emperor of Russia, you'd wear your best clothes, wouldn't you?"

"Yes, ma'am, but,—”

"Never mind the 'but' just now; I want to ask you, first, if you think you ought to show more respect to one of them earthly rulers, than you do the 'King of Kings,'— whose house we take the Church to be?"

"Certainly not; but then Christ set us such an example of plainness and simplicity in all His earthly life, that it seems fitting for His followers to imitate it; particularly when they meet together, to offer up prayers and praises in His name."

"Now, I think," persisted Mrs. Divine, "that Christ lived and labored in the humblest walk of life, to show men that fine things are nothing in themselves, since He could do without them; so that nobody need to feel proud because he has got them, nor mean because he hasn't. I am certain that the Lord likes me just as well in my oldfashioned gown here, that I've worn this ten years, as He does Alice in her pretty blue muslin, if my heart is as much set to obey Him; but I shouldn't feel so sure of it, if I had a brand-new silk hanging up in my closet, that I thought was too good for Him, but not a bit too nice for Mis' Thingembob's parties. I guess Solomon wore his royal robes, and handsome ones, too, when he went up to praise the Lord in the temple he had built."

“But, Mrs. Divine, I wish you could see some of the dresses I wear to parties, at home! I am sure you would agree with me that they are not suitable to wear at church."

"It's very likely I should. But did you ever ask yourself whether it was just right to have dresses too fine, or too showy, to wear in God's house? The bettermost for Him, I say; but that don't prove that costly finery and finicky gew-gaws are the things for a Christian to wear anywhere."

"But there are always people who will wear such things," returned I; "must they, therefore, wear them at church?"

"Well, no, I suppose not," answered Mrs. Divine, after a little hesitation; "perhaps it's one step toward better things for them to make up their minds they can't flout them in the Lord's face. But that don't make it right for