A long pause now followed, and then the old man said "Do you ever read the Bible?" 66 I do," said the Wee Botanist; "I read it often." "What does the Bible say about a person when he dies?" "Then shall the dust return to the earth as it was, and the spirit shall return unto God who gave it." "Why do people die ?" "The wages of sin is death." "Have all sinned?" "Death passed upon all men, for that all have sinned." Your bright eye will become dim; that hand will moulder into dust; and your soul will be far away from earth." Here again the old man sighed, and paused for some time. "I see you know something of the Bible," said he, changing both his subject and voice. "Have you read it much?" "I have read it through two or three times, and committed a great many texts to memory," replied the Wee Botanist. 66 Indeed," said the old man, "how did you manage to read it through?" "Mother always asks me to read a book right through at a time ; and you know I was three years in the house when I hurt my leg, so I had plenty of time to read, and I read no other book." "Then," the old man went on, you could tell the meaning of the story about the little lamb and the shepherd." "Oh, yes; I knew all the time what was its meaning," the boy replied. "Did you ever think how sad it would have been had the little lamb been too late in coming back to the fold? If the lion had got it—if it had been killed-ah! I have made you sad," for the old man saw the troubled looks of the Wee Botanist. "Well, I will talk to you some other time. Bring your basket to me, and I will tell you the names of the flowers you have found." The Wee Botanist could scarcely manage to hide his feelings, for he was very much troubled in his mind, and, being very shy, he was doing all in his power to hide his real state. This his old friend knew, so he lifted a flower from the basket and said "Oh, this is a geranium molle; see, the flower is like a bell in shape and a rose in colour. What beautiful round leaves are on it! The whole plant, stem and leaves, are covered with soft hairs that make it feel like velvet. Its English name is dove's-foot crane's-bill. You can remember that, I am sure." And taking up another flower, he said, "You are a lucky botanist! This is a rare plant to find here; it is anemone nemorosa, for its starry flowers shake and quiver in the wind, so it is called the wind flower. "And here is the glechoma hederacea (ground ivy,) of which the old people made tea. There are, too, Lamium album (the white lamium,) and lamium purpureum (the purple lamium.) And you have here fumaria officinalis. Why, do you know, this is a queer plant in many ways, but it is strangest for this:-if the plant is dried, then burnt in a dish, and the ashes washed with water, you can get more, far more potash from this little plant than from any other you can find.” And so the old man went on telling of the plants as he lifted them out of the basket and placed them on a large stone. "Veronica agrestis, Veronica arvensis, Veronica chamodrys, Geranium Robertum, Primula vulgaris, Viola canina. Ah!" said the old man, "you have found this old favourite. There are thousands who pass it by because it is little. Draba verna, with its thousand snowy flowers, makes many an old wall white. This is called by the old people whitlow grass; they think that it cures whitlow in the finger." The old man tried hard to interest the Wee Botanist in the wild flowers, but somehow he could not do it, and he felt that he was not succeeding. "I am afraid I have made you sad," he said at last; "but when I thought of my son I felt a pleasure, and I always feel a pleasure in being sad when I think of my poor boy. Some other day I will tell you more about it. Good morning." "Good morning," said the Wee Botanist, and in a very troubled frame of mind he came to his little garden. He planted his flowers, but the only name he could remember was anemone nemorosa. All that day (which was Saturday) he could do nothing more; he felt so very miserable, which to him was a most painful thing, he being of a very playful disposition. Next evening he went, as usual, to his Sunday class. The class was large, and in the form of a square. The Wee Botanist took his place behind the teacher, who was sitting in the middle of the square. The teacher was disturbed by the boy's entrance, and turned round, still speaking. The words he said, looking the Wee Botanist in the face, were" too ate; you cannot enter now." The teacher had been explaining the parable of the marriage feast, and had arrived at the last sentence when he was interrupted, and turning round with these words on his lips, it seemed as if he had said them to the Wee Botanist. It was a bow-shot at a venture, so far as the teacher knew or knows yet; but it shook the whole frame of the boy. A number of his friends in the class thought him ill. For a moment he seemed as if he would break down. He rose and left the class to go out; he never returned. He managed to reach a low wall at the end of the school; he placed his brow on the cold stone. His tears now flowed in floods, and with his wet face raised to heaven, and stretching out his arms, he cried-" My God! am I too late?" A. G. Music. COLLEGE GREEN. L. M. (With Trochaic Doxology) Come, Holy Ghost, our souls inspire, And light-en with ce About A.D. 1860. Praise to thy e ter nal mer - it, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. A-men. Or this: ST. ELDAD.* L. M. (With Trochaic Doxology.) Come, Holy Ghost, our souls in spire, And light-en with ce - les - tial Coda for Doxology. fire. Praise to thy e ter- nal mer- it, Father, Son, and Holy Spirit. A-men. e ⚫ Bishop of Gloucester in the time of the ancient British Church, in A.D. 490, and referred to as such in the inscription on the back of the Bishop's seat in Gloucester Cathedral. According to Ussher, this bishop buried the Britons who were slain by the treachery of the Saxons near Ambres bury, Wilts. See RUDGE'S "HISTORY OF GLOUCESTER," p. 199. WINCHESTER with WINTER. C. M. With Chorus. WINCHESTER or WINCHESTER OLD. C. M. Sal - va- tion! Oh the joyful sound, What pleasure d d "It is the Lord; let Him do what seemeth Him good."-1 Samuel iii. 18. "It is the Lord;" let not thy tearful eye Are thy beloved ones from thy presence torn? In tender mercy from thy tear-dimmed sight Art thou reclining on a bed of pain, Ordains thine anguish-in unchanging low- "Goodness and mercy" crowned us all our days. MRS. J. WOOD. A Sermon in Outline. THE VOICE OF GOD'S HARVEST - FIELDS. What loving rebuke did Christ utter against the lukewarmness of His disciples, when, returning from "the neighbouring city," whither they had gone to buy meat, and finding their master holding conversation with a Samaritan woman, they said-"Hath any man brought him aught to eat?" He replied-"I have meat to eat that ye know not of." The uppermost thing in their minds ought to have been how they could best do their Father's will. That should have been their meat as it was His; and when He bids them-"Lift up their eyes, and look on the fields; for they were white already to harvest,"-He sought to remind them in what their Father's will consisted, and how earnest they should be in its prosecution. Men are glad to apply truths to others rather than to themselves. None could doubt the application of Christ's word to the disciples; but do we not shrink from taking them to ourselves? When Christ reminded His disciples that the fields were white to harvest, it was that they might give themselves for action; even so with us. His words are: I. A PROTEST AGAINST LAZINESS. In summer the fields are not covered with corn in order that we may stand and look at them, or that we may have something to talk about. If in agriculture the reapers simply looked and talked, nothing would be done. So is it in relation to God's kingdom. Sad as the fact is, there are many in our churches, who, although they know of the opportunities that are being afforded for the extension of the Redeemer's kingdom, yet are doing nothing to gather in the precious fruit. They stand and admire; they talk much about the glorious harvest; but beyond that they do not go. They think it a joyful thing for the world to be in such a state of promise, and offering so many opportunities for usefulness; they even affect to inquire into the wonderful things which are being done; but to such, Christ's words convey an unceasing rebuke. He does not say— "Lift up your eyes, and look on the fields, for they are worthy of being admired or talked of;" but because they are "white already to harvest." II. WE HAVE HERE A CALL TO DUTY. The state of the harvest-fields indicates the Master's will. What are we doing? How are we fulfilling Christ's commands? Does our religion merely consist in attending Sabbath services? If this is all, the more to our shame. Christians were not intended to be as a light under a bushel, so as to keep it to themselves, neither as ornaments to be preserved under a glass shade for others to look at and admire, but rather to be about their Father's business. We need more of the holy fire of martyrs and confessors. We should be like the young Spartans, to whom their mothers used to give, as they marched to the battle, a shield, saying-"Come back either with this or upon this"- either conquer or die. That is the spirit of all true work. It was this that won the battle of the Reformation. When John Knox was fighting the Lord's battle in Scotland, he was seen one night to leave his study, and to pass from his house down into an enclosure behind. He was followed by a friend, when, after a few minutes of silence, his voice was heard as if in prayer. In another moment the accents deepened into audible words, and the earnest petition went up from his struggling soul to heaven—“O Lord, give me Scotland or I die !" Then a pause, a silence; but again the petition broke forth"O Lord, give me Scotland or I die!" Once more all was quiet, when, with a yet intenser pathos, the prayer once more was offered-" O Lord, give me Scotland or I die!" And God heard it; despite cardinals and princesses Scotland became and is the noblest land of Christian loyalty to truth and to God. O for more of this spirit! O |