prayer, and I see how naturally and spontaneously the Gothic church sprang from this sympathy, between the cathedral aisles of the forest, fretted with interlaced branches and gilded by struggling sun-beams, and the outgoings of the human heart in search of divine mysteries.

To me a slave is the most unnatural thing in the universe. It is the most terrible comment upon the infancy of the race in a moral sense. Were there, anywhere, the least intimation that Jesus was servilely ministered unto, we could not, for an instant, recognise him as one who reverenced every aspect of our humanity, and brought to us a heavenly mission of human brotherhood, love, mercy, entire equality. Man, sovereign man, irrespective of sex or color, was the object to be won. "I came not to be ministered unto, but to minister."

This morning, I took the letter of Dorothy True, thinking I must read it. My hand trembled, a sickness and blindness overcame me, and I held it long in silence. The past, the dreadful past, I cannot revive it. The deadly shot seeks not twice the same mark; the tornado, which has created a desert where once was beauty and gladness, returns not again to toss the ghastly ruin, and play with the broken and disrupted tokens-but time, time the great healer, treads gently over the fallen greatness, and mantles all with pitying vines, that steal like nerves of human sympathy along the shattered trees; and, softly, like the muffled drum of a sor

rowful procession, the heavy mosses gather upon rock and bole of mighty oak, so that the howl of the wind is dumbed, and the harsh voices of destruction mellowed to faint, scarcely audible sighings. And so I said, I will not seek to know the mystery of this letter. I will bury it for the time being. Then I took a small urn of bronze, dark and sombre-looking, and placed the letter therein, and sealed it up, and then I prayed the good God for comfort. Days, days, did I agonise in prayer, for the past came like a mighty tempest upon me. All the windows of my soul were open to admit shapes of dread-every bye-nook of my spirit became cleansed and winnowed, as when the harvest-man, with great blows, winnows the wheat from the chaff. My eyes poured out unwonted fountains of tears, and my tongue would only cry, “Light, oh, give me light." I made no cry for mercy, for peace, for happiness, but the great cry of the soul within me was for light. As the sun arose above the mountains, chasing the shadows before him, penetrating every nook and valley; touching the water, lighting the hill-side, warming the bird-nest, and blessing the blossom; so did a great joy arise to me from out the gloom of this great agony, and I walked a new heaven and new earth, and remembered no more the anguish.

We find occasional notices of Ernest Helfenstein. Mention of his singular genuineness and loveliness of character, and hints of hers in aid of his ministry. Once she says, "Ernest is not in the least drawn to myself. He rather

dislikes me, I fear;" and again we find her regretting that she is left so nearly apart from human sympathy. She intimates that Ernest does not know his own power-is a dreamer of poetic beauty, but the actual of life is disregarded. He has vague desires for usefulness, but not the grasp essential to achievement. He sits in his old library and revels in the luxuries of thought, while opportunity slips by, and his people are, in fact, little benefited by him, except in the rare privilege of listening to beautiful and artistic essays, and witnessing the daily life of a being of rare mental and moral beauties.

We must now open upon the journal of Ernest Helfenstein, which, strange as it may seem, is of a more practical cast than that of Bertha. The latter seems to have worshipped God through active services to her kind, and her journal is the vehicle for states of mind, or expressions of sentiment, while that of Ernest is the detail of events, irksome to him in their passage, and recorded as milestones to prompt him to duty. Ernest dreams amid the actual; Bertha lives the actual, and dreams upon paper. A poetic woman, it would seem, is more practical in life, than a poetic man.

CHAPTER VII.

A coward, a most devout coward; religious in it.

SHAKSPEARE.

SUNDAY. AS I gave forth my text to-day-I observed my audience was very small. Deacon Pettingal, who keeps up late of a Saturday night for the purpose of balancing his accounts, was fast asleep before I had half finished, and upon my soul I did not blame him. Worship has become such a mechanical routine, that its true spirit is lost. I understand Bertha (a fine old word, meaning brave) seriously advocates the admission of woman into the pulpit.

By the way, Bertha should preach; she is brave, spiritual, primitive. I remember the Deacon told her, that St. Paul had forbidden it, to which she replied, with a sweet serenity, "In so far as St. Paul uttered what is partial in its import, he is so much the less inspired. Jesus gave no limited distinction of sex. He

oracle. He taught without the addressed the Genus Homo, inferring the teachings applicable to one as applicable also to the other. He did not even address himself to exceptions, however lovely these may be; but he enfolded our bruised, broken

humanity tenderly under the shadowings of divine love. St. Paul is a mystic of a high order; and he seems to have understood this better than his followers, when he says in Christ, 'There is neither Jew nor Greek; there is neither barbarian nor Scythian; there is neither bond nor free there is neither male nor female.'

;

As Bertha uttered this, in her clear musical voice, with exquisite intonation, her serene face, radiant with her inward convictions, I felt that a woman thus inspired, must be a more effective expounder of truth, than a preacher of our sex is likely to present; but, I confess to a repugnance also I trust in God envy has no place in my mind—but I will look to it.

I am very dull to-night, and I did not interest my audience in preaching. The storm beat violently against the windows-the old trees creaked against the panes. I grew depressed, and found myself too much interested in watching the good Deacon, and even calculating the moments between his loudest snores, which would start up his wife in utter dismay; and then she would nudge him, and ahem and look about so wildly, that I could hardly refrain from a laugh. I doubt not dreaming (I hope the Deacon dreams) was better than my sermon, for I saw Jane Gowen write a note with pencil in a blank leaf of the hymn book, and poke it through the balusters of the pew to her lover. Young Benjy Fields only kept awake by chewing vigorously at an immense piece of gum, as he sat with his head stuck back, and his eyes winking, just as I have