GOOD SAYINGS AND SHORT MAXIMS.

FOR THE USE OF YOUNG MOTHERS.

RISE SO early in the morning that you may be able to secure at least half an hour for reading the Scriptures and prayer before your domestic concerns require your attention. You will find this exercise admirably adapted to prepare and strengthen you to encounter, with a becoming temper and spirit, the trials and vexations of the day.

Accustom your children to make prayers and praise to God, the giver and preserver of life, the first employment in the morning and the last at night. Remember that the duties of a mother are untransferable; therefore, except in cases of unavoidable necessity, never suffer the devotional exercise of your children to be superintended by another.

See that your daughters rise early, and that they employ themselves about such domestic affairs as are suited to their years and capacities.

Never suffer your children to require services from others which they can perform for themselves. A strict observance of this rule will be of incalculable advantage to them through every period of life.

Let all the young members of your family be regularly washed and combed before breakfast; never permit them to treat you with so much disrespect as to appear at your table in a slovenly condition. It should ever be remembered that the highest respect which a child can pay is due to its parent. This respect may be insured by forming correct habits in youth.

"Resist in time-all medicine is but play,

When the disease has strengthened by delay."

Never overload either the plates or the stomachs of your children; give them sufficient and suitable food. Recollect "milk is for babes," and "strong meat for men."

Watch against the practice of leaving portions of food on the plates or throwing them about, which begets a habit of

wastefulness highly pernicious. "Waste not, want not," is a good proverb, and should be kept in mind.

Be yourself the judge, both of the quantity and quality of food your children should eat. There are many things which may appear, to the eye of a child, "pleasant and good for food," which nevertheless contain the seed of disease and death. Entirely refuse them sweet and rich cake.

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ADELIA.

"Fare thee well, round thy name, which long, long shall endure,

While the lily and myrtle we twine,

We will pray that our hearts may be ever as pure,

And our lives ever lovely as thine.”

In one of those sequestered spots, so often met with in central New York, surrounded by hills, and shut out from the gaze of a busy world, stands the cottage which was once the home of Adelia. There is an air of loveliness about the place, and one would think that here happiness might be found without alloy. The vine that once was taught by her fairy hand to wind itself in graceful wreaths about the door, and the flowers that bordered the little path that leads up to it, hang drooping now, and seem to mourn the loss of one so kind. She was an only child. The fond hopes of parents clustered about her path, and their smiles lit up every dark shadow that chanced to come across her brow. I saw her in all the loveliness of sweet sixteen, the flush of health sat blushingly upon her cheek, and her eye was lighted up by the fire of love that burned within.

She was one of those happy beings which make the moments pass sweetly by, and weeks seem but days while blest with their presence. And, as we look back o'er the track of life, we can see many bright spots through the dark

shadows of the past, made so by those joyous beings who have come, like the sweet flowers of spring, to delight us with their beauty, "stay one short month, and are gone."

She had a praying father and loving mother, and many were the prayers that went up to the throne of God in behalf of their dear child. They were answered-Adelia became the subject of divine grace, she sought pardon, and received by the Saviour a full forgiveness of her sins. * *

* I saw her again. It was on one of those calm, sweet days when the sun shines forth in all his beauty, and the forest bird gladdens the hour with his song.

I approached her cottage by a road which winds round a little hill, affording a prospect of a delightful valley that was clothed in all the verdure of early summer.

The little brook that passes near seemed to add a charm to this retired spot. Its gentle murmurings as it rippled by, reminded me of the little stream that had cheered and gladdened my heart so often in childhood; and, as I gazed upon its waters, the forms of those I loved in youth came flitting by, and with the eye of imagination I could see faces that oft had cheered me with a smile.

As I approached the door, there was a stillness pervading the scene which told God was there, and I felt that I was treading on holy ground. I was welcomed by a sweet smile from the lips of Adelia; and, oh! how changed the scene from that when I last met her at her home.

Long shall I remember the hour I passed in that holy place. The blighting hand of death was visible in her pallid countenance; her form had wasted, and her sunken eye told that she must soon bid adieu to all she held dear on earth.

"Sweet is the scene where Christians die,
Where holy souls retire to rest."

I trust that in that calm and solemn hour I dedicated myself anew to God. I felt it a "privileged place" to stand at the bedside of one so happy even in death. She seemed ready to go, and only waited her Saviour's bidding. The soft air

of mid-day moved gently the curtain's fold at the window as if ready to bear her spirit to the skies. Her mother sat beside her couch; tears of grief were streaming down her cheek, which showed her cup of sorrow was full.

Shall I attempt to describe a father's emotion when he stands at the bedside of his dying child? No! no human hand can pen the anguish of his soul. Years have passed away since then, and I have learned to feel deeply for those who are amid the 'waters of affliction.' Death has plucked a flower from mine own bosom, which has caused me to endure the anguish of such a parting scene. She told us how much she loved the Saviour, and spoke of the happiness of those who had gone to dwell with him in glory. As we poured forth our voices in a song of praise to our Creator, she seemed like an angel before us; her eyes were raised to heaven as if to catch some faint glimpse of the joys above.

***** A few short hours and Adelia was no more. And as I listened to the soft mellow tones of the village bell, as it tolled slowly away the few short years she had been with us, I felt that another bright spirit had gone to its rest.

"And thus, oh! how often, the ones we love best,
Drop away from our sides like the roses of June-
But, why should we weep? since they pass to their rest,
And, if parted a while, we shall follow them soon."

H. T. L.

"CHILDREN should always be made to understand distinctly what it is that we require of them, and in what way we shall be satisfied with them; for it is of great importance that their ordinary disposition should be cheerful and confiding; otherwise their understandings are clouded, and their spirits depressed; if possessed of quick feelings, they are irritated; if weak and timid, they are rendered stupid."

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MOTHERS AT THE WEST.

You have daughters and sisters, relatives and friends, that are mothers at the West. Many of them were once with you in that maternal association and that sweet circle of prayer, and around the domestic altar, enjoying all the advantages and blessings of your eastern homes. You cannot have forgotten them. But aside from these there are multitudes of mothers who are strangers to you all, that greatly need your prayers. Could any one of the many eastern readers of your instructive Magazine accompany me a few days as I travel over these beautiful and heaven-adorned prairies, and witness the trials, disadvantages, and discouragements under which the great mass of mothers who would train their children for God and usefulness in the great West, have to labor, it would be a more powerful appeal, and make a deeper impression than words can make. Many mothers as they read your valuable pages have been led to feel that many of the writers upon the duties of mothers, took it for granted that all enjoyed the privileges of themselves, or those advantages which belong only to a favored few. When the nursery, the separate room, and many and various attentions have been spoken of and urged, they have felt they were either forgotten or their true situation not known-that there was a failure to sympathize with them when most they needed that important aid. Said one good mother as she closed the reading of a valuable article in the Magazine which a kind neighbor lent her from month to month, and as the tears found their way in quick succession down her cheeks" I wish they better understood the situation of Mothers at the West, that they might sympathize with us, and more fully meet our wants." This mother had six small children-a sickly infant in her arms, her own health gone by excessive toil-one little room in a log cabin was her whole house just beginning in a new country-not able to