your knee when you came in, and cuddle 'em ever so, and give 'em bits of your tea. You were always pleased then when they hadn't been put to bed before you came home. You were good-tempered and gentle like, and unselfish then. No, Dick, I'm not going to begin saying things to you. I try to think of you as you used to be; and I try to teach the little ones to love you." Her voice wavered here, showing that it was no easy task she had set herself. "And some day," she went on, with more confidence—and before the man could believe what he saw she was down on her knees beside him, her arms clasped round him, and her head laid on his breast-" Some day, Dick, we are all going to be happy together again, like we were at first. I know we are, because you are not in my hands--you are in His," and she raised her eyes reverently. "He has told us to take all to Him, and leave it there, asking for help with faith, believing that we shall receive. I do this-I have done it these long four years, and shall never give up. He hears me, and when He sees fit He'll answer me. Till then I shall try to wait patiently. It is hard work sometimes; He only knows how hard. I think I can bear it for myself, but for the children I feel now and then as if I couldn't go "on much longer. But it won't last much longer, I think, for you do love your wife and children. You would like to see them rosy and happy, and your home nice again. It's only the drink that has drowned it for a bit!"

The man looked at his wife, who for those long four years had borne so uncomplainingly the unkindness, the poverty, the misery, of which he had been the cause-the sole cause for nothing in her had led him to drink. He thought how she must have worked and toiled to have kept them all alive, to pay the rent and clothe them; for he had himself not brought home any wages for ever, ever so long; nay, even he had forced her many a time to give up to him the few coppers he had seen her put into her pocket, and for which she had worked early and late. So low can any man sink when drink drowns the good in him!

Yes; he looked at her, and knew that, in return for the coarse, brutal words and angry blows he had ofttimes given her, he had met with nothing but meek submission and patient endurance.

No wonder that, when he remembered and thought of all this, his eyes were so dim that he could scarcely see, his voice so husky that he could hardly speak, as he said, "Lucy! God bless you! When in years to come you look back to this night you will do it with a happy, joyful heart— able to say to yourself, 'It was through his wife's Christian life of faith and hope, and patient endurance, that he was saved.' Fetch the little ones down again : we'll begin it at once."

The woman tried to speak, but words would not come ; she looked up at her husband, and saw that he meant what he said; and, with one great sob, she laid her head against him again.

"Can't you believe it, lass ?" he said, quietly.

"Yes! oh yes; I can believe it. I can believe it, because I knew it would come some day; but it seems so beautiful that it dazes me. Oh, Dick! thank God for this -not me!" And her head was bowed silently for a moment; and then, getting up from her knees, she went upstairs to fetch the little ones down again, although she could not think what her husband wanted them for.

"To be sent for by father" was more a message of terror to them than of delight; for when he did send for any of them it was generally either to beat them for something or other, or else to fetch him drink from the public-house. But now, though they could not see their mother's face, they could tell by the tone of her voice that all was right, for they could not ever remember hearing it sound so cheery. "Children! are you asleep? Come along down again with me: father wants you."

"Father wants us ?" and they started up from their beds of straw with a feeling of dread, in spite of the mother's cheery voice.

"I say, mother, he doesn't want to whip any he?" the eldest one, Joe, asked in a whisper.

of us, does

"No; that he doesn't. Come along quick, and you'll soon see."

Yet they were timid feet that pattered after her nervous, beating little hearts, in spite of the warm assurance of no harm.

The father saw the bright eyes peeping from behind, but for his own peace of mind he tried not to see how full of fear they looked.

"Come along, children!" he said, in as hearty a voice as he could under the circumstances. "Your mother has let out that you haven't any of you had your tea, so I've sent for you down to have it now. Now, then, all of you sit in a row close up to the fire, like you were just now, and we'll all have a feast."

'And the mother saw that he had divided the fish into bits, and put each bit on a piece of bread; and as the astonished children took their seats on the hearth as he bid them, he handed a portion to each; and he poured some nice warm tea into two cups, and these two were handed round.

It would have done any one good to have peeped in then at that cottage-window. It was a picture that would have gone straight to any heart.

"Well, do you like it?" the father asked, brightly, as he saw the food was quickly disappearing.

"Yes; so nice!" ran along the row.

"Should you like nice tea, and dinner, and breakfast every day, and a fire, and some warm shoes and stockings ?"

The heads were lifted, and the eyes opened so wide; but the words were too wonderful to be realised, and so gained no answer from the bigger ones; but "little Tiny" thought it sounded very nice, and so she raised her face innocently, and said,

"I s'oud, daddie; so nice! and more to-morrow day; only mother says she can't get it for us-and she wouldn't

say she couldn't if she could!" And the little voice went slower and sad.

"No; mother can't, Tiny; but father can-and will, with God's help."

"Oh, very well! Tiny 'll like it; and we'll all be so good! And you'll not slap mother nor none of us, 'cept when we're naughty, eh ?—and mother's never naughty!" And having made this treaty to her own satisfaction, she nodded a funny little nod of approval to the others; and the next moment she was lifted upon her father's knee, and her curly head was laid against him.

That night was the beginning of a new life in Dick Wilson's home; after that there came many days and weeks and years of happiness and prosperity; for Dick never went back to the old ways-he had no wish to do so-nay, rather, he used to shiver when he looked at a drunkard, at the thought that he had been such as he; and with a heart full of thankfulness at what he had been saved from himself, he spent all his spare time in trying to save others. And he would assure them again and again that, though it seemed so hard to give up the drink and the sin, yet, if they made the effort in God's strength, they would not find it so very hard after all. And to the wives he would say, "Oh! try to win back your husbands with religion and love; not in words so much as in deeds. Don't get in the habit of rating and ranting at them—that doesn't do no good; but try to keep up the old love, and think of 'em as they were when you married 'em-and above all, pray for 'em and believe !"

March Winds; or, Teachings in the Tempest. ELL, poets certainly try to make other folks think the best of disagreeable things, however much they grumble at them themselves."

These words were cheerfully spoken by a young man as he entered his snug parlour one bitter, bleak day in

March, when what is called a black wind was literally wailing through every aperture that afforded an entrance to its relentless search.

"What now, Edmund? What poet has been at you again? The east wind has, that's certain; for your face is as blue as cholera, and your coat is variegated with all sorts of odds and ends, with a generous sprinkling of road pepper."

And, without waiting to know with what particular poet her husband had quarrelled, Miriam took him playfully into custody, and, leading him into the court, proceeded to brush the dusty particles from his coat; then, giving her own dress a shake, she said, "Now then, your poet can see how I deal with disagreeable things when he can't make me think the best of them. But what did you mean, Edmund, by what you said when you came in just now?"

“Oh, nothing, dear; only, as the horrid wind was blowing the dust between my teeth and in my eyes, I tried to comfort myself with that old couplet—

"March winds and April showers

Do bring forth the sweet May flowers;'

and then began wondering if the fellow who wrote it ever got such a mouthful of grit as I had just had when he attri buted such good results to the March winds."

Miriam looked thoughtful for a moment, and then linking her arm into her husband's, preparatory to returning to the house, she said,

“Ah, but you forget; 'twasn't only the March winds, but the April showers too. Besides, perhaps the poet who composed those lines was so looking forward to the sweet May flowers that he didn't mind the grit and dust; or, if he did mind it, he would not grumble, because he knew that the wind which sent it into his face was full of future promise."

"You are coming out in a new character indeed, Mrs. Walrond," laughed her husband. "I had my eyes open