I have much to do in London before starting; and my sister will be terribly disappointed if I do not get to Wimbledon for a few hours to say good-bye. shall be obliged to leave here to-morrow afternoon at latest."

I

"Well, you know how delighted we should be if you could remain with us," said the Squire, rising from his seat and crossing over the room to where Mr Wheeler was sitting. "When do you really think we may look for you back again?" he asked in an undertone.

"The Bishop has given me a year's leave, you know," replied Mr Wheeler, turning sideways so as to face the Squire, "longer, he says in his letter to-day, if I require it. It must all depend upon my health. If I pick up my strength, as I hope to do, in the seavoyage, I may return sooner than I anticipate. I shall be happier in leaving since my excellent young friend St George has taken my duty. He is a noble fellow, and his heart is in his work. I often think he is like what my boy would have been, had it pleased God to spare him. He has been a great favourite of mine ever since first meeting with his family down in Wales. His father is dead, you know, but he has a mother living, and a younger brother (also in the Church), and one sister, who is, poor girl, deformed. I think I told you he has property of his own, so that he is spared many a heart-ache such noble fellows as himself too often feel when the scanty purse vetoes

the longing to alleviate the pressing cases of need, a pastor-especially in a large parish-must almost daily come in contact with, amongst the truly poor.

"Ah! Mr Percival, pardon me if I seem to flatter, it is only true and right to say it, if there were more like yourself, people ready to put within the hands of the clergy, and others doing the work they do, money so much needed (but so ill afforded from scanty stipends and small purses), to meet the pressing wants of the sick and suffering, the poor would be better cared for, and the rich happier in their abundance.

"Few are better fitted than God's ministers to distribute alms; experience teaches them how to discern between the hypocrite and truly deserving, the wilfully idle, and those struggling with poverty; and yet, of all people, these are the most powerless to help. While the wealthy are doling out their £5 and £10 to distant charities, which have made a call upon their sympathy through some printed circular, glad, it may be, of the opportunity of giving of their abundance to any object so seemingly, and, possibly, truly worthy, there are men within a stone's throw of their luxurious homes, wearing out their lives in God's work, stinting themselves, it may be, of necessary food and clothing to give to the sick and dying; or perhaps their minds are daily harassed with the thought, 'Utterly powerless to do anything, O God, for means!' Would that the wealthy only

realized this condition of things, what joy they would bring to themselves and others, how much true suffering might be lessened!"

In the meantime, while Mr Wheeler was thus talking to Mr Percival in a quiet undertone near the window, Mr St George had drawn his chair towards Mrs Percival's couch, and was making some comments upon the village and neighbourhood.

"I am so pleased to find myself placed where there seems to be great need of work," May heard him say to her mother. "It was my one prayer, when at College, that I might be led to such a spot. The delicate state of Mr Wheeler's health has of course prevented him doing so much as he would otherwise have done of late years. He has been telling me to-day many of his little plans, which have had, one after the other, to be given up. I hope, God helping me, to put them into working order before his return. I shall always have the assistance of his advice, as he has promised to give me the help of a constant correspondence."

Mrs Percival seemed very much interested, as Mr St. George continued to speak of his plans for the moral and spiritual improvement of the people, and she was quite sorry when Mr Wheeler rose to say good-bye, and thus put a stop to the conversation.

Dinner was announced as soon as the visitors had taken their departure, and May had little time, during the remainder of the evening, to resume her reverie,

or think of more than the passing hour with all its happiness and joy. Singing to her mother, and playing chess with her father, was, after all, a not very selfish way of spending her evening! Had May made a mistake in supposing her life to be useless?

CHAPTER II.

GRACE SULLIVAN.

"So others shall

Take patience, labour to their heart and hand
From thy hand and thy heart, and thy brave cheer
And God's grace fructify through thee to all."

MRS BROWNING.

"WHAT exceedingly nice people!" exclaimed Henry St. George, as he and Mr Wheeler left Springbank Hall, and crossed over the park in the direction of the village. "The Squire seems a fine specimen of a true country gentleman, and his kind and gentle wife greatly charmed me; there was something so plaintively sweet in the way she roused herself into taking an interest in what I was saying. Her suffering evidently expands rather than contracts her heart's best sympathies, and yet-—perhaps I should not say it-there is something missing, or at least so it struck me, of the true life and love, without which our purest sympathies are comparatively cold and listless."

"Strange! but you have read Mrs Percival aright,