using him as a symbol of a wickedly careless government."

"Pardon, mother! I think we do Gallio great injustice. He was really nothing worse than a good magistrate, who refused to take any interest in a theological fight."

"Scotia !"

"Father, I appeal to you. The Jews took the Christians to the court of Gallio, and charged them with not worshiping God according to their lawthat is, as they worshiped him. The Proconsul Gallio was a pagan; he knew nothing about the tenets of Christianity, nor yet of Judaism.

very much as you would feel, father, if you were called upon to decide a quarrel between Antinomians and Separatists, or Buchanists and Brownists. I dare say you would not care, either."

She had laid down the offending knife and fork, and she spoke with a nervous amount of temper she very rarely exhibited. Mrs. Rodney was astonished and curious. She understood that the old Roman was a mere pretense, and that Scotia's flushed cheeks and eyes, shining with restrained tears, were the evidences of an annoyance far more personal than Gallio's court or the Scottish kirk. She glanced at Bertha, and Bertha sighed, cast down her eyes, and then lifting them, gazed pointedly out of a certain window. Mrs. Rodney understood her. Angus Bruce, then, was a factor in the trouble, but in what respect she could not guess. However, her suspicions were excited, and she continued:

"I think you are sick, Scotia. You have fever; that is to be seen, very plainly. I will give you some medicine before you go to bed."

"No! I am not sick, mother; though it is a kind of sickness to have the whim of telling the truth. You once said so, father.”

"Yes, my dear; but I meant about worldly things. It is a pity I spoke of Gallio; but he is the natural example in cases of religious carelessness."

"I know he is; and perhaps it is as well not to object. If men and women are to be misrepresented and made examples of in the pulpit, it is better that Greeks and Romans should be the victims. They are dead, and perhaps they won't mind-also, they cannot talk back."

The Colonel looked at his Dorinda inquisitively. A smile was in his eyes, though his lips were drawn tightly together. "There is mair in the atmosphere than its ain proper elements; as Adam Gowrie would say. Now girls, what is it?"

"Nothing," said Scotia promptly.

"Nothing," said Bertha, with an air of innocence.

Nothing that I am familiar with; " said Mrs. Rodney doubtfully.

"Then Scotia, my child, if you feel cross, attack your neighbors; that will be fair play, for I'll be bound you will only be paying back scores. Leave religion alone-and the Holy Bible."

"The Holy Bible says nothing of religion. It talks of God, not of religion. It tells us to be godly, not religious. As for us, we think far more of our own souls than we do of God."

"What is the difference, Scotia?"

"Just the difference of thinking of yourself, and of forgetting self-the difference between the fear of hell and the love of God."

"Ring the bell, and let us have the Exercise ;" said

the Colonel sternly. He rose hastily from the table, and went to the reading desk, and began to turn with an affectionate reverence the leaves of The Book. And the men and maids came heavily in, and the psalm was sung. Then the Colonel passed over the regular portion, and selected the 18th chapter of Acts, and Scotia's face burned and she quivered with angry feeling, when she was compelled in her turn to read the 15th verse. But she was not convinced. On the contrary, the Roman Proconsul became at that hour one of her friends; even on her knees she was inclined to defend him.

And her heart was wounded by this public defection of her father. In all family troubles and disputes he was generally on her side; why had he forsaken her this night? Was he suspicious of the tender feeling between Angus Bruce and herself? If so, he ought to have understood her suffering and her irritability, and given her sympathy. And so the calm, holy tones of her father praying, did not comfort or soothe her. She thought he had been unkind. And oh ! the behavior of Angus was strange and unkind enough.

But afterward, when he bade her "good-night," when he drew her within his arm, and held her close to his heart, when his full eyes sought hers, and he kissed her twice, she went out of the room with a smile; with her head lifted, and her soul full of comfort.

III.

BLAIR RODNEY ARRIVES.

"I marked all kindred powers the heart finds fair :

Truth with awed lips; and Hope, with eyes upcast;

And Fame, whose loud wings fan the ashen Past To signal fires :

Love's throne was not with these; but far above

All passionate wind of welcome and farewell;
He sat in breathless bowers they dream not of ;

Though Truth foreknow Love's heart, and Hope foretell;
And Fame be for Love's sake desirable." —Rosetti.

BLAI

LAIR RODNEY came the next morning. His letter of the preceding evening had put aside immediate expectation, he had been forgotten except by Bertha, and the surprise he had pleased himself with arranging appeared to be complete. The Colonel was in his morning sleep; Mrs. Rodney was with her housekeeper; Scotia had gone to Kirk-Logie. Only Bertha was prepared to receive him. For the vague letter had not deceived her. The smallness of her own mind enabled her to anticipate and follow such petty maneuvers.

Just before noon-hour, the young man came; and he was not disappointed in the sensation his arrival caused. The exclamations, the hurrying hospitality, the welcomes, and the apologies which attend unexpected arrivals, he had them all. And Bertha added her little pinch to the incense burned in his honor, though she

was wondering all the time what pleasure he found in the temporary excitement, to compensate him for the writing of unnecessary letters, and a whole night in the small tavern in Rodney village.

Her own plan before a visit was to have everything well understood. She liked servants and a carriage waiting her arrival; and she preferred stepping out of it into a household full of pleasant anticipations of her visit. Improvised meals, hurriedly prepared rooms, and plans already formed, without reference to her presence and pleasure, did not do her justice.

But then her cousin was a man, and men—as women of all ages have found out—are sometimes queer. As he was eating his breakfast, she sat demurely busy with her needle, watching him. He was talking to his hostess, and therefore Bertha had plenty of opportunity to make a transient appraisement of his qualities. She found him good-looking enough. Thoughtful people might have said that his head was too small, but then he was remarkably tall and sinewy; and it was likely that the tales they had heard of his leaping and running, his walking and golf-playing, were correct. He looked precisely like an athlete, who could march up to a five-barred gate, put his hand on the topmost rail, and vault lightly over it. This was said to be an ordinary feat of Blair Rodney, and Bertha felt that she would like to see him perform it.

Scotia had supposed that his talk would be of bullocks and sheep, and agricultural games and fairs. On the contrary, he talked only of family and kirk matters. After the first questions and answers on subjects relating entirely to the Rodneys, Blair plunged enthusiastically into the controversy between. the Kirk and the State. He did not seem to care for