Pago page Loyal Hearts—A Consultation ... 225 Ordination and Mission Necessary 239 The Crooked Rib-How to Use it 231 The Aggrieved Parishioners. . . . 242 The Vision of Daniel . . . . . . 232 A Quaint Lay . . . . . . . . . . .247 Illustration . . . . . . . . . . 233 Say Well and Do Well . . . . . . .247 Kindred in Law—In What Law? 234 Current Notes. . . . . . . . . . 248 The Holy Cross . . . . . . . . 235 Correspondence . . . . . . . . 250 What Poetry is not ... . . . . 236 Children's Corner . . . . . . . . 251 How to Prevent Cholera . . . . 237 | Notices to Correspondents ... .. 251 NOTIC, E S TO SUR SORIBERS. Bound Wolumes in Cloth for 1873, 1877, 1878, 1879, 1880, 1881, 1882, 28, 6d, each, postage 4d., are now Ready. Cases for Binding all Wols, are now Ready; 18, 9ach, postage 3d. .*, A Cheap Edition of the Wols, for the years 1877, 1878, 1879, 1880, 1881, and 1882, is now issued in Paper Covers, 1s. 6d. each, postage 4d. 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Four times the strength of Cocoas THICKEYED yet WEAEEMED with Stareh, etc. and in reality cheaper than such Mixtures, CoCOATINA A LA WANILLE is the most delicate, digestible, cheapest Wanilla Chocolate, and may be taken when richer Chocolate is prohibited. Charitable Institutions supplied on Special Terms by the Sole Proprietors: H. BOHWEITZXIR and Co., 10, Adam Street, Adelphi, London, W.G. Sold by Chemists and Grocers in Air-tight Tin Canisters, at 1s. 6d., 3s., 5s. 6d.,etc. “ NEW AND OLD:” S E E D - TIME AND H A R W E S T. LOYAL HEARTS.—By FLORENCE WILFoRD. CHAPTER IX. A CONSULTATION. A-, FTER some months of regular attendance at S. Mary's, | and after availing herself carefully of every opportunity of getting instructed in Church doctrine, Annie Stevenson - felt herself more really a churchwoman than she had ever been in her life before. But she was not yet confirmed. The annual Confirmation for S. Mary's parish had taken place in Lent, while she was still an attendant at the Hall, and Mr. Akroyd had told her—when she spoke to him in May—that he thought it would be better for her to wait till the time for another came round, than to seek for an earlier opportunity. “I could, of course, prepare you by yourself, and ask the Vicar to get you confirmed in some neighbouring parish where the Confirmation falls later,” he said; “but I think, considering your long estrangement from the Church, it might be better to wait, and test the sincerity of your return before admitting you to this privilege. What do you think about it yourself?” “I’m quite content to wait, sir, if you think I ought,” said Annie humbly; “the only thing is, I had thought, perhaps—.” She was too frightened to finish the sentence at once ; but when the priest said in a very kind voice, “Don’t be afraid to speak out. Do you mean that you are longing to be a communicant 2" she answered, “Yes, sir, that's just it; and I had thought that if I could get confirmed in the autumn sometime, you would perhaps let me take the Communion at Christmas.” “I'm afraid there are not often Confirmations in the autumn, the Bishop mostly holds them in the spring or early summer,” said Mr. Akroyd; “but I will speak to the Vicar about it. And the Prayer-book authorises us to admit to Holy Communion those who are ‘ready and desirous to be confirmed, so, if you are preparing WOL. XI. K for Confirmation and trying to lead a holy life when Christmas: comes, I do not see that you need be kept back from the Altar. There will be time between this and then to give proof of your sincerity.” He thought to himself that she was already giving proof of this in her willingness to be tested, and in her entire abstinence from protestations of any kind. There seemed to him far more promise in her humble acquiescence in the necessity of a certain delay than if she had clamoured to be admitted at once to the full privileges. of the Church. He felt in that one conversation with her that she was simple and true, and really anxious to be led right, and his only fear was lest she should not have courage to persevere in the face of Mrs. Mesham's opposition. He knew something of Mrs. Mesham and the kind of influence she exerted, and he had heard from Miss Betsy in what relation Annie stood towards her. Strange to say, the only person who took offence at Annie's being kept back from Confirmation for awhile was Mrs. Mesham herself. She had been wont to describe the clergy of S. Mary's as most unscrupulous in their efforts to proselytise, but now she shifted her ground, and said, “they were that careless they would let people slip through their fingers without a thought.” Annie in vain protested that Mr. Akroyd seemed to be giving a good deal of thought to her case. Mrs. Mesham's immediate rejoinder was, “Don’t tell me! If he'd got anything like a proper zeal in him he'd have had you a joined member of the Church before you could look round.” “I think I am a joined member,” represented Annie timidly, “I was received into Christ's Church at my christening; but as I'm a member that have been behaving badly, and keeping away from worship, and going where I shouldn't, it's only right that I should show I'm sorry before I'm allowed the full blessings of the Church.” “They'll have you confessing on your bended knees, I suppose, afore they're content,” said Mrs. Mesham with an angry snort; but to this Annie wisely made no answer. She had hoped that now her cousin's favour was withdrawn from her she should at least be left to follow her own conscience without interference; but after disdainfully holding aloof from her for about a month, Mrs. Mesham suddenly called her into the parlour one evening for a chat, and from that time forward showed a most inconvenient interest in the progress of her religious education. The month of coldness and estrangement had been a trial to Annie's gentle soul, and she had been obliged to comfort herself with thinking that her cousin could not mean to cast her off altogether, since she had neither given her notice to quit, nor implied a wish to get rid of her by raising her rent; but now she sometimes thought that it would have been better for her in the end if Mrs. Mesham had really gone the length of turning her out. LOYAL HEARTS.-A CONSULTATION, 227 “I should have had to pay more for a room elsewhere, and 'twould have hurt me I know to be sent off in that way,” thought Annie to herself; “but still when once the wrench was over I should have been quieter like and more to myself, and there wouldn't have been no one by to catechise me, and try to make me think as I'm not being treated right. I can't give notice myself, for now they've built so many houses round this way cousin Sophy wouldn’t find her back kitchen as easy to let as it would have been in the days when first I came to lodge here, and I couldn't be so ungrateful as to leave it on her hands; but if she ever seems to want me to go I'll take her at her word, instead of pleading to stop. It does worrit me above a bit to be questioned as to what I does, and what's said to me, and all that. I'm so dreadful afraid of saying something that I shouldn't, something as she'll lay hold of and make mischief out of; and if I’m not very careful I may bring contempt on the Church, when all the while it would be me and not it that was to blame.” Like most timid nervous people, Annie shrank more from talk and worry than she would have shrunk from actual persecution. It scared her to find Mrs. Mesham lying in wait for her in the passage when she came home from the evening Instruction, and she began to look upon an invitation from her to “walk into my parlour” as not less a trap than was that of the spider to the fly in the nursery poem. She did not like to tell Mr. Akroyd or Miss Betsy how she was annoyed, nor to bewail herself to her boys; it seemed to her loyal heart a sort of duty to say nothing but good of her cousin. She was, however, getting rather weary and discouraged when a sermon she heard at Church cheered and set her right again. The text was 1 S. Peter v. 7,—“Casting all your care upon Him, for He careth for you,” and the preacher said that the Greek word, which in our English Bible is translated “care,” means not only great sorrows and troubles, but even petty griefs, and things that we describe as “worries.” He set forth very eloquently the immense sympathy of our Heavenly Father, and urged his hearers to lay all their troubles, however small, before God, and to slip the burden off upon Him, as His divine word so graciously invited them to do. Annie drank in the counsel and obeyed it. Before she left the Church that morning she told out her new difficulties to God in simple words, and asked for grace to answer her cousin rightly. And after that she no longer felt so fretted, nor had such a painful sense of responsibility in every word she uttered. It seemed to her that God had undertaken for her, and that He would not let her bring dishonour on His cause. When free from anxiety about herself she had more thought to spare for others, and she began to watch with affectionate concern the doings of her young cousin, Mary Mesham. The girl had taken to attending Church every Sunday evening, and now and then came to Mr. Akroyd's Instructions; but : still R went to the Gospel Hall in the morning whenever her mother went, which was not very often, and she kept her Church-going a profound secret. She had warned the boys not to betray her, and they rather enjoyed the mystery; but to Annie her conduct did not seem quite straightforward, and she could not feel as if a blessing would rest on privileges snatched by stealth. Annie spoke her mind quite plainly on the subject in one of their walks to the shop; but Mary would not heed, and laughed to scorn her cousin's proposal to consult Mr. Akroyd for her as to the right course to pursue. “I couldn't bear for you to talk me over with a clergyman 1" she said; “and what would be the good if you did 2 I daresay he'd say I was to tell Ma, and I'm not going to tell Ma, whatever happens. When I see her go off to the Hall of a Sunday evening I feel as free as air, and I won't have my liberty interfered with. She likes me to go there with her when she goes of a morning, but she gives me my evenings to myself, and I mean to keep them to myself. The only thing I'm afraid of is that that little sneak Albert Paynter may let out to Gussie that I go to S. Mary's. I wish I could catch hold of Mr. Tom and tell him on no account to mention to his brother that he's seen me there. I did warn Bessie—that's the little sister—last Sunday, but she hardly seemed to understand me. Albert don't live with them, but they see him now and again. There's no quarrel between them, though they do think so different.” “I want to speak to Mr. Tom Paynter myself,” said Annie; “Frank and Isaac is in his class now in Sunday-school, and they do get on so well I should like to thank him. Supposing we asked him whether 'twas right for you to go to Church without your mother's knowing 2 You wouldn't mind that, would you ? when we was on the subject; and though he's not a priest he's been well taught, and knows a deal better than I do what's right and what's wrong.” “We can hear what he says,” said Mary, colouring a little, and looking much more modest and pretty than when she had been loudly proclaiming her independence; “but how’ll you get hold of him 2 Shall you wait for him coming out of Church on Sunday evening 2" “Oh no, no l’’ replied Annie, “I wouldn't make so bold for anything. He did say something to the boys about coming to see me, and Isaac is always asking whether he mayn't bring him home with him some Sunday afternoon after the Children's Service. If so be it were convenient to him to step in next Sunday, I might ask him the question for you, or you might come down and speak to him yourself.” “And what are we to do if Ma pops in upon us?" “Do 2 Why ask her to sit down to be sure. I'm not ashamed of letting my boys' teacher come to see me;—if 'twas anything wrong I shouldn't do it, and I oft-times think it wouldn't be a bad |