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before his ascension, to his disciples, and these are they 'Go ye, therefore, and teach all nations, baptizing them in the name of the Father, and of the Son, and of the Holy Ghost; teaching them to observe all things whatsoever I have commanded you; and lo, I am with you alway, even unto the end of the world. He that believeth and is baptized shall be saved; but he that believeth not shall be damned.'"

"He does not say," interrupted Fabian, "he that is not baptized shall be damned."

"He does not," returned his neighbour, "for our Lord is merciful, and knows there are cases in which it is even impossible that baptism should be administered. But when he annexes such an important promise to its believing fulfilment, and when it was the very last injunction he gave us as a legacy before he ascended to heaven, can any man in his right senses, think you, neglect it? Why, suppose he had bidden us do some great thing, would we not have done it? How much rather, then, when he only says, 'Wash and be clean.""

"To grown men," objected Fabian.

"To all nations," rejoined his friend. "To all living people. Many children that well know right from wrong, die while they are youngwhy should we exclude them from the promise?" "But why should a promise be annexed to a mere form?"

"Listen to me, Fabian! It's not a mere form. It's a covenant between two parties; and no matter to us how trivial, how worthless the benefit to the other party, if we have an equivalent, and if he admit it to be binding. Is a lease a mere form, even though we are only to pay a peppercorn rent? A signature to a cheque is not a mere form? nor a covenant between landlord and tenant; why, then, between God and man?"

It was not a mere form,” he continued, "for the early Christians to burn or refuse to burn a handful of incense before the statue of Jupiter; it showed what they were; and so their enemies knew well enough!

Suppose you were in a situation of great difficulty, and the Author of Evil were to come to you in a bodily form and say 'I will release

now so wondrous wise that a learned doctor * among us who numbers his believers, asserts that there are three stages of the world corresponding with the three stages of human life, infancy, childhood, and manhood, and that we are now just at that point where the world is in the prime of manly perfection, and has put away childish toys and passions. It cannot be expected, therefore, that we who are so very good and wise, should be capable of needing or benefiting by the humble teachings of Fabian's friend. Sure it is, however, that the worthy fellow, after reconsidering them all the way home, gladdened Agnes on re-entering the cottage, by telling her that their infant should be baptized the very next day.

* Can his name be Temple?

CLAREMONT AND THE PRINCESS

CHARLOTTE.

"Daughter of chiefs and monarchs! where art thou?

Fond hope of many nations, art thou dead?
Could not the grave forget thee, and lay low
Some less majestic, less beloved head?

In the sad midnight, while thy heart still bled,

The mother of a moment, o'er thy boy,

Death hushed that pang for ever; with thee fled

The present happiness and promised joy

Which filled the imperial isles so full, it seemed to cloy."
Childe Harold, canto iv.

Ir is more than twenty years ago that we accompanied an invalid mother one fine autumn by easy stages to the Isle of Wight. Our first halt was at the neat country inn of the Bear, at Esher, fifteen miles from town; and while one of us remained with my dear mother in the quaint little inn parlour, the others proceeded up a by-road to the left of the inn, bounded by

N

mossy park-palings, and overhung by fine trees, till we reached a lodge-gate surmounted by the royal arms.

"the

At the mention of a talismanic name gates wide open flew," and we proceeded up a carriage-road, winding through undulating turf cropped by sheep, till we came to the house.

It is a substantial, light-brick mansion, with stone dressings, and a Grecian portico surmounted by the royal arms. A flight of about twenty steps led us to the entrance-door, where we soon obtained audience of the housekeeper, who took us over the first floor, which comprises a square entrance-hall, grand staircase, and eight spacious apartments en suite.

After duly admiring a fine cast of the Warwick vase in iron lined with copper, executed at Berlin, which occupies the centre of the hall, we entered the library, which contained full-length portraits, by Dawe, of the Princess Charlotte and Prince Leopold, also portraits of the princess's preceptor, Dr. Fisher, Bishop of Salisbury, and her subpreceptor, Dr. Short.

"On this chair," said the housekeeper, with