the rafters, the silence, except for Clover's soft breaths, Paul's impressive absencewere all strange, almost alarming.

As for Miss Jane, she looked around her but said nothing.

"Shall we sit down?" Miss Maggy asked, in a whisper. "Where is he, Janie?" "He will come in a few moments," said Jane. "Yes, sit down, please."

She went over to the bin to turn up one of the lamps, and looked, with anxious responsibility, towards the unused stall which Paul had told her was to be his dressing room. Suppose he didn't do well? She was nervous to have him begin and get through with it.

Suddenly, back in the shadows, Paul began to whistle:

"I'm dreaming now of Hallie,

Sweet Hallie, sweet Hallie;"

then he came bounding out, bowed, whirled round on his crutch, and stood still, laughing. Jane caught her breath, her feet and hands grew cold; the other two sisters murmured, agitatedly. Paul was clothed in his black tights and scarlet breech-cloth; a small scarlet cap was set side-wise on his head, and his crutch was wound with scarlet ribbons.

"Ladies," he began, "I shall have the pleasure

"I really think-I really feel—” said Miss Maggy, rising.

"I-I'm afraid, perhaps-such a costume—” murmured Miss Henrietta.

Paul looked at them in astonishment. "Is anything wrong, ladies? If you'll just be seated, I'll begin at once."

"Do sit down," Miss Jane entreated, faintly; "people always dress - that way."

The two older sisters stared at her in amazement. "But, Janie-" whispered Miss Henrietta.

"You can go," said Jane, "but I shall stay. I think it's unkind to criticise his clothes."

"If he only had some clothes," Miss Maggy answered, in despair. But they sat down. They could not go and leave Jane; it would have been an impropriety. As for Paul, he plunged at once into his performance, with his running commentary of fun and jokes. Always beginning, "Ladies!" Once inadvertently he added, "and gentlemen," but stopped, with some embarrassment, to explain that he got so used to his "pat

ter" that he just ran it off without thinking. His agility and strength and grace were really remarkable, but Jane Jay watched him with hot discomfort; once, when he turned a somersault, as lightly as a thistle seed is blown from its stalk, she looked away. But the rest of the "audience" began to be really interested and a little excited. "Just see that!" Miss Maggy kept saying. "Isn't it wonderful!"

"But if any one should call," Miss Henrietta whispered, "I should swoon with embarrassment. Still, I am sure it's very creditable. Once, when I was a child, I went to the circus, and saw a man jump that way.”

Jane's face was stinging. "I don't like it at all," she said, under her breath. She looked at one of the lamps on the feedbin until it blurred and made the water stand in her eyes. "Oh, I wish he would stop!" she said to herself.

"If," said Paul, "any lady in the audience would care to hold her hat up above my head, I may demonstrate a high kick!"

"I will, Mr. Phillips," Miss Jane said, briefly.

"Oh, Janie-" said Miss Henrietta. "Oh, my dear, really-" murmured Miss Maggy.

"If you'll stand up on this bin, ma'am," said Paul, taking off his cap with a sweeping bow.

For just an instant Jane hesitated, which gave Miss Maggy the chance to say, “Oh, Jane, my dear-really, I don't think—”

"I don't mind in the least," said Miss Jane, breathlessly.

Well, wait," Maggy entreated; "if you must do it, let me run back to the house and bring over one of my skirts. I'm taller than you are, and if you put it on, it will be longer and hide your feet."

Miss Jane nodded. "I'll come in a moment, Mr. Phillips," she said, in a fluttered voice; and when Miss Maggy, very much out of breath, brought the skirt, she slipped it on, and climbing up on to the bin, stood, the long black folds hanging in a clumsy and modest heap about her feet, and held out the hat; her face was stern and set. She was miserably ashamed. The two other sisters gaped up at her apprehensively, but with undisguised interest. Paul, however, did not share the emotions of the moment; he leaped over three chairs arranged in a

pyramid, twirled round on his crutch, and then, with a bound up into the air, lifted with his foot the hat out of Jane's nervous hand. Then he stopped, by force of habit, to wait for applause; the two ladies before him said, faintly, "Dear me!" But they whispered to each other that it was wonderful.

Jane, gathering up the long skirt in her hands, looked down at him, and said nothing.

He turned, kissed his hand to her, and bowed so low that the scarlet cockade on his cap swept the floor; his dark eyes, looking up at her, caught the flare of the candle-light in a sudden flash.

Jane Jay's heart came up in her throat. That was the end of the show. The three candles of the foot-lights were burning with a guttering flame; the cow had gone down on her knees, and then come heavily to the floor, ready for sleep. Paul, out of breath, but very much pleased with the condition of his knee, sat down on one of the overturned buckets and fanned himself.

"This is the time you preach, isn't it, Mr. Phillips?" Miss Jane said. It was as if she were trying to bring him back to his true self.

"When I get through a performance? Yes, ma'am. People are pretty good natured then, and willing to listen, you know."

He laughed as he spoke. There was always a laugh ready to bubble over when he talked.

"It is a pity," said Miss Henrietta, vaguely, "that Paul's circumstances in life did not permit him to study for the ministry."

"That's so," said Paul; "but my folks couldn't have afforded it when I was growing up, even if I'd had a mind towhich I didn't, till I was converted, and I was twenty-four then."

"It isn't too late yet, is it?" said Maggy, sympathetically. "Perhaps Dr. Lavendar could help you to get a scholarship somewhere. I know he wrote letters about a scholarship when the Smiths' oldest boy wanted to go to college."

"I

Jane's face flushed suddenly. never thought of that! Why, Mr. Phillips-why shouldn't you study now?"

Paul had stopped fanning himself, and was listening. "I've heard of scholarships," he said, "but I never had anybody to put me in the way of them."

Miss Jane, in her excited interest,, did not notice that her sisters had risen and were waiting for her. "Come, Janie," they murmured; and Jane came, reluctantly. "You must see Dr. Lavendar to-morrow," she said, as they drew her away. "Oh, I believe, I believe you can do it!"

And as the three sisters, with their empty candlesticks in their hands, walked back in the moonlight to their own door, she said again and again, “Yes, he must be a clergyman-he must!"

Miss Maggy smiled indulgently, and said that she supposed Jane had it in her blood to work for the church. "Greatgrandfather Jay was always encouraging young men to enter the ministry," she said, "and Janie inherits it, I suppose." And then Miss Maggy said that she was worried to death because she didn't think the new pink worsted was a good match for the pink they had been using.

When Miss Jane went to her room she was too excited to go to bed; there was a spot of color in her cheeks, and her eyes shone;-a clergyman! yes; why not?

Jane Jay sat

It seemed to Miss Jane, because of the beating of her heart and the swelling of her throat, that her hope for Paul was desire for the Kingdom of God. How much good he would do in the world if he only were a clergyman; if he had a church, and wore a surplice! He would talk differently then, and not say "ain't"; and he would take dinner with Dr. Lavendar, and go to Mrs. Dale's for tea; he might even be assistant at St. Michael's! For Dr. Lavendar was getting old, and by the time Mr. Phillips took orders, there would have to be an assistant at St. Michael's. down and leaned her elbows on the window-sill, and looked out into the misty September night. She could see the black pitch-roof of the stable, where a lamp was still burning. It came to her that perhaps Paul was kneeling there. Something lifted in her like a wave. She felt a strange longing for tears; she, too, wanted to pray, to cry out for something-for pardon for her sins, perhaps, or for death and heaven. She said to herself that she loved her Saviour;-this was what Mr. Phillips called "conversion," she thought. "Oh," she said, in a broken, breathless way-“oh, I am a

great sinner! He has converted me." She murmured over and over that she had sinned; in the exaltation of the moment she did not stop to search the blank white page of her life to find a stain.

Then she covered her face with her hands, and knelt down and prayed passionately.

V.

Paul Phillips was to set out on the road the next day; but the hope that had leaped up at Miss Maggy's words made him eager to follow the suggestion of seeing Dr. Lavendar.

Jane Jay, her face pale, but full of some exalted consciousness, went early to the rectory and told the story of Paul and his aspirations. "It is very interesting," Dr. Lavendar said, "very in teresting. Of course I'll see him. Jane, my dear, it is wonderful, as you say. The Lord is able to raise up children to Abraham out of-anything! Send him along. Tell him to be here at ten o'clock."

Jane went back to the stable and gave Paul the message. He was kneeling down, packing his few possessions in his knapsack, unwinding the scarlet ribbons from his crutch, and taking the cockade out of his cap. He looked up anxiously. Does he think-" he began. "You are to go and see him at ten, Mr. Phillips," she said; "and-you will be a clergyman!" Paul drew a long breath and went on with his packing; but there was a light in his eyes.

"Do you know," he said, "sometimes it seems to me that our disappointments are His appointments? Just drop the dis, you know. It makes 'em real pleasant to look at them that way. It was a disappointment to wrench my knee; there's no use denying it; and yet look what may come out of it!" He gave a smiling upward look of the frankest, most good-humored affection, as though communing with Some One she did not

see.

Miss Jane watched him without speaking. She stood leaning against the feedbin, twisting a bit of straw nervously, looking at him, and then looking away. "You will be a clergyman," she said, in a low voice. "But I want you to know now, I want to tell you-"

Paul had risen, and had gotten his crutch under his arm; but there was something in her voice that made him

look at her keenly; then, instantly, he turned his eyes away.

"I want you to know--that I-oh-until you came I never thought anythingmattered. I never really cared; though I went to church, and my father was a clergyman, and Great-grandfather Jay was a bishop. But I-I didn't really-" She faltered, trembling very much, her throat swelling again, and her face illumined. "You've made me--religiousI think," she ended, in a whisper.

"I thank the Lord if He's spoken a word through me," the man said, tenderly; but he did not look into her face.

Miss Jane went away hurriedly, running, poor girl! the last half of the way to her own room; there she lay upon her bed, face downward, trembling. She was very happy.

When Paul came limping into the rectory, the old clergyman gave him a steady look; then all his face softened and brightened, and he took his hand into both his own. "Sit down," he said, "and we'll have a pipe. Well, you had an ugly fall, didn't you? How's your knee?"

"Well, the darned thing's all right now," said Paul, with his kindling smile, "but it's been slow enough. I don't know what I would have done if the ladies hadn't been so kind to me."

"And you are starting out again now, are you?" said Dr. Lavendar. “Oh, that's my dog, Danny. Danny, give your paw, sir. like a gentleman."

Paul seized the dog by the scruf of the neck and put him on his knee. "Ain't he a fine one?" he said, chuckling. "Look at him licking my finger! Yes, sir; I'm going on the road again; but Miss Jane Jay, she told me that maybe you could put me in the way of getting an education, so as I could be a preacher." "But I understand you do preach now?" said Dr. Lavendar.

"Yes, sir; but not properly. I just talk to 'em. Plain, man to man. I get at them after I've given a show on the road or in the saloons. But--it's a hard line, sir. I-used to be a drinking man myself," he ended, in a low voice.

The old minister nodded. "You go right into the enemy's country?" "Yes," Paul said, briefly.

"It gives you a hold on 'em?" Dr. Lavendar suggested.

That's so," Paul said. "I sometimes think if I hadn't been there myself I wouldn't know how to put it to them. Still," he said, thoughtfully, "you can't apply that doctrine generally. It would be kind of dangerous. We don't want to sin that grace may abound. Well, it's mixing. You see, that's where I feel the need of an education, sir. That, and people going down to the pit: the pit ain't just according to my ideas of fairness."

and he took off his glasses again, and polished them on his big red silk handkerchief.

"How do you explain those things?" asked the old man.

"The Judge of all the earth shall do right!" said Dr. Lavendar. "Tell me

some more."

So Paul, stroking Danny's shaggy little head, told him, fully. Dr. Lavendar got up once, and tramped about the room, with his coat tails pulled forward under his arms, and his hands in his pockets; once his pipe went out, and once he took his spectacles off and wiped them.

When the story was finished he came and sat down beside the younger man, and struck him on the knee with a trembling hand. "My dear brother! my dear brother!" he said. "Go back to the roads and the saloons, and prepare the way of the Lord, and make straight His paths!" Paul put Danny down, gently, and looked up with a puzzled face.

"Sir," said Dr. Lavendar, "the Lord has educated you. You don't need the schooling of men. See what a work has been given you to do: Paul, a minister to the Gentiles!"

"Yes, sir," said Paul, "if I can just get some education. If I can know a few things."

"My dear friend," said the old man, smiling, "you know what is best worth knowing in the world: you know your Master. He's put you to do a work for Him which most of his ministers are not capable of doing. You have a congregation, young man, that we old fellows would give our ears to get. Who would listen to me if I went into Van Horn's and talked to them? Not one! They'd slink out the back door. And I can't get 'em into my church-though I've got the red cushions," said Dr. Lavendar, his eyes twinkling. "No, sir; your work's been marked out for you. Do it! -and may the Lord bless you, and bless the word you speak!" His face moved,

But when he rose to go, there was a solemn moment of silence. Then the old minister, with his hand uplifted above the young minister's head, said:

"Almighty God, who hath given you this will to do all these things, grant also unto you strength and power to perform the same, that He may accomplish His work which He hath begun in you, through Jesus Christ our Lord."

Paul, leaning on his crutch, covered his face with his hands, and said, passionately, "Amen.”

When he went back to the three ladies, the uplifting of that moment lingered in his eyes. He came into the sitting-room, where Miss Henrietta and Miss Maggy were at work; it was a cool September day, and a little fire crackled in the grate. The room was hot, and smelt of worsted; Miss Henrietta's canary hung in the sunny window, cracking his hemp seeds, and ruffling his feathers after a splashing bath. The two ladies were rocking and knitting, and Miss Henrietta had been saying how much she missed rolling her big pink ball along the floor for Jacky to play with. "Though he didn't play much," she said; "he was getting old.”

"I used to think he was lazy," observed Miss Maggy, comfortably.

"No, he wasn't," Miss Henrietta retorted. "You never appreciated Jacky.” "Yes, I did," Maggy remonstrated; "only I never called him human.”

"Human! Well, I think that some cats are nicer than most people," old Henrietta replied, with heat.

It was just then that Paul came in to report the result of his interview with Dr. Lavendar. He was very brief about it, and as he talked the solemn look faded, and he spoke with open cheerfulness,

though with reserve. "I guess he's right," he said; "the place for me is the place where I'm put; I guess he's right. Well, ladies, I came to say good-by, and to thank you, and--”

"Do you mean," said Jane, from the doorway behind him, "that Dr. Lavendar won't help you to be a clergyman?" Her face was pale, and then flooded with crimson; she was trembling very much. "It is wicked!" Her voice was suddenly shrill, but broke almost into a sob. You ought to be a clergyman!"

Paul held up his hand with a certain authority. "I have been called to do my own work," he said.

"I guess Dr. Lavendar's right, Janie," Miss Maggy said, soothingly. "Paul, I'm going to give you one of Bishop Jay's sermons. I've copied it out, and I'm sure you will make good use of it."

Then she asked some friendly questions about his route, and brought him the sermon, and a little luncheon she had prepared; and then Paul began to make his adieux. He said much of their kindness to him, and his wish that he could ever have the chance to do anything for them;

SA

while they politely deprecated anything that they had done. Miss Henrietta shook hands with him, and said that if he should meet a white cat anywhere, to be sure and see if he answered to the name of Jacky. Miss Maggy bade him be very careful of his limb, and hoped he would find his sister better. "And if you ever get so far east again, you must come and see us," she said, kindly.

Jane gave him her hand; but she let it slip listlessly from his fingers. "Goodby," she said, dully.

Paul, shouldering his knapsack, waved his hat gayly, and started off, limping down the path to the street.

AID the late Mr. Abraham Hayward, "There is but one fault I have to find with Mr. Gladstone: he won't look out of the window." Mr. Bryce says "he was too self-absorbed, too eagerly interested in the ideas that suited his own cast of thought, to be able to watch and gauge the tendencies of the multitude." And again, "It was the masses who took their view from him, not he who took his mandate from the masses. With reference to the matters Mr. Bryce is discussing, the Irish Church, the Turks, and home - rule, this last is true. Both are as true as epigrammatic sayings can well be. Certainly he took account of the public opinion of the time; he could not have carried on the business of a party leader for a day unless he did that, or the business of governing an empire. His own statement was that he looked about him; that he found enough to occupy his mind and in

form his judgment in that way-that sufficient unto the day was the business thereof. To-morrow, yes; but much beyond that, no."

66

Mr. Hayward was one of the men most constantly in contact with Mr. Gladstone, one who made it his business to acquaint him with the state of mind prevailing in that world, which Hayward knew as well as anybody, or better than anybody-the world of society and of politics in London. And yet Hayward, with all his daily replenished stores of knowledge, could not make such an impression on Mr. Gladstone's mind as satisfied him, after years and years of familiar intercourse, that he really did give heed to what was going on about him- heed enough to make him steer a safe course.

You might have heard something like this from others. The whips in the House of Commons are good authorities on such a point. It was their business to keep