still more when I perceived your delicate attention to my father's friend. Believe me, Milly, no true man would trust his happiness with one who would insult gray hairs; there is little heart in such a one, however faultless the exterior; and I have such extreme reverence for the aged, that a loathing, impossible for me to express, came over me when I witnessed the behavior of your cousins. They may be wealthy, highly educated, fascinating, but I would no more wed one of them than I would play with a rattlesnake. There, - God bless you, Milly, — look up, love, and let me tell you that in my eyes you are worth millions, nay, more than all the world." Bell and Annie Grosvenor are both wedded, but neither of them has Professor L-- or Dr. James for a husband. They are, however, very gay and fashionable, if that is any compensation. But Milly, sweet Milly, lives in a beautiful villa in a country town, as happy and devoted a wife and mother as can be found in the wide, wide world. KIND FRIENDS AT HOME. O, THERE'S a power to make each hour For life hath here no charms so dear For future hopes - and praise them; Whilst flowers as sweet bloom at our feet, For things afar still sweeter are, When youth, bright spell, hath bound us; But soon we're taught that earth hath nought Like home and friends around us. The friends that speed in time of need, Though all were night, if but the light From Friendship's altar crowned us, 'Twould prove the bliss of earth was this Of home and friends around us. MY MOTHER. My mother's voice! How often creeps Its cadence on my lonely hours, Like healing on the wings of sleep, Or dew on the unconscious flowers! Her gentle tones come stealing by, And years I have been out at eventide, With wilder fleetness thronged the night: When all was beauty, then have I With friends on whom my love is flung, Like myrrh on winds of Araby, Gazed on where evening's lamp is hung. And when the beauteous spirit there I've poured a deep and fervent prayer To rise in heaven, like stars by night, THE FAULTS OF MAN. A THOUSAND faults in man we find; Man's inconstant and unkind; Man is false and indiscreet; Man's capricious, jealous, free, For want of better, he must do. HOW TO BE HAPPY. I WILL give you two or three good rules which may help you to become happier than you would be without knowing them; but as to being completely happy, that you can never be till you get to heaven. The first is, "Try your best to make others happy." "I never was happy," said a certain king, "till I began to take pleasure in the welfare of my people; but ever since then, in the darkest day, I have had sunshine in my heart." My second rule is, "Be content with little." There are many good reasons for this rule. We deserve but little, we require but little, and "better is little, with the fear of God, than great treasures and trouble therewith." Two men were determined to be rich, but they set about it in different ways; for the one strove to raise up his means to his desires, while the other did his best to bring down his desires to his means. The result was, the one who coveted much was always repining, while he who desired but little was always contented. |