"David, these are the things to make you unwilling to die." Yes, and these are the things that make men unwilling to think of dying. Familiarity with danger makes men, it is said, heedless of danger. Certainly, familiarity with death tends to make us all too careless about it. If one human being died in a century, what excitement it would occasion, and what a profound impression it would make upon survivors! but as the event is one of constant occurrence it attracts scarcely any attention.

The subject should awaken in the minds of the unprepared a desire for immediate preparation. If you are about to cross the ocean to a distant land, you get all in readiness for the voyage, and wait for the sailing of the ship. Much more ought you to prepare for that day in which you shall go the way whence you shall not return. It is said that the Mahommedan pilgrim, setting out on his journey, is more anxious to provide himself with a shroud than any other change of raiment. If he is taken ill on his journey, the caravan with which he is journeying pushes on, and he is left behind. He then clothes himself with his shroud, hollows out a grave in the sand, casting up a heap to the windy side; and, in the hope that the blast of the desert will spread a covering over him, and with a prayer to the angel of the resurrection that he may not be forgotten at the last day, he lies down in his lonely grave to die. Learn here the duty of preparation. As to the kind of preparation needed, we have the plainest instructions in the Word of God. The preparation needed for death is the preparation needed for life-the forgiveness of our sins; the purification of our nature; the life of God in our souls.

The subject should stimulate the

exertions of all engaged in the service of Christ. It bears two aspects. As the leaf fades, so fade those whom we would benefit. They are fast passing from us, and going beyond the reach of our efforts and our prayers. Many whom we have known are gone. Are we not reminded, as we think of some of them, of neglected opportunities? We might have been useful to our departed friends. Perhaps we intended to be useful to them; but we allowed favourable seasons of usefulness to go by, purposing some other time to speak the needed word. And now they are dead! But others are still with us; how long they may be allowed to remain we cannot say; while we are hesitating, or busy here and there with our pleasures and our worldly cares, they too may be gone. Let us warn them, and plead with them, and pray for them while we may. And as those whom we desire to benefit are fading and dying around us, so we ourselves are hasten

ing to the grave. The present is the only time on which we can calculate for usefulness. Think now, in these autumnal days, that sooner than you are aware, you may fall into "the sere and yellow leaf." From the countless leaves that lie in mingled decay amid the trees of the forest; from the hedgerows that are becoming bare; from your garden despoiled of its beauty; from the shortening days, and the sombre sky, and the cold winds; from the spirit of sadness. which breathes through all nature; from all these, uniting as they do in their funeral dirge over departed life, there comes a voice of exhortation and warning, the echo of that Diviner voice in the Bible-"Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might; for there is no work, nor device, nor knowledge, nor wisdom, in the grave whither thou goest."

CHAPTER I.

KYTHE ANSTEY.

LTHOUGH the month was April, and showers were frequent, the bleak winds of March were still blowing gustily, and driving heavy clouds across the sky, when the coach that ran biweekly from the nearest railway station to the little town of Bickley set down a solitary passenger at the door of the principal inn. She was a pale slight girl of seventeen or eighteen, not half so well wrapped up as she ought to have been, seeing that she had travelled in a draughty third-class carriage all the way from London; and she moved languidly, as if overcome with fatigue. The coachman dragged from the roof a couple of trunks, which he placed beside her, and drove away without hearing-or, at all events, without answering-her inquiry if it was far from here to Hartswood Grange; and shivering in the bleak wind, she stood gazing disconsolately around her till a smart shower of hail drove her to take shelter in the clumsy wooden porch.

It was Kythe Anstey's first visit to the "north countree," and it seemed likely to prove a disappointing one.

She had rarely heard her mother speak of her old home. Indeed, Mrs. Anstey had loved her husband so well that, while he lived, she seldom thought of carlier associations, but adopted his predilection for the metropolis, and dwelt contentedly in the suburban street where he taught the sons of the small tradesmen in the neighbourhood all day, and added a little to his earnings by keeping the books of their fathers in the evening. Nor did she evoke the pity of her wealthier relations after his death until the long and wasting illness of her younger daughter, and the impossibility of procuring her the nourishment the doctor prescribed, recalled to her mind how there was always plenty and to spare at Hartswood, and finally induced her to try the effect of a statement of her

But when a brief note bade her send the invalid to the Grange, many and sweet were the recollections that crowded into her mind. The greatness of the contrast between the two small rooms she was occupying and the wide chambers of the old farmhouse, the narrow London street with its murky atmosphere and the breezy freshness of Hartswood, invested it with a golden halo; and she expatiated to her attentive daughters on the wealth of her kinsfolk, the beauty of the scenery around their house, and the size and importance of the dwelling itself, till one, at all events, of her hearers drew fancy pictures of it very different from the original.

Kythe Anstey had never been out of London before, and she enjoyed her journey till she grew cramped and tired with sitting between two women with babies, and a stout grazier for her vis-à-vis. But it was no use complaining; the compartment was crowded, and she must put up with the inconvenience, so she amused herself with dwelling on the pleasant time that awaited her at the Grange, when, judging from what her mother had told her, she would be petted and indulged to her heart's content.

"You'll come back to us such a spoiled child that we shan't know what to do with you," Mrs. Anstey had said, between laughing and crying; and Kythe had laughed too, though she felt that it was selfish to accept all these good things so willingly, while her mother and Alessie-poor sightless fretful Alessiestayed in their dull lodgings in town.

She expected to find some one on the look-out for her at the railway station, and was dismayed on learning that she had another twelve miles to travel by coach. But at Bickley there would surely be a carriage of some kind awaiting her; not a London cab, of course, but a trim dog-cart, with plenty of warm rugs to wrap round her, and some one or other of the cousins her mother talked of, coming to claim kinship, or standing by ready to greet her heartily, and bid her welcome to the East Riding.

Kythe had looked up and down the hilly High Street of Bickley, but there was not a vehicle to be seen after the coach disappeared. Then she glanced over her shoulder into the house, where half-a-dozen rough men, who were attached to a threshing machine, sat, enveloped in smoke, playing at some game with halfpence, while the landlady was alternately waiting upon her customers and scolding a couple of sullen lads who had been in mischief.

She was too busy to notice Kythe, till one of the boys took his finger out of his mouth to point to her; and when she did accost the young girl, it was in so

broad a dialect that her meaning was guessed rather than understood.

She shook her head when asked if no one had come from Hartswood Grange to meet the coach, and, with rustic familiarity, was proceeding to ask who Kythe was and whence she came; but, not inclined to submit to such catechising, the young girl broke in with an inquiry as to the best way of proceeding to Mr. Raynor's house.

"I am expected," she added, in cold displeased tones. "It is very neglect-it is very strange that no one is here to meet me! but perhaps it is not far to the Grange?"

"No, to be sure not," was the cheerful reply. "A matter of four mile or under; ay, it won't be more than three and a bit by the fields now there's good footing across Hartswood marsh."

"Four miles! I cannot walk that distance !" cried Kythe, computing anxiously how much silver was left in her purse after paying the coachman.

If her cousins had known that their invitation, thankfully though it was received, would cost Mrs. Anstey a sleepless night and the loss of some longhoarded relics, they would have slipped a sovereign into their letter to help to defray the expenses of the journey, and Kythe need not have hesitated and made secret calculations before she said—

"I'll trouble you to get me a conveyance as quickly as possible. I should not like to be benighted."

The hostess opened her round eyes, and set her hands on her hips.

"Conveyance! My word, lass! ye'll get none in Bickley this day, though ye were to search the town through and through! My man, and every one else that isn't kept at home as I am, was away soon after daybreak to t' horse fair at (What, haven't ye heard o' the great horse fair at -?), and I'm not looking to see any o' them back again before the small hours."

"But what am I to do?" asked Kythe, piteously. "What should ye do but foot it?" asked the woman, with a ring of scorn in her voice. "The road's none so bad just now, and you 're young and lissome. Take the field path when ye come to the Lady Oak, and you'll do it in little more than the hour. Why shouldn't you?"

"But not alone! I could not go alone! It will soon be dark, and I am a stranger. If I were to lose myself in this wild country, what would become of me?"

The landlady considered.

“Well, well; it is a bit lonesome from here to Hartswood. I wouldn't mind it myself, but you 're a white-faced weeny lass; happen you've been ill?"

Kythe nodded assent, but declined the "soop o' hot tea" hospitably offered to her. She was eager to reach her journey's end, and begged so urgently for a guide that the good woman began to cast about in her mind for one.

"If my man were at home he 'd be glad to drive ye over, for he's wanting to see Muster Raynor about some calves. Run round to the stable, Mark, and fetch Corrie. He'd find his way to Hartswood blindfold. Corrie 's a bit softy," she confided to the impatient Kythe, "but there's no harm in him if he isn't crossed. He'll guide thee well enough."

While Kythe was wondering what was meant by "a bit softy" a queer-looking individual was dragged into sight by the boy sent in search of him. His hair was grey, yet he had the wizened face of an illcared-for child; his limbs were so long as to be out of all proportion to his narrow chest and small spare frame, and he twisted in aimless fashion the battered hat he held in his hand, while the landlady impressed upon him that by escorting the strange lassie to Hartswood he would secure for himself a bountiful meal of hot girdle-cakes, and a gift from Miss Mia besides.

Kythe was half afraid of this odd-looking being, but she felt still more terrified of the rough men staying at the inn, especially now a couple of them had lounged into the porch to survey her, and, with north-country frankness, were commenting on her looks so freely that her cheeks burned with indignation. Leaving her trunks in the care of mine hostess, she bade Corrie lead on.

"It'll be a dismal night," said the woman, following her into the street to peer up at the lowering sky. "I'm thinking you'd better stop here with me till the morn."

But Kythe would not hear of this, and hurried on to overtake the idiot, whose sidling movements carried him over the ground so rapidly that when they had climbed the hill, and were fairly in the open country, she was obliged to entreat him to stop while she took breath.

She had some difficulty in making him understand her, but when he did pause it was to sit down by the road-side and begin playing with some pieces of coloured glass he took from his pocket. With these he persisted in amusing himself, turning them about in his palm, and gloating and chuckling over their beauty, deaf to her assurances that she was sufficiently rested, and anxious to get to her journey's end.

At last he was prevailed upon to rise and go on, Kythe resolving that no amount of weariness should extort another complaint from her. The gathering twilight now obscured the country, and a mist was creeping up from the valleys, so dense that she was compelled to keep close to her guide, lest she should lose sight of him altogether.

On and on they went, Corrie rattling his pieces of glass, and crooning to himself, and the panting Kythe stumbling after him inexpressibly weary, but hoping soon to hear the welcome announcement that they were nearing their destination.

How coldly the mist hung about her, and how thoroughly it had blotted out every feature of the landscape! High above it the stars were beginning