I got what I could, the blessin' of the Holy Virgin be on it. The meal is so dear now, I couldn't get even two quarts for father's day's wages, ar' what would that be among us all, so I axed the miller for a fine lock of meal-dust and we can mix the few turnips we have with it. It's bad food for Christian people, but shure, it will keep away the gnawing hunger.'

،

Well, for us to have that same, Kathleen, dear,' said her mother, if the Lord only spares us to each other through the black days before us, we shall do well.'

The Lord save us,' said Kathleen, but I thought the sight would lave my eyes this mornin'. I was about two miles from Ballycastle, and what should I see but poor Biddy Tomash of our village. You know, mother, she had only the one small meal a day this fortnight back, and if she had that same every day, she'd have lived, but she hadn't. An' there she was lyin' cowld and stiff on the road-side, as I passed by; an' she had sold her cloak and shawl to buy the bit, an' had nothin' but ould rags on. There's going to be what they call a coroner's inquest on her, to-morrow.'

The family were silent: the same fate seemed to await themselves. Kathleen began to prepare their wretched meal, putting a quart of mill-dust to every pint of oatmeal, and adding a few turnips. The youngest children were the only persons in the house who had partaken of nourishment on that day, and all sat down with pleasure to the unwholesome and unsavoury meal.

'Sure, it's betther nor the black pratees any way,' Isaid the cheerful Kathleen. It has no smell that would make you turn from it.'

As she spoke, the widow Leonard entered the cabin

with the usual salutation, 'God save all here.' She exhibited no trace of that animation which had always cheered her labours with song: her brow was now clouded with care.

And how are the times goin' wid you, Kathleen, dear?' she enquired.

6

They're not so bad but they might be worse,' replied Kate, we have enough to keep off the hunger yet, praise be to God for the same.'

'It's not long I'll have that,' said the widow, 'I took leave of my cow last fair-day, and 'twill not be long before we eat the price of her,—and what 'ill become of us then?—I don't so much think of myself, but what will become of my Norah and Peter ?'

S. O'MOORE.

THE HERDMAN OF TEKOA.

No. II.

WHO can fail, in reading the Prophets, to be struck with the dignity and authority of their language! They might be men of low degree, even as Amos was a herdsman and a gatherer of sycamore-fruit, yet they tremble not when they stand before kings, and shrink not to rebuke the vices of the great. This was no haughty presumption on their part. God, as he said to Jeremiah, "had set them over the nations, and over the kingdoms, to root out, and to pull down, and to destroy, and to throw down, and to build, and to plant." They only realized their true position when they stood before earthly princes as ambassadors and representatives of the King of kings. Their high commission is not in like measure given us, but we are called on to partake of their spirit. If instead of fixing our eye exclusively on our own littleness, on our relative position in the eyes of others, we were to look upwards, and view our relation to the great King, and the duties which that relation imposes upon us,-what firmness and dignity would take the place of our too often vacillating and undecided conduct!

Let us now turn again to the controversy carried on between Amos and the people of Israel. The shield on which the Israelites strove to blunt every arrow of warning, was their fancied privilege as the chosen

people of God. This refuge of lies, the prophet, in the name of God, proceeds to wrest from them. "Hear the word that the Lord hath spoken against you, O children of Israel, against the whole family which I brought up from the land of Egypt.

"You only have I known,

Of all the families of the earth;
Therefore will I punish you,

For all your iniquities."

Here was the boast, that they, and they only, of all the families of the earth were known of God; the inference they drew from it was, that God would not punish them; but here He tells them that for this reason he would punish them for all their iniquities. Other nations had sinned against their Creator and bountiful preserver, but Israel had exceeded them all in sinning against a God who had taken them into fellowship with himself; who called Abraham his friend; who condescended to know them as a man knows his friend. They had sinned against grace which chose them, rather than nations greater and mightier than they, even before all the families of the earth; therefore their sin was very heinous, and could not be passed over. This verse is a solemn warning to the backsliding Christian. Perhaps unconsciously to himself, the freeness of Divine mercy has lulled him to sleep; he feels he is safe in Christ, and has grown careless and indifferent. Oh let him remember that sin in him after so much mercy, is tenfold sin, and that God will not fail to visit it. That He who came to save his people from their sins will save none in them, and that it behoves those who have "fled for refuge to the hope set before them, to work out their own salvation with fear and trembling."

"Can two walk together

Except they be agreed?

Will a lion roar in the forest

When he hath no prey ?

Will a young lion cry out of his den
If he have taken nothing?

Can a bird fall in a snare upon the earth

Where no gin is for him?

Shall one take up a snare from the earth
And have taken nothing at all?

Shall a trumpet be blown in the city
And the people not be afraid?

Shall there be evil in a city

And the Lord hath not done it?

Surely the Lord God will do nothing,

But he revealeth his secret unto his servants the

prophets.

The lion hath roared-who will not fear?

The Lord God hath spoken-who can but prophesy?"

The word of God aims to enlighten and not to stifle man's reason; it therefore not unfrequently teaches by questions in which man's own judgment is appealed to. "I speak as to wise men, judge ye what I say." It is thus that Amos teaches the Israelites. You say you are the chosen people of God, and you count on his presence as your protection, but tell me how can two walk together unless they be agreed ?-how can you walk with God while you break all his statutes? You say all these threatenings are vain and idle, but tell me do the lion or the young lion roar for nought?-much more is not the awful roar of God's threatening heard without a sufficient cause. You say it was a chance which happened to you, when judgments came; but, will a bird fall into a snare, where there is no gin? The