RUTH GLEANING IN THE FIELD OF

BOAZ.

DURING the forty years' peace which ensued upon Deborah's triumph over Sisera, general of Jabin's forces, the Israelites incurred the anger of God, who visited them with a grievous famine, in consequence of which a man of Bethlehem, named Elimelech, with Naomi his wife, and his two sons Mahlon and Chilion, went to dwell in the land of Moab. Elimelech died there, and his sons married two women of the country, named Orpah and Ruth. About a couple of years after these marriages the young men died, when Naomi their mother, having determined to return to her own country, requested the widows of her sons to remain in their native land, probably being unwilling to introduce her heathen relatives among the people of her own nation. Orpah took leave of her mother-in-law with tears and lamentations, but Ruth was determined to accompany her, and her appeal was so earnest, that Naomi at length consented. They quitted Moab, and reached Bethlehem about the time of barley harvest. Naomi had a rich relative, named Boaz, in whose fields Ruth proposed gleaning, and it so happened, that while she was thus occupied, Boaz saw her, and, being struck with her beauty, inquired of the person that was appointed to overlook the reapers who she "Then said Boaz unto his servant that was set over the reapers, Whose damsel is this *?" Having ascertained that she was the daughter-in-law of his kinswoman, Naomi, he treated her with a most delicate and tender gallantry. When Ruth related the kind reception she had met with from Boaz, the wily mother-in-law instructed her how she should act, in order to strengthen the favourable impression already made upon her kinsman, the end of which was, as Naomi had foreseen, that Boaz married the beautiful Moabitess. This is one of the most beautiful episodes in the Bible, and the whole narrative is very touchingly detailed in the book of Ruth.

was.