we never thought that you'd pull through; he blushed like a peony when Charles began but you did." to discuss his merits.

"Ah," said Charles, thoughtfully, “when I look back on all this, it seems like a dream. How we all lived through that terrible night on board the brig is more than I can tell."

"And why did not you send and let us know of your safety before?" asked Ellen.

"Well," he replied, "one cause was that the weather was so rough that for nearly a fortnight there was no communication with the main land; beyond that, I must leave Pemberton to explain."

"Oh, you cunning old fox! And so you knew of it, and never said a word," and Ellen shook her small, attenuated finger at the good doctor menacingly.

"Never mind-never mind, my dear lady. The old fox knew what he was about," replied Dr. Pemberton, laughing. "All's well that ends well,' you know. Besides, you ought to be thankful that I let you have your cup of joy full to the brim, instead of letting you take it sip by sip."

It was a beautiful sight to see those twohusband and wife-sitting hand in hand, their eyes beaming with love, and their hearts overflowing with gratitude. Their cup of happiness was not only full, but was brimming over. They had sown in sorrow, they were now reaping in joy.

"Ah, yes," he said, "I've no doubt Mrs. Pressley's been a treasure to you; but you women mustn't have it all your own way. My friend Jim here is a born nurse. He's as strong as a lion and as tender as a baby. The way in which he attended upon me and lifted me about was wonderful. I've been thinking of suggesting to him to give up boating and go into the nursing line. If I and Pemberton were to recommend him, he'd make his fortune. He's just the fellow we want, Pemberton," he said, turning to the doctor. "No fear of our instructions not being carried out where Jim was. If we ordered our patients knobs of chairs and pump-handles they would have to take them! Why, when I was getting better, and thought I might use my own discretion, I found out my mistake. Jim pulled me up, and no mistake. 'It's all very well, sir,' he said, 'when you are at home. Then you are the doctor, and can give your orders; now you're a patient, and you've got to obey.'

"Well, you see, sir," put in Jim, apologetically, "I could not help it. orders, and I was bound to see 'em carried out."

"There, you see, that's just what I told you," cried Mr. Woodman.

smile.

"There's not the smallest doubt about it," replied Charles. "Firmness and kindness are the two finest qualities a man can possess, especially if it be, as in this case, coupled with patience."

"I daresay Mr. Pressley was quite right," "Ah," said Ellen, taking Mrs. Pressley's said Ellen, and she glanced over at Jim's hand in hers, and kissing it, "this, Charles, weather-beaten countenance with a beaming is the star that guided me in those days of anxiety and horror. When the darkness in me was the most profound, her faith shone the brightest. God bless you, dear Mrs. Pressley, for all that you have done for me and mine. I only hope that every one, when sorrow and sickness falls upon them, may "Ah, speaking of patience reminds me of find a friend as faithful and constant as you patients," said Dr. Pemberton. "I can't do have been. God has been very merciful to anything more here now, so I must be going. us all, but the best and greatest blessing He As to you, Mrs. Woodman, I shall turn you over has conferred on me, was His sending you to to your husband; he's the best prescription help me. Poor dear," she went on, musingly, I can give you. Í had almost given you up "in the midst of her own grief, when her at one time, but I have some hope of you heart was sorest, she always had a word of now. As to you, Woodman," he went on, comfort and encouragement for me."

Jim Pressley felt very bashful and uncomfortable, but it did his heart good to hear such things said of his wife, and to see her on such good terms with the doctor's lady; but

"though you are a little thin and worn, you look so happy, and all has seemed to have ended so satisfactorily, that I am half inclined to embark in a boat, and see if I can't find a ship that is 'Waterlogged.""

GOLDEN HOURS WITH
HOURS WITH "THE BOOK."

I. LIVING WATERS.

"Living waters shall go out from Jerusalem."

Zech. xiv. 8.

Tarsus may be encrusted with the disfiguring leprosy of prejudice and pride; yet the living waters shall wash them whiter than snow, and bring to them again the flesh of a little child! ROM Jerusalem." You reLIVING waters, Gospel blessings are; for they member Our Lord's own inspire new life, quicken the soul into conwords spoken from the scious, healthful, and delightful activity. marble stairway at the Tem- The tongue breaks forth into singing, the ple porch? "If any man hands hasten to be doing, the heart and pulse thirst, let him come unto Me and drink. He are beating, the willing feet are running, and that believeth on Me, out of him shall flow the inmost soul is thinking, loving, aspiring; rivers of living water. This spake He of the and all in harmony with the holy will of God. Spirit, which they that believe on Him should Living waters! for they refresh the soul when receive; for the Holy Ghost was not yet weary, lift up the head when drooping, cheer given, because that Jesus was not yet glori- up the heart when failing, cool the hot brow fied." But as He, the risen Lord, stood when aching, and stimulate the tired and upon the Mount of Olives, and from fainting spirit with life, and love, and strength, thence ascended, amid an angel escort, and hope! LIVING waters! Not cistern to His throne in heaven, he was glorified. waters that grow less with every draught ; Then, in the upper room, amid the waiting not stagnant waters growing unfit for use. watchers, the fountain was unsealed, the Spirit Living waters, always flowing, always fresh was outpoured, the living waters flowed, and and sparkling; always plentiful and free!

from Jerusalem the Gospel tidings were
carried east and west; the living stream,
borne along the highways and byways of the
world, began that course of irrigation and
expansion which shall never cease until this
droughty, barren, desert world becomes
everywhere fruitful and beautiful as the both.
garden of the Lord.

"Flowing full and fresh as ever,

Full and fresh without decline;
Flows for ME the gracious river,

Flows for THEE the stream divine."

For me and thee, and well within reach of "To the east and to the west," that is to say, everywhere. First, the Gospel tidings "Living waters.” That is the name di-made their way westward through Syria, vinely applied to the blessings of the Gospel of Christ. What is the'fount from whence these waters spring? Hear the words of the Lord Himself, as He complains of the backslidings of His people: "Ye have forsaken ME, the Fountain of Living Water." They are living waters, then, because they flow from the living God: they are the outwellings of our heavenly Father's love! O wonderful waters! Clearer than crystal; sweeter than the waters of Bethlehem; more to be desired than the streams of the south! Cleansing waters. David's hands may be red with blood; the hands of Zaccheus may be yellow with the touch of dishonest gold; the lips of Peter may be soiled by the treble stain of curse Reader, it has come to you. Its wavelets and oath and lie; the soul of Magdalen wash your threshold, its ripples murmur may be soiled by the devils who made it their along your life-path, it is lifted to your lips unclean abode; the malefactor on the cross in these Golden Hours.

may be steeped to the lips in the crimson of a

life of crime; the whole nature of Saul of

Greece, and Rome; through Gaul and Spain and Britain. Borne in Saxon pitchers the living water reached the continent of America; then eastward, all through hoary Europe and the continent of India, and right away among the thousand islands of the sea. "To the former sea and the hinder sea," Red Sea and Mediterranean, Dead Sea and Adriatic, Black Sea and German Ocean, Atlantic and Pacific; all over the peopled globe the living waters from Jerusalem are flowing, bearing life to the dead, light to the dark, love to the forlorn, fruitfulness and beauty to the barren and unlovely, holiness to the impure, happiness to the wretched, Jesus to everybody.

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'In summer and in winter shall it be."-Zech. xiv. 8. "In summer and in winter shall it be." There are brooks and rivers in nature which rapidly lessen and dry up beneath the summer sun; so that where but lately a merry streamlet rippled as it ran, there is nothing but a dry and stony bed. The parched traveller and the panting animal track its course in vain. In summer the streamlet shall not be. There are rivers which in summer-time flow strong and deep, and bear upon their noble breast the ships of commerce or the skiffs of pleasure, but which in winter-time are sealed up like a sepulchre in thick-ribbed ice. But neither summer heat nor winter frost can affect the living waters that flow from the fountain of redeeming grace.

"This river so precious, so healing and gracious,
Is flowing for ever, unbounded and free!
Is flowing for ever, and faltereth never,

In summer and winter these waters shall be."

Human experiences are ever changeful. There is the summer of youth and the winter of old age; there is the summer of health and the winter of sickness and disease; there is the summer of prosperity and adversity's keen winter frosts; there is the summer of strong confidence and the winter of doubts, despondency, and fear. Every Christian has to undergo sharp and unexpected changes now, it is, fretful April; now, it is sultry July; now again, November's raw mist and fogs are felt, and the December or January's biting blasts. Summer and winter, joy and sorrow, pain and pleasure, loss and profit, life and death. Happy they who drink habitually at the living stream. In summer and winter it shall be. Summer warmth shall be more grateful, summer drought be better borne, summer corn be better nourished, and summer flowers wear brighter hues, because of the living waters which shall purl, and roll, and ripple all the time; and winter, sharp and biting winter, shall lose its terrors, and be shorn of all its pains and penalties by reason of the consolations, stimulus, and blessing that lies in a draught from the living spring. See here the worthless and delusive character of all earthly streams. The stolen waters of pleasure, the floods of prosperity, the rivers of delight that flow through the world's gay summer gardens, all dry up when the sun comes scorching down; all the cisterns, pools, and rivulets this poor vain world can boast are

locked in icy bonds of death when the winter of our greatest need arrives! The "wells of salvation," the fountain of redeeming love, are always flowing. Let the weather be what it will, let the seasons chop and change as they may, this river runs!

Still it flows as fresh as ever

From the Saviour's wounded side,
Still it flows, and never, never

Can the living streams be dried!

There is no state or condition, no need of our mind, body, or estate, no change of circumstance, no state of soul, no period of time in which its vital blessings shall not aid and comfort, nourish us and make us glad. It is the joy of life, it is the bliss of dying, it is life and immortality! This stream is the love of God in Christ Jesus, brought to us by the sweet influence of the Holy Ghost.

But do we make the most of our precious privilege? Is the path to the brook well trodden and familiar day by day? How often do we "draw water from these wells of salvation"? How often do we dip our pitcher into the vital flood? Let us love our Bible, for the living spring bubbles out of every page. Let us be often on our knees, for then most of all its precious waters rise and ripple, musical with promise and rife with blessing, up to our very lips. Let us love the house of God, the means of grace, for they are specially called the "Waters of the Sanc tuary," and it is by passing through its porches that the Bethesda, waters are found to be healingly troubled by the angel of the Lord. Let us make known the stream to others. Let us take our children, our friend, our neighbour by the hand and lead them to the brink of the hallowed stream, and tell them how that the taste to us has been "sweeter than honey and the honeycomb."

hell he lifted up his eyes, being in torment." The Greek for the "pomp" of Agrippa and Bernice is the word for fantasies-fancies, phantoms, tricks of imagination. Dreams are common to all ages, and even old age itself is an inveterate dreamer, its dreams being usually as grotesque and senseless as if at bedtime one should don a wedding-dress to sleep in.

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"Near" the great day was, but not as some men count nearness, seeing that the interval overclasps already about two millenniums, and may yet embrace many more. The day and hour formed no part of the prophetic inspiration, but only the event with certain of its details. The spirit-stirring descriptions of these remain for our instruction, and the eagerness of expectation expressed by the apostles betokens the frame of mind in which succes- Sunshine and brightness and beauty and sive ages should contemplate the ever-nearing gladness are all associated with our ideas of day of the Lord. Elsewhere (2 Thess. ii.) 'day," and all the radiant visions which the we are at least authorized to suspect as de- word calls up will be realized in heaven. ceivers those who tell us that, according to The apostle speaks as one who has been long our notions of nearness, "the day of Christ benighted, but at length sees the morning is at hand"; and we may take it confidently breaking. "Knowing the time"-how light that, as it regards ourselves, the apostle's it is becoming, how short and precious it is, warning has its full force in the brevity and how much we have to do, and how far we uncertainty of life. Our years are passing have to go, "it is high time to awake out of away, we must soon have done with this world, sleep." Since the Christian first "believed," and there may be even now but a step the last scene in this world's history and the between us and death. glory that will follow have drawn nearer. In the words, "I must work the works of "Behold, the Bridegroom cometh!" and in Him that sent Me, while it is day: the night order to be prepared to meet Him he must cometh, when no man can work. our Lord doff all "works of darkness" as a nightcontrasts this life with the darkness, the still- dress which does not beseem the day. To ness, and inactivity of the grave; but here it get dressed for eternity, he must first undress; is contrasted with the bright and blessed and to learn to do well, he must cease to do evil; active heaven which awaits all "children of to run with patience the race set before him, the day." In comparison with his former he must lay aside every weight; to perfect holistate the believer is "not in darkness"; but, ness in the fear of God, he must cleanse himas compared with what he "shall be," he is self from all filthiness of the flesh and spirit. only an heir of light, and he must wait for In "the armour of light" the metaphor is his inheritance till the night of sin and igno-partly retained and partly changed. Clothing rance and trouble and death is past. What is still spoken of, but now it is military. A know we of what we most wish to know? soldier, in war-time, is not dressed till his Scarcely more than a traveller observes at arms are on. The armour of the ancients was midnight of the scenery around him. The often so resplendent as to dazzle and constars cheer, the aurora pleases, and the full-found their enemies. Old Homer says of orbed moon sometimes delights us; but still Patrolcus, the night continues, and we often long for the day-dawn, when the darkness will be gone, and the shadows shall flee away.

Sleep denotes that condition of indifference to sin which allows and practises "the works of darkness," and into this state of peril it is intimated believers may yet fall.

"Night is the time for dreams,

The gay romance of life; When all that is, and all that seems, Blend in fantastic strife. Ah, visions less beguiling far Than waking dreams by daylight are." The pursuits of men in general are nothing but waking dreams. The rich man in the parable thought no greater happiness attainable than such as wealth may win, and the next thing we hear respecting him is that "in

"Achilles' shield his ample shoulders spread, Achilles' helmet nodded o'er his head : Adorned in all his terrible array, He flashed around intolerable day." In the Canticles the Church is similarly described, "Who is she that looketh forth as the morning, fair as the moon, clear as the sun, and terrible as an army with banners?" Holiness is called "armour," because it is our best defence against the dangers of this sinful world; it is "the armour of light," because it comes from the world of light, because the beauty of holiness transcends all other beauty, and because it harmonizes with the pure and perfect "day" which is "at hand." Thus arrayed, we shall be "meet for the inheritance of the saints in light."