yield her own wishes to her faithful servant's. Servant! we beg Martha's pardon, help. Serving most assiduously, she had an antipathy to the word servant. Was she not right? There must be new terms to express new relations. Help may have a ludicrous and perhaps an alarming sound to unaccustomed ears; but is there a word in the English language more descriptive of the service rendered by a New-England domestic; truly a "republican independent dependent, and the very best servant, (this we say on the highest foreign, ay, English authority,) provided we are willing to dispense with obsequiousness and servility, for the capability and virtue of a self-regulating and self-respecting agent.

The Barclays' religion governed all their relations. They did not regard their servant as a hireling, but as a member of their family, who, from her humble position in it, was entitled to their protection and care. Martha was their friend; the family joys and sorrows were part and parcel with hers, hers with theirs. As her qualifications increased with her years, and her labors with the growth of the family, they had augmented her wages; never taking advantage of her preference of their house to withhold a just (others might have called it a generous) consideration for her labors, and quieting their consciences by a resolution to recompense her at some convenient season, that future indefinite, so convenient to the debtor, so hopeless to the creditor. Mrs. Barclay was certainly a most successful grower of the virtues; but with the best moral

cultivation, human infirmity is a weedy soil, and poor Martha sometimes, wearied with the unvaried routine of domestic service, became, like others, unreasonable and fretful. She was not fretted at in turn, and wondered at, as servants are (as if they alone should be exempt from human weakness), but sent to recréate herself in her native New England; whence she returned, strong and cheerful, to her tasks.

7

But we are leaving too long unsettled the interests of our little friend Biddy..

"Martha," said Mrs. Barclay, "the Phealans are breaking up at last."

"Are they indeed, ma'am? I am sorry for it; they have been a sight to behold, that family. I never could look at them without feelings.'

"Courage!" thought Mrs. Barclay; "if Martha once has what she calls feelings, all will go right. "Poor Biddy," she continued, "is looking puny; she has been too much shut up with the baby.She is a nice, bright child."

"Yes, she is indeed, ma'am."

"I wish, Martha, she could get a good place." "I wish she could, ma'am, but she is not fit for service yet.

"No, not exactly; I suppose hardly any body would be willing to take the trouble of her for two or three years yet, while she is going to school."

66 I suppose not, but they would be well paid for it afterwards, such a very good child.” "That they would, Martha; but there are so

few persons that are willing to take trouble now, for a possible reward hereafter.'

"I know it; there's few, even of those that aim to do right, that are willing to pay the cost. You and Mr. Barclay"- Martha stopped; it was not in her line to pay direct compliments.

"Mr. Barclay and I, you think, perhaps, might be willing to stretch out a helping hand to poor Biddy; and so we should, and would, but the trouble, Martha, would come upon you.

66

'O, ma'am, in such a case, - for a poor little orphan like Biddy, and so good too, I should not mind the trouble."

"If you really would not, Martha, I shoula take her joyfully into the family. But you must consider well; you will have her constantly with you. You know you don't like a child under your feet. If she is brought up in the family, you will have to teach her; for you know I do not choose to keep any one to wait on the children. It will be a task, and a long one, Martha; but then, if you should decide to undertake it, you will have the consolation of doing a great service to a fellow creature. Think of it, Martha, and decide for yourself."

Martha took time for consideration, and then little Biddy was installed, a most happy and grateful member of the family; and Martha, who had been generously allowed to be a free agent in the good work, bore all the little trials it brought with patience, and trained Biddy with a zeal that enters only into voluntary action.

"The poorest poor

Long for some moments in a weary life,

When they can know and feel that they have been the dealers out

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Of some small blessings,—have been kind to such
As needed kindness.'

CHAPTER VIII.

A DARK DAY.

"A foolish son is the calamity of his father."

THERE are seldom allotted to humanity fourteen years of such success and happiness as had been experienced by the Barclays. In this time, Mr. Barclay had secured a competency. His competency did not merit the well-known satirical defi"little more than a man has,' nition of being a but was enough to satisfy his well regulated desires, to provide for the education of his children, and to save his daughters from the temptation of securing a home, in that most wretched of all modes, by marrying for it. It was no part of his plan to provide property for his sons. Good characters, good education, and a start in the world, was all they were to expect. This they perfectly understood. As soon as they were capable of comprehending them, they were made acquainted with their father's affairs, minutely informed of the condition of his property, and his plans for the

future. Mr. Barclay despised that mean jealousy with which some parents hide their pecuniary affairs from their children, some husbands from their wives even, as if they were not joint and equal proprietors in the concern.

He had now nearly reached the period when he meditated a great change in his life. From the beginning of his career in the city, he had looked forward with a yearning heart to the time when he might retire to Greenbrook. His children often visited their relatives there. It was their Jerusalem, to which the heart made all its pilgrimages. The old parsonage had recently come into market; Mr. Barclay had purchased it; and it was a fixed matter, that in the ensuing Spring, as soon as the house could be repaired, the family should remove thither. In the mean time, this long hoped-for event was the constant theme of father, mother, and children. Improvements and occupations were planned by day, and at night Mr. Barclay's dreams were of that home of his childhood. Again he was wading and swimming in that prettiest of all streams that circled the meadows, slaking his thirst from the moss-grown bucket, and making cups and saucers for little Anne Hyde from the acorns under the great oak tree at the end of the lane.

Alas! disappointment comes to the most prudent, when least expected and often when least deserved.

It was just before Christmas, about the annual period when business is investigated and its results ascertained. Mr. Barclay had been shut up