"I see no house," said Mrs. Temple, "which I should take to be the vicarage: that to the right, on the margin of the river, is evidently the residence of the miller, whose mill is turned by the stream. Do look, my dear Allan," she said, "what a picturesque water-mill? the quaint gables, and the dark wheel, with its sparkling waters and silvery foam, and the vivid green of the grass, contrasting so richly with the peculiar tint of those dark clustering alders, and with that group of grey and quivering aspens-what a study for one of your favorite Flemish painters!"

"It reminds me," he replied, "of that fine Hob bima which my brother brought from Flanders. But there, however, is the vicarage,-presenting, just now, a lovelier study than any of my favorite Flemish pictures. That must be the good old clergyman himself, sitting under the shade of the chestnut trees; and that neatest of old ladies by his side, in her black silk gown and white muslin apron, must be his wife; what a lovely sight the group of little girls assembled before him! he is giving them some lesson from the large Bible which is open on his lap, teaching them from God's own Word, how to go forward in their course through this world, from whence he, as an aged pil

grim, will perhaps take his departure before they are grown to womanhood."

As they entered the garden-gate of the vicarage, and advanced towards the house, the old clergyman rose up to meet them, and a youth,-whom they had not noticed before, but who had been leaning against one of the old chestnut trees, and listening as attentively as the little children to the instruction of the venerable pastor,-came forward to offer his arm to his grandfather. The old clergyman had risen with difficulty, and was assisted as he walked, by his wife on one side, and by his grandson on the other. He raised his hat from his brow when he recognized the bishop, who returned his greeting with a look and manner of even deeper respect.

"This is very kind, my lord," he said, "and very gratifying to me; for I wished to see you, not only for your own sake, but for that of your worthy father. I should have known you by your likeness to him, though he was a younger man when we last parted, than you are now. You find me almost worn out," he continued, when they had reached the house, and were seated in the low but pleasant parlor of the vicarage, which, from its books and furniture of various descriptions, seemed to serve alike for the

study of the good old pastor, and for the sitting-room of his wife. "But I am wonderfully better and stronger to-day, and the air is deliciously mild, and the lawn so dry, that I begged my kind nurse "— turning his eyes affectionately towards his wife as he spoke" to let me pass an hour in the open air, that I might endeavor to obey once more that command of the good Shepherd, Feed my lambs!'"

"You will doubtless tell me," replied the bishop, "that you find the catechizing both of children and of their elders the best means of preparing them for the instruction of the pulpit. I think I have heard that you have often recommended the practice."

"I have pursued it with great advantage," he replied, "for the last thirty years or more; and, so far as human efforts can avail, I speak from my own. experience in saying, that I deem the practice almost indispensable-if we would look for fruit from our preaching. You are probably as well aware as myself, of the almost incredible ignorance of many of our hearers, with regard to the common rudiments of scriptural truth; no one who has not questioned and catechized them, would be able to form a conception of it. I honor preaching, as the great, the chief ordinance of our Blessed Lord, for the rescuing of lost

souls, and winning them to Him; and I hold the office of the preacher to be the highest under heaven, that is, if he make Jesus Christ and Him crucified, what the Scriptures of God have made Him, the sun of his whole system, irradiating every separate part, and illuminating, the whole. Without this, the finest oration of the most gifted preacher, is but the darkened exercise of a darkened mind. I honor preaching; but I was taught by experience, after I had served many years in the ministry, that if I would look to be a successful preacher in the pulpit, I must become first a pains-taking teacher out of it; I must inform myself personally of the ignorance of my hearers, and, by the plainest and most familiar teaching and questioning, endeavor to make them acquainted with the sublime truths of the Gospel; and thus, my lord, I set to work to collect here and there a little class of grown-up persons, or of children-the sheep and lambs of my flock; and I prayed for patience, and for wisdom, and for faith, whenever I applied myself to the task of striving to make them exercise their minds, in thinking upon, and understanding the meaning of what seemed to myself the plainest matters, subjects which no one could well fail to understand, but which I soon found they neither understood,

nor cared to understand. It was at first hard work; for it was a tedious trial to an ardent and impatient spirit, as mine then was: it troubled and it wearied me to go over and over the same ground, only to find, after a long season of toilsome labor, that, as it seemed to me, little or nothing was done; but I was enabled to make it a work of faith, and a labor of love, and a subject of prayer-prayer as unceasing as the work; and He who, in His good providence, blesses the toil of the laborer in the, common field, was graciously pleased to bless my spiritual husbandry. This I have been permitted to see; my addresses from the pulpit soon began to tell upon my people as they had never done before, and though many have remained unchanged and unblessed under my preaching-for we have but to do our work, and to leave the issue to our gracious God-still, can I bear my testimony, at the end of my long pilgrimage, to the deeply gratifying fact, that the more earnestly and diligently we labor, the more abundantly He seems to own and bless our labors."

The old man stopped, and though his glance caught the fixed look of earnest attention on the Bishop's expressive features, the color glowed deeply on his own pale countenance