afterwards), he caught sight of a well-known eye-glass, and a row of buttons down the middle of a dress, and instantly slid back the bolt, with the triumphant shout, "It's only grandmamma!-only grandmamma!-only grandmamma!" opening the door wide as he did so, and hiding himself behind it.

The first glance was enough for us too; and the rush at grandmamma this time astonished her. But we wanted to tell her that what we had done was "only for fun," and she was soon persuaded, laughing heartily at her bolster figure.

But with her came in another person-a bachelor brother-in-law, our uncle James, of whom we had rather a dread, good-natured as he was. He was a lawyer, and used to puzzle us with questions to which he always wanted much more exact answers than we were either able or willing to give. And on the present occasion, not understanding what he saw, he begged to have everything explained. Grandmamma told him a good deal, but when he wanted to know why we called her "Only Grandmamma," even she could not answer his inquiry.

Still he would go on asking us separately all round, but everybody said they didn't know, until he came to me, and I was the last, and by this time was feeling rather fierce. Nor was my fierceness abated when, as a final resource, he lifted me upon the table, saying, I must be put in the witness-box, as there I should be obliged to give evidence. Poor Uncle James! he meant to be funny and amuse us, but he did not understand children as grandmamma did.

Yet after all, it was lucky he did what he did; for between the dislike of remaining there alone and the sensation that I must say something, I was stirred up to think what the real truth of the matter was. But think as I would, only one idea came into my head, and that I couldn't get rid of, so in despair I shouted it out at last

"It's because we love her so very, very much."

Grandmamma now interfered, and declaring I had made a first-rate witness, took me down, and let me soothe myself on her knee. Uncle James tapped his snuff-box, said it was "Very well, indeed," and would have caused "sensation in the court," and so the matter ended.

But thenceforth the name was established in the family circle, and for years, aye, for many happy years, we called grandmamma by it, till at last one came, when the Christmas dresses were all mourning ones; when we sat around the fire more silent than usual, and spoke of her to cach other as "poor grandmamma."

Yet how call her poor who, "rich in faith," had "inherited the promises?" Truly, if Uncle James himself had asked us, we could but have answered as before, that it was—

"Because we loved her so very, very much."

CHRISTMAS EVE: THE DECORATION OF THE CHURCH.

"The glory of Lebanon shall come unto thee, the fir-tree, the pine-tree, and the box together, to beautify the place of my sanctuary; and I will make the place of my feet glorious."-ISAIAH lx. 13.

The church is swept and garnished- The festival of festivals,

LADIES' WORK IN A COUNTRY PARISH:

OBJECTS OF EFFORT.

"The true strategy in attacking any vice, is by putting in a virtue to counteract it; in attacking any evil thought, by putting in a good thought to meet it."—HELPS.

WE remember how, not many years ago, the literature of the day was inundated by the unsolved question of "Woman's Vocation," "Woman's Work," or the "Rights of Women," until the reading public became perfectly sickened with the subject. So much ridicule fell upon it, that, when the agitation it at first caused had subsided, "Women's Rights" were shoved into the background, or were left to become the leading topics of a small party. But though we of the present day no longer engage in such futile and excited inquiries, we still find that the question, under another and more simple form, has a strong and firm hold upon our attention. The use and necessity for female efforts in district visiting, in the superintendence of hospitals, unions, schools, and reformatories, have all been advocated, supported, and again opposed, in the periodicals and public meetings of the day. That the assertion can no longer be disputed of the advantage and actual necessity for ladies and females of a higher stamp as nurses for our army and for our hospital-sick, is owing to Miss Nightingale and others of the same class, who have worked their way into the London infirmaries. We are content to leave unsolved the perplexing question of women's vocation in our own mind, whilst we watch with intense interest its practical solution in Miss Faithful's noble and hitherto successful effort at enlarging female employments, by opening a printing press and a law-copying office for women; and follow, with equal attention, the attempts of the society formed for the same purpose to encourage women in the art of lithography or wood-engraving, or in the, to them, hitherto sealed duty of book-keeping. Nor can we take up a paper or magazine without reading accounts of societies and associations of ladies, who, of all sects and parties, are yet united in furthering every variety of institution and every kind of charity for the benefit of their fellow-creatures. Sisterhoods, for the visitation of the poor, the education of orphans, the training of servants, and the reformation of penitents, have already gained ground, though still a doubtful subject of discussion for some, whilst female district visitors have out-lived the opposition they once received, and are now established in every town in England. How, then, has this change been effected in the opinion of our times, which encourage ladies actually to consider themselves as fellowlabourers with the opposite sex? We believe it is owing to the few