but Clara could never again delight in her former pursuits. How like
very dust and ashes seemed the food she had been seeking to nourish
her soul upon! A softened melancholy rested upon her heart, and she
would wander about her house looking at the relics of her lost one.
And day by day the roses faded from her cheek, her step grew lighter
on the stair, and she rapidly declined, till at length she was
startled at the shadowy form and face her mirror revealed to her. Her
long-neglected Bible was once more sought for, and she read with all
the desperate eagerness of a drowning man, who catches at every chance
of safety. It was her mother's Bible, and along the margin were
delicate pencil tracings, pointing to many precious passages. How
eagerly she read them over! and when she was too weary herself, she
gave the book into her husband's hand. Still he could give her no
advice in her spiritual distress, and looked upon it with compassion
as the result of her disease. He gave her the tenderest worldly
consolation, but it brought no peace to her anxious soul. Was there no
one to offer a word of true counsel? From a very humble source came
the advice she so much needed. The kind nurse, Margaret, whom little
Bertie had loved next to his parents, was an earnest, humble
Christian. It was from her lips he had learned to lisp his morning and
evening prayer, and her low, gentle voice that told him over and over
the sweet story he never tired of hearing--the story of the Babe of
Bethlehem.

Plainly and simply she pointed Clara's mind to the Lamb of God as the
only Saviour, praying hourly in her heart that God would bring home
the truth with power to her.

At length a little light broke in upon her mind. "It may be he will
receive even such a wandering sheep as I," she said, "oh, I will cast