ti

| said if you like, but you know it’s true. Hasn’t
| it convinced you that you ought to go, though

| now I have made up my mind about it, how glad

| require a change. You will find it a lovely ride
| When you are once out of the Black Country.”

| road, you know I have never been there, and it
| will be dark, or nearly so by the time I get up.”

‘Because I knew that was exactly what he
would not do. If he had died, no one would have
had any right to grumble, but to leave himself a
useless invalid for other people to take care of,
because he chose to have his own way, was
enough to make any one angry. He called it
‘self-sacrifice.’ I call it childish obstinacy. I
admire real unselfishness as much as any body,
but I don’t call that reckless disregard of con-
sequences the right thing; so now if you choose
to go on working and get the cholera, I shall think
it served you right, but that it’s very hard on
your family. That kind of thing always puts me
in mind of Christ’s temptation to cast Himself
down from the pinnacle of the temple,” he con- |
tinued very earnestly. ‘And the devil finds it |
answers very well now-a-days, especially with
those he wants most, the good religious people ; they
seem to forget our Lord’s censure, and to be quite |
willing to tempt God whenever they have a chance.”

“But a man must do his duty.”

* Ah, but if he doesn’t let his vanity blind hin, |
he won’t often find that he has to tempt Providence |
in the doing. There’s a great deal of vanity about |
all that self-sacrifice—-people think that God can’t |
manage the world without them, yet somehow it |
goes on eyen when they have knocked themselves
up by crowding the labour of ten years into two,
or something of that kind. He gave men their
bodies, and He meant them to be kept in order for |
the doing of His work, not thrown out of gear and |
spoiled by oyer-straining. I believe a man who |
ruins his health by over-fasting or want of rest
is going as much against God’s will in the matter |
as one who produces the same result by self-
indulgence and idleness. Overdoing things is one of |
the subtle temptations of the day, for good people.” |

“Ts it? Well, then, I won’t yield to it this time. |
I will obey orders, and go up to the farm, and I'll |
tell Winnie that you have the greatest objection |
to self-sacrifice, and that she had better cultivate |
a healthy spirit of self-consideration instead.”

“By all means; you may laugh at what I’ve

you are sorely tempted to stay ?”
“Yes, I think you have won the battle, and

I am to have the chance of fresh air and quiet

country instead of cholera horrors !”
“That is Nature’s voice, saying how much you

“‘By-the-bye, I am not at all clear about the

“TY will trace you a plan while you are writing
your list, for you would be sure to lose your way

LL
226. WINNIE CORSELLIS; OR, DEATH IN THE POT. |

without some guide of the kind; there are few |
people in the lanes during the day, and in the late
evening you might ride for miles without meeting any |
one to tell you whether you are right or wrong,”

“Shall I put your letter in my pocket ?”

“ Thank you.”

“JT wish you could come also.”

“So do I, but I promise to take a holiday as
soon as it is necessary ; I will practise what J]
preach, you may be sure.”

Half an hour later, Mr. Hammond was riding
quietly out of the town, already feeling the depres-
sion and languor of overwork falling away from
him in the keen enjoyment of the short holiday
from anxiety and labour. For the first part of the
journey he urged the mare to her best pace, and she
answered willingly to the touch of the spur, seeming
as glad as her master of a long stretch through
country lanes in the cool evening air. But when he

| once cleared the smoke, and the fires, now glimmer-

ing brightly through the gathering darkness, were
all behind him, he drew rein and sauntered along
almost at a foot-pace. It was pleasant not to be
in a hurry, to be able to loiter on the road without
feeling that he was injuring any one by the delay.
Life had been such a rush since the cholera came
that there had never been time for all the work
that was waiting to be done, and it was partly this
striving to overtake the constantly accumulating
arrears and the sense of never having finished, which
had overtaxed his nerves and exhausted his ener-
gies. But now he resolutely turned his thoughts
from his patients: he could do nothing for them,
and he knew that for his own sake and theirs it
became him to make the very most of his interval
of rest. So he sauntered along the lanes, thinking
how glad and surprised they would be to see him
at the Farm, watching the red gleams of fire-light
reflected across the evening sky, and the graceful
droop of the tall ferns and bending sprays of dog-
rose and bramble, which lined the pretty ill-kept
hedge-rows through which he passed.

Y.

GREAT was Trot’s delight the next morning when
she awoke in Aunt Winnie’s bed, and was told that
papa had come.

“Me go see,” she instantly remarked. ‘ Papa
like see Trot ;” and with little pink toes peeping
from beneath her night-gown she pattered across
the floor to the opposite room, and finding the door
ajar scrambled up to Mr. Hammond, who dreaming
of cholera patients in the courts of Dudley awoke
to find a rosy little face with ruffled golden hair
pressed close against his own.

“ Papa, papa, me glad you come.”

“Hullo! little woman! where did you spring
from?” said her father, taking her into his arms,

a ee