Henny was the only surviving daughter of Mammy, and was naturally regarded by her mother and the family with peculiar interest, as her successor in due time to the honors of her position.

She would have been eminently worthy of the trust, for she possessed an unusual degree of intelligence, united with a gentle and docile temper, and had eagerly profited by the advice and the teaching she had received. She was about the age of Constance, and had availed herself of the childish lessons of her young mistress to accomplish herself in reading. Mrs. Melville had made this discovery on one occasion when she was ill, and the little handmaiden, in a soft and musical voice, read a chapter in the Bible, having first modestly asked her permission. This heightened the interest already felt in her, and the child had grown up into a girl of sound principles, good dispositions, and deep religious impressions.

Mrs. Melville saw with concern that her health was gradually declining under the influence of a slow but fatal malady that had caused the early death of her father. For two years she had been watched over and attended with all the care that the best medical aid and ceaseless kindness could afford. But all seemed unavailing, and she had been for some months unable to leave her mother's cottage.

Mrs. Melville immediately granted her request, and accompanied by Constance, she followed Mammy to her daughter's bedside.

Poor Henny was lying very quietly as if asleep, and looked up feebly as Mrs. Melville and Constance approached. A ray of pleasure played on her dark face.

"It is very kind of you, ma'am, to come so soon, whenever I send to ask you," she said, "and Miss Constance too. I like might'ly to see you both."

66 'Certainly we will come whenever you ask to see us, Henny; but you are better to-day I hope; you seem very quiet.”

"No, ma'am, I am no better," she replied. "I shall not be any better until I go home. But I am ready now when my Saviour calls, and I feel as if he would call me very soon."

"Is there any thing you would like that we can do for you?" said Mrs. Melville.

Henny waited a moment and then said, "Yes, ma'am, I should like to see Miss Alice once more."

Little Alice soon came, and the poor girl looked fixedly at her for some minutes.

"She looks like the angels I see in my dreams ma'am," she said, and she kissed the little hand freely extended to her. "My dreams are a great comfort to me," she continued, still addressing herself to Mrs. Melville. "I often see angels all in white with shining wings and golden crowns, and sometimes I see you among them. Last night I saw you as plainly as I see you now, and you were among those angels, and in a white shining garment, as they were."

Mrs. Melville could not trust her voice to speak for some moments. She then asked if Henny had any other request to make.

"Yes, ma'am, I should like to hear Miss Constance sing once more one of those sweet hymns you taught me when I was a little child in the Sunday school."

The request was willingly complied with, and Henny said she had only one more wish,-that Mrs. Melville would read the verses beginning with “Let not your heart be troubled.”

Ah, how many thorns have been removed from the pillow of the departing pilgrim of life's journey by those heavenly words!

Mr. Bloomfield readily came at Mrs. Melville's request to visit his humble parishioner.

"I have never," he said, "seen the evidences of a brighter and purer faith than are manifested in this poor girl. The 'wise and noble' might learn a lesson of true wisdom in her perfect and childlike confidence, and in the resignation and even the joy she expresses in the hope of entering into her rest."

Poor Henny died that night, and the family followed her to her last resting-place at the cemetery in the grove of evergreen trees. Many tears were shed over her early grave, and her mother was regarded with more kindness than ever, in consequence of the sympathy her affliction elicited. ⚫

CHAPTER VIII.

A BRIDAL.

SPRING had returned; the balmy season that poets love to sing and artists to paint; when nature puts on her freshest "robe of universal green," and new health and life are awakened by the "vernal airs breathing the smell of field and grove."

Happily there are some "flowers of paradise" yet unsung, for every clime has its peculiar graces at this fairest portion of the varied year. One of our own authors has justly and beautifully said that "while every insignificant hill and turbid stream of classic Europe have been hallowed by the visitations of the muse, and contemplated with fond enthusiasm, our lofty mountains and noble rivers raise their majestic heads and roll their waters unheeded, because unsung." Our humble muse dares not attempt a range so extended, and would shrink from themes of such grandeur and magnificence. A scene of quiet loveliness is all that her unaspiring song would com

memorate.

The same author mentions a peculiar feature of our grand indigenous forests, in a huge vine that had

enclasped an oak, and entwined itself around the stately tree so completely that it might have been imagined "The Lion of trees, perishing in the embraces of a vegetable Boa."

This had not been the fate of any of the fine old oaks that composed the Tarleton wood at Avonmore, and whose giant arms, as we last saw them, were stretching out in bold relief against the wintry sky. They were now in all the pride of spring, and waving in graceful foliage. The vines had happily indulged in a salutary caprice in their attachments, and had clambered from tree to tree, forming festoons and draperies and leafy canopies, in every direction; and the air was laden with the rich perfume that exhaled from their tender blossoms.

The velvet green of the lawn was relieved by the "pendant shades" of the trees on either side of it; and the clustering flowers of the acacia, the chestnut, the catalpa, and the tulip tree, added the charm of renewed youth and beauty to their proud strength. Flowers of all hues, roses with and "without the the thorn, 99 were scattered in profuse luxuriance on every side, and one, hardly known to fame, hung its long emerald wreaths studded with bells "blooming ambrosial" flowers of "vegetable gold," and sending an unseen cloud of oriental incense through the air.

It would seem pedantic to introduce a botanic reference for this comparatively unknown flower; but the "yellow jessamine," thus popularly but erroneously called in the region in which it flourishes, will be recognized by all who have seen this superb evergreen vine in its gorgeous bloom.