now in pain I love Thee still more. How much sweeter it is to be like Thee, stretched upon Thy Cross, even than resting upon the hard couch at the poor man's table!"

12. "Thou triflest with me," exclaimed the judge, thoroughly vexed, "and makest light of my lenity. We will try something stronger. Here, Catulus, apply a lighted torch to her sides."

A thrill of disgust and horror ran through the assembly, which could not help sympathizing with the poor blind creature. A murmur of suppressed indignation broke out from all sides of the hall.

13. Cæcilia, for the first time, learnt that she was in the midst of a crowd. A crimson glow of modesty rushed into her brow, her face, and neck, just before white as marble. The angry judge checked the rising gush of feeling; and all listened in silence, as she spoke again, with warmer earnestness than before:

"O my dear Lord and Spouse! I have been ever true and faithful to Thee! Let me suffer pain and torture for Thee; but spare me confusion from human eyes. Let me come to Thee at once, not covering my face with my hands in shame when I stand before Thee."

14. Another muttering of compassion was heard.

"Catulus!" shouted the baffled judge in fury, "do your duty, sirrah! what are you about, fumbling all day with that torch ?"

The executioner advanced, and stretched forth his hand. to her robe, to withdraw it for the torture; but he drew back, and, turning to the prefect, exclaimed in softened accents:

"It is too late. She is dead!"

"Dead!" cried out Tertullus; "dead with one turn of the wheel? impossible !"

15. Catulus gave the rack a turn backward, and the body remained motionless. It was true: she had passed from the rack to the throne, from the scowl of the judge's countenance to her Spouse's welcoming embrace. Had she breathed out her pure soul, as a sweet perfume, in the incense of her prayer? or had her heart been unable to get back its blood, from the intensity of that first virginal blush?

CARDINAL WISEMAN.

Nicholas, Cardinal Wiseman was born at Seville, in Spain, of an Irish family settled there. Completing his education at Rome, he became eminent for his learning, and his lectures on Science and Revealed Religion were printed in many countries and many languages. In 1840 he was appointed a Coadjutor Bishop in England, and in his person as Archbishop of Westminster the English hierarchy was fully restored in 1850. He was also created a Cardinal. He was an eloquent preacher and writer; and, as one of the founders of the Dublin Review, and by works in various departments of literature, exercised great influence for the Catholic cause. He died in 1865, aged sixty-three.

"Cæca" (3) is the Latin for "blind." The rack was used not only as a direct torment, but also to keep the body distended for the application of other tortures. That of fire (12) was one of the most common. There are many instances in the lives of martyrs of their deaths being the fruit of prayer (15), as in the case of St. Praxedes, St. Cæcilia, St. Agatha, etc.

Small service is true service while it lasts;

Of friends, however humble, scorn not one :
The daisy, by the shadow that it casts,

Protects the lingering dew-drop from the sun.

The heights by great men reached and kept
Were not attained by sudden flight;
But they, while their companions slept,
Were toiling upward in the night.

1. Boys in general would be very good farmers if the current notions about farming were not so very different from those they entertain. What passes for laziness is very often an unwillingness to farm in a particular way. But say what you will about boys, it is my impression that a farm without a boy would very soon come to grief. What the boy does is the life of the farm. He is the factotum, always in demand, always expected to do the thousand indispensable things that nobody else will do. Upon him fall all the odds and ends, the most difficult things.

2. After everybody else is through, he has to finish up. His work is like a woman's-perpetual waiting on others. Everybody knows how much easier it is to eat a good dinner than it is to wash the dishes afterward. Consider what a boy on a farm is required to do; things that must be done, or life would actually stop.

3. It is understood, in the first place, that he is to do all the errands, to go to the store, to the post-office, and to carry all sorts of messages. If he had as many legs as a centiped, they would tire before night. His two short limbs seem to him entirely inadequate to the task. He