the dark presently. How bright the sails are shining in the moonlight; it is gone! Evelyn, that is like one of His own; you know whom I mean, don't you? I mean one of His Who died on the Cross for us; it is like His bidding, Come, out of sorrow and temptation, into the bright light of His own conscious love. Oh, then, Evelyn," said he, laying his head on Evelyn's shoulder, we go back again to the dark. You know it is in the dark and then in the light, and in the dark and then-" And Evelyn finished the sentence.

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Then, Eustace, in the light for ever."

"Yes," said Eustace, "that is true-in the light for ever. Evelyn, don't leave me; I am so tired after the journey. I do so want to look at that broad sea under the moonlight. That little boat and that white sail; I wish it would come back. Wasn't that boat like the body-this body of ours, and the white sail like the soul which catches the light of JESUS, and then carries our frail body over the dark into the light? And I need carrying through the dark.”

"Yes," said Evelyn, "yes, Eustace, it is; our bodies are but frail barks indeed, and the white sail in that great Light is like the Divine part which bears the body on."

Mrs. Sherwood's lodgings had no great advantages, except that they looked upon the sea. It was clear beyond all doubt that Eustace had imbibed, through the scarlet fever, the seeds of consumption; and that he was rapidly declining, not only in health, but in life itself, was apparent to all around him. But although no one was more conscious than he was that he was approaching the everlasting shore, there was no one of the little party which surrounded him who looked forward with more real joy and hope to it than Eustace did himself.

A few days after they arrived, the following conversation ensued:

"I have not got up for the last four days, and I do not think I shall get up again. Nay, stop those tears. You and I need not cry; we have both been happy together. But it is better to go. We need not weep when one or other of us is called to GOD."

"Why do you say that, Eustace ? Have you any right to be glad that you are to die before you have done all that the LORD wills you to do on earth ?"

"Evelyn," said Eustace, "look here; you are afraid of me, lest, as you think, I am seeking more for death than for my work in life. Now, I hope I am right; if I am not, may He teach me what is right, by any sorrow He may lay upon me. But I think I am right. When any one is going away from this world, at least he is sincere, is he not, Evelyn ?"

“ "Well," said Eustace, "if the LORD is calling me, and if I love to go to Him, I could think that this alone would justify my feeling as I do. I am just at that age when I may be more tempted to wrong, and, may be, the LORD calls me out of temptation. If I have done but little work-no, none at all-for Him on earth, may not it be that He calls me to fill some other place in His rest; the lowest, perhaps, in that blessed abode, where I can, even though amongst the lowest and least of His redeemed ones, still do something for His kingdom? May this not be so? And it may be, too, that my early death (if I do meet it with courage and patience,) may be the means of helping others that are young to know that there is truth in the words, 'They that seek Me early shall find Me." "

"Oh, Eustace, Eustace, would that I might go with

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you! Must I stay behind, when you are gone ?" cried Evelyn, "you have said indeed what is most true."

They had but two rooms in their lodging-house, the sitting-room below stairs, and Eustace's room above. Mrs. Sherwood's object was to nurse her child, and to attend his every want, and to enable him, as far as might be, to enjoy the last of those scenes of earth,-the air, the sea, and the country, so often to the dying the anticipation of a better world.

CHAPTER XVII.

DEATH AND DYING.

MANY weeks had now passed since Stapleton had shown up what he called the deceit and dishonesty of Eustace. These weeks had been occupied by several important events. They contained holidays, and at the beginning of those holidays Mr. and Mrs. Beaumont had resolved that their darling child, Raymond, should go abroad, in order to enjoy some of the many charms which Paris especially presents to the eye of young travellers. Stapleton was the chosen companion, and one or two other young men of the neighbourhood, who had means sufficient to take the trip, and to live with that amount of comfort and luxury which Mr. Beaumont had determined on as right for his child, formed the party.

Raymond and his friends left their homes. The servants were out to bid them farewell, and everything promised a joyful journey and a happy holiday.

That Mrs. Sherwood and Eustace had left the neighbourhood precipitately, and without very much expression

of regard from those whom they had left behind, was no matter of wonder to those who knew the story. Evelyn, too, was with them.

Raymond and his party pursued their travels with considerable success. The weather was fine, Paris was gay, and the many gay sights and scenes of that great city were in the highest degree attractive to the eyes of the youthful parties who were now visiting it. They went to Versailles and Fontainbleau; they visited with great care the Louvre, and went to see the principal churches of Paris, not forgetting S. Roch, S. Denis, and S. Chapelle.

But while they were passing a joyous and happy holiday in Paris, other scenes were going on at home. Mr. Cleffain was dead. The old man had gone out as usual in the "Caterpillar," and wandered up the lanes; he stopped here and there, not so much to do anything as to gaze upon trees and hedges, and watch shadows and sunlight, and buds and flowers. This afternoon the horse that carried him stopped at the bottom of a wellknown slope instinctively, brought the "Caterpillar" home and stopped at the door, seeming to say that something was wrong.

Mr. Cleffain, as the carriage drove up, was found leaning forward on the footboard; his hand had lost the rein, and when Burton and the footboy came to the door, they discovered that a sudden seizure had deprived him of his consciousness, if not of his life. They carried him up to his bed, and all help and appliances were at once used. The Beaumonts were sent for. Mrs. Beaumont was loud in her lamentations; but amidst it all her chief grief was (as she continually whispered to her husband) that her Raymond was away. "What a pity! he ought to have been by the bedside of his dear relative at such a time. But, Mr. Beaumont, can you not telegraph for

Raymond ?" And yet who, that could have read her inner mind would not have heard her truer language? "Raymond! why are you away, when the will will be read,-when the old man is buried, and you will have got the whole fortune ?" But there was no use in her lamentation; Raymond was away; the old gentleman was very ill; such an attack was alarming. He did not revive much, and although everything that medical attendance and skill could do was used, with every appliance, he died before the morning.

Few people's deaths, even those of the most influential, excite very long notice in this busy world of ours; and even to many whose most attached ones are left behind, there is often but a slight tribute of affection offered when a few days have passed. But where, as in Mr. Cleffain's case, there were few except the servants and dependants around him, and the distant relatives that lived near him, it will be no matter of surprise to any one to learn that his death created deep distress but for a few hours after the actual detail of the funeral and the reading of the will. That will left the whole of Mr. Cleffain's property to Raymond alone, and left nothing to Eustace. It was read on the day of the funeral, after they had committed the remains to the ancestral vault of the Parish Churchyard. Bright and beautiful was the scene through which the corpse was carried. The cottage in which he had lived, the gable ends covered with ivy, honeysuckle, and roses, was itself a picture. In the room he inhabited still lay scattered about his Indian ink drawings on the backs of innumerable notes, with portfolios full of Gainsborough sketches, Garrick's written remarks, early touches by Turner when a young man, and lifelike sketches of Hunt the great "nature-painter" of the present day; dim and dusty, the spider only dared