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Mr. B. Emma, I think. Yes, Emma.

Mrs. B. Emma Cooke!-No; it cannot be my friend Emma Cooke; for I am sure she was cut out for an old maid.

Mr. B. This lady seems to me to be cut out for a good wife.

Mrs. B. May be so I am sure I'll never go to see her. Pray, my dear, how came you to see so much of her?

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Mr. B. I have seen very little of her, my dear. only saw her two or three times before she was married. Mrs. B. Then, my dear, how could you decide that she was cut out for a good wife? I am sure you could not judge of her by seeing her only two or three times, and before she was married.

Mr. B. Indeed, my love, that is a very just obser

vation.

Mrs. B. I understand that compliment perfectly, and thank you for it, my dear. I must own I can bear any thing better than irony.

Mr. B. Irony! my dear, I was perfectly in earnest. 7 Mrs. B. Yes, yes; in earnest- —so I perceive—I may naturally be dull of apprehension, but my feelings are quick enough; I comprehend too well. Yes—it is impossible to judge of a woman before marriage, or to guess what sort of a wife she will make. I presume you speak from experience; you have been disappointed yourself, and repent your choice

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Mr. B. My dear, what did I say that was like this? Upon my word, I meant no such thing. I really was not thinking of you in the least.

Mrs. B. No-you never think of me now. I can easily believe that you were not thinking of me in the least.

Mr. B. But I said that only to prove to you that I could not be thinking ill of you, my dear.

Mrs. B. But I would rather that you thought ill of me, than that you did not think of me at all.

Mr. B. Well, my dear, I will even think ill of you, if that will please you.

Mrs. B. Do you laugh at me? When it comes to this, 9 I am wretched indeed. Never man laughed at the

woman he loved. As long as you had the slightest remains of love for me, you could not make me an object of derision: ridicule and love are incompatibleabsolutely incompatible. Well, I have done my best, my very best, to make you happy, but in vain. I see ĺ am not cut out to be a good wife. Happy, happy Mrs. Granby!

Mr. B. Happy, I hope sincerely, that she will be with my friend; but my happiness must depend on you, 10 my love; so, for my sake, if not for your own, be composed, and do not torment yourself with such fancies.

Mrs. B. I do wonder whether this Mrs. Granby is really that Miss Emma Cooke. I'll go and see her directly; see her I must.

Mr. B. I.am heartily glad of it, my dear; for I am sure a visit to his wife will give my friend Granby real pleasure.

Mrs. B. I promise you, my dear, I do not go to give him pleasure or you either? but to satisfy my own curiosity.

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LESSON CXI.

To a Waterfowl.-BRYANT.

WHITHER, 'midst falling dew,

While glow the heavens with the last steps of day,
Far, through their rosy depths, dost thou pursue
Thy solitary way?

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Might mark thy distant flight to do thee wrong,
As, darkly painted on the crimson sky,
Thy figure floats along.

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Seek'st thou the plashy brink
Of weedy lake, or marge of river wide,
Or where the rocking billows rise and sink
On the chafed ocean-side?

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There is a Power whose care

Teaches thy way along that pathless coast-
The desert and illimitable air-

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Lone wandering, but not lost.

All day thy wings have fanned
At that far height, the cold thin atmosphere;
Yet stoop not, weary, to the welcome land,
Though the dark night is near.

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And soon that toil shall end,

Soon shall thou find a summer home, and rest,
And scream among thy fellows: reeds shall bend
Soon o'er thy sheltered nest.

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Thou 'rt gone! the abyss of heaven Hath swallowed up thy form; yet, on my heart Deeply hath sunk the lesson thou hast given, And shall not soon depart.

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He, who, from zone to zone,

Guides through the boundless sky thy certain flight, In the long way that I must tread alone,

Will lead my steps aright.

Doth the hawk fly by thy wisdom, and stretch her wings toward the south? Doth the eagle mount up at thy command, and make her nest on high? She dwel

leth and abideth on the rock, upon the crag of the rock, and the strong place. From thence she seeketh the prey, and her eyes behold afar off. Her young ones also suck up blood: and where the slain are, there is she.-Bible.

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LESSON CXII.

The Widow and her Son.-W. IRVING.

DURING my residence in the country, I used frequently to attend at the old village church, which stood in a country filled with ancient families, and contained within its cold and silent aisles, the congregated dust

of many noble generations. Its shadowy aisles, its mouldering monuments, its dark oaken pannelling, all reverend with the gloom of departed years, seemed to fit it for the haunt of solemn meditation. A Sunday, too, in the country, is so holy in its repose; such a pensive quiet reigns over the face of nature, that every 2 restless passion is charmed down, and we feel all the natural religion of the soul gently springing up within us:

"Sweet day, so pure, so calm, so bright,
The bridal of the earth and sky!—"

I do not pretend to be what is called a devout man; but there are feelings that visit me in a country church, amid the beautiful serenity of nature, which I experience nowhere else; and if not a more religious, I think I am a better man on Sunday, than on any other 3 day of the seven.

But in this church I felt myself continually thrown back upon the world, by the frigidity and pomp of the poor worms around me. The only being that seemed thoroughly to feel the humble and prostrate piety of a true Christian, was a poor decrepit old woman, bending under the weight of years and infirmities. She bore the traces of something better than abject poverty. The lingerings of decent pride were visible in her appearance. Her dress, though humble in the extreme, 4 was scrupulously clean. Some trivial respect, too, had been awarded her, for she did not take her seat among the village poor, but sat alone on the steps of the altar. She seemed to have survived all love, all friendship, all society; and to have nothing left her but the hopes of heaven. When I saw her feebly rising and bending her aged form in prayer-habitually conning her prayerbook, which her palsied hand and failing eyes would not permit her to read, but which she evidently knew by heart-I felt persuaded that the faltering voice of 5 that poor woman arose to Heaven far before the responses of the clerk, the swell of the organ, or the chanting of the choir.

I am fond of loitering about country churches, and this was so delightfully situated, that it frequently at

tracted me. I stood on a knoll, round which a stream made a beautiful bend, and then wound its way through a long reach of soft meadow scenery. The church was surrounded by yew trees, which seemed almost coeval with itself. Its tall Gothic spire shot up lightly 6 from among them, with rooks and crows generally wheeling about it. I was seated there one still, sunny morning, watching two laborers who were digging a grave. They had chosen one of the most remote and neglected corners of the church-yard; where, from the number of nameless graves around, it would appear that the indigent and friendless were huddled into the earth. I was told that the new-made grave was for the only son of a poor widow.

While I was meditating on the distinctions of worldly 7 rank, which extend thus down into the very dust, the toll of the bell announced the approach of the funeral. They were the ob'sequies of poverty, with which pride had nothing to do. A coffin of the plainest materials, without pall or other covering, was borne by some of the villagers. The sexton walked before with an air of cold indifference. There were no mock mourners in the trappings of affected wo; but there was one real mourner who feebly tottered after the corpse. It was the aged mother of the deceased-the poor old 8 woman whom I had seen seated on the steps of the altar. She was supported by an humble friend, who was endeavoring to comfort her. A few of the neighboring poor had joined the train, and some children of the village were running hand in hand, now shouting with unthinking mirth, and now pausing to gaze, with childish curiosity, on the grief of the mourner.

As the funeral train approached the grave, the parson issued from the church porch, arrayed in the surplice, with prayer-book in hand, and attended by the 9 clerk. The service, however, was a mere act of charity. The deceased had been destitute, and the survivor was pennyless. It was shuffled through, therefore, in form, but coldly and unfeelingly. The well-fed priest moved but a few steps from the church-door; his voice could scarcely be heard at the grave; and never did I hear the funeral service, that sublime and touching

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