.

resistance of her nature within to many of the tasks imposed upon her which would not be appeased. She would rush from her abstract studies into the open air of the garden, which surrounded the house, and clasp the trees. with her arms as if they were conscious, sympathizing friends who would rescue her from her thraldom. She would throw herself upon the ground by the flower-beds, and brood over the lilies and violets, for she seldom gathered them, and say, "O, my beautiful angels! they need not say that ye are without life like me, for I feel it in every breath of your fragrance. Ye tell me in that, that ye are sorry for my woe, for Ah, my sweet flowers! ye know well that they are not kind to the little dark-girl as to you; for here in God's beautiful sunshine ye may ever dwell, and be wet by his dew, and sprinkled by his showers and bloom, O, so beautifully in the light of his smile, while I am chained to dark, bewildering words, and mystic crooked characters in the prison-house of my soul's bondage with the fear of frowns and sneers, if I do not love them and make them my own. But O lily, queen of my heart! they speak not to me as thou dost, when I ask them whence, why am I and what does our Father wish me to do. Thy voice even is not clear to me yet in answer to my ceaseless request; but it may be that when I have more and better studied his holy Word, my mind will be pure and still enough to hear distinctly your revealings. So bloom on, my lily and violet, and when your leaves fall and mingle with the dust, and your breaths ascend to heaven to take to themselves more glorious and lovely representations of God's beauty and love, O, then plead with Him when ye are blooming at the foot of his great white throne, to tell me more plainly when, where and how I am to do his holy will! Farewell, my flowers, until I have wrought out my tasks, and then I will come again and seek my reward in the odor of your incense, and the radiance of your sheen."

In going in she met Miss Ingemann: "Miss Zoë,” said she, "these are school hours, you are aware?"

"Yes, ma'am."

"You know the rule, it is not necessary to repeat it to you?"

The lady walks up the steps with great dignity, while Zoë goes to the schoolroom and takes her Algebra.

"It may be breaking the rules to the letter to go and talk to the flowers between nine and twelve in the forenoon, but at any rate my head is clearer and courage greater than before I went out, so my lessons will not suffer by it. Come here, you dingy Arab of an arithmetic; I wonder if your old grandfather far removed, who made you, and who is, I hope, in heaven, is not sorry that he left you behind him, to puzzle and fret so many little girls. I wonder if Jesus studied algebra! I doubt it. Then I don't know why I should. But come along, I say; we have got other masters now-a-days. But you don't get me to go astray from him, in what I know he did or did not."

CHAPTER XI.

"Spirits are not finely touched,
But to fine issues; nor nature never lends
The smallest scruple of her excellence,

But like a thrifty goddess she determines,
Herself the glory of a creditor,

Both thanks and use."-SHAKSPEARE.

"ZOË! there is the music teacher, dear; have you practised your lesson enough to be familiar with it, for you know how cross he is when we are at fault?" said Hilda, who partly from her love to her friend and dread of her incurring censure, and in part, from her inherent spirit of management, which, train it as she would, still floated on the surface of her character, though the principle upon which it rested, had had its roots dislodged, kept an eye upon her friend's doings.

"After a fashion; though tum-ti-tum, diddle-de-dee, don't, you well know, belong to me, so I give it but little welcome, seeing that I shall drive it from my soul's door as soon as I can. I make my courtesy to it, and do it the honors to please Miss Ingemann, but such a little shallow, chattering blonde and I have not much in common. Come, Miss, perch on my little finger, and

So we will go

To the realms below,

Where is sound without sense

To be bought for pence;

and she balanced her music sheet on its tip, and thus walked out of the room,

(Hilda alone.)

"The funny, mournful, foolish, wise little thing; yes, thing! for I really do not know what else to call my precious, provoking, fascinating, fantastic, but dear, dear friend. I wonder what fairy left such a little elfish, yet cherub changeling in this naughty, prosy world. She is so different from us all in her way, speech, looks and everything. Sometimes she is so weird, that I am afraid of her; and then again, no angel from the skies could look or talk more beautifully. One would think, to hear her speak of Jesus, that she had lived when he did, and he had been her schoolmate as I am, and that walking to and fro, they had led each other by the hand, and spoken in the most serious, but familiar way of their love for God and their fellow-men, and of the great and good deeds they would do for them. And then again, she so revolts against her life here and her lessons and work—not in word ever to Miss Ingemann, but by her listlessness and indifference that I am out of patience and in fear for her. For our teacher dislikes her, that is evident; and Zoë knows it, and that makes her more and more like a stone, when in her presence. Miss Ingemann never sees her as I do, sometimes full of fire and fancy, sometimes, O, so tender and loving to me, and then again, so mournful and sad, and next hour so angelic and devout, that I look upwards to see if Heaven is not opening to receive her. And yet, I well know, that she tells me but very few of her feelings of any kind, for I am so unlike her, I could not understand them, but I know her better than any one, for I sometimes catch sentences of her soliloquies, and they make me wonder and tremble for her too. What more can I do for her than I do? I try to explain, and explain matters between her and our teacher, but it is of no use. Miss Ingemann will persist in seeing only her surfacemind and character, which do not suit her. And Zoë is under a spell, I. verily believe, for I can think of nothing

but a dead wall when she is in her presence, which, of course, is rather an incumbrance in a house full of bright, lively people. O me! I could be so happy, if the world did not go so badly with poor Zoë! My heart is as light as a feather, when I have not her lying upon it with her griefs and wrongs. Why can't people be happy, I wonder? I see no reason for discontent.

"Trall la la la, la la, la la,

Merrily dance we 0:

Cast care to the winds,

For sighing and sins

Come not to my world, no, no:
Trall la la la, la la, la la la," etc.

And she waltzed out of the room.

Zoë practised her quadrille in the presence of her master, a common-place mind, who played with great execution the music of the reputed masters of song, whose deeper spirit was nevertheless beyond his ken. He was constantly dissatisfied that his pupil did not finger her piano with more agility and force, but could appreciate but very feebly the occasional bursts of melody which in the simplest manner would gush from her at times, when the clouds would momentarily roll away from her spirit, revealing the glory behind. Still less was he pleased when, with disgust in her soul at the present hour, which encircled her in its folds of servile propriety, with glimpses of a future far in the distance, dazzling to her vision by its splendor and beatification, but shaded for the most part to her prophetic eye by she knew not what big mountains of diffi culty, tipped with sunlight, or valleys thousands of feet deep, into which, however, the glory of heaven shone, except into one dark mass of vapor inscrutable to her gaze, she gave vent to all that was in her in language and tone appropriate to her feelings much more than to poetic rules. She was sure never to do this when he was by, but this day he lingered in the hall for some trifling purpose, and heard her outpourings: