A NEW YEAR'S GREETING.

H

A NEW YEAR'S GREETING.

TO THE READERS OF THE "FAMILY FRIEND." DEAR FRIENDS,-Your new Editor greets you with all those kindly and largehearted aspirations which at this season of the year are so commonly exchange between friends and acquaintances. She would wish you all " A Happy New Year" in the very best and highest acceptation of the term. Before us lie the fair unspotted months, unsullied as yet by mortal crime, and undarkened by the shadow of human griefs and pains. We know not, we cannot know, how much joy or how much sorrow may be our lot in the year that we are anticipating; but we do know that a merciful and all-wise Father, who has brought us so far on life's varied journey, can and will order for us all that which shall come to pass, as the stream of time flows on in its swift and silent course towards the illimitable ocean of eternity.

The Editor has good wishes for all with whom she expects, through these pages, to be associated during the coming year. For the Little Children she would say: May their path be strewn with flowers! May they experience all the might and depth of father's tenderness and mother's love; may no ungentle word, no undue severity, no coldness, no harshness, meet them, as they commence their pilgrimage, and receive their first impressions of a world in which, if spared, they will have to play their part, either for good or for evil! May they be docile, obedient, and truthful, kind to each other, unselfish to all; and so very happy from the Christmas-time that is passing away to the Christmas that will come again, when the flowers have once more blossomed and faded, and the woodlands are once more bare and chill, and 1865 draws near its end!

For the Young Men.-May they be energetic, brave, and of a manly spirit! May they be endowed with courage to do the thing that is right and to speak boldly that which they know to be the truth; to be firm and fearless in the path of duty-young soldiers of Christ, ready and eager to carry anywhere and everywhere the royal banners of God's own truth! May they be diligent in business, doing their work heartily, whether it be of brain or of hand; and may success and prosperity attend them in all their undertakings

For the Young Maidens-the Editor would desire a sweet and pure womanliness, a cheerful spirit, devotion to the needs of others, loving hearts, skilful hands, feminine tact, and delicate thought for all around. May they learn much and teach much; may they love and be loved; and may each one be the sunshine of the home in which she dwells, and the fairest ornament and the deepest joy of the home to which she may some day in God's providence be called, when some good man shall take her into his heart of hearts, and make her queen and mistress of his own household, and the dear companion of all his future days!

For the Middle-aged-patience, faith, endurance, and steadfast hope! Middlelife has its peculiar trials; youth's impulsive ardour is chilled, its buoyancy is checked, and the calm serenity of old age is yet to come. Work is only half done; the mistakes of earlier years make themselves manifest in the failures of the present

and sometimes, even to the stoutest comes a sense of weariness, as if the day were all too long, and the shadow so earnestly desired slowly travelled on. Courage! He who has brought you so far will bring you safely to the end. Toil on manfully, womanfully-trust, where trust alone is safe, and you shall never be confounded.

For the Aged.-May a double portion of blessing be their lot! May they be revered, esteemed, and loved! May they rest from the cares and labours of the way, and fold their hands in calm content a little while, as around them gather children's children, and friends long tried and sure, a little while, till they reach the calm slopes leading down to the stream on whose farther shore the angel forms, "long loved, but lost awbile," are waiting their arrival in the eternal Kingdom!

May God bless all, strengthen all, and comfort all, and grant prosperity, both spiritual and temporal, according to the needs of those who shall read these lines, which are but the weak and imperfect expression of a most earnest desire! The Editor closes these remarks by transcribing some beautiful and appropriate lines from Miss Muloch's exquisite poem-.

"A PSALM FOR NEW YEAR'S EVE."

O, NEW YEAR, teach us faith!
The road of life is hard:

When our feet bleed, and scourging winds us scathe,
Point thou to Him, whose visage was more marred
Than any man's; who saith

Make straight paths for your feet; and to the
opprest,

Come unto Me, and I will give you rest.'

Yet hang some lamp-like hope
Above this unknown way,

Kind Year, to give our spirits freer scope,
And our hands strength to work while it is day.
But if that way must slope
Tombward-0, bring before our fading eyes,
The Lamp of Life!--the hope that never dies.
December, 1864.

Comfort our souls with love

Love of all human kind!

Love special, close-in which, like sheltered dove,
Each weary heart its own safe nest may find;
And love that turns above

Adoringly; contented to resign

All loves, if need be, for the love Divine.

Friend! come thou like a friend;
And whether bright thy face

Or dim with clouds, we cannot comprehend;
We'll hold out patient hands, each in his place,
And trust thee to the end.

Knowing thou leadest onward to the spheres,
Where there are neither days, nor months, nor
years.

DESPONDENCY IN YOUTH.-It is too | don't know where they had been lying common with young men to look upon the before. I have long noted down practical world with an eye of despondency. Their rules for life, as they come evidenced to way seems barred up. They seem to them my mind, either from wise books or the selves supernumeraries. For them there conversation of men of experience, or what is no bench in the world's great workshop, had been forced upon me by my own conand no plate at Nature's ample board. victions. One is simple, but carries me far Despondent youth! it may seem to thee -to put the best construction on every so now, but it shall be so but for a moment. human action till a bad is proved, and call The great and universal laws of death and that bad no worse than it is proved to be. labour are working for thy relief. They-Leigh Hunt. shall make for thee room and employment KNOWLEDGE.-When God created the sooner than thou thinkest. The only ques-world, the first fiat of His omnipotence tion is-for what station, for what employ- was, "Let there be light!" So it is in all ment wilt thou fit thyself? That station, human enterprises, Let there be knowthat employment, will surely find thee out. ledge!" This, after all, is the most essenPoor humanity is like a crow's nest up tial distinction between man and man. a high tree on a windy day-how any of is the first and most essential element of the sticks remain is the wonder, not that a power; it is the germ of all prosperity; it ew of them snap, or get in such shape we is the means of all enjoyment.

It

GRETCHEN.

GRETCHEN:

A LEGEND OF RHINE-LAND.

CHAPTER I.

of the fact that there was nothing by GRETCHEN was a fair-haired, blue-eyed when at last she roused herself and looked which the shadow could be caused; and girl of about sixteen. Her mother died round, it was with a feeling of dread that while she was yet a baby, and soon after she saw a human shadow completely, her father married again. mother was not unkind, but was over-ing over the fields towards her. It came Her step- without any corresponding figure, creepwhelmed with the cares attendant on a nearer and nearer.

As Gretchen started

After a moment

came again- don't trample on me: it is "Don't trample on me!" The voice so very unpleasant.'

large family. Her father was busy all up to get out of its path, to her horror day, occasionally refreshing himself by the shade fell full upon her, and, passing getting drunk in the evenings; so it hap-on, came and stretched itself, as a tired pened that no one took particular thought man might, along the grass beneath the for Gretchen. Had the family been shady side of the tree. poorer, the services of a grown-up daugh- a ghostly, worn-out sigh came from the ter would have been required to help in shadowy lips. This was too much for the household; but the father was a well- Gretchen, and, with a scream, she sprang to-do farmer, to whom his second mar- up to run away; in doing so, however, she riage had brought a considerable sum of trod on the shade's hand. money; and Gretchen was free to help as much or as little as she pleased in the work of the day. She did not love children; their noise and continual claims on her attention worried her. principally to wander alone through the She loved oak and elm woods which surrounded the valley where lay her native village of Neppeltheim, not far in distance from the town of Heidelberg; but effectually separated from it in that day by a steep though low chain of hills-a branch of the wood-covered Berg Strausse. The tales of the country, as told by old dwellers in this forest district, haunted her mind, and she would try in her roamings to picture the strange and terrible scenes of which they spoke, making herself in fancy an actor in them.

One day, coming home from a farmhouse to which her mother had sent her with a message, she sat down under a cherry-tree, at the corner of a field. It was a sultry afternoon in September, and the broad, hot sunshine lay over all the land. As Gretchen leaned, half-dozing, against the tree stem, she noticed a man's shadow lying across the yellow stubble. In a lazy way she watched it for some minutes, as it moved along the ground, without being struck by the strangeness

There was something in the words so and she delayed, and turned to look at it. human that the girl's dread was lessened, The face lay in direct profile on a stone covered with close green moss, which allowed the features to be distinctly seen. Once only had Gretchen seen such features, and that once only in a painting. It was like the blessed St. Hubert, to whose shrine Gretchen had once been on a pilgrimage, and whose face had haunted her ever since.

straight outline, the same curving upper Here was the same lip, all so startlingly different from the coarsely-formed faces of her every day and she stayed gazing till, by a slight life. Her fear was forgotten in admiration, movement, which disturbed some leaves on which she stood, the Shade was apparently roused.

is

"What is that?" it cried.
"It is I," was the girl's answer.
"What a sweet voice you have! What

your name?"

"Gretchen Müller."

use.

"Ah!" sighed the Shadow," it's of no
I am foolish again."
"What is of no use?"

forgiveness of her rudeness, saying I had
so startled her, she was nervous and
easily frightened,-
-as this was said in such
soft, tender tones, I forgot all except that
lovely, pleading face; and before I left
the room she was my affianced bride. A
little time after there was to be a great
wolf hunt in the woods near the town,
and I and several of my friends were going
to try and destroy a peculiarly savage
beast which had been ravaging the country
for some months back, in spite of the
great efforts that had been made to catch
it. I was the more glad to go, because
Sabine hadn't been well for some days
and I couldn't see her, and found the
time very heavy. The party was divided
as usual, all of us agreeing to meet about
moonrise round a great grove of oaks,
where it was thought we were most likely
to find the creature. All went well, and
at the time appointed we had surrounded
the knot of trees; I, with my party, being
posted at the foot of the slight slope on
which they grew. We heard soon the
howl of the wolf, and, strange to say,
there was a certain peculiarity about it,
in which I recognised at once the howl I
had heard the evening Sabine rushed
away from me. It made my heart throb
to think what a narrow escape she had
had, and I almost hated the brute for
having had my darling so nearly in its
power. You don't know about hunting,
so its no use trying to explain it to you.
It got off in spite of us. I only managed
to hit it; just below the eye my spear
entered. The wolf took the direction of
the town, where the ground was over-a
grown with excessively thick underwood,
and the dogs and horses were checked by
it. We all were greatly disappointed,
and promised ourselves to make an end of
the beast next time. Next day I went,
as usual, to see Sabine, but was obliged
to be content with her promise that she
would see me in the evening. I had not
seen her for three days, and it seemed
like three months. Were you ever in love,
Gretchen ?"

No!" she said, with a little sigh and
changing colour.

Ah, well," he said, "you will be some day, and then you will know how one feels."

Somehow Gretchen didn't like hearing him speak of her in this way.

"When the evening came I was grieved to see how pale and ill she looked. Every one naturally was full of the hunt of the night before, and wondering at the strange way in which the wolf had disappeared so close to the town. A young girl standing by Sabine wanted to hear the details. A I was giving her an account of the whole affair, I told of the wound I had inflicted on the creature. I hit her there,' I said, pointing laughingly to a small patch on Sabine's cheek. I never saw such a look as came over my betrothed's face as I did so-a hungry, blood craving, inde scribable look. It lasted only a second: but I shrank from her with horror. I looked to see if the girl to whom I had been talking had noticed it. Her face, too, was horror-struck. Sabine must have been conscious of it, for the blood flew into her pale cheeks; but she re doubled her charms, and when she strove to bewitch you it was hopeless to think of resisting. Indeed, she did love me, I believe, with all her heart. In the course of the evening, arrangements were made for another hunt. Sabine begged me not to go. Why not?' 'Oh, she was afraid for me; wolves were terrible crea tures.' The tears were shining in her eyes; I didn't know how to refuse. But my father had overheard her, and by his jesting at her girlish nonsense saved me the necessity of answering. Accordingly, next evening, we all met for the chase, determined not to be again foiled. After long and exciting hunt we succeeded in bringing it to stand at bay. Several of the dogs were torn and mauled by it; we had wounded it in several places in return; and from the quantity of blood along the ground, the beast must be losing strength every instant, when, to our surprise, before we could get close enough to give the death-stroke, the wolf burst away, and disappeared in the thick underwood. By the time we had made a slight circuit and come out on the plain ground beyond, it had distanced us, and must have run close into the town. Imagine my dismay at seeing that the line of blood along the snow led straight to the Countess Wolfart's garden, which was on the outskirts