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"Claude began explaining, but his first attempt was far too scientific. Phyllis gave a desponding sigh, looking so mystified, that he began to believe that she was hopelessly dull, and to repent of having offered to help her; but at last, by means of dividing a card into four pieces, he succeeded in making her comprehend him, and her eyes grew bright with the pleasure of understanding.

“Even then, the difficulties were not conquered, her addition was very slow, and dividing by twelve and twenty seemed endless work; at length, the last figure of the pounds was set down, the slate was compared with Adeline's, and the sum pronounced to be right. Phyllis capered up to the kitten and tossed it up in the air in her joy, then coming slowly back to her brother, she said with a strange awkward air, hanging down her head, Claude, I'll tell you what.'

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Well, what?' said Claude.

I should like to kiss you.'

Then away she bounded, clattered down stairs, and flew across the lawn to tell every one she met, that Claude had helped her to do her sum, and that it was quite right."

The deficiency of the book lies in the plot, which however will not, we think, prove a great one with young readers, who, as the Preface says, "may be content to feel with Lilias, conjecture with Jane, or get into scrapes with Phyllis, but will, we hope and think, not fail to extract and digest the moral conveyed thereby, that feeling unguided and unrestrained soon becomes mere selfishness, while the simple endeavour to fulfil each immediate claim of duty may lead to the highest acts of self-devotion." We think it not the least merit in this book that it is not too transparently instructive. Some perhaps may be of opinion that the serious purpose is hardly sufficiently evident,-but, we think, that purpose, being mainly to prove the superiority of a sense of duty over mere feeling, is very ably supported throughout the book. The character of Lilias is a very interesting one, and full of instruction, showing the danger of acting solely from the impulse of feeling and affection without cultivating the sterner virtues of duty and self-denial, taking in fact feeling for Christian charity. We heartily commend the book to those on the look out for tales for the young.

"Godfrey Davenant" is a most earnest book, on a subject we have long wished to see treated by one versed in boys' nature. The test of its usefulness of course will be its ability to stand boys' criticism, for whose especial benefit it has been written. We have ourselves, however, no fear upon that head.

The object of the tale is thus stated by the author in his "Introduction":

"The Author begs to inscribe these pages to those for whose benefit they were written. In so doing he asks the indulgence of all, and the consideration of those who think that the state of things described in them does not answer to that in any one school that they know. Doubtless it does not in many respects, but still the picture may be a fair

representation of school life generally, the more fair on this very account; and the writer has been careful to mingle many facts in with the characters and anecdotes of the tale.

"Perhaps the romantic and imaginative Godfrey may be the first person excepted to, as an unusual character, and therefore not an example of any class of boys. The Author readily allows that his romance and imaginativeness take a freer range than is usual and are carried farther; but he believes also that the ardent feelings and quick sensibilities of Godfrey, accompanied by moral cowardice, vanity, and instability, are the distinguishing traits of a numerous class, bringing with them capabilities of great good and great evil, of a noble or a little character.

"One use of this tale, it may be hoped, will be to show how necessary it is that a Church Education should be brought to bear upon such temperaments, the sympathies of the Church to induce affection and confidence, the system and doctrine of the Church to restrain, to chasten, and confirm. A cold formal mode of treatment, an highly intellectual training, with religion, but without Church docrine and guidance; and the ill organized and isolated tendencies of popular religionism which at once excite and neglect the feelings, all these injure and often ruin youths of this class in one way or another, increasing their positive faults, and not supplying their deficiencies.

"We have seen good specimens of the old disciplinary schools of manners and scholarship, and of late have been blessed with a reform in education which has made Christianity its basis, and has brought the Master and the Pupil together in friendship and affection; but the old system reanimated by Church principle, and not merely superseded by a religious principle, is what is still rare. The second school of educationalists is still superseding the old set in our endowed seminaries, rather than the distinctively Church Schoolmasters whom we so much require; and this is doubly unfortunate now that our country is so divided, so much in need of the unity of the Church; and when there is great danger from German Theology.

"This, however, is by the way; for this little tale is not addressed to the elder but to the younger generation. Its object is to guard, if it may be, against the inseparable dangers of education, to induce the reader to stand firm, to take a bold and manly part on the side of truth and honour and religion, to resist the stream of evil, to enter into the object of school, and to sympathize rather with the Master than with the idle and ungrateful amongst his pupils; to pass school life so as that it may be a preparation and holy training for the trials of a University career, and the temptations of manhood; and so as that if accident or disease should cut off the boy in his youth, he may not appear before his Judge with the sins of manhood, but in the simplicity of childhood, and may give an account with joy, because he was ever mindful that he had an account to give. If the least assistance to such a course should be furnished by these pages to any one single soul, the writer's object, and the writer's prayers, will be fully answered; and if he should be happy enough to think that this is the case, he will endeavour to carry Godfrey Davenant through his University carcer on the same plan and with the same purpose."

The book is full of incident, and the characters well drawn, se that, even apart from the moral intended, it will be read with interest. Its chief merit however, of course, is that it exhibits a course of Christian education in successful operation: neither does Mr. Heygate by any means evade the difficulties by which such an attempt would be infallibly beset in any of our great public schools. The story has its full share of difficulties: they are met and overcome, not (as is too often the case in the exhibition of a favourite theory,) avoided. We shall have much pleasure in renewing our acquaintance with Godfrey at College.

LAYS FOR THE MINOR FESTIVALS OF THE ENGLISH CHURCH.

I.

JUNE 1.-S. NICOMEDE, PRIEST AND MARTYR.—A.D. 90.

S. Nicomede was a Priest of the Roman Church, and is supposed to have been a disciple and assistant of the blessed Apostle S. Peter. He was scized by order of a nobleman, named Flaccus, for having given Christian burial to Felicula, a virgin who had suffered Martyrdom. His refusal to sacrifice to the gods was the signal for his execution, and he was beaten to death with whips loaded with lead.

Who that has bowed him by the grave
Of one he could have died to save

From death's unheeding dart,-
And felt that now his friend was gone,
The dull earth on the coffin thrown
Grating upon his heart;—

Who could forget the awfulness,
The achings drear, the cold distress,

Which shuddered through him then?

Yet gleams of hope were hovering there--
He lays him down in peace and prayer,
And he will rise again;

Oh there is sunshine in the thought,
That he whom sin so low hath brought
Sleeps still in holy ground-

Sleeps where his friends and brethren sleep,
The Cross his guardian-silence deep—
An Angel watch around.

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JUNE 5.-S. BONIFACE, ARCHBISHOP AND MARTYR.-A.D. 755.

S. Boniface, or Winfred, was born at Crediton, in Devonshire, in the year 680. 680. From his early youth, his great desire had been to preach the Gospel in Pagan countries. This design was for

warded by Gregory II. who gave him a commission to preach and baptize in any infidel country he might choose to go to. He had already fixed on Germany as the scene of his missionary labours; and immediately began to carry the Gospel to the Frieslanders, Hessians, and Thuringians. He was made Archbishop of Mentz by Zachary, Bishop of Rome, in 746; and, nine years afterwards, was murdered in Friesland with fifty other Ecclesiastics by the Pagan inhabitants.

Man's heart is narrow, nor can well contain
The mysteries that surround him everywhere;
Sun, earth, wide ocean, dazzling skies, in vain
To his dim gaze their deeps of wonder bare,
And truths divine in thrilling tones declare.
His eye conveys no sunshine to his heart,
Earth's thoughtful beauties are but empty glare,
The skies-Ō there he deems he hath no part,
Nor feels th' unwearied beams that o'er old Ocean dart.

Yes, blind is man, before the dew of heaven
His soul hath watered with its radiance bright;
Deaf to the guide which boundless Love hath given-
Stern Conscience that would lead him aye aright,
With unblest mail he girds him for the fight,
Nor bathes his weapons in the holy well;
He recks not that he wars in GoD's despite,
He knows not that within him demons dwell,
And that his bosom is a garnished house of hell.

Oh! what an angel's task to lead him home-
Home to the light that flows from happy skies!
To bring him where baptismal blessings come,
To win him from the world of phantasies,
To rend away the veil that dims his eyes,
And show God's hand amid each day's employ.

To save a soul from death that never dies,

To save and make in heaven's bright mansions joy,

O thought of happiness, O bliss without alloy !

See where they pass-that noble pilgrim-band,----
Through the wide bounds of pagan Germany,
And as they go they sound o'er all the land
The Gospel words of peace, the preacher's cry,
"Repent ye, for His kingdom now is nigh."
The swift Rhine wond'ring saw their untir'd pace;
Friesland received the blessed company,---

Their sign the Cross, their armour God's good grace,
Their pealing war-cry Prayer, their leader Boniface.

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