like this as each morning opens on you? If not, enter on the practice and pursue it, until it becomes your morning habit, and you will realize the habitual enjoyment of a poor, but religiously intelligent man, whose very appearance and manners were beautifully illustrative of a peaceful, happy religion. It was thought that the secret of his inward but evident repose, would be touched by one question; he was asked, "I suppose your first work of a morning is to pray?"

"No."

"No! What then is it?"

"Praise," said he. "Praise is my first act; and when the day begins with praise, prayer and every good thing comes in its turn; for you soon learn the happy art of turning the bright side of things towards yourself, of looking at God's goodness until it always cheers you, of marking the blessings of each hour as the hour passes, and of communing with a happy future until you find it possible to rejoice evermore, pray without ceasing, and in everything give thanks.' Thus joy in Christ Jesus,' passes into prayer, and prayer into thanks, and thanksgiving brings the happy soul back again to the blessed Saviour; and so the day passes, and from hour to hour the heart keeps up its music like a sweet peal of bells; yes, and the Holy Spirit himself seems to be ringing the changes in my soul of praise and prayer, love and joy, gratitude and peace."

"Thank you," said the old man's friend, "thank you for your lesson on morning music. God gives you the grace of praise 'new every morning'; you must have some favourite morning hymns."

"Oh yes, many, many a hymn and psalm come springing up, and sometimes I wonder how they

come, for I do not know that I ever took very great pains to learn them. Among them all I have my favourite verses, and they are always fresh; and it strikes me that they bring their own tunes with them, for the verses no sooner come to my mind, than some suitable tune flows from my tongue. Scarcely a morning opens but these verses are forthcoming from my heart and lips :

Christ, whose glory fills the skies,
Christ the true, the only light,
Sun of Righteousness, arise,

Triumph o'er the shades of night.
Day-spring from on high, be near,
Day-star, in my heart appear.

Oh disclose thy lovely face,

Quicken all my drooping powers;
Gasps my fainting soul for grace,
As a thirsty land for showers.
Haste, my Lord, no more delay,
Come, my Saviour, come away.

Dark and cheerless is the morn,
Unaccompanied by Thee;
Joyless is the day's return,

Till thy mercy's beams I see.
Till Thou inward light impart,
Glad my eyes and cheer my heart.

Visit, then, this soul of mine,

Pierce the gloom of sin and grief;

Fill me, Radiancy Divine,

Scatter all my unbelief;

More and more thyself display,

Shining to the perfect day.

"Whose verses are these?

دو

"Whose? Why, Charles Wesley's; and they are so like him. Prayer and praise are always so cheer

fully intermingling in his hymns. He must have been a cheerful Christian; and I like cheerful Christians, they are so consistent with their profession. If the New Testament teaches anything, it is that the disciples of Jesus are to be happy; and Charles Wesley's spiritual songs appear to breathe that lively, happy spirit which is so sweetly in tune with the promises of the new covenant. There is another morning hymn of his that I am fond of singing. It tells out one's sense of weakness and dependence so sweetly, and yet gives the longing soul new fire, and makes it feel that while it kindles into warmer desires after God, everything within, and everything without, brightens with spiritual joy. This is the hymn:

Jesus, the all-restoring word,
My fallen spirit's hope,
After thy lovely likeness, Lord,
Ah, when shall I wake up?

Thou, O my God! Thou only art
The Life, the Truth, the Way;
Quicken my soul, instruct my heart,
My sinking footsteps stay.

Of all Thou hast in earth below,
In heaven above, to give,
Give me thy only love to know,
In Thee to walk and live.

Fill me with all the life of love;
In mystic union join

Me to thyself, and let me prove
The fellowship divine.

Open the intercourse between
My longing soul and Thee,
Never to be broke off again
To all eternity."

Chapter XVIII.

SONGS IN THE NIGHT.

"Ye shall have a song, as in the night when a holy solemnity is kept."

HOUGHTS at night are deepest," said the heavenly-minded Leighton. And perhaps some who are more used to night watchings than to "night thoughts" will be disposed to take up his style, and pronounce that music at night is sweetest. At all events, many of those who have known the weariness of night watches will have some pleasant recollections of times when their spirits have been cheered by a night carol, or when some pipe or flute, or horn, has given them a strain, plaintive or merry, touching their jaded soul pleasantly as it has come floating upon the calm air of night. It has seemed doubly sweet in the dark and dreary hour; and has brought its own welcome to the watcher. For some reason or other night music seems to have a more mellow richness and sweeter melting touch for the soul when we listen to it by the seaside. On the wild precipitous coast of Northern Cornwall, there are the remains of an ancient castle. Tradition says it was the birth-place of the British King Arthur.

More certain records show that as early as 1245, Richard, Earl of Cornwall, gave shelter there to the rebellious David, Prince of Wales; that after witnessing many changes it became a state prison under Richard II.; that in 1385, John Northampton, Lord Mayor of London, "for his unruly mayoralty was condemned thither as a perpetual penitentiary;" and that about ten years later it held as a prisoner Thomas, Earl of Warwick. About the middle of the sixteenth century, the first and last "antiquary royal” of England, John Leland, visited the spot, and says, "This castelle hath bene a marvelus strong and notable forteris, and almost situ loci inexpugnabile, especially for the dungeon, that is on a great high terrible cragge, environed with the se, but having a draw-bridge from the residew of the castelle into it. Shepe now fede within the dungeon. The residew of the buildinges of the castelle be sore wether-beten and yn ruine, but it hath beene a large thinge."

A somewhat later chronicler describes it in his day -"Half of the buildings were raised on the continent and the other half on an iland, continued together (within man's remembrance) by a drawe bridge, but now divorced by the down-faln steepe cliffes, on the farther side, which, though it shut out the sea from his wonted recourse, hath yet more strengthened the iland; for in passing thither you must first descend with a dangerous declyning, and then make a worse ascent, by a path, through his stickleness occasioning, and through his steepnesse threatening, the ruin of your life, with the falling of your foote. At the top, two other terrifying steps give you an entrance to the hill, which supplieth pasture for sheep and cowyes;