offer to relieve him from duties which he was quite incompetent to perform. The offer was most gratefully accepted, and he never visited the wards again.

Dr. Hope's strength declined so very slowly that he sometimes expressed an opinion that he might last till the ensuing year-a reprieve of which the prospect was by no means agreeable to him.

This expectation of a protracted illness proved fallacious. Towards the end of February, some private occurrences of a distressing nature totally upset him, and so impossible did he find it to rally from the attack brought on by these unforeseen circumstances, that in less than a fortnight he yielded to the solicitations of Mrs. Hope to retire from practice. This resolution was adopted on the 1st of March, and he made preparations for removing to Hampstead, the vicinity of which to town would enable him to see his friends, while he was sufficiently removed from the importunities of patients who, so long as he remained in town, still solicited his advice.

On thus closing the account of Dr. Hope's professional career, it may be expected that we should give some idea of the amount of practice to which a successful physician may attain in the short space of twelve years from his arrival in London, with only one friend. Dr. Hope kept a regular account of every fee which he received during those twelve years, and we are, therefore, enabled to speak with the greatest accuracy. The first two years that he was in London

he made £.200 per annum, a larger sum than he could have anticipated, considering how small was his circle of acquaintances, and that he had then had no means of introducing himself to the notice of the public and the profession at large. The third year, the accidental removal of some families who employed him reduced his practice to £.150. At the end of the third year, his work on the Diseases of the Heart was published, and he came before the profession as physician to the Marylebone Infirmary. For the first year after, his practice was little affected by these circumstances; but from that time, as his reputation became extended, his practice increased gradually; at first more slowly, but without the slightest retrogression, till, in eight years more, when he retired, he was making £.4000 per annum. During the last twelve months his health was so weak that he refused to see any one after six o'clock, and he was often incapacitated from going out for several days together. Had it not been for these limitations of his physical powers, it is probable that his practice before the end of the year might have exceeded even the large sum of £.4000.

He had so completely gained the confidence of his patients, that even after he had retired from practice, they insisted on consulting him. During the first three weeks after his retiring, he made £.100, that is, rather more than £.1700 per annum, in fees received from those who would not be refused. Even after his

removal to Hampstead he might have been fully

occupied with seeing those who, having come from the country, did not hesitate to go a few additional miles for his advice. So late as the day before his death, he declined a visit from one of his former patients.

At the early age of forty, with an extended reputation, an unsullied character, much promise of increasing wealth; with domestic happiness, which alone, in his estimation, would have sufficed for his enjoyment ; with a temper and tastes calculated to make him happy in every situation of life, Dr. Hope might have been excused had he preferred the longer enjoyment of so large a share of earthly blessings-had he even cast one lingering look behind. On the 30th March he left town with the certain knowledge that he never should return. It was the close of his professional life, the termination of all those dreams of wealth, honour, and usefulness, in which he had once so ardently indulged. Such a day would have made most men moralize, perhaps rather sadly; but he was conscious of only one feeling-that of unalloyed pleasure. He was going to enjoy repose, imperfect indeed; but preparatory to that perfect rest to which he was hastening, and for the rapid approach of which he earnestly prayed. But if he regretted not the change for himself, did he not regret it on account of his only child, for whom, like other fathers, he had his plans of ambition? When speaking of his son, he observed, that had he lived, the boy would probably have been independent of a profession; "but," he added, “I am not

sorry for the change, for then he would probably have been more a child of the world than, I trust, he may now prove to be."

Let us pause one moment to consider this remarkable change, and inquire into its causes. Can this be the same individual who, filled from earliest childhood with bright visions of earthly honour, wealth and distinction, so perseveringly struggled for their attainment, and for nearly thirty years sacrificed every personal consideration to gain those very treasures which he now prizes so lightly? Strange, incredible as it may seem, it is indeed he! Whence, then, this change? Has the world frowned on him, and has he learned, by hard necessity, to despise the smiles of fortune? No-the world before him is brighter and more inviting than it ever was before. Is it the madness of enthusiasm, or the sickly dream of an exhausted brain? No, for his intellect is clear, his judgment cool, and his present feelings, far from being the growth of temporary weakness, date their commencement from the time when health was unimpaired. The christian alone can discover the cause in the book of God. will there find that through the Divine agency, man becomes a new creature; old things pass away, and all things become new. To the transforming influence of the Holy Spirit alone can we ascribe a change of sentiment and feeling which human motives would have been too weak to have effected. The infidel philosopher may nerve himself to regard with stoic

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indifference the approach of death: he may reason himself into a belief of the worthlessness of those joys which he has found insufficient to his happiness; but he cannot, like our christian philosopher, enter into the feelings, and appreciate the blessings of this world, and yet resign them joyfully because there are within his grasp richer treasures, surpassing honours, purer joys, which shall never fade, never cloy, but endure for ever and ever. This higher excellence is reserved for him who, justified by faith in Christ, and sanctified by the Spirit, has fought a good fight, has finished his course, and knows that henceforth there is laid up for him a crown which the Lord shall give him in the day of his appearing.

CHAPTER IV.

THE morning after his arrival at Hampstead, Dr. Hope was in almost boyish spirits as he sat down to breakfast in the cheerful drawing-room of the house which he had taken. The view from the window, embracing a rich meadow and a few fine trees, offered no beauty beyond that with which the return of spring clothes every landscape; but he was a passionate admirer of nature in every garb, and he continually expressed his delight at the cheerful prospect that he enjoyed, and his gratitude to the Giver of