MURIEL'S KEY-NOTE. "Why, you ought to know that best," said Muriel. "It was last year. We were amusing ourselves with the idea that everybody has a tune to play in life. Rosie declared some would do nothing but polkas and waltzes, and some could not get beyond a jig, and others were so classical and high above their neighbours that nobody could understand them, or say where the melody of their tune lay. And I said I thought the greater number were painfully out of tune, which explains why so many people jar upon one's nerves. And you said that the more men played in accord with heavenly harmony, the less there would be of jarring and discord." "I remember. Yes, we made something of the notion to our own satisfaction at least." "It was afterwards that you spoke to me about myself-only a few words, but I have been thinking about them lately. And I have quite come to the conclusion that my tune in life is a mere wretched scraping upon a hurdy-gurdy." John smiled. "Self-abuse isn't always humility, Muriel," he said. And then she knew, with shame, how she had counted on a contradiction from him. Whereas he only added Too much of that in all of us, I am afraid." Muriel felt almost inclined to defend herself, but wisely refrained from a step which would have placed her in an odd position. "However, I would take to a harp if I were you," said John, somewhat quaintly again. "No good, if all one's playing is to be out of tune." 3 But, John, one must be melancholy sometimes." "How are you going to reconcile that with the Alway rejoicing?" “But, John, haven't I cause?” "Rejoice evermore,' Muriel." "I can't. I have troubles, and you know it." Well, then, be sorrowful, but alway rejoicing.' My dear Muriel, you can't get out of it. Rejoice in the Lord alway: and again I say, Rejoice.' St. Paul never played his life-tune in the minor key." "But when the depressed mood comes on, everything looks dark, and I can see light nowhere. Oh, John!" The exclamation was one of alarm this time; for a tall figure strode past, stopped, looked round, and went swiftly on-a figure so tall, slim, straight and vigorous, that nobody would have guessed it to be that of an old gentleman in his seventy-sixth year. But to Muriel these were marks not to be mistaken, even without the abundant frizzly white hair which curled down over his collar, and made a framework round his face. Features were scarcely to be distinguished in the dusk. The figure stopped again some paces ahead, and a voice said sternly 66 Muriel!" "Yes, grandpapa." "Come here.' John's hand grasped hers. "Good-bye," he said distinctly. "All blame to me, you know." Lower he added, "You are not often out of our thoughts. Good-bye." His lifted hat was ignored by the old gentleman. John took little Connie's hand, and went quietly the other way. CHAPTER II.-THE HOME ATMOSPHERE. "What do you mean by this?" demanded Mr. Rivers. "I met John and Constance, grandpapa, two turns back in the road; at least they overtook me." "What then? I thought my orders were explicit." "I could not pass them by," said Muriel with difficulty. "I beg your pardon! When I give a command, there is no such thing as 'could not.' Once and for all, understand me, Muriel. There shall be no intercourse between that fellow and my household." "That fellow!"-of one who, for more than a "Practical and poetical as ever, John.” "Work-a-day middle life knocks the poetry out of quarter of a century, had been the very pride of his heart! A throb of indignant pain brought tears to Muriel's eyes. a man." "Middle-life-at thirty-one?" "Off from the point, Muriel. I was going to say that I believe you have a key-note-generally." "What is it?" "I hardly ever meet them," she said. "John very seldom comes to Claverton now, and we have not exchanged a word for months. But when we do meet I can't treat them as strangers. I can't do it." "You-can't!" repeated Mr. Rivers with haughty deliberation. "That is not the way to answer me." Muriel was silent, and her heart beat fast. "I expect unquestioning obedience, and I will have it too. You ought to know that by this time. I am not to be trifled with, Muriel. By-and-by, when you have had leisure to recollect yourself, we Now you will have a few more words together. may go home.” He turned down a side-path, passing a turn-stile, | she did choose. Wherein the gift of winning power and left her to pursue her way alone. It was some- lay in her, and lies in others, it is hard to define. what lighter here than among the trees, and houses For some beautiful women have it, and some have it stood at intervals in gardens. Muriel walked on, not, and some plain women possess it largely; and feeling a good deal tempest-tossed. She was angry it is by no means certain to co-exist with intellect, for John, and distressed for herself, and uncertain though the two are found together. Sympathetic as to the manner of reply she would give to Mr. natures can boast it more often, but some intensely Rivers. Things looked cloudy. Yet happening to sympathetic people, who would give all they have meet two lady acquaintances, she bent cordially and for love, may never win it; while others, kind, but smiled her brightest, and then stopped to chat with non-sympathetic, have affection rained upon them. one of her little Sunday-scholars. But these were incidental breaks only. The shadow settled down upon her more heavily thereafter. Claverton Manor, standing near the high-road, received ample shade from its shield of evergreens. The house was about a century old, and built upon a singular plan. The ball occupied the middle, rising through both stories to the roof, with a fretted ceiling like that of an old church. A passage ran round three sides of it, with doors leading outward into the several rooms, and a second passage overhead held the same position with regard to the second story. Some narrow windows, Gothic and unglazed, opened from this upstairs passage upon the hall, and at one of these Muriel took her stand for a few seconds. It was almost dark below. Opposite to her was a handsome circular window of stained glass, set in carved stone, red and blue tints being dimly visible. On one side beneath stood an organ, and a slender figure in white sat upon the bench, bringing out some sweet but rather uncertain sounds. The candle beside her lit up a face in complete contrast to Muriel. "Lilias will never make anything of music," muttered Muriel, with a gesture of impatience at the sound of a false chord. She went quickly to her own room, threw off her walking-things, and dressed for dinner. There was a moment's hesitation as to what dress she should put on, solved by a hasty, "What does it matter? Nobody cares.' And she took the first which came to hand. Reaching the hall once more, she found Lilias gone. A glance showed her the little boy at the bellows still, and from that look she returned to take the empty seat. The contrast between the appearance of the two sisters was not greater than the contrast between their styles of playing. Muriel's fingers had no manner of uncertainty about them. The full chords poured out rich waves of sound. She did not see that Lilias had only gone to fetch another piece of music, and now stood waiting behind her. Somebody else entered the hall-a lady, in rich evening dress, tall, fair and dignified, almost younglooking enough to have been Muriel's sister instead of mother, and indeed not twenty years her senior. Mrs. Bertram had married an Indian officer in very early girlhood, and had lost her husband directly after the birth of her youngest child. There was nothing of the widow about her now. She had the air of an acknowledged beauty, and neither of her daughters could at all rival her in looks. And Mrs. Bertram was a woman of power. Not of intellectual power, though she was not wanting in common ability; but of that singular and arbitrary power which consists in winning love. She could gain the affection of any human being that she chose. Many loved her, without the exertion of intended attraction on her part, but none could resist when Mrs. Bertram could in no wise be described as sympathetic, being far too self-absorbed for large out-goings of her heart to brother and sister human beings. But she knew her own power, and she took a pride in using it. a pride in using it. She had it in her to give pleasure or pain with the merest touch, and could call out fear as well as love. Yet with all this Mrs. Bertram's was an essentially commonplace nature, shallow and contracted. Her centre was herself; her mistress was the world; her aim was to live and do and think precisely as everybody else lived, did and thought. Her objects were commonplace; her pride of birth and position were commonplace; her self-satisfaction was commonplace; her words and actions were commonplace: yet all were invested with a halo of skin-deep beauty and grace. The commonplace element was not often found out by strangers. "Why is not Lilias playing?" asked Mrs. Bertram. Muriel stopped slowly, letting the sound die away beneath her fingers. "Lilias has gone," she said. "Lilias is here. This is her practising-time, Muriel." Muriel rose and moved away. "Lilias should have spoken," she said. "I never Lilias did not take the empty seat. play when Muriel is here, and, besides, one does not care to go on after an interruption," she said. "This is not to happen again," observed Mrs. Bertram, as Lilias left the hall, with just a touch of the spoilt child in her manner. "Lilias will never do much with music,” said Muriel rashly. 66 That may be your opinion, but others do not think with you. Herr Richter says her advance is quite remarkable.” Muriel made no answer. She held her head erect, and kept silence, with a proudly-submissive bearing which certainly did not spring from humility. Indeed, there was a self-contained coldness in this home manner of hers, widely different from her sisterly warmth to John, her tenderness to Connie, and her geniality to passing acquaintances-different, and less attractive. "What made you put on a black dress to-night, Muriel?" 66 It came first. I did not think it mattered." "It matters whether you please me, I suppose," said Mrs. Bertram, with a graceful air of displeasure. "That shade of blue with your complexion is excruciating." Muriel looked down at herself. "I can change the ribbons," she said. "Pray do. Mr. and Mrs. Haye will be here to dinner. You need not have dressed like a grandmother to receive them." "I did not know they were coming. But you don't like me in white, mamma.' 66 Your choice does not lie between white and black TIME A PREPARATION FOR ETERNITY. only. Besides, I have no objection to black if it is well made and properly relieved. This style does not suit you." Muriel wondered whether she ever should find a style that suited her-in her mother's opinion. Other people held different views on the subject. "I have seen John to-day," she said suddenly. "Where?" 66 On the Claverton Road. He and Constance were there. We walked together a little way, till grandpapa overtook us.” "You don't mean to say, Muriel, that he saw you with them!" "He called me away. Mamma, if he had not seen me I must have told him, so it comes to the same thing." "Nonsense! What should you tell him for? I wish you had had more sense, Muriel. Your grandfather never ought to have seen you together. We shall not hear the end of this for weeks." "I could not help it. Grandpapa came up from 5 behind. Connie looks very delicate, I think. It seems so wrong that we should be cut off from them in this way." "No help for that," said Mrs. Bertram. "It is vexatious, of course, for people do remark upon family divisions. But John should have been more careful. Nothing can be done now. Once offended is always offended, with your grandfather. I never yet knew him change when he had such a feeling about anybody. Your aunt Constance, for exampleyou know how long that has gone on, and so will this. After all, you have yourself partly to thank; and if you let him see that you disobey him now, you will just make matters worse.' Muriel held her peace. Mrs. Bertram's manner to her was not irritated, but it was cold-a manner commonly seen when she spoke to Muriel. There was a marked difference in her bearing to her youngest daughter. An outflow of motherly tenderness went in that direction, but Muriel stood very much alone in the household. TIME A PREPARATION FOR ETERNITY. WHEN the Psalmist declares that “ BY THE DEAN OF CANTERBURY. this period between two years: to see the past gone for ever, and carrying with it the closed-up record of a year of our lives: to see the future just advancing, with its pages still unstained, and we all uncertain as to the events doomed to be recorded there: whether "Arise ye, and depart; for this is not your rest.”—Micah ii. 10. day unto day uttereth speech, and night unto night showeth knowledge," one voice heard and one lesson taught us in their ceaseless revolutions is that time is fast hastening onwards; that our last hour is coming. Youth succeeds childhood, and manhood follows quickly upon youth, and then old age seems as it were suddenly to surprise us in the days of our strength, while our minds are still full of busy plans, and our hopes still bent upon distant expectations. Ever are we moving onwards: we rise in the morning, and perform some slight task, and lo! our day is done. It has been as nothing; so soon has it passed away. And another comes, and goes as quickly and again another. And so weeks pass, and months, and still we heed them not. We call not to mind that it is our life that is being thus hurriedly borne along; we forget that these neglected hours are all we have. But at length, a year has gone, and then there are few who but for an instant pause. A year-that is too long a time to have been carelessly spent, and for us to feel nothing at its loss. It is too valuable a portion of our lives for us to have no regrets, when we look back upon its course, and think how little use we have made of it. A year from that what great things might we not have expected? How much good might we not have done in it! What progress, what improvement might we not have hoped for in ourselves! What advance might we not have made in holiness and in subduing our carnal natures to God's will! And what, now that the record is closed, has been the result? A year has fled away, and where are the hopes with which we commenced it? What fruit can we show of the many opportunities that God has given us in it of honouring His holy name here, and of preparing for our own departure? It is indeed a serious thing to stand as we do at it may be but one of many more years yet in store for us, or our last-that which shall record our deaths, and whether we accepted or refused God's final offer to us of mercy. It is a serious thing thus to stand, having to examine the past year; to inquire whether it was spent in open enmity to God, or whether, with a name to live, we yet were careless and negligent; or whether by God's blessing we sought humbly and in prayer to walk in the ways of godliness. And for the coming year, may not its character depend upon its beginning? May it not be a year of sin, or of spiritual growth, according as to-day, at its commencement, we either put aside all serious thought, all real concern for our souls, or determine in God's strength, and in earnest supplication, to live with a more single eye to His glory, and with more anxious efforts for the salvation of our soul? The past is gone: we may repent of it, may grieve over it, may go mourning for what we have done in it all the days of our lives, but we cannot alter it. Nothing can change the writing in that book; for every deed that we do is, like the soul itself, immortal. It may be thoughtlessly, rashly done; but, once done, nothing can change it. Throughout all eternity that deed must live; and though repentance can rescue us from its consequences, yet it cannot render that deed undone. But the future is yet ours. It still may depend upon ourselves. The sin to which our present pathway leads us may yet be escaped. Not yet are we hopelessly lost. The prayer of a contrite heart put up to-day at God's throne may alter the whole character of the coming year. The past may be polluted with guilt dark as crimson; conscience may harrow up our souls with remorse for crimes never to be recalled; but the future is still bright with mercy. Its record may be that of pardon and peace. And whether it be so or not must in great measure depend upon the manner in which we begin the new year. It must depend upon the spirit in which we enter upon its long round of months; whether it be carelessly, and in unconcern, or in deep and humble penitence, and firm trust in God, and earnest prayer to Him for help. May God then of His great mercy grant unto us serious hearts: may He make us remember how much of happiness or of woe for eternity may depend upon the spirit in which we begin the new year; and may He bow down our hearts in deep contrition for the sins and lukewarmness of the years gone by, and enable us firmly to resolve that in time to come we will serve Him more warmly, more earnestly, more consistently; and live with our hopes more truly set upon the promises held out to us in Jesus Christ our Lord. What then are the prophet's words addressed to all careless and unconcerned sinners? "Arise ye," he says, "arise ye, and depart; for this is not your rest." Nay, more; he gives a reason enough to terrify the most unthinking: "because it is polluted, it shall destroy you, even with a sore destruction." We are too apt to be satisfied with this world: because God has given us many enjoyments in this land of our pilgrimage, we therefore forget the better country to which our pathway leads us. And yet has not God given us many warnings also of the uncertainty of our sojourn here? Does He not often remind us that all our happiness here is built upon a foundation of sand, which the accident of an hour may blow away? If there is one lesson written plainly upon all things here below, it is their transitoriness. It is the frailty of their weak owner, man; and the uncertain tenure by which we grasp them. Well did that mighty king of old weep, when in the summit of his power he saw the martial array of fifty nations defile before him, and he their sole master. Well, I say, did he weep at the bitter thought that would, unbidden, thrust itself upon him-that of all that host, let but a few years pass by, and alike he their lord, and the humblest slave, would have passed away. Not one would remain, even to recount to others the pomp of that mighty army; not one to say, he saw it. The very greatness of that day, on which he felt himself the mightiest of men, taught him that there was a yet mightier power-that death would claim all. that host: that death would humble into one indiscriminate nothingness the varied rank and majesty and grandeur of that countless throng of human beings. There he saw them passing before him with hearts full of emotions; each with his own wishes, his own ambitious thoughts, his own selfish longings, his own secret hopes; let but a few years pass by and all would be still: those busy hearts would beat no more those active hands would be powerless for good and for evil, and all those hopes and longings and plans and projects would interest them no more. And with ourselves too: let but a few more new years pass away, and a new congregation will fill our church, to be taught by a new pastor. They will have their plans and hopes; but we shall be still and motionless. As day follows day, we shall each singly depart, till the last solitary survivor sets out upon his lone journey, and the present generation of mankind is fully gathered to those that have gone before. Nature itself then teaches us that here we have no abiding city. For it summons us away: and that by so sure a decree, that beyond a certain age scarcely one single person passes. Of all born in any one single year we can calculate how many will each year die, till one or two of many thousands hover upon the verge of one hundred; and yet men live as carelessly as if life would last for ever; and as if no reckoning must be given for all that we have done and are doing here. Were And yet it seems as if God plainly intended otherwise-intended that we should live with a constant sense of the uncertainty of the tenure by which we continue here, and of the certainty of the things that are to come. For all nature is full of images of change there is nothing so plainly written upon all things below as that they all pass away. our existence spent among things unvarying, we might be justified, or at least excused for our thoughtlessness: we might be pardoned for forgetting our instability if, e.g., the sun ever shone with unaltering splendour-if one perpetual spring clothed with constant verdure the fields around us--if time ceased from his incessant ravages--if no weariness summoned us at every few hours to rest-if no sickness seized upon our frames, and no grey hairs, no furrowed lines upon our foreheads, no sense of exhaustion and fatigue admonished us of our own frailty. But what excuse can we possibly plead when everywhere around us the one image which meets our eye is change? Nothing new springing up except it be fed by the death of what went before! Nothing completed and made perfect but forthwith decay begins! Scarcely has the day reached its meridian before the sun begins to decline, and the shadows of night lengthen. Scarcely has the summer attained its fulness, before the winter gathers round, and the shortening days and changing foliage of the trees remind us of its approach; and in ourselves we can scarcely distinguish the full strength of our manhood from the commencement of our decline. For in the very prime of our days death still declares his presence, and reminds us that we are but a few days removed from his power. Everywhere then around us, and in ourselves, the great fact written is change; and this seems intended by God to remind us of the great truth declared in the text, that here is not our rest. It is true that these same images lead us on to the expectation that man's being does not end here; that for him, too, there is a spring in store; that from his death, too, new life will begin: but we know it will not be in this present world that we shall renew our existence. As soon as a few more years have rolled by, our whole being here will be over: whatever future life may await us, we have here no abiding city; no habitation here with a sure foundation. This is not the place of our rest: live as we will for the world, love it as we may, set our hearts upon it, and give it all our thoughts, we yet cannot make it ours. It will glide away, and escape from our closest grasp. However much we may put from us the thought of death, and immerse ourselves in TIME A PREPARATION FOR ETERNITY. 7 worldly cares, yet death will come; and whatever | in holy Scripture. It never tells us that this world else may remain for us, wherever else the immortal soul may once again live and think and feel, it will not be on this earth, nor amongst the objects dear and familiar to us now. Did we know nothing more then of our destiny than that we had to depart; were there but one truth we were certain of, and that one truth death how completely might it alter our whole view of the world! And yet we do know this truth; theoretically we do not doubt it; and notwithstanding we live as if we should continue here for ever: our thoughts are devoted to earthly objects, our wishes centre in the things that the world has to offer us. Oh! did we but realize our true state here, in how different a spirit should we live! Did we but fully comprehend that this is but a temporary resting-place, that we are but strangers here and pilgrims, whose course, whether we will or not, is onwards-did we but realize this, how differently should we feel how much less interested in earthly things, and our desires and wishes how much more eagerly fixed upon that which is to come! We know here what a difference it makes in our feelings whether a thing be our own or another's. We know how far more one esteems a small thing that is one's own than a large property held in trust for others; and least of all do our affections fix themselves upon a country we are merely passing through, or upon an inn at which we repose merely for a night. And yet such really is the world. It is a mere halting-place, in which God has bidden us wait for no one knows how short a time, and in which He bids us ever be ready to depart; because we know not when our Lord may come for us. How then can we fix our desires so entirely upon that which we cannot keep? Why so value that which we must leave behind us? "There is a sore evil which I have sen under the sun, namely, riches kept for the owners thereof to their hurt;" worldly things, that is to say, prized and valued and lived for, while the soul pines and starves in neglect and misery. And what do they profit? for "as he came forth of his mother's womb, naked shall he return to go as he came, and shall take nothing of his labour, which he may carry away in his hand." Were this then all that we knew, that in a few more years, at the most, we must leave this world, and that then we must depart poor as we came, and leave behind us all that we have gathered-were this all we knew, would it not be folly and thoughtlessness to give our cares and hopes to a transitory world? As wise men we should be content with such a moderate share of earthly goods as will raise us above daily wants; while for all besides, we should feel with Solomon, after he had learnt the worthlessness of power and wealth to make him happy, that "if riches increase, they also are increased that eat them; and what good is there to the owners thereof, saving the beholding of them with their eyes?" But we have not been left to any such mere epicureanism as this; for after all this amounts to nothing more than “ Let us eat and drink; for tomorrow we die." It says nothing more to us than that as reasonable beings, who daily see in the deaths of all around us how transitory this life is, we should not give our hearts to that which we cannot keep. But there is a deeper lesson than this concerns us but little. It never bids us seek our ease in contentment. It never recommends to us a philosophical indifference. On the contrary, it tells us that our time here is all we have. It tells us that we cannot value this world too much, for upon the manner in which we use it depends our state for ever and ever. It is never contentment to which it urges us, but a vigorous struggle; an earnest, long-enduring strife; a vigilant and unrelaxing warfare. Here in the text itself with what terror-inspiring words the prophet rouses from their apathy the sluggish Israelites. He does not say, "Fix not your heart upon the world, for here is not your rest." You must leave it, and therefore be ware lest you love it too well. The sages of Greece and Rome might wisely say as much; but the words that the Spirit dictates are, "Arise ye, and depart; for this is not your rest: because it is polluted, it shall destroy you, even with a sore destruction." It is not then merely that the world is transitory; that it is folly to love too well that which we cannot keep the prophet tells us that it is ruin to be at rest here. "The love of the world," he tells us, "is enmity against God." He points to sin; he shows us the world polluted; it is a land of darkness, and of the shadow of death; and to love it is to love that which has rebelled against its Creator-to love the fallen and sin-stained, in neglect of the pure and holy. He tells us that it is a choice we have to make; that we cannot enjoy both; that it is impossible to serve both God and mammon to serve the one is to be at war with the other; and what the consequences are he declares in words enough to alarm the most unthinking: "It shall destroy you, even with a sore destruction." We are not forbidden then to rest here, because it is not worth our while for so short a time, but because it will bring us trouble hereafter; because there will be woe and bitter anguish in eternity for the careless and negligent here. We are bidden to grasp after the one hope of safety; we have these few years vouchsafed to us in which to accept God's mercy; and oh! if we let them pass by, and our souls are still not saved, with what terror shall we look forward to the dreadful summons to stand before God's throne, and hear there the terrible sentence that condemns even the negligent and careless to perpetual banishment from God's presence. The world in its rapid revolutions is hurrying on to destruction; its pathway is to ruin and misery; but God offers us mercy in these few years of our sojourn here He seeks for us with all a Father's love, and earnestly presses upon us the offer of salvation. So valued is each sinner's soul that the courts of heaven resound with songs of thanksgiving when the wicked is converted from his evil way, and lives. How then can any one be unconcerned when so fearful an alternative is before him! How can you reject the Father's love! How can you harden yourselves against the Son's entreaties! What obduracy must there be in you to resist so constantly the Holy Spirit's intercession! Who does not feel with what truth the prophet of the gospel warned in old time the careless members of a church whe refused its real and spiritual blessings! "Rise up," he said, "ye women that are at ease; be troubled, ye careless ones: strip you, and make you bare, and |