hocked by
receiving a number containing the following paragraph:

CALAMITOUS ACCIDENT

"It is known to our readers that the steeple of the old meeting-house was
struck by lightning about a month ago. The frame of the building was a
good deal jarred by the shock, but no danger was apprehended from the
injury it had received. On Sunday last the congregation came together as
usual. The Rev. Mr. Stoker was alone m the pulpit, the Rev. Doctor
Pemberton having been detained by slight indisposition. The sermon was
from the text, "The wolf also shall dwell with the lamb, and the leopard
shall lie down with the kid." (Isaiah xi. 6.) The pastor described the
millennium as--the reign of love and peace, in eloquent and impressive
language. He was in the midst of the prayer which follows the sermon,
and had jest put up a petition that the spirit of affection and faith and
trust might grow up and prevail among the flock of which he was the
shepherd, more especially those dear lambs whom he gathered with his arm,
and carried in his bosom, when the old sounding-board, which had hung
safely for nearly a century,--loosened, no doubt by the bolt which had
fallen on the church,--broke from its fastenings, and fell with a loud
crash upon the pulpit, crushing the Rev. Mr. Stoker under its ruins. The
scene that followed beggars description. Cries and shrieks resounded
through the horse. Two or three young women fainted entirely away. Mr.
Penhallow, Deacon Rumrill, Gifted Hopkins, Esq., and others, came forward
immediately, and after much effort succeeded in removing the wreck of the
sounding-board, and extricating their unfortunate pastor. He was not
fatally injured, it is hoped; but, sad to relate, he received such a
violent blow upon the spine of the back, that palsy of the lower
extremities is like to ensue. He is at present lying entirely helpless.
Every attention is paid to him by his affectionately devoted family."

Myrtle had hardly got over the pain which the reading of this unfortunate
occurrence gave her, when her eyes were gladdened by the following
pleasing piece of intelligence, contained in a subsequent number of the
village paper:

IMPOSING CEREMONY.

"The Reverend Doctor Pemberton performed the impressive rite of baptism
upon the first-born child of our distinguished townsman, Gifted Hopkins,
Esq., the Bard of Oxbow Village, and Mrs. Susan P. Hopkins, his amiable
and resp