orking on my fancy, and yet I cannot believe that it
was so. Oh, what joy it would bring to my heart could I know that he
loved the Saviour, and that he is yet alive and the door of mercy still
open."

Peter's heart was too full of sorrow to let him speak. The waning light
prevented him from clearly distinguishing his mother's countenance, but
there seemed to be a strange brightness in her eye as she spoke with
failing voice, and the hopes her dying words expressed were imparted to
him.

"Bless you, my boy, bless you!" she murmured, in a scarcely audible
voice.

His hand was in hers, she pressed it as she spoke, and tried to draw him
nearer to her heart. He leant over her, and put his other arm under her
head; gradually he felt her hand relax its loving grasp, but many
minutes passed before the fear came over him that her spirit had fled.

"Mother, mother!" he earnestly cried; "speak to me."

There was no answer. He had never been with death before, but he knew
too well that she was indeed gone from him.

He sat there long with his face on the bedclothes, too much overwhelmed
with grief to move. He longed to go and call Betsy, yet he could not
bear to leave his mother's body. Soon, however, a step was heard, and
the old woman herself entered the room.

There was still light sufficient to enable her to see at a glance what
had occurred. She stepped up, and closing her dead friend's eyes,
gently led little Peter into the outer room. She had brought a couple
of candles with her, purposing to spend the night at the cottage if she
was required, and lighting them, she left one with Peter, bidding him
sit down while she took up the other.

"When you feel sleepy, my boy, go to bed; the rest will do you good.
I'll stay with your mother; it will be nothing strange to me. I have
had so many I loved taken from me, that I am accustomed to watch by the
bodies of those who, I hope, went where I am sure she is gone. It's a
blessed thing to know that she is happy in heaven; let that comfort you,
Peter, and don't take on so, boy."

Saying this, she returned to Mrs Gray's room.

Peter's head sunk on the table--he wept sorely and long. As he bent
down, he felt the book his mother had just given him, which he had
placed in his bosom. He took it out and began to read it. Promise
after promise beamed forth from its sacred pages on his young soul,
lighted by God's Holy Spirit, for he took God at His word, and was
comf