in spirit. "Olive," said she, "I heard that poor bewildered maid come to the house last night, and go away; and I do not mean to pass through such another night as these two she has cost me. I have wrestled the thing out in my heart. On the one side, there is the heretic the Apostle John spake of in the epistle. But I consider that heretic was a tempter, and a man. Now Annis, poor soul, is tempted, and a maid; which makes a difference, to begin with. Then, on the other hand, there is the man who fell among thieves. I consider Annis Nye has fallen among thieves; and I don't think one of Mr. Baxter's people, in this year of our Lord sixteen hundred and fifty-one, ought to be outdone by an ignorant Samaritan, who lived in no year of our Lord at all."

"Then, Aunt Dorothy," I suggested, "there were the Samaritans all through the Gospels, and our Lord's pitiful ways with them altogether. I think the Samaritans must have been at least as wrong as the Quakers."

"Maybe, my dear; I am not so well informed as I should wish as to the theology of the Samaritans. I should think it was a great medley. But our Saviour knew all things, and could do what He pleased."

"And may not we do what pleased Him ?”

"Olive," said Aunt Dorothy, turning on me, "I am not going to have Scripture quoted against me by one I taught to read it. I never did call down fire from heaven on any one, nor wished to do so, and I am not to be enticed by any smooth by-paths

into such tolerations as yours and your husband's. You need not think it. But, with regard to Annis Nye, my conscience is satisfied; and you may bring her at once to the house. Besides," she added, "I do not mean to let any of you depart without bearing my testimony."

Whereon Job Forster departed in search of Annis Nye; whom, with some difficulty, he persuaded to place herself again within range of Aunt Dorothy's hospitalities and admonitions.

The day passed in much stillness. Aunt Dorothy herself moved heavily, like a thunder-cloud with lightnings in it; and the weight of her impending "testimony" made the air heavy.

Towards evening my husband came, and all thunder-clouds naturally grew much lighter to me. He brought more tidings of the campaign in Scotland and the Battle of Worcester. He believed it would be the last of the war. Aunt Dorothy loaded us with every kind of bodily refreshment and comfort. But she kept herself apart from the conversation, and never vouchsafed to ask one question, save concerning the safety of the king, of whom no news had been heard. It was decided we were to leave on the morrow; and often I saw her eyes moisten tenderly as she glanced at Maidie, who, in her sweet trustful way, kept drawing her amongst us by claiming her sympathy with her joy in tho little treasures her father had brought her.

In the night, before the dawn of the next morning, Aunt Dorothy and her little maid were astir, and wonderful cookings and bakings must have

gone forward. For when we came down to breakfast, a huge basket stood laden with provisions for the way, substantial and dainty, with special reference to Maidie's tastes; little tender preparations which often brought tears to my eyes on the journey, as I found them out one by one, and thought of the self-repressed rigour of the dear old rock from which those springs of kindness flowed.

Yet all the while we were at breakfast together at the great table in the kitchen, every slightcst want watched and anticipated by Aunt Dorothy, I felt as if she were looking on every morsel as a coal of fire heaped on our heads; while the weight of the impending testimony hung over us.

At length it came.

"Nephew and niece, Leonard and Olive Antony," said she, as we were about to rise; "and thou, Annis Nye and Job Forster, I have somewhat to say to you."

And then she testified against us all, and also against Oliver Cromwell, the army, and the country; comparing us to the people who built Babel to make themselves a name, to Jeroboam who made priests of the lowest of the people, to Absalom, to Jezebel, to the evil angels who speak evil of dignities, and to the Laodiceans, in a way which made the blood rush to my face on behalf of my husband. Finally, turning to Annis Nye, she launched on her a separate denunciation; beginning with the devil who clothed himself as an angel of light, and ending with the Anabaptists of Münster, and the Jesuits, who, Mr. Baxter believed, had emissaries among the Quakers.

I knew that the more tenderness Aunt Dorothy felt at heart for offenders, the more severe were her denunciations of their offences. But Annis could not be expected to be aware of this, and I trembled to see how she would bear it, lest it should drive her once more from us into the world, so hard on Quakers. The calm on her countenance, however, was not even ruffled. She kept her eyes, all the time, fully opened, fixed with an expression, not of defiance, but of wonder and compassion, on Aunt Dorothy, until Aunt Dorothy herself at length paused, apparently checked by the strength of her own language, held out her hand to Annis and added,―

"Now I have said what was on my mind. I did not mean to anger thee; but less, in conscience, I dared not say."

Annis took the hand offered to her with a tender compassion, as she might that of an aged sick person.

"Why should I be angered, friend?" said she in her softest voice. "Can thy words touch the truth? It was there when they began; and it is there when they end. And one day we shall all have to see it; whatever it is, wherever we be, thee, and Olive Antony and her husband, and all.”

Aunt Dorothy had no further words to lavish on obduracy so hopeless. She only struck her palms together, shook her head slowly, and looked up in speechless dismay.

Job muttered under his breath, as he rose to saddle the horses,

"Poor souls! poor dear souls! They have got somewhat yet to learn. They have got to learn the lesson Oliver taught us on old Burford steeple !" But my husband only replied,

"Mistress Dorothy, you have been the truest of friends to me and mine. We cannot agree on all things, although I shall always honour you in my heart more than nine-tenths of the people I do agree with. But there is one admonition of Oliver Cromwell's. which I should like to have engraved deep on the hearts of us all. It is one which he addressed last year, in a letter, to the General Assembly of the Kirk of Scotland. 'I beseech you,' he wrote, 'in the bowels of Christ, think it possible you may be mistaken'"