My brother's keeper, by Amy Lothrop. By miss Wetherell

-but the little wooden platform absolutely full of humanity in the last state of enjoyment, and the one bell upon the horse's neck exerting itself to the utmost. And here, there, and everywhereapon the frozen gutters, upon the crossings-in every attainable place of inconvenience and danger, countless little boys were busy exercising the only team they had,-to wit themselves.

"There is Marion!" exclaimed Hulda, as Miss Arnet flew by in her sleigh, and gaily kissed her hand in answer to their salute. How pretty she looks! But I wonder why she always rides alone.'

Because she chooses it, I suspect," said Thornton, drily. 'Rosalie, there comes your friend Mrs. Raynor."

Caleb Williams looked sobriety itself behind his black horses, who lifted their feet and set them down again in the white snow with a sort of dainty regularity and precision; while the large grave-coloured and most comfortable-looking sleigh, followed on at a pleasant but not breathless rate. The smile of the good quakeress to Rosalie was refreshing to see so very bright and heartfelt.

Thornton, however, thought differently, for after conveying to his horses a very imperative request that they would go faster, he saw fit to express his distaste in words.

"I wish I could ever go through Broadway without meeting that turn-out!" he said.

What is a turn-out?" said Hulda, whose eyes were already half shut.

"I don't care much about it when I'm alone," Thornton went on, without noticing her, "but when you are with me I always get provoked

"That is unfortunate," said Rosalie, smiling. "If I am such a magnet for disagreeableness I had better stay at home. I hope you don't get provoked at me?"

"You always will look so pleased to see her," he said, gloomily. "So I am- I like her very much."

"But I don't there's the thing. And she looks at you just as I saw you once, when you were a little child, look at a canary bird in the hands of a schoolboy. And I say it provokes me.'

What an imagination you have!" said his sister, laughing. “I noticed the particular pleasantness of her look towards you.'

"She had no business to look at me," said Thornton. "I don't know her, and I don't want to."

The next time you come out," said Rosalie, raising her bright eyes to his face, "I'll write a placard for the front of your cap'Ladies will please keep their eyes off.'

"You are a saucy girl," said her brother, whose displeasure was, however, evaporating. 'Do you mean to say that Mrs. Raynor did not think to herself what a poor forlorn child you were, and how much better off you would be in her sleigh than in mine?"

"She has called me a poor child very often, but not from any such reason," said Rosalie, as the thought of the true one fell like a shadow upon her face. "And she knows very little of me, Thornton, if she thinks that I wish myself out of your sleigh, or

that I have one thought in my heart about you I am unwilling you should know."

"There are several I don't wish to know," said Thornton,-"I doubt some of them might make me feel uncomfortable. But I wish you would pull that veil back again, Alie, for I have somehow got an uneasy notion that I am the wind blowing in your face.'

"You are full of notions to-day; but the wind does not trouble me at all now that we have turned. How pleasant it has been! I have enjoyed it so much."

Really?" 'Really."

Thornton looked pleased.

I have enjoyed it, too, very much—with one or two drawbacks." "How did you ever get such a dislike to so excellent a person as Mrs. Raynor?" said his sister, as she arranged the little sleeping Hulda in a more comfortable position. You do not know herand surely you never heard anything but good of her."

'Never-I wish I had. If any one else would speak of her with a qualification, perhaps I should not. I hate these dreadfully precise people.'

"Oh she is not a bit precise!" cried his sister-"not a bit! Of course a quaker must talk after the quaker fashion, but her heart is as free as a child's."

'Well, that is a good thing about a heart, certainly," said Thornton, with a meditative air. "But, however it may be, the sight of her always gives me an uncomfortable sensation. I believe she reminds me of her son, and him I do know."

"No-
Why not?"

"I could give a very straight answer on the subject," said the young man with a glance at his sister's face, "but perhaps it's as well not. In general, he don't like me and I don't like him-nor his pursuits."

"Did you ever hear that they were anything but creditable?" said Rosalie, turning a startled look upon him.

"What is it to you whether they are or not?"

Making the profession he does, I should be exceedingly sorry to think that he had disgraced it. Did you ever see or hear anything to make you think so?"

Never," said Thornton, briefly.

And no more words were spoken till they were at home again. The sleigh with black horses was at the door in five minutes after their own arrival, and Rosalie was called down to see her friend" for a single moment only," before she had time to do more than throw off her wrappers. And when she came into the parlour, her hair a little brushed back by the wind, and the glow of exercise and fresh air yet in her cheeks, the good quakeress took her in her arms, and kissed her more than once before she spoke.

་

"I was so glad to see thee out," she said, "it is so good for thee. And how dost thou now, dear child? better? Art thou

learning to cast all thy care upon the strong hand that will not let it press thy little weak heart too heavily?" The trembling lips could hardly answer, "Sometimes."

"I have chosen thee in the furnace of affliction,' said her friend tenderly. "Chosen thee, love-not cast thee out thither. Thee must remember that. And also that other verse which saith, Rejoice in the Lord alway.' Now tell me how doth thy sister?” Oh, quite well again.'

And thy brother-I saw him with thee even now. He hath thine eyes, Rosalie, but more self-willed. I love him for thy sake -ye are so much alike."

But Rosalie's smile was like nobody but herself.

66 And you are well again, too?" she said, as she sat on a low seat by her friend, looking up at her with the intense pleasure of having even for a moment comfort and counsel from one older than herself.

Yes, my child-or at the least so well that I am going awaythat is wherefore thou seest me now, and but an instant have I to stay. A week or two I shall be with my sister, which shall pleasure and I trust profit us both; and then shall I return again to wait.”

What for, the quakeress did not say, but she rose and took Rosalie in her arms as she had done before.

“Fare thee well, dear child! and the best of all blessings be upon thee. There may be many that say, 'Who will shew us any good? Lord lift thou up the light of thy countenance upon us!" "O that it might be upon us!" Rosalie thought, as she came back from the front door, and went slowly up stairs to dress. "Will that day ever come?" And then she remembered,

"I had fainted, unless I had believed to see the goodness of the Lord in the land of the living."

"And what had your dear friend to say to you?" inquired Thornton, when he came to dinner.

"Not much-just to bid me goodbye. She is going away for a few days."

Charming! We will go sleigh-riding every day. I shall take this opportunity to give my canary bird plenty of fresh air and exercise."

"Your canary bird is much obliged to you for being glad when she is sorry," said his sister, smiling.

Truly you are sorry sometimes when I am glad," said Thornton.

"When the question is of things that do you mischief."

"I wonder how you are to judge of that?" said he, laughing, and patting her cheek. "Methinks your censorship is getting a little rampant. Don't you suppose now, my fair monitor. that if you went out a little more I should go out a little less-that if you sometimes gave me your company abroad, I should oftener give you mine at home?"

"You know I have had enough to hinder my going out." "Have had-but now?

There was enough, now; but after a moment's struggle with herself, Rosalie looked up and answered cheerfully,

"I will go with you wherever you wish me to go."

"Is that said with a little Catholic reservation to your own better judgment?"

'No, to yours. I would trust you pretty implicitly if you once took the responsibility upon yourself."

I should like to know where it rests now?" said Thornton, looking half amused and half vexed. "If you were not the steadiest little mouse that ever went about from corner to cupboard, the responsibility would be pretty well thrown upon my shoulders, I fancy. I'll take it, at all events. Will you go with me to the theatre to-night?"

"OI am not obliged to answer any but serious propositions," said she, smiling. "You do not wish me to go with you there-let this be one of the evenings bestowed upon me at home."

'Why shouldn't I wish you to go? What harm will it do you any more than other people?"

I never mean to try and find out. But I would not go if I knew it would do me none."

"Because you think actors must necessarily be bad people?" "Not necessarily, perhaps. But Thornton, if there was a gulf over which but one in a hundred could leap, while all the rest were dashed to pieces, what would you think of the rich people who hired them to try?"

"I will let you know my opinion of that amusement when it is advertised," said her brother. "But I tell you, Alie, it's of no use to compare our opinions-we never were meant to live together.'

She laid her hands upon his shoulders, and looked up at him with a face so loving, so beseeching, so full of all that she could not say, that its light was half reflected. Her whole heart was in that look: and Thornton felt as he had never felt before, how true, how pure a heart it was-how unspeakably reasonable in all its requests. But his own unhumbled nature, the blind pride which will serve sin rather than God, because he is the rightful ruler of the universe, rose up within him; and silently laying his hand upon his sister's lips, Thornton disengaged himself and walked away to the dinner table.

CHAPTER X.

Jaques. Let's meet as little as we can.

Orlando. I do desire we may be better strangers.-As You Like It. EVENING found Rosalie alone in the parlour. She had listened to her brother's departing step until even her fancy could hear it no longer, and the approaching ones were dull now and void of interest. The sleigh-bells jingled yet, almost as merrily as ever, but with a somewhat different effect; for the sun had taken leave of the cold earth, and Jack Frost had sent out his myrmidons. The little beggar children began to retreat slowly and shivering to their dens of sin and sorrow; hopeless of anything from the goers-by, whose

rapid pace they could hardly check; and home, of one sort or another, seemed to be in everybody's heart. Why was it not in Thornton's?

His sister would have been comforted to know that it was in his heart, that even then, as he met a party of gay friends, and joined their walk, he remembered the one being whom he had never wished to see less unspotted from the world; more pure, to his fancy, she could not be. He thought of her, and of the bright pleasure he might give and take where she was. And yet he came not,-and the soft twilight fell gently upon her, and gay lights blazed down upon him. Fit emblems of the spirit of each heart. The one a bright artificial glare,-in the other a mingling of darkness indeed, but what light there was, from heaven!

So deep was Rosalie in her own reflections-devising ways and means to make herself more agreeable and home more attractivethat a ring at the door was unnoticed; and it was not till Tom announced, "A gentleman, ma'am," that she recollected how much rather she would be alone. But he was there, and there was no help for it.

A young man, whose character lay not all on the surface. His aspect was singularly grave and quiet-by some people called morose; but the eye from its calm depth sent back no shadow of misanthropy, and if the mouth spoke self-control, it spoke with sweetness. And when a smile came-which indeed was not very often the person in the world who liked him least would have done something to prolong or to bring it back. There was also about him a singular air of power, without the least assumption of it. It was the sort of fortress-like strength, the sure position taken and held unshrinkingly within the walls of truth and moral courage; and withal, the perfect freedom and fearlessness of one who has himself well in hand. Able, too, he seemed, to wage offensive warfare-yet he rarely did. The eye might fire and the cheek glow, and that sense of power strike disagreeably upon the beholder; but when the word came, it came with the very spirit of love and gentleness and was the more powerful. The effect was neither hurt feeling nor wounded pride, the effort was not to destroy, but to build up. Yet for this very thing, so unlike themselves, many of his own age disliked and shunned him. They could not endure to trust a man thoroughly because his face commanded that trust; nor to feel themselves rebuked by his presence, when he had not uttered a word.

For a moment, in the darkness, Rosalie looked with some doubt at the stranger; but she had quickly met him half way, with a look of great pleasure and the exclamation, "Mr. Raynor!" His look was as bright and more demonstrative, till he saw hers change and every particle of light pass from it; and not guessing the associations which a friend so long unseen had called up, not knowing what had taken place during his absence; Mr. Raynor said with more anxious haste than caution

"You are all well? your brother is not ordered away?"

'No, he is here and quite well," she said, but turning a little from him.

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