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"And, father, how do so many persons in the world come to poverty?"

"Oh, Lord! child, I don't know -- suppose it happens so."

"So I suppose, too. And riches with some people happen, too?"

"Yes; nobody knows who'll be rich or who'll be poor."

"I suppose the rich people never know any thing about suffering?"

"They try not to, Hetty?"

"And can't they get rid of it?"

"No; they are sometimes sicker than you or I ever are."

"Why, father, they have the best of doctors and medicines, you know!"

"Yes; but don't you know they die, Hetty?"

"I know that; but, I was thinking they died easy. They have rich, soft beds and pillows, and so many to wait on them."

"It don't make a farthing's difference, child. They're just as dependent as any body when they come to the pinch."

"And that seems strange! Can't any of the doctors help them?"

"Sometimes the doctors help us, you know; so they sometimes help them. But they would have a poor means of living if it were not for a great many sick rich folks."

"So they would, indeed, father! Why didn't I think of that! You always tell me something I hadn't thought of before."

"You see, Hetty, I am around more than you are, and notice things how they are done; that's all the difference."

"Well, perhaps it is," said she. "I wonder if there's many sick people now at the poor-house? Do you know, father?"

"No, not exactly; some are sick, I believe."

"Is old widow Prescott alive, father?"

"Yes, she's living, and Tucker and Mag and Roxy; so is Bill and old Dan."

"Any more alive?"

"No, not that used to live with us."

"All dead and gone?"

"Yes."

"Well, wasn't it lucky that Jims got away and found a good home?"

"Yery good for Jims."

"Yes it was -- I was so glad!"

The Captain's recollections thus stimulated, seemed to him a little less pleasing on that point than her's, but she noticed it not, and the father said, "Jims has proved a smart boy."

"He will be a great man, won't he?"

"I think it likely; but we can't tell, you know."

"I really think he will though, and a very good man."

"Well, Hetty, you must not talk too much. It will tire you. Can't you get a little sleep now?"

"I do not feel wearied a bit; but if you think best, I will try to sleep."

"It will do you good."

"There is one thing, father!"

"What, my child?"

"How I should love to see old aunt Prescott."

"Why so?"

"Because she's so good."

"Good!"

"Yes, she talks so good."

"Oh, yes. She's a saint, undoubtedly."

"She loves the Bible and knows it all by heart. How I wish I could hear her talk about it. I have never forgotten what she used to tell me."

"What did she say?"

"She said the Bible was meant for the poor and needy and sick and blind. 'Come unto me all ye that labor and are heavy laden, and I will give you rest ' That,' said she, 'is the spirit of the Gospel.'"

"I suppose/' said Captain Bunce, regarding his poor child with affection, and contrition, and pity, "I suppose, my daughter, she was right. We must all go to Him for rest."

"Must we -- must every body? Is it He that gives rest of soul to such as go to him?"

"Yes, I suppose so. That's what the Christians say."

"Well, father, then let us go to Him -- will you go with me? Go to Him that gives the weary rest?"

Captain Bunce never had such an appeal before -- never one that so shook him from head to foot, and convulsed his chest, and choked his utterance.

"Let us both go to Him, father, and we shall obtain the promise -- one as well as the other."

Still the Captain said nothing in reply, only he shook and sobbed till the poor girl heard his heavy breathings and begged him to come near her. Then she threw her arms around his neck, and said, "though our sins be as scarlet, they shall be as wool, though they be red like crimson, they shall be white like snow."

Her father bowed his head on the pillow and wept, and she also shed with him a flood of tears, as she murmured a prayer, beginning -- "Our Father who art in Heaven."

"We have, dear father, a Saviour -- an 'all-sufficient Saviour' aunt Prescott called him; and it is he that bids us come to him. He it was who healed the sick -- who opened the 'eyes of the blind -- who raised Lazarus from the dead -- who, when he was himself crucified and buried, rose again to life and went up to Heaven. He is the Judge of the world, and the Redeemer of men. I begin to love him for his love, to triumph in his glory, and to confide in his promise. Oh! father, let us follow him to prison and to death, through evil report and good, till we die."

"It seems to me, my daughter, that I will," said the humbled father.

"Oh, what a blessed thing to us, then, is that promise, 'I will give you rest!'" said the weeping invalid.

"May be it means spiritual rest," said her father.

"May be it does. How comforting to feel, then, our sins forgiven for his sake, and all our iniquities purged away!"

"That, oh! that," said her father, "is what I need; for I have sinned greatly, and have lightly esteemed the rock of my salvation."