Year: 1860

for you too, sooner or later, must come thi
time when all earthly help shall fai. you,whel
no human words can be of avail or healing
to you, and in those silent and awful sor
rowe, when only the voice Of God can speak
to the heart, you too may find what it is to
have the windows of the promises opened
and your soul shall sit down under their
blessed shadows and be healed.





Days passed away. A young man walked
along the country road slow and YEARLY,
leaning upon stout oak staff; :; his face was
ghastly white, and he wore the blue uniform
of the 'continentals.' He had a terrible
wound in his right shoulder, and had been
left on the battlefield for dead. He opened
the back gate softly, and gazed all about him
at the wood-pile in one corner of the great
yard near the sunHower stalks, and the small
ounce trees which grew on one side of the
old brown homestead of Deacon Palmer
Suddenly the kitchen door opened, and Re-
becca Palmer came out of the door with a
tin basin in her hand, and the mans heart
leaped as he heard her say in her quick way
Never mind sprinklin' them clothes, mother,
III attend to it as soon as I've hunted up
few O. them winter pears to stew for supper,
and he saw the light, rapid figure hasten
round the corner of the house to the old
pear tree just in the edge of the pasture,
which he remembered climbing so many
times in his boyhood,and amid whose branch
es he had gathered the faded birds nests ey-
cry fall.


He followed the quick figure stealthily,and
stood still moment just outside the bars,
and she did not see him, for her back was
turned, and she had dropped down on the
yellow grass, and was searching amid it for
the fruit which the wind had shaken off,


Becky, Becky, sayD


She turned quickly, and as her eyes fell
upon his face, "a ghastly pallor crept over
hers. She covered it with shrek mot loud,
for it seemed to lie for very terror i'll her
throat.


why, Becky, do look up here! Haven't
YOU got better welcome than this for your
brother, when he's come back from the dead
like -


But she covered closer down in the grass,
and moaned and shivered like the leaves in
the old pear tree.


See here, now, what on airth ails you p
If you take ME for spirit, jest look up and
Ill be able to convince YOU I'm honest flesh
and blood yet p


He lifted her up with one arm, for she was
too weak betwixt fright and wonder to resist;
but the old familiar, hearty tones half reas-
sured her. She lifted her face from her
hands and looked at her brother a moment
with strained, wild glance, and then the
truth broke into her heart, for the hazel eyes
had their old, roguish glance, though they
were set in pale, wasted face.


%, Reuben, Reuben, thought i. was
ghost and she fell upon his neck with wild
sob Of joy.


1t was long before he could get her to talk
nationally. She would throw her arms around
his neck, and hugging him tightly, murmur
such tender words over him betwixt sobs and
laughter as Reuben Palmer had not heard
since he lay babe in his mothers crib.
You precious, darlin' fellow. have You really
come back to US alive p Bless Your heart
how white ard changed YOU are o. Reu-
ben. darlin,, is it really you, or am dream
ing"


And at last the girl grew camer, and was
abe to tell her brother of that terrible night
when the awful tidings came of his death,
and how they hadn't one of them smiled
since, and how, though his mother tried to
bear up every one who looked into her face
could see that her heart was broken. And
then both the young man and the maiden sat
down on the grass and wept as though they
were little children.


AT last Rebecca rose up. 20, what will
mother say You must come right into the
house, Reuben, only perhaps Id better break
it to her slow like, for she's weakly now, and
the sudden JOY might kill her. o, there's ia
ther.


And they saw the old deacon come slowly
into the yard and alight from his horse just
before the barn door, and remove the heavy
bags of -four from the animals back, for the
old man had just returned from the mill.
Wen 70 and tell him first. You Just keep
around the corner of the barn, and I'll break
the news said Rebecca. She came painting
up to her father just as he was leading the
horse into the barn.


%, say, father, want to tell you-some-
things happened"


The old man turned and looked into the
eager face of his daughter, and his son.
standing little way off,could sea the change
which the last two weeks had wrought in MS
face.


We'll, what is it, my child :?


! You'll be so glad, father, and yeti can't
tell it. o, Reuben 90 come here
| And he came out. Father


The vague superstitions which almost all
country people held at that period of ghosts
who haunted their old homes, and visits made
by the dead to the living. at once suggested
even to the well balanced mind of the deacon
the possibility OF his sons spirit returning to
him. lie turned white as his child had done.
but did not speak. and Rebecca cried out,
Don't be af.ared. father. 1t isn't ghost,
but Reuben's old self, and he wasn't dead,
as We all thought


One long, greedy glance, and the father
knew his child.


20, Reuben, my son Reuben, the Lord be
praised.'


And the father and son fell upon each 9th
er's necks, like Jacob and Joseph of old, and
wept:


we must break it to mother easy, my
children, or it'll sartin kill her for joy,' said
the old man, vigorously wiping his face with
his pocket-handkerchief.


SO it was arranged that Deacon Palmer
should 60 in and break the joyful tidings to
his wife according TO his best Judgment
The trio went up to the house; Deacon Pal
mer entered the kitchen, and his children
stood just outside the door, where they could
hear every word. Mrs. Palmer was slicing
some apples into wooden bowl. She did
not look up as her husband entered; all
these weeks she had zone ON with her house