ant to go too."

"So do I," said Christie, with a sigh, "but the gates won't open to me
for a long, long time."

Then the nurse called Mabel in, and Christie walked sorrowfully away.
The world seemed very full of trouble to him. Even the sky was overcast,
and a cutting east wind chilled Christie through and through. The spring
flowers were nipped by it, and the budding branches were sent backwards
and forwards by each fresh gust of the wind, and Christie felt almost
glad that it was so cheerless. He was very sad and unhappy, very
restless and miserable. He had begun to wonder if God had forgotten him;
the world seemed to him so wide and desolate. His old master was dying,
his little friend Mabel was in trouble, there seemed to be sorrow
everywhere. There seemed to be no comfort for poor Christie.

Wearily and drearily he went homewards, and dragged himself up the steep
staircase to the attic. He heard a voice within, a low, gentle voice,
the sound of which soothed Christie's ruffled soul. It was the
clergyman, and he was reading to old Treffy.

Treffy was sitting up in bed, with a sweet smile on his face, eagerly
listening to every word. And, as Christie came in, the clergyman was
reading this verse: "Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you;
not as the world giveth, give I unto you. Let not your heart be
troubled, neither let it be afraid."

"That's a sweet verse for you, Treffy," said the clergyman.

"Ay," said Treffy, brightening, "and for poor Christie too; he's very
cast down, is Christie, sir."

"Christie," said the minister, laying his hand on his shoulder, "why is
_your_ heart troubled?"

But Christie could not answer. He turned suddenly away from the
minister, and, throwing himself on old Treffy's bed, he sobbed bitterly.

The clergyman's heart was very full of sympathy for poor Christie. He
knelt down beside him, and putting his arm round him, with almost a
mother's tenderness, he said gently,--

"Christie, shall we go together to the Lord Jesus, and tell him of your
sorrow?"

And then, in very plain, simple words, which Christie's heart could
understand, the clergyman asked the dear Lord to look on the poor lonely
child, to comfort him and to bless him, and to make him feel that he had
one Friend who would never go away. And long after the clergyman had
gone, when the attic was quite still and Treffy was asleep, Christie
heard, as it were, a voice in his heart, saying to him, "Let not you