s; steadily
he descended, feeling that God held his hands, and he told his
Rehoboth friends afterwards, when he recounted his escape, that he
felt the angels were descending with him.

When he reached the ground amid wild and passionate cries of joy,
he disengaged the child from his neck, and wiping his face with
the sleeve of his shirt, said:

'The Lord's will be done.'

Dr. Hale, who was standing by the side of Mr. Penrose, and who
heard the saying of old Amos, turned and said:

'Calvinism grows strong men, does it not?'

'Yi, doctor, yo're reet,' exclaimed old Joseph; 'theer's no
stonning agen God's will.'

V.

WINTER SKETCHES.

1. THE CANDLE OF THE LORD.
2. THE TWO MOTHERS.
3. THE SNOW CRADLE.

I.

THE CANDLE OF THE LORD.

Through the summer months the old Bridge Factory stood in ruins;
the only part that remained intact being the tall chimney-shaft,
down which Amos Entwistle had brought the fainting child from out
the flames. The days were long and the weather warm, and the
inhabitants of Rehoboth spent the sunny hours in wandering over the
moors, never dreaming of hard times and the closing year. A few of
the more frugal and thrifty families had secured employment in a
neighbouring valley, returning home at the week end. The many,
however, awaited the rebuilding of the mill and the recommencement
of work at their old haunt. But when the autumn set in chill and
drear, and the October rains swept the trees and soaked the
grass--when damp airs hung over the moors morning by morning, and
returned to spread their chill canopy at eventide--faces began to
wear an anxious look, and hearts lost the buoyancy of the idle
summer hours.

There is always desolation in the late autumn on the moors. The
great hills lose their bold contours, now dying away in a cold
gray of sky, through which a blurred sun sheds his watery ray;
while the bracken, with its beaten fronds, and the heather with
its disenchanted bloom, change the gorgeous carpet of colour into
wastes and wilds of cheerless expanse. The wind sobs as though
conscious of the coming winter's stress--sad with its prophecy of
want, and cold, and decay. Little rivulets that ran gleaming like
silver threads--the Pactolian streams of childhood's home and
lover's whisperings--now swell and deepen and complain, as though
angry with the burdens of the falling clouds. Bared branches and
low-browed eaves weep with the darkened and lowering