ay for Madagascar, and the people of the capital were
wild with joy, for condemned ones who had long been given up as lost,
because enslaved or imprisoned for life, were suddenly restored to
family and friends, while others could entertain the hope that those who
had been long banished would speedily return to them. Many a house in
the city resounded that day with hymns of praise and thanksgiving that
the tyrant Queen was dead, and that the gentle Prince was crowned.

But the change did not bring equal joy to all. Some there were whose
smitten hearts could not recover from the crushing blows they had
sustained when the news of loved ones having perished in exile had been
brought to them--though even these felt an impulse of pleasure from
Christian sympathy with the joy of their more fortunate friends.

Among these last was poor Reni-Mamba. She, being very meek and
submissive, had tried hard to join in the prayer and praise; but her
voice was choked when she attempted to speak, and it quavered sadly when
she tried to sing.

"Oh! if it had only pleased God to spare thee, Mamba--thou crumb of my
life!--my dear, my only son!" She broke out thus one day when the
sympathetic Ra-Ruth sought to comfort her. "I was beginning to get over
the loss of his father--it was so many years ago that they took him from
me! and as my boy grew up, the likeness to my Andrianivo was so strong
that I used to try to think it was himself; but--now--both--"

"Are with the Lord, which is far better," said Ra-Ruth, tenderly laying
her hand on Reni's arm.

"You are young to give such comfort," returned Reni, with a sad smile.

"It is not I who give it, but the Lord," returned Ra-Ruth. "And you
forget, mother, that I am old in experience. When I stood on the edge
of the Rock of Hurling, that awful day, and saw the dear ones tossed
over one by one, I think that many years passed over my head!"

"True--true," returned the other, "I am a selfish old woman--forgetting
others when I think so much of myself. Come--let us go to the meeting.
You know that the congregation assembles to-day for the first time after
many, many, years--so many!"

"Yes, mother, I know it. Indeed I came here partly to ask you to go
with me. And they say that Totosy, the great preacher, is to speak to
us."

Many others besides these two wended their way to the meeting-house that
day. Among them was a group in which the reader is perhaps interested.
It consisted