"should meet here below, we shall meet "in heaven, where we shall never, never "part!!!"

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"I send you two sweet texts in Latin: "Ego sum pastor bonus, et cognosco meas, et cognoscor a meis. Sicut novit me Pater, "et ego agnosco Patrem: et animam meam "pono pro vobis.'*-JOHN, x. 14, 15."

I pass over the history of this dear child until the 30th, of April 1843, when he met with an accident, from the consequences of which he never wholly recovered,- the loss of his left eye. It happened on Saturday afternoon, under remarkable circumstances. Augustus had been invited to C, with his brothers and sisters. I feared lest the

*"I am the good Shepherd, and know my sheep, and am known of mine. As the Father knoweth me, even so know I the Father: and I lay down my life for you." Augustus has altered the "pro ovibus," to 66 'pro vobis." I find, by reference to his Greek Testament with Montanus' Latin Version, that he has marked these verses with his pencil.

As

on

vanities of that fashionable place should draw away his heart farther from the Lord, for he had not been walking near him; and I cried to the Lord, that if He saw that the visit would not be for His good, he would prevent it-little thinking what the manner of the answer to my prayer would be. our whole family were going to Wthe following Monday, we had arranged to travel so far on our way together. I was busy packing up stairs, when Miss B-, our governess, ran to me crying, "O! Mr. Deck, poor Augustus has run his knife into his eye!" With an aching heart I hastened down, and saw the humours of the eye trickling down his face; and heard his bitter cry, "Oh! Papa, I have hurt my eye! I have hurt my eye!" I caught him up in my arms, carried him up stairs, and laid him on the sofa, while I immediately sent for medical aid.

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* Augustus always called me Papa Deck,"-for though no child could more tenderly love his natural parents, he bore to me in their absence quite a filial affection.

He was cutting a cord tied round a mattress; fearing to injure it, he cut the cord towards himself: the knife slipped, and went with considerable violence into the ball of the eye, the sight of which he never afterwards recovered. Poor boy! at first he was full of distress, not at the pain of the wound but at the thought of losing his sight; and he asked me with the deepest earnestness, "Papa, shall I be blind? shall I lose my eye? shall I lose my eye?" I replied, "My dear child, you know I never deceive you; it is a bad accident, I fear you may lose it." He cried, "O! Papa, I cannot bear to lose my eye!" I said, "Do you not believe that God loves you, dear Augustus? did he spare his own Son for you? could you not, if it were HIS WILL, bear to be blind?" "Yes," he replied, while the tears streamed down his cheeks, "if it is God's will that I should be blind, I am willing to be blind." This was indeed a triumph of the grace of God; it filled our hearts with thankfulness in the midst of our deep sorrow; and we

knelt together round the dear sufferer, and commended him to the Lord, thanking him for giving him grace to submit to his holy will, and beseeching him to sustain him under this deep affliction, and sanctify it to him.

He

From that time not a murmur escaped his lips: his brother and sisters, and the greater part of the family, departed for W, on the Monday, as had been previously arranged, leaving him in his dark chamber; but he was quiet, and resigned to the will of God. said to me a few days after, "Papa, I have prayed to God to shew me why he sent me this trial, and I see that I needed it. I was becoming very worldly, and God saw that I should have been more so if I went to Cand therefore He prevented my going there."

What made this accident the more remarkable was, that a dear friend had only a few weeks before cautioned Augustus, in using his knife, never to cut towards himself; and told him of a similar accident which had happened to a friend of his some time before. Augustus remembered this warning, and had

himself given it to two or three men who were packing our furniture, the very day it happened to himself. Another remarkable

thing was, that he had lost his knife till within a short time (I think about half-an-hour) before the accident happened, when one of my boys found and brought it to him. How the Lord causes us to see his hand in these apparently little things; and if we believe that not a sparrow falls to the ground without his knowledge, and that the hairs of his children are all numbered, how it silences the murmurs and reasonings of our hearts, and enables us to say, "It is the Lord, let him do what seemeth him good." And how easy has he made it to say this, if we really believe what he has told us, that his end in all our afflictions is "our profit, that we should be made partakers of his holiness." HEB. xii. "We know that all things work together for good to them that love God, to them that are the called according to his purpose." This only can enable us to say, in the precious words of this dear child, "IF IT IS GOD'S