to his Master's cause, his boundless generosity, and other such-like gifts and graces, could not fail to render his life one of pre-eminent usefulness, and greatly to endear him to all who enjoyed the privilege of his acquaintance.'-A. D.

25. Amid the many solemnizing changes that are now taking place with such startling rapidity, none has so much impressed me as that which has broken up the family circle that used to be to me like a second home. The intercourse I have enjoyed in it during the many hours and days I have spent in its atmosphere of prayer and communion with God, the fatherly counsels I have received, and the acts of worship in which I have often joined, I must always reckon among the most privileged of my life.'A. P. S.

26. My residence in London was always with Mr. Nisbet, bookseller. He and his family were warm and affectionate friends of missionaries. Three or four of us have been at his house at once. He greatly assisted us in preparing for our embarkation ; and I have always found a home at his house since. His friendships have not been overlooked by the Master. As it was with Obed-edom, so it has been with Mr. Nisbet. The Lord blessed the house of Obed-edom, because of the ark.'-BIRRELL'S Life of Knill, p. 56.

In these extracts, there are many touching allusions

which a mere stranger may not be able fully to appreciate; but in the hearts of those who were on habits of intimacy with him whom they miss, and over whom they mourn, they will awaken sweet memories of the bright and joyous days they were privileged to spend in his genial presence, or under the shelter of his hospitable roof. These reminiscences, however, can scarcely fail to be shaded and subdued by the sad thought, that the comfortable mansion is now closed, the family is entirely broken up, all its inmates are away, even their very graves are far apart from one another. The dust of James Nisbet is reposing beneath the pavements of Regent Square; his venerable partner, and a little one whom he greatly loved, in the churchyard at Hawick; his eldest daughter, at Elie, in Fifeshire; and his youngest, in the cemetery at Highgate. We trust that those who were so lovingly devoted to one another on earth, have all reached the Father's house, where there are neither tears nor parting, and are now communing and worshipping together on the golden pavements of heaven, high in salvation and the climes of bliss.' But to those who are left below, the change from what once was, to what now is, is startling and solemnizing. For myself, I cannot think of it, without hearing, in the profoundest depths of my heart, the slow and measured movements of the pendulum in the old clock on the stairs.

4

'In that mansion used to be
Free-hearted hospitality;

Its great fires up the chimney roared;
The stranger feasted at its board;
But like the skeletons at the feast,

That warning time-piece never ceased,-
For ever-never!

There youths and maidens dreaming strayed.

O precious hours! O golden prime !
And affluence of love and time!

Even as a miser counts his gold,
Those hours the ancient timepiece told,—
For ever-never!

Never-for ever!

From that chamber, clothed in white,
The bride came forth on her wedding night;
There, in that silent room below,

The dead lay in his shroud of snow!

And in the hush that followed the prayer,

Was heard the old clock on the stair,-
For ever-never!

Never-for ever!

All are scattered now, and fled,
Some are married, some are dead;
And when I ask with throbs of pain,
Ah! when shall they all meet again!
As in the days long since gone by?
The ancient time-piece makes reply,—
For ever-never!

Never-for ever!

Never here, for ever there,

Where all parting, pain, and care,
And death and time shall disappear,—
For ever there, but never here!
The horologe of eternity

Sayeth this incessantly,

For ever-never!

Never-for ever!

"Them that honour Me, I will honour.'-I SAM. II. 30.

N the General Assembly of the Free Church of Scotland, June, 1, 1855, Dr. M'Kenzie of Birmingham, as one of the commissioners from the Synod of the Presbyterian Church in England, spoke as follows: While many of the Disruption elders have been taken away from the Free Church, their sister church in England had likewise to utter her lamentation for that stanch friend of Presbyterianism and of missions, James Nisbet of London-a man who, on the memorable day of the Disruption, stood up in his place in that house, and, with a tearful eye and a grateful heart, tabled his thousand pounds, in testimony of his love for them, and of his admiration of the grace then granted them. All these bereavements are fitted to humble the one church and the other, and constrain them right