In the year 1838, Gerald Griffin had attained a popularity which would have satisfied the wishes of the most ardent literary enthusiast. He was no longer the literary hack, the despised minion, the swindled victim at the mercy of harpy publishers and newspaper knaves. He could now write at his leisure, and be handsomely rewarded for his labor. Positions from which much emolument might be derived were offered him, but he answered them with a polite refusal. Contributions were solicited to no purpose. The desultory articles written under pressure of hunger in the confinement of the garret near St. Paul's were hunted for by publishers, who were too happy to pay a handsome premium for any thing printed over the name of the now popular author. To those who have never tried to realize the working of divine grace in the hearts of the pure and virtuous, Gerald Griffin would now seem to have nothing more to wish for, no unacquired honor to enkindle a new aspiration, no need of money to compel him once more to write for a living. The wisdom of advanced years, and a religious discernment guided by the spirit of God, and becoming more devotional day by day, began at last to discover the sophistry and the deceit of human glory and human praise. He still yearned after a mysterious something which he began to realize could never be found amid the jarring discord and empty distractions of the secular world. A new light irradiated the thick gloom by which he had long been encompassed. Gradually the mist and shadow of doubt and difficulty rolled away, disclosing at length the gray walls of a silent monastery in spirit of unpretentious work and pious exercise, far sequestered from the busy haunts of worldly men. Step by step he was approaching the humble cell of recollection and prayer, in the religious solitude of which he was to find true peace and lasting happiness. From the cottage cradled on the Shannon's breast to his later home in the poetic solitude of sweet Adare; from the three-cornered garret in the London back street to the tables of the rich and the titled, he had experienced every vicissitude between the antithetical extremes of joy and sorrow. When, at length, the final step was taken, it was not the rash or eccentric choice of momentary impulse, but the matured result of wise and cautious deliberation. He prepared to enter the noble order of the Christian Brothers, whose humble office it is to instruct the children of the poor, and whose labors in the cause of Christian education have been of incalculable benefit to the Irish race. One morning previous to Gerald's final departure, an elder brother entered his bedroom. He found him in a kneeling posture holding the last fragment of a charred heap of manuscript over the blazing fire. He had made the final sacrifice to God of all that could wed his heart to future worldly honors. In the year 1838 he entered the Christian Brothers at Cork, and after a short novitiate received the habit and the