A Sabbath in the country, with a Sabbath quiet in the air, and a cheerful sunlight beaming like the smile of Heaven on the earth--how beautiful it is! Donaldson Manor is only a short walk from the church whose white spire gleams up amidst the dark grove of pines on our left; at least, it is only a short walk in summer, when we can approach it through the flowery lanes which separate Col. Donaldson's fields from those of his next neighbor, Mr. Manly. Now, however, the walk is impracticable, and all the sleighs were yesterday morning in requisition, to transport the family and their visitors to their place of worship. I was a little afraid that the merry music of the sleigh-bells and the rapid drive through the clear air might make our young people's blood dance too briskly--that they would be unable to preserve that sobriety of manner becoming those who are about professedly to engage in the worship of Him who inhabiteth Eternity. I was gratified, however, to perceive that they all had good feeling or good taste enough to preserve, throughout their drive and the services which followed it, a quiet and reverent demeanor. It may seem strange to some, that I should characterize this as a possible effect of "good taste;" but in my opinion, he who does not pay the tribute at least of outward respect to this holy day, is incapable not only of that high, spiritual communion which brings man near to his Creator, but of that tender sympathy which binds him to his fellow-creatures, or even of that poetic taste which would place his soul in harmony with external nature. Let it not be thought that I would have this day of blessing to the world regarded with a cynical severity, or that the quietness and the reverence of which I speak are at all akin to sadness. Were not cheerfulness, in my opinion, a part of godliness, I should say of it as some one has said of cleanliness, that it is next to godliness. Like my favorite, Mrs. Elizabeth Barrett Browning, "I think we are too ready with complaint In this fair world of God's;" and like her, I would utter to all the exhortation, "Let us leave the shame and sin Of taking vainly, in a plaintive mood, The holy name of Grief!--holy herein, That, by the grief of One, came all our good." But cheerfulness, so far from being incompatible with, seems to me inseparable from that true worship which is the best source of the Sabbath seriousness I am advocating.