--Here is a poor, blind man basking in the sunshine, silently appealing, with outstretched palm, to the passer-by. Through his thin, gray locks the wind plays lovingly. A smile beams on his withered face; for, though his eyes are rayless, he can _feel_ that chill Winter has gone; and he knows that the flowers are blossoming,--for the sweet West wind cometh, God-commissioned, to waft him their fragrance. Some pedestrians gaze curiously at him: others, like the Levite, “pass by on the other side.” A woman approaches. She is plainly clad, and bears a basket on her arm. She has a good, kind, motherly face, as if she were hastening back to some humble home, made brighter and happier by her presence. Life is sweet to her. She catches sight of the poor old man; her eye falls upon the label affixed to his breast: “I am blind!” Oh, what if the brightness and beauty of this glad sunshine were all night, to her vailed lids? What if the dear home faces were forever shrouded from her yearning sight? What if _she_ might never walk the sunny earth, without a guiding hand? She places her basket upon the sidewalk, and wipes away a tear: now she explores her time-worn pocket; finds the hardly-earned coin, and placing it in the palm of the old man, _presses his hand lovingly_, and is gone! Poor Bartimeus! He may never see the honest face that bent so tenderly over him; but, to his heart’s core, he felt that kindly pressure, and the sunshine is all the brighter, and the breeze sweeter and fresher for that friendly grasp, and life is again bright to the poor blind man. “Oh God! I thank Thee, that I live!” * * * * * How swiftly the ferry boat plows through the wave! How gleefully that little child claps its tiny hands, as the snowy foam parts on either side, then dashes away like a thing of life. Here are weary business men, going back to their quiet homes; and pleasure-loving belles, returning from the city. Pacing up and down the deck, is a worn and weary woman, bearing in her arms a child, so emaciated, so attenuated, that but for the restless glance of its dark, sunken eyes, one would think it a little corpse. The mother has left her unhealthy garret in the noisome lane of the teeming city, and paid her last penny to the ferryman, that the health-laden sea breeze may fan the sick child’s temples. Tenderly she moves it from one shoulder to another. Now, she lays its little cheek to hers; now, she kisses the little slender fingers; but still the baby moans. The boat touches the pier. All are leaving, but the mother and child; the ferryman tells her to “go too.” She says timidly, “I want to return again--I live the other side--I came on board for the baby,” (pointing to the dying child.) Poor woman, she did not know that she could not go back without another fee, and she has not a penny. Loathsome as is her distant home, she must go back to it; but how?