Sweet words of comfort! we have read, Till hope sublimest faith became, What Jesus in Judea said, When children for his blessing came. Yet, lost and loved! through coming years How many sighs must uttered be, How many silent thoughts and tears, Our hearts will consecrate to thee. In the cold grave, without a stain, We place thy little form to-day, But hope to meet thee once again, When the long night shall pass away. Most holy, merciful, and just! Be our complaining hearts forgiven; To Thee we yield our darling trust, Receive his gentle soul in heaven. * * * * * MALINA GRAY. BY ANN S. STEPHENS. (Continued from page 214.) CHAPTER II. “Oh, it is pleasant for the good to die—to feel Their last mild pulses throbbing, while the seal Of death is placed upon the tranquil brow; The soul in quiet looks within itself And sees the heavens pictured faintly there.” Those less innocent and pure minded than Phebe Gray, might have thought lightly both of her sister’s fault and its probable punishment, but to one brought up in the strict discipline of a Connecticut church, and with a deep reverence for all its exactions, any thing like contempt of them was little less than sacrilege; and to be reprimanded by the minister, a disgrace which would have broken poor Phebe’s heart, had she been called upon to endure it instead of her sister. When she reached her room the gentle girl knelt down in the midst of her tears and prayed earnestly, for in all her troubles and in all her tranquil joys, she had a Father to whom she could plead as a little child—a Father in heaven, though she had none on earth. Phebe was yet kneeling, subdued and tranquilized, for prayer was the poetry of her existence, when the door was flung suddenly open, and Malina entered the chamber, her eyes flashing and her lips trembling with passionate feelings. “Never!” she exclaimed, while the tears stood on her burning cheeks, “never, never!” “What has happened—what have they done to you?” inquired her gentle sister, rising from her knees; “Oh Malina, do not look so angry, I scarcely know you with that face.” “Angry, sister, who would not be angry, persecuted as I am, and all because I would not sit still and be insulted in open church, because I did not cringe in my seat and acknowledge that to hear a sermon from any man but Minister Brown was a deadly sin; but I will never listen to him again, never enter the old meeting-house while he preaches there—I will take a vow here—and this moment.”