Few villages in the Union could exceed Green Valley in local beauty and advantages; embosomed in hills, embellished with trees, and watered by a willow-shaded stream that meandered through its centre. Situated, too, within twenty miles of the great emporium, and skirted by a railway leading to it, the cultivators of a soil, that ever fulfilled more abundantly the hopes of the husbandman, could ask nothing more favorable to the ready disposal of their crops. The inhabitants of Green Valley were mostly farmers, who, besides "owing no man any thing," had each a comfortable dwelling and ample outhouses of his own, nothing better than his neighbors, but equaling theirs in the well-to-do look of the fences, the garden and door-yard. That the village was originally settled by Quakers, and half peopled by this drab-coated sect at the date of our story, no stranger needed to inquire, after passing through its straight-cut roads, or breathing its air of purity and quietude. Long had its simple-minded, true-hearted people lived in the daily enjoyment of mutual kindness and love; till contentment seemed written not only on the broad brims of the farmers, but on the bridles of their docile beasts, and on their very implements of husbandry. In the course of time, other religious denominations were established in Green Valley; but as the descendants of Penn continued to "work in quietness and eat their own bread," strangers intermeddled not with them; while the savor of their peaceful spirits seemed so diffused among other sects, that all "agreed to disagree" with one another, and for years unbroken harmony was the result. But _we_ have only to do with the Congregational church of Green Valley, and will forthwith introduce the reader to the shepherd of this little flock. Mr. Worthiman was a plain man of God--middle-aged, of respectable scholastic attainments, and one who, for his sound judgment and exemplary "walk and conversation," had ever a "good report of them that were without." The law of kindness dwelt in his heart and on his lips, and in all the offices of exemplar, teacher and comforter of his charge none was more worthy than he. The church at its earliest organization, without a dissenting voice, invited Mr. Worthiman to become its pastor--his prayer dedicated the house of worship, and each succeeding Sabbath for a series of years found him at his post, breaking the Bread of Life to a grateful, confiding people. Nor were his pastoral duties less regularly fulfilled: One afternoon of every week was devoted by himself and his wife (whose living example was "such as becometh woman possessing godliness,") to visiting in rotation the families of his congregation; and so well timed was this custom, that the farmers' wives could calculate each her honored turn to a day; so that the substantial hospitalities of a generous board were added to the warm welcomes of heart and hand.