It was not difficult to find an appropriate Scripture lesson for the evening. The Old Testament abounds with interesting reference to servants. It is remarkable that the first-recorded appearance of an angel in this world was to a servant—Hagar. Abraham’s servant, Eliezer, was to him as his right hand. The character which we particularly dwelt upon was Rebecca’s nurse, Deborah,—beginning at the first mention of her. “And they sent away Rebecca, their sister, and her nurse.” We traced her probable life, as can easily be done from the history that is given us of the families in which she lived; the long quiet years with Isaac and Rebecca alone, when she doubtless had her trials, arising, perhaps, from the want of perfect truthfulness in her mistress, or from the quiet, contemplative disposition of her master, who did not always appreciate her efforts to please. Then came two little boys to be nursed, who, while they gratified her pride, gave her as much trouble as little boys of the present day. How often the nurse and mother conversed together about them, as they grew up to be young men!—Deborah sometimes, with a heavy heart, not liking to tell the mother all that went on behind her back. Her earlier discovery of the vast difference in the dispositions of the brothers, had already awakened in her mind a fear that trouble was in the distance. And when the trouble came—when the little household, once so peaceful, was distracted by the contention of the brothers—when the uncongenial daughters-in-law, who were a grief of mind to Isaac and Rebecca, were introduced into the family—when her mistress discovered too late, that whatever is purchased at the expense of truth, brings only sorrow—and when at last she had to witness the distress of her mistress in parting with her favourite son,—through all this, how often must the kind assistance and sympathy of this faithful servant have been sought! how many tears shed by the poor mother in secret were wiped away by the hand of this unfailing friend! After the last kind offices were performed for Rebecca, we find Deborah in Jacob’s family, living her old life over again in the care of his children, and winning love and respect even from Rebecca’s lawless descendants. Is it any wonder, if, after all this, a chosen spot, “under an oak,” was selected as the place of her burial, and that the numerous family who attended her to the grave should have wept so much, that the name of the place ever after was called “Allon-bachuth,” the “oak of weeping?”