The throne of Poland having become vacant by the death of Stephen Bathori, he was invited to enroll himself among the candidates. He does not seem to have been tempted by this splendid opportunity of obtaining sovereign power and honors, but cheerfully acquiesced in the queen's will that he should remain her loyal subject. She said, rather selfishly, I think, that she "could not consent to lose the jewel of her times." Soon after this, she appointed him to a military command in the Low Countries. Here he soon distinguished himself by skilful generalship, rare coolness in danger, and courage in action. At last, on the 24th of September, 1586, in a gallant attack on a greatly superior force of the enemy, near Zutphen, a town he was besieging, after having had one horse shot from under him, he was severely wounded by a musket-ball in the left leg. As his soldiers were bearing him from the field of battle toward his camp, he grew very faint from loss of blood, and asked for water. It was brought to him; but just as the glass was raised to his parched lips, he caught the eye of a poor dying soldier fixed wistfully upon it. In an instant he passed it to him, without having tasted a drop, saying, "Drink, my friend; thy necessity is yet greater than mine." Oh, in all his noble life, Sir Philip Sidney had never done so grand a deed as this! It was, in truth, a Christ-like act, though performed upon a bloody battle-field,--and it will be remembered and honored while the world endures. Sir Philip's wound was unskilfully treated, and finally caused his death. He died at Arnheim, about the middle of the next month. This seemed a sad closing to so brilliant a life. Far away from country and home, from his dearest friends, his beloved wife, and his darling child, with no loving one to sympathize with him in his pain, and comfort him in his sadness--to listen reverently to his dying words, to close tenderly his darkened eyes, and to weep over the pale beauty of his dead face. But we may trust, from all we know of his pure Christian life, that comforting angels were near him, whispering hope and peace to his heart--that divine love sustained him; and we may feel assured that, for the gift of that "cup of cold water" to the dying soldier, his soul drunk deep of "the waters of life that now from the throne of the Lamb," and make beautiful forever the Paradise of God. Greenwich Hospital--The Park, etc. LITTLE ROBERT AND HIS NOBLE FRIEND. Greenwich, though a large market town, containing a goodly number of elegant and noble buildings, and many thousand inhabitants, appears in this age of steam to form a part of London--for when you set out from the metropolis to visit it, you seem to have hardly got comfortably seated in the railway carriage, before you are _there_.