I marvel what becomes of these small people in heaven. They cannot stay as they are, for then heaven would be a poorer place than earth, where all but idiots increase in wisdom and stature. And if they keep growing,--why, it seems but a sorry exchange, to give up your tender, tiny, clinging infant, that is still almost a part of your own life, and receive in return a full-grown angel a great deal wiser and stronger than you. Perhaps it is only a just punishment for our guilty ignorance and selfishness in treating the little things so harshly, that they die away from us in sheer self-defence. And how good is the All-Father thus to declare for His little ones, when the strife waxes too hot, and the odds too heavy against them! We can maltreat them, but only to a certain limit. Beyond that, the lovely, stern angel of Death steps in, and bears them softly away to perpetual peace. I read our vital statistics,--so many thousands under five years of age dying each year; and I rejoice in every one. If their chances were fair for purity and happiness, the earth is too beautiful to slip so quickly from their hold; but, with sin and suffering, twin beasts of prey, lying in wait to devour, oh! thrice and four times happy are they who escape swiftly from the struggle in which they are all too sure to fail. So many, at least, are safe within the fold. And thus, too, it seems providential, that the sin of pagan nations should take the form of infanticide. It is Satanic work, but God overrules it for good. Evil defeats itself, and hatred crowds the lists of love. From misery and wickedness, from stifled cities, over-full, from pagan lands, steeped centuries long in vice and crime, from East and West and North and South, over all the world, the innocent souls go up,--little lily-buds, swelling white and pure from earthly slime to bloom in heavenly splendor. Jamie, Jamie, do you see birdie has put his head under his wing and gone to sleep? What does that mean? It means "Good night, Jamie." Now come, let us have "Cr-e-e-p, cr-e-e-p, cr-e-e-p!" And two fingers go slowly, measuring Jamie from toe to neck, and Jamie cringes and squirms and finally screams outright, and almost flings himself upon the floor; but, as soon as his spasm is over, begs again, "Say, 'K-e-e-p, k-e-e-p, k-e-e-p!'" and would keep it going longer than I have time to wait.