Martha looked troubled and uneasy. "I al'ays say as how we should go up to the Table one of these days," she said, "but somehow or other, the time seems never to come." "I fear that you are not sufficiently in earnest on the subject," observed Harry. "Were a message to be brought to you from our Queen, your mind would be fixed upon it, you would scarcely think of anything else." "You see, sir," said Michael Garth, "if we neglected the Queen's invitation, we should never be likely to get a second; but there's not a month as passes but we have an opportunity of staying to Communion, and so, it may be wrong, I don't deny it, but one's more inclined to put off." "Ah! You wait for the convenient season," observed Harry, gravely, "forgetting that present neglect may be sin, and that by future obedience, if we be permitted to live to show it, we cannot make up for the past. Opportunities lost are blessings thrown away, we cannot recall them again. Let us not forget, in regard to taking the Sacrament, that the same voice which bade us watch and pray and keep the commandments, said also, 'This do in remembrance of Me.'* And had we no other reason for partaking of the Holy Communion, no special benefits to hope for, it should suffice to make us do the bidding of our King that this is A SERVICE OF OBEDIENCE." * Luke xxii. 19. CHAPTER IV. A Service of Hope. THERE was silence in the cottage for a short space of time after Harry had finished the last sentence. Michael Garth continued to look fixedly into the fire, with a thoughtful expression upon his weather-beaten face. His wife watched him anxiously, wishing that he should be the first to reply. Presently Garth turned from the fire, slowly seated himself beside it, and resting his hands on his knees, began— "All you've said, sir, is true; but I don't feel us how I'm fit yet to take the Lord's Supper. I've been a hard-working man, I've no learning, and I don't think I'm good enough yet; that's the long and short of the matter." "And there be such terrible words about taking the Communion unworthily," said Martha, timidly. "Those terrible words were written to the Corinthians, who were actually guilty of intemperance when they met together for their love-feasts," replied Harry Maude. "It is impossible, as our services are conducted, that we could offend as they did." "But sure, sir, we can take the Lord's Supper unworthily," observed Garth. "Yes, assuredly, if we dare to approach the Table when living in wilful sin," said the officer. "If we keep the leaven of malice and wickedness in our hearts, we are unfit to partake of the feast. If we are acquiring money by fraud or theft, we are unfit to partake of the feast. If we are denying the Lord who bought us, we are unfit to partake of the feast."