an orphan's blessing can lift to the mercy-seat of God a frail spirit of the earth. Many a time has this blessing been granted, and they who have befriended the lonely, have found a friend in God's own Providence. Is it not remarkably the case, that orphan children when judiciously and kindly counselled and cautioned, well repay all solicitude, and well appreciate, as a gratuitous offering from their protector, the care which, if from a parent, they might regard as a matter of course, hardly claiming any grateful recognition? A relation of peculiar beauty sometimes springs up, at once filial and friendly, blending in itself the affections both of companion and child. The remark applies to step-children as well as to those who are wards by adoption or guardianship. "Hence," says that gifted and fervent writer, Henry Zchokke, "not rare instances in which step-children manifest more cordial sympathy, more touching attachment towards their foster parents, than their own children. For what the latter are apt to take as matter of obligation, the former look upon as token of disinterested love and genuine goodness; and a grateful mind brings before them all the kindness and fidelity which they received from step-parents in the years of minority. As children, they may not understand what you have given, although they may see how you gave it. But when grown up, they understand what you have done for them." * * * * * When under this form of adoption or the others specified, there is surely enough to interpret such secondary relations cheerfully, and history is full of passages, that illustrate the blessing of the legacy of the Cross. In our own experience we must in some way interpret that legacy, and find its joy or its rebuke. Do not leave the subject without touching its practical point. If such and so general is the fact of orphanage, such are the secondary relations which are providentially offered, and such is their solace when properly employed, there is a lesson from the subject, which no person can escape, a lesson as to our duty to our own children and to others. First of all, bear in mind the lonely, and strive to be comforter, and to find comforters for them. Think tenderly of the orphaned, who are in any way near your own sphere, whether from relationship, friendship, or any other association. It may not be, it is not generally money, that is most needed, but kindness, counsel, encouragement. Many an orphan boy is saved by a judicious word and timely hand from a friend of his lost father or mother, and many a lonely girl finds the path of peace and usefulness smoothed for her by those who remember the parent's image in the daughter's face. The story of Moses, the foundling of the Nile, and of Joseph, the exile from Jacob's house, is often repeated in the lives of youths, like them in loneliness, and not wholly unlike them in subsequent energy and honor. Think of this in your