They tell a story of a learned preacher who had isolated himself from his children on account of his dislike to their noise. One day, while taking a walk, he was attracted by the beauty and wonderful intelligence of a little boy. Inquiring of the nurse whose child it was, she answered, much astonished: "Your own, reverend sir, your own." Judging from the attention that some fathers bestow on their children, I am inclined to believe that this learned preacher has many an imitator among his sex, for whom not even the inexcusable excuse of absorption in studies can be set up. I have read of a business man, who one day thanked God that a commercial crisis had thrown him into bankruptcy. He said it afforded him an opportunity to stay at home for awhile, and get acquainted with his own family, and that for the first time he learned to know the true worth of his wife, and that he found his children the sweetest and dearest creatures that ever lived, and not for all the business of the world would he again deprive himself of their sweet association. Prior to his misfortune, or rather good fortune, his business had so absorbed him that he had altogether forgotten that there were sacred claims at home that demanded his interest and his service. Not all our orphaned children are in our orphan asylums, or under the supervision of "The Orphans' Guardians." There are more of them at home with their fathers and mothers, and especially among our well-to-do families. There are children growing up who scarcely know anything else of their father except that he is referred to during the day by their mother when they are bad, as that dread personage who would inflict a severe chastisement on them when he returns, or whose presence silences their fun and makes their own absence agreeable. He makes no effort to entertain them, takes no interest in their pleasures, in their progress at school. He is simply their punisher, but not their friend, and it is not at all surprising to see children growing up with a conception of their father such as that little boy had, who, when told by a minister of heaven, and of the meeting of the departed there, asked: "And will father be there?" On being told that "of course he would be there," he at once replied, "Then I don't want to go." Occasionally wife and husband spend an evening out, or they entertain company at home, and oh, what a transformation she observes in him. In other people's homes, or when other people are present, his stock of material for conversation is unlimited. Then and there he is full of fun, bright and cheerful; when alone with his wife he has scarcely a word to say; he moves about the house with the lofty indifference of a lord, and with a heartless disregard of every member of the household. At home he is cold and cross and boorish, in other women's parlors he is polite and considerate and engaging. He has a smile and a compliment for other women, none for his wife. If they