"I am so happy, and the little hymns which you have taught us keep bubbling over all the time. Everything goes right, and I love the Saviour, and am trying all the time to do what He would like to have me do. I don't know as it is being a Christian, but I want to be one, if I am not." "What makes you so queer to-night?" asked May that evening. "Queer, am I?" returned Alice. "Yes, queer and quiet. Your face shines as if you had heard some wonderful news or something." "I have!" said Alice. "I have heard of that which angels smile over." And then she told May the story of the afternoon, and May replied, more soberly than her wont, "I declare, Alice Merwyn, if there is anything in religion that will subdue such a boy as Fred Pratt has been I shall believe in it! Why, he has been the terror of the neighborhood! And dear little Annie! I shall never twitch her hair again." May put up her frizzes silently with a quiet look on her face, and at length she turned to Alice and said: "I believe I'll go to Sunday-school with you after this. I can't have my little sister getting ahead of me." Do you think Alice Merwyn will ever regret the effort she made to help the children in that out-of-the-way neighborhood to a knowledge of the truths of the Bible? FAYE HUNTINGTON. THE ALABASTER BOX. MY dear little friends, I suppose many of you have read the sweet story in the Bible, about Mary who broke for her Lord and Master the precious box of Alabaster. It was a very costly and rare perfume. I want to tell you, that although Christ is no longer with us here on earth, yet we can still break for him our Alabaster boxes. Do you ask me how? Well, He says that when we serve His dear children, we serve Him, just as much as though He were present with us. And I think every day, perhaps every hour, we can give to Him one of our Alabaster boxes. I do not mean the very ointment that Mary had, but we can speak kind and helpful words, we can encourage the downtrodden, we can carry flowers to the sick, make our homes sunny and cheerful, lend books to the poor, comfort our pastor, and do, oh! so many _little_ things to make others rejoice! J. BESSIE'S STORY. [Illustration: BESSIE.] I AM a very little girl, I can't say much, but I know Christ is died and gone to Heaven Many hundred years ago. And he suffered, here on earth, All his weary long life through, That our sins might be forgiven, And we go to Heaven too. And I know how he was born, In a hornèd ox's crib; Wasn't that a dreadful place For a little babe to live? Muvver told me all about it, 'Bout the Shepherd, and the star; And the blessed angels, singing Way up in the sky, so far.