LERRIE; OR, LINKS IN A GIRL'S LIFE.

BY BIRDIE E. S.,

Author of "Birdie's Mission," &c.

LERRIE wandered on, deep in meditation, without noticing how the clouds were gathering, and when a distant sound of thunder made her look up, she was startled to find how far she had come. "I am sure it will rain before I get back," she sighed, mournfully to herself. "Oh, why was I so foolish?"

She turned back at once, but all her hurrying would not delay the rain, and very soon it began to come pattering down, and another peal of thunder louder than before, made Lerrie start off and run in a very undignified fashion. She felt tempted to stuff her fingers into her ears, for she was very much afraid of thunder.

Ah, Lerrie! did no recollection of another storm harder even than this, which brought you suffering through your own wilfulness, cross your mind? No, Lerrie was too disturbed to recollect anything just now. In the distance she could see before her another form-a woman's, and she, too, was hurrying, but Lerrie was a fleet runner, and had soon almost reached her. Then the woman turned round and stopped. They had almost reached the first house-Miss Greeve's now.

"Have you far to go?" the stranger asked in a quiet voice. "A good distance," Lerrie replied, "but it will not take me long to go."

"You will be wet through," the lady said compassionately. "We are strangers to each other, but I don't think in a storm we need stand on ceremony. If you will accept the invitation, you are quite welcome to take shelter in my house till the storm

is over."

They were at the gate now,-it was Miss Greeve's house :and was this she standing before Lerrie? The nick-name which had been given her flashed into Lerrie's mind, and made her almost afraid. But a flash of lightning, followed by a rumble of thunder decided her, and she followed Miss Greeve across the plot of green turf to the door, which was opened at once by a pleasant-looking, elderly woman-servant, and Lerrie felt relieved to think that there would be some one in the house beside "Mad Pru" and herself.

Not that Miss Greeve was by any means so peculiar a personage as Lerrie had imagined her. She was simply a middle-aged spinster, with a brow and face wrinkled with care and thought rather than years, and hair that was surely prematurely grey. Her dress was neither antiquated nor peculiar; it was simply dark, and very plain. The most striking thing about her

appearance was her eyes; dark, almost black they were, and their merest glance seemed to look one through and through, to read right down into the depth of thought and feeling. One with a guilty conscience standing before the searching glance of those black eyes, must surely feel as though they could read the secret of his guilt, and quail before their gaze.

But the half smile which played about Miss Greeve's lips when she spoke to Lerrie, and the ordinary and kindly tone in which she addressed her serving woman reassured her, and she began almost to enjoy her novel position. Miss Greeve led her upstairs into a little room, which seemed to be a kind of boudoir, where she insisted on her taking off her dress, which, being thin, was soaked through with the rain. The waiting-woman went up a moment after with a light dressing-gown, which Lerrie threw round her, while the servant took up the dress, saying, "We have a good fire in the kitchen, and this will soon dry.'

"I am sorry I am giving you so much trouble," Lerrie said, really distressed.

"Trouble, Miss? Oh no! we do not reckon anything trouble that we do for the Master."

Lerrie did not feel astonished at the answer, she expected such conversation in this house. Miss Greeve had sent word that if she pleased, she could go and sit with her, and Lerrie at once accepted the invitation. What a strange, isolated life it must be, she thought, it all seemed so quiet, so solemnly still. Miss Greeve sat in one of the front rooms, the one from which she had uttered these words which still dwelt in Lerrie's memory. She was seated by the window engaged on some needlework, but she looked up as Lerrie entered, and beckoned her to a seat opposite to her.

"The thunder is almost over," she observed, "I have not seen any lightning since I came in-I think it has gone some distance away."

"The rain seems heavy still," Lerrie answered, wondering how she was to keep up a conversation with this person of strange report.

"Have you any friends who will be anxious about you?"

"I am staying with my aunt at the other end of the village, but I don't think she will be anxious. She has some friends not far below here, and she will conclude that I have called there, I expect."

There were a few more little common-place remarks, then Lerrie said,

"What a beautiful place Brambleton Hill is."

"Very beautiful," was the answer, "when did you see it first."

"On the first Sunday I spent here." Lerrie coloured a little

as the dark, searching eyes looked up. "I went there for a walk in the evening.'

"There were a good many on the hills that evening?" "Yes, a good many."

"I know they go past here every Sunday, I see them go along in groups, laughing and chatting as though Sunday were a pleasure-day, a day given for the display of finery, and of lovemaking. It makes my heart sick, and my spirit burn, when I see them going, all careless and thoughtless to fritter the blessed Sabbath away in their own pleasure.'

"Do you think it is wrong to spend the Sunday evenings on the hillside?" Lerrie asked. "May they not learn much there?"

Miss Greeve gave her a quick, searching glance.

"My child, you do not know. In that town yonder, the town from which these pleasure-seekers pour almost in streams, there are back streets, and dark alleys. There are taverns and publichouses filled with people of all ages and conditions. There are little children playing in the gutters; there are sick ones lying on beds of pain, with no one to attend to their wants; there are dying ones who are trembling at the gates of death, and passing through the dark valley to the awful Beyond; some who have never heard of Jesus' love, or of heaven; and there is no one to tell them. Child, you will find it hard to believe, but there are heathen yonder, as dark and ignorant as those to whom we send missionaries. There are those who are wilfully sinning against the light, choosing rather a life of sinful pleasure, who want some kindly persuasion and some truthful warning; there are others who are sinking down to sin and misery, for want of a friendly hand to uplift them. There are little children, yes, even little children, who are being led astray."

"I shall frighten you;" she added in a different tone, as she caught a look of surprise on Lerrie's face, "you must excuse me, I am so used to being alone and thinking of these things, and talking of them to Mrs. Birken, that I had forgotten myself."

Lerrie could understand now, how Miss Greeve had won the name of 'Mad Pru." There was a wild gleam almost of insanity in her eyes, as they were fixed on the window before her, where the rain pattered still, almost obscuring the wide view which was usually spread out before her.

"You asked me if I think there are no lessons to be learnt on that hill-top, Miss Ring. Did you learn anything there?"

Lerrie felt her cheeks suffuse with colour at this unexpected question, but with those searching orbs fixed upon her, they seemed to wring the truth from her.

(To be continued.)

In the collection of Luther relics in the British Museum there are few objects more interesting than an original copy of the printed broadsheet which Luther fixed on the church door at Wittenberg, on the memorable 17th October, 1517. Apart from the bearing upon Luther's history, it recalls a custom common in the old days, especially in university towns, for public disputations being held on any topic of the time, or upon general points of philosophy which the challenger or disputant chose to select. Thus we are told that the learned and eccentric genius known as "The Admirable Crichton," in visiting seats of learning, used to post up theses which he was prepared to defend against all comers. Luther used this method to bring before the learned at Wittenberg the doctrine of Indulgences and other points raised in his conflict with Tetzel. The discussion could not fail to establish and to spread the doctrines maintained in opposition to Rome. The Wittenberg disputation was a notable event in the history of the Reformation.

Referring to this time, Luther afterwards said, "When I undertook to write against the gross errors of indulgences, Dr [No. 17.]

Jerome Schurff (his Swiss colleague at the University) stopped me and said, 'Would you, then, write against the Pope? What are you about? It will not be allowed.' 'What,' replied I, 'what if they must allow it?""

When the theses were posted up some laughed at him, and thought he could never destroy a work which the Pope and the bishops maintained. When one of the senior professors of the University saw the theses, he said, "Brother, creep back into your cell, and pray, Lord, have mercy on me!"" An old monk said, "My dear brother Martin, if you can overthrow the doctrine of purgatory and this papal system of peddling souls, you will indeed be a great man; of which a writer at the end of the sixteenth century says, "What would the old monk say if he were living now ?"

The effect of Luther's silencing Tetzel was his being denounced by the Pope, who sent documents intended to ruin him, especially the famous bull, the burning of which gave signal of open rupture with the Papal See.

TRIX AND GERTIE.

In a small, pleasant room looking out into a dusty, dull Liverpool street, two girls are sitting, one busily writing, the other engaged in some intricate millinery operation.

"Trix!"

"In one minute, my child;" and Trix knits her smooth, white brows into two upright lines over the German translation she is correcting, and with relentless severity scores and underscores the mistakes. Then, with a little imperious gesture she tosses back her head, scribbles "Atrocious!" at the bottom of the page, pushes aside a great pile of French and German exercise books, puts her elbows indignantly on the table, and stares meditatively at her cousin. "Didn't you make a remark,

Gertie ?" says she at last.

"It is just a week to the holidays."

"Yes.'

"My ears do. I hope I shall not hear another note of music for the next six weeks."

But, as if out of very spite and maliciousness, an organ-grinder at this very moment strikes up a most dismal and exasperating La ci darem just underneath the window. Gertie laughs, and then sighs the next minute.

"What is the use of holidays that are to be spent in all this