tends them, so that they may bloom by day, showering soft dews on their tender heads, but when morning comes he is gone. How gladly would I thank the kind Flower Angel."

He

'So with these thoughts Selia went, and plucking the loveliest flowers of the valley, wove them into a garland, and when evening came and the sun went down, he went to the hill side, and lightly laying down his wreath, stood still to think of the angel. now turned his steps homewards, and his little heart was at rest. "Well, my child," said his mother to him, when she visited his bedside that night, "where hast thou been this evening? To the flowers

again!'

666

Yes, mother!" replied the boy, "I have plucked the most beautiful that could be found in the valley, and have woven them into a garland that the angel might find them to-night." How his elder brother laughed at Selia. 'Simple child," he said, "if the Flower Angel can make flowers, surely he has enough, and needeth not your garland!"

66

Poor Selia! his heart sank at this, and he looked doubtfully at his mother. But she said

"Cheer up, my beloved, the angel looks not at the flowers alone. but remember he saw the spirit of the child which caused him to weave the wreath, and to offer it to him, and fear not, he will never spurn the heart-offering." So Selia was comforted and sank to sleep, and in his dreams he fancied that the Flower Angel came and looked kindly at him, and many a summer's morning early the boy went out to the fields, always returning with joy, "For see, mother," he said, "the angel must have seen my gifts, and that he has not disdained them is plain, for on my garland of flowers what sparkling dew drops are lying."'

Edward looked up, there was a tear in the master's eye, and like Selia's the boy's heart was cheered. You are young, dear child, and helpless.'

An orphan, and poor,' murmured the boy.

'An orphan and poor, Edward, but remember that the heart's offering the poorest may give. Be obedient, my child, be loving, be truthful, and thou wilt be dear to us all. Give me the service of thy heart, dear boy, and like the sixpence thou dropped into the box last night, that service will be precious. God, too, who sees the motive, will not withhold the dew of his blessing on thee. The flowers of the field, Edward, are helpless, but he careth for them. They have but their bloom to offer their Maker. Offer, then, thine heart in the bud. The bird of the air has only its song wherewith to praise its Creator. Offer thou thy daily song of praise; and for the rest, my boy, remember that God is a father of the fatherless, and will not forget thee.'

Edward rejoiced as he heard these words, and perhaps we may look in on him a little time hence, and see how he proved the words of the good schoolmaster, and found a father in God and a friend in the worthy Doctor.

Children, it is not in great things that we can prove our love. The best of our deeds to man, the best of our service to God, are but like Edward's sixpence. The love that prompts the offering is that at which God, the heart-searcher, looks. She has done what she could,' the Saviour said of her who anointed his feet. Go you forth on your life's journey, and do what you can.

The parable which the good schoolmaster told to Edward is translated from A. D. Krummacher's Parabeln.

LINES WRITTEN AT WALMER, JULY 12, 1852.

I SAT upon the shingle strand,
And gazed upon the rippled sea,
Its face by gentle airs was fanned,
As it toiled in its careless ministry.

The noontide sun had clouds on high,
And shot, intense, his fiery beams;
But then he stood in the lower sky,

And feebly sped his parting beams.

Soft gliding shadows now were seen,
That fell, outstretched, upon the sea;
Or, robe-like, dressed the fading scene,
In evening's dusky drapery..

Yet, on the farthest verge in view,
One bark received the solar ray;
Decked with a beauteous rosy hue,
(2) As; she sped to a region far away.

Monthly Retrospect.

We have to-day to record the commencement, progress, and virtual completion of what should be a great national solemnity, and is, in theory and result, an expression of the national mind and will. On the 7th of July, the Queen closed the fifth session of the third Parliament of her reign. The same day, a royal proclamation declared that Parliament dissolved, and commanded the election and assemblage of another. The event which had appeared imminent a year and a half before, which had actually been delayed from week to week through the past five months by the boldness of an usurping Government and the forbearance of a hostile majority, had arrived at last; though still a year and a half before its natural term. The promised appeal to the country was now formally presented-the permanence of Free-trade, and all the momentous interests affected by imperial legislation, were remitted to their primary and ultimate tribunal, the constituencies of Great Britain and Ireland.

On Tuesday, the 12th, the city and borough elections commenced, and within the week were completed throughout England and Wales. The metropolis returned of its twenty members but one Ministerialist. Liverpool gave the Government their first and most important victory, by the election of Messrs. Turner and Mackenzie in the place of Messrs. Cardwell and Ewart. Dover, likewise, returned the Derbyite, Lord Chelsea, instead of the Peelite, Sir George Clarke; Canterbury, two Derbyites, in the place of a Peelite and a Whig; Plymouth and Devonport a Derbyite, in the place of a Peelite and a Whig; Cambridge, two Derbyites, in substitution for two Whigs; Bradford, Oldham, and Derby, one Ministerialist each in the place of Radicals. Meanwhile, the Opposition had gained seats at Bristol, Bath, Norwich, Bolton, Stockport, Cardiff, Newport (Isle and Wight), and other places. The balance of gain and loss on the whole of the cities and boroughs, appears to be exactly poised. In the counties the Government have gained ten-including the expulsion of Buxton from South Essex, Cornewall Lewis from Herefordshire, Hodges from West Kent, Sir George Grey from North Northumberland, and the substitution of Sir Bulwer Lytton for Mr. Pullar in Hertfordshire. In Scotland they have neither gained nor lost more than one. In Ireland, their gains have been six (including the cities of Dublin and Belfast), and their losses five. At the moment of writing, very few elections remain undecided. The known returns amount to 649, and their approximate classification is as follows:-Liberals 328; Ministerialists 285; Liberal Conservatives 36. It is evident, therefore, that the balance of power is in the hands of the party last named-that upon the greater or less affinity of the group represented by Sir James Graham and Mr. Gladstone for the policy of Lord Derby or Lord Russell, will depend the possession of office by those rival chiefs; and very probably the duration of Parliament itself. The Radical professions of Sir James at Carlisle, and the fierce Tory opposition to Mr. Gladstone's re-election for

Oxford University, render very unlikely their alliance with the Government; while the exclusion of several of the late ministers from the House of Commons at once necessitates and facilitates a junction between the leading Liberals and the colleagues of Sir Robert Peel. With a Government of such unprincipled pliancy as the present, however, it is impossible to predicate from the returns of the polling-booths the proximate course of affairs. The only indisputable result of the general election has been—the further weakening of parties before so weak that none dare give battle to the other; the further progress of disruption towards absolute disorganization. It is as though the parts of a disjointed and unmanagable machine had been returned to the crucible for re-casting, and had come forth from the channels into which the molten stream found its way more incapable than before of adaptation and control.

In this destruction of old organizations, this chaos of political elements, we, of course, see nothing to deplore and much that is hopeful. Believing that if only Free-trade be maintained-if only the cheapness of food and its correlative abundance of employment be continued to us-there is nothing to be lost, but much to be gained, by the substitution of Earl Derby for Lord John Russell-regarding nothing as so childish and pernicious as the maintenance of a Whig Government from dread of a Tory one-we have watched through the storm of battle but one flag; we have cared only for the progress of real civil and religious liberty towards legislative realization. Personal predilections may have excited in us pleasure or regret at various incidents in the contest that may little affect the great result; but it is by the number of Radicals and Voluntaries returned or rejected that we estimate the gains and losses of the day. Our gains are not many, but they are important-our losses are not numerous, but they are severe. To begin with the latter the Tower Hamlets has strangely fallen back from the proud position it achieved in 1847, having, not less to the astonishment than to the regret of his friends, displaced Mr. George Thompson for one who is certainly not a Dissenter, and was till lately a Tory Churchman. At Bradford, Colonel Thompson has been unseated by a very small majority-but it must be owned that, though replaced by a Conservative, he owed his defeat rather to the failing than to the staunchness of his Volunta yism; for it was the Roman Catholic voters who, in revenge for his support of the Ecclesiastical Titles Bill, turned the scale against him when victory was in suspense. Mr. W. J. Fox was consistent and unflinching on ecclesiastical questions; his rejection by the cajoled and intimidated electors of Oldham is, therefore, a loss to Nonconformity as well as to Radicalism. The same is true of Mr. Lawrence Heyworth, displaced-temporarily, we hope from the representation of Derby. It is also much to be regretted that the large-minded fidelity of Mr. Chisholm Anstey to the cause of religious equality should have cost him his seat for Youghal, without ensuring his election for Bedford. The defeat of Mr. Dawes, member in the late Parliament for the Isle of Wight, is to be deplored, as the loss of a steady though unobtrusive supporter. Such are our absolute losses. On the other hand, we have gained one seat for each of the following places-Norwich, Sheffield, Stockport, Halifax, and Cardiff; two at Bolton, and two at Newport (Isle of Wight).

Mr. Peto has received a congenial colleague for Norwich, through the noble exertions of its citizens, and especially of Mr. J. H. Tillett, in the person of Mr. Warner. Mr. G. Hadfield and Mr. F. Crossley, munificent Congregationalists, have displaced respectively a Whig at Sheffield and a Conservative at Halifax. Stockport sends up with Mr. Kershaw, Mr. J. B. Smith, the late member for Stirling, instead of the old-school Wesleyan, Mr. Heald. One of the new members for Bolton (Mr. Barnes) is well known as a Dissenter, and the other (Mr. Crook) is sound on ecclesiastical questions; on which both the former members were wrong. Mr. Coffin, who has achieved not only a victory but a triumph at Cardiff, is thoroughgoing in his professions. Of the two new members for Newport, one (Mr. Biggs) was a leader of the consistent Nonconformists of Leicester at the time of the anti-papal furor; and the other (Mr. Massey) is a trustworthy member of the bar.

In several places, an important victory has been gained for Nonconformity and Radicalism, though no numerical addition has been made to the ranks of their supporters. First on this list must be mentioned Rochdale. The return of Mr. E. Miall, though as the successor to one of similar views, is a gain that would have compensated for many losses. The election to Parliament of the editor of the 'Nonconformist,' is not now so significant, nor so honourable to Dissenters, as it would have been when first 'he presented himself to a constituency; but for himself it could not be more honourable or opportune. Mr. Miall will now enter the House of Commons, not so much the champion of an ecclesiastical principle, as one who has gained distinction and inspired confidence among public men,-and at a time when the complication of political and religious questions will render the more impressive his lucid exposition of a 'present truth.' We anticipate much from the new position which Anti-state-churchism will take in his person-and from the influence he may exert upon those who, professing Anti-state-church principles, have yet not been elected in virtue of that profession. The triumph of Mr. Bernal Osborne, and of Messrs. Gibson and Bright, over opposition incurred almost exclusively by their independence of Church influence,-opposition, the conduct of which was as reckless as its motives were bigoted,-we may claim as proof of the growing strength of our principles among those whom we may call secular politicians. The return of Mr. Apsley Pellatt for Southwark, and of Sir James Anderson for the Stirling burghs, are indications of the same fact. Opposition to State endowments of religion is now fairly engrafted upon the Radical ticket'-to use an Americanism. A candidate cannot show himself in a popular constituency with any chance of acceptance, if he be not prepared for at least a negative pledge on this point. The separation of Church and State is as loudly clamoured for by the unenfranchised in front of the hustings, as is universal suffrage or the ballot. But even the success of a cause is full of reproach to those, its natural guardians and upholders, who left it to be championed by other hands. And such has been the case in many a constituency during the late contests. In Finsbury, a Dissenter was ostentatiously supported by Churchmen, and received from them a majority over one among whose qualifications Anti-state-churchism is prominent. In another of the metropolitan boroughs, opposition to the