most subdued tones, that it can burst forth at any moment, almost without effort, in overpowering fullness. The sweetest woman's voice I ever heard sounded to me as if there was great effort; as if it was taxed to its utmost; and the highest notes were almost painful to me. I feared one higher effort still would give pain to the singer; but man's highest notes sometimes break on the ear like wave after wave in the tide of song. You don't fear the effort will exhaust; there's an ocean of melody above and beyond. I can't help it, but I don't like to hear a woman speak or lecture in public. In order to be heard by a crowd, she elevates her voice unnaturally at times, strains and taxes it. It seems to me that the best woman-lecturer that ever takes the public platform, has in her highest tones something of a squeal, and the charm is gone.

The first hymn is read. The choir rises; Mildred blushes, then turns pale. I tremble; I am afraid to look up at her; I can hardly hear the first line, nor the second; her voice falters, trembles, flutters like a frightened bird. I tremble; I can scarcely breathe. O she will fail; and she is so sensitive she will never recover from it; but all at once, like a lark above the clouds, her voice soars, rises, it thrills me it can 't be Mildred; she is going beyond herself; she sings two lines all alone; her voice fills the house; all eyes look up in wonder and admiration; two or three whisper near me, "Who is she? who is she?" Ernest Heart and I are looking over the same hymn-book; my hand trembles as I hold the book; I am so provoked and annoyed that I blush like a nervous school-girl; but the very thought that my hand trembles so makes it tremble all the more. I am glad when the last verse is sung. The text is, "No mention shall be made of coral or of pearls, for the price of wisdom is above rubies." I think of the lines I wrote in the "Cosmos," and I blush again.

Just before church closes there is a sudden shower; there is not an umbrella in church; so most of the people wait. I see Mary K in a pew near me; so I go and talk with her some moments. I have left my fan in the pew; I come back to get it ; Ernest Heart has just gone, and he has left his hymn-book. I take it up, see his name in it and some lines just written with a pencil; they are dated this morning; he must have been writing while it rained. I suppose I am wicked, but I read them.

"She stands beside a pillar fair,

A maiden girlish-slight,

But stronger than the column there
Her innocency's might;

And simple straight her thoughts go up, in purest white arrayed,
And far above the pillar's shaft their resting-place is made.

"She stands beneath the arching lines
That o'er the chancel sweep,
And on her brow the holy signs

Of peaceful conscience sleep,

And higher than the arches' height her steadfast eyes do look,
The while they meekly seem to fall upon her open book.

"Anon the organ's minstrelsy,
And all the choir join in;
But she, albeit her silency
Is holier than a hymn;

For Jubilate Domine' her every look doth show,
And 'Gloria' is writ upon the brightness of her brow."

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"I suppose he looked up at Mildred and wrote these lines about her," I say, as I lay the book where I find it, and walk down the aisle, saying over the last two lines; they are so beautiful I can never forget them. I meet Mildred at the door; I I can see "Jubilate Domine" in her eye and “ Gloria" on her brow, as I look into her face. 'Mildred, how well you did!" said I, as I took her hand. "I was afraid you would fail at first; I knew you were embarrassed; it was a great ordeal for you to pass, you have been so long shut up with only me for an audience, and the church was so crowded to-day.

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I was very much frightened, at first," said Mildred, “as I looked up and saw the sea of faces below me. I felt as if my heart was a little boat on a great ocean, without any rudder, or anchor, or sail, as if nobody could steer or guide, and I must go down or be wrecked alone. I knew I should fail, — my voice was gone, and if I failed this time, I never could enter a church or meet a human face again. Something said to me, What did you come here for? You might know you would fail;' but I happened to look down once, and I saw Dr. Boynton's upturned face, and that look in his eye 'Don't be afraid, Mildred!' I thought I would n't fail while he was there. I shut my eyes a moment, and tried to think only Luke is with me.' I forgot the crowd; something kept me up. I felt as I did that morning when I was singing alone with Dr. Boynton, that I could sing the whole book through, without faltering or wavering."

"I never heard you sing as well," said I; "the ordeal is past.” My heart sends up its te deum. Mildred, the poor, lame sewing

girl, is well; she sings; she is independent. I have seen her, like an eclipsed, hidden star, come out from behind the cloud, and my poor hand has helped remove the cloud.

I thought, as I looked over this morning's paper, at the very liberal donations to the various grand, conspicuous, and popular charities, that it would look benevolent, munificent, generous, for Louise Grenville to put down fifty dollars for the relief of homeless orphans, or a hundred for the Young Men's Education Society; but as Cavanilles, the Spanish botanist, liked, through his micrometer, to see the grass grow, so I must confess I like to see the good grow. It seems to me no very great charity, but rather a sorrowful thing, to give a man a loaf to-day, while he goes hungry to-morrow, or a poor ragged boy a cap this winter, while the next he goes bareheaded. I would n't be contented to join a great loaf and cap society, to give a hundred bareheaded, hungry boys a loaf and a cap; I would rather hunt up one bareheaded, hungry boy, and keep him with a loaf in his hand and a cap on his head till he is able to keep himself fed and covered. see Mildred's success, her joy, does me as much good, and perhaps more, as to see a long line of sorrowful, pale-faced, orphan children, walking slowly and solemnly back from church to their only retreat in the orphan asylum. Is n't one life complete better than fifty helped a little?

To

I sat in my rocking-chair and fell asleep, thinking of Mildred, and dreamed that I was most elegantly dressed, and Dr. Boynton came in and said we would go to New York, to the Academy of Music, for it was the night of Mildred's benefit; and we went, and Mildred, dressed like a fairy, in a white robe adorned with stars, stood on the stage and sung enchantingly ; she was assisted by the most celebrated pianists and vocalists ; but she was the star of them all, and from the galleries showers of bouquets fell at her feet. A slight noise awoke me, - I started, there stood Mildred by my side with a bouquet in her hand.

"Where did you get that," said I, “Mildred?”

"I don't know; I found it on my table; some one has sent it; I can't find out who. Is n't it beautiful?

Mildred has been in a perfect state of excitement ever since she has been able to walk; I never saw a creature happier.

It is foolish to tell one's dreams, but last night I was reading De Quincey's "Suspiria," and I could n't help think some people

don't think enough of dreams. I read this in "Suspiria," and I copied it, for the book is n't mine: "The dreaming faculty, in alliance with the mystery of darkness, is the one great tube through which man communicates with the shadowy. The dreaming organ, in connection with the heart, the eye, and the ear, compose the magnificent apparatus which forces the infinite into the chambers of a human brain, and throws dark reflections from eternities below all life upon the mirrors of the sleeping mind."

I dreamed that dream over last night about my father, and to me a dream of the loved and lost fulfils more than anything else the boast of Parcelcus, that he "would restore the original rose or violet out of the ashes settling from its combustion"; for a dream brings back from the ashes of the past, Joy's sweet, dead rose, and Love's lost violet.

CHAPTER XV.

THE DOVE IN THE HEART.

"He shall give His angels charge concerning thee."

I NEVER was nervous before, but I suppose I am a little nerVous now. The first walk I took in the street after I was hurt, it seemed as if every coming carriage was going to run over me, and I would start and run at the least clattering on the pavement, as if a whole regiment of evils were pursuing.

I went to the Astor Library this morning; I have n't been there in a long time. If I were a man, and wise and patient enough, I think I would make another catalogue for that library. If I know who the author is, I can find any book I want, but if I don't know who the author is, and only know the name of the book, I may look a long time before I find it. The gentlemen seated by those six little tables and two long ones, seem to have found exactly the book they want; some of them have sat there, without stirring, an hour. I am in a corner by myself, looking over Allan Cunningham's "Songs of Scotland"; I look up a moment, and I see a gentleman, seated at the first of three little tables, at the left hand of the librarian, with the three blue and gilt volumes of Mrs. Browning's Poems before him. He is taking notes in that little black book. He is so long at that one place in the book I think he must be copying some entire poem: I go up to the librarian to get another book, and on

the desk before me is one of those little papers with the signature and the name of the book; the date is the fifteenth; the book is "Greek Lyric Poets," and the name Ernest Heart; and standing by my side, waiting for the Poets, is Ernest Heart. He has finished Browning, and is going to look over some Greek. I get my book and return to my seat. In about half an hour, Ernest Heart put up his three volumes of Greek Poets, and turns to go out, walks a few steps, and goes back and asks for that small, blue, paper-covered book again; looks it over as if