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THE USEFUL LITTLE MAID.
(THE CHILDREN'S PAGE.)

SHOULD like to be useful wherever I go;
I'm so glad I have learned both to knit and to sew!
I can read and can write, and if I have strength,
I feel sure I shall make a good servant at length.

I am willing to work, and I love to be taught
How to do all my duties and tasks as I ought;
How thankful, how grateful I am for my school!-
I might have been left without teaching or rule.

But God, who has been my protector and guide,
Who has hitherto kept me, I know will provide
A place for His child who is willing to learn,
And anxious her food and her clothing to earn.

I am sure I should serve with the readiest mind
A master and mistress, if patient and kind:
But still, if austere, I would strive to obey,
And the meekness of Jesus my pattern display.

When I rise in the morning I'll ask for His aid;
When I lie down at night, what shall make me afraid?
There's an eye will watch over me all the year through,
'Tis the eye of my Saviour, "the faithful and true."

HINTS FOR THE HOUSEHOLD.

TO CLEAN TIN COVERS, PEWTER

POTS, ETC.

Powder a little of the finest whitening, which is sold in large cakes, with a drop or two of sweet oil; rub the covers, etc., well with the mixture, and wipe them clean; then dust a little dry whitening on the covers, and rub them bright with a dry soft leather.

TO CLEAN PLATE.

Make a thin paste of whitening and water, then with a piece of sponge cover your plate with it; let it dry on your plate, then brush or rub it off as occasion requires. Polish the plate with a very fine soft leather.

ΤΟ CLEAN FRYING-PANS, SAUCEPANS, ETC., AFTER USE. First rinse with warm water. If dirty, let the next lot of water with which you fill them boil in them. Then pour it off, rinse with cold water, and well dry them. If very dirty, after rinsing, put a good lump of soda in your warm water, and let it boil up, pour off, then fill your pan with warm water again, and rinse at last with cold. N.B.-Always wipe your saucepans dry, and leave them open. Clean saucepans, gridirons, fryingpans, etc., are essential to having things either taste or look well.

BURNS AND SCALDS.

Of all applications for a burn, there are few equal to a simple covering of common wheat flour. This is always at hand, and while it requires no skill in using, produces most astonishing effects.

COUGH SYRUP.

Dissolve an ounce of gum arabic in four table-spoonfuls of boiling water; add two ounces of syrup of red poppies, one ounce of oil of almonds, half an ounce of ipecacuanha wine, and two

drachms of tincture of tolu. Mix well together. For children give half a teaspoonful three times. a day; for adults two teaspoonfuls.

FOR RECENT BRUISES.

Put one tablespoonful of tincture of arnica into half a pint of warm water. Apply constantly the same quantity of tincture of for the first hour. Then apply arnica with cold water.

FOR DIARRHEA OR SICKNESS.

Take of the best Bermuda arrow-root a tea-spoonful, cold water a wine-glassful. Mix well, then add five drops of chloric ether. To be taken every three hours if required.

THE BOOK-POST.

Two copies of The Mothers' Treasury" may now be sent to any part of the kingdom for one half-penny.

BOOKS RECEIVED.

Home Joys (Partridge & Co.).-The Pearl Almanack, for 1871.— Children's Treasury (Book Society).-Home Visitor (Hunt & Co.).— Sunday at Home.-Child's Companion (Religious Tract Society).-The Converted Family (Nisbet & Co.).-Friendly Visitor (Seeley & Co.).

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IN the golden sunshine, lightly flitting across the flower-garden, see yon butterfly! For a moment it rests upon a blooming rose, then up and away to the sweet-pea, and on from flower to flower, so unlike the busy bee or the laborious ant. Such was my life as a child. Earnest realities, even then, were all around me. Sin and death were everywhere, but I thought not of them. Eternity was before me, but I perceived it not. And God himself was there, but I knew it not. I hunted the golden bubble of pleasure, and wandered in the bypaths of sin and folly.

Sickness

At length the Unseen Hand was gently laid on me. fell like a blight upon the little child. The world looked darker. My thoughtless heart was led to some reflection, but nothing more. Childhood passed away, and changed into boyhood; and then fever came upon me. The cheek was flushed, the pulse ran high, and I was laid upon a little bed in a clean attic chamber, with the blind drawn down, and stillness all around. And then, day after day, there sat by that bed an elder sister, whose tender hand smoothed the sick boy's pillow, and whose gentle voice spoke, amid the stillness, blessed words about the holy "Lamb of God, that taketh away the sin of the world."

Through the vista of twenty eventful years I now look back on

VOL. VII. No. 12.

[DECEMBER, 1870.

the quiet chamber, as the birth-place of my soul to a new eternal life; for there I experienced the blessed change of heart known as conversion to God. It was like the entrance of light into darkness! It was as if the shutters of the soul had been taken down, and pure daylight from heaven let into it! Then, for the first time, did the wonderful and glorious things which I had read in the Bible seem real to me. Had an angel appeared to me, as I lay on that bed, methinks he could not have shone before my eyes more brightly real, than did the truths of salvation. It was as if the Lord, in whom I had seen no beauty or glory that I should desire Him, had been transfigured before me, His face brighter than the sun, beaming with divine and healing rays of love and mercy, and His raiment, which I had despised, whiter than the light; and I seemed, in spirit, to meet His loving glances, and read my salvation in His looks. Then was "my mouth filled with laughter, and my tongue with singing." It was as if the heavens had been opened above me, and God looked down with a Father's love, and called me His child, and told me that my sins were all forgiven. I heard no voice. I saw nothing unusual with the outward eye; but I believed in Christ as I had never done before. I accepted Him as my own precious Saviour. I took His blessed words to myself, and I rejoiced. Now time and eternity seemed bright before me! I knew that I was saved-that old things had passed away, and all things become new. To those around me, I soon confessed what great things the Lord had done for my soul; and when raised from the bed of sickness, I knelt down in secret to worship God with the feelings of a new creature, and read with joy and reverence His blessed word, and fed upon it as a lamb feeding in green pastures.

Dear reader, you have now read a short account of my conversion. This is the conversion to God which the Bible talks about. This is being "born again;" and without this new birth no sinner can possibly be saved.

Thousands deceive themselves by thinking that an outward change of life is all they need. What every sinner needs is a heart renewed by the Spirit of God. We "must be born again." We were born sinful, because born of sinful parents. Now in order to become holy, we must be" born of God.” Sinners are like trees

bearing poisonous fruit. Such trees will never bear good fruit till their very nature is changed. The thorn cannot bear grapes, or the thistle figs. They cannot do it, for it is contrary to their nature; and no pruning or cultivation will ever make them. So with us. Cutting off the branches of our bad habits does not change the nature of the root. Yea, though you cut the branches off a thousand times, the root will bear fresh ones like them over again. We need new hearts. No cultivation can change our natures. Religious training cannot cause the sinner to produce the fruits of righteousness. It cannot bring out of us what is not in us. A

sinner can no more change his nature than an Ethiopian his skin, or a leopard his spots. But when God converts a sinner, it is by means of the truth. He leads that sinner to hear and to believe the truth which saves him. James the apostle says, "Of his own will begat He us with the word of truth" (Jas. i 18). The apostle Peter describes the saved as " born again, not of corruptible seed, but of incorruptible, by the word of God, which liveth and abideth for ever. And this is the word which by the gospel is preached unto you" (1 Pet. i. 23, 25). These texts teach that men are born again by means of the TRUTH. Their hearts are changed by the power of the gospel. See how the three thousand were converted on the day of Pentecost. They were great sinners. Many of them had doubtless taken part in the crucifixion of Christ. Peter, full of the Holy Ghost, preaches to them that He whom they crucified was the Messiah and the Saviour. Pierced to the heart by the awful truth, they cry out, "Men and brethren, what shall we do?" Peter then preaches forgiveness to them for all their sins, through that Saviour's name. They believe, and straightway they are saved!

THE PRISONER'S MOTHER.

FEW years since, in a large prison, the convicts were gathered for Sabbath morning service in the chapel, when a clergyman, who was providentially in the city, occupied the chaplain's place. In his appeal to their hearts, he mentioned the case of a wayward boy whose pious mother was dead, and who, after the successive steps of early depravity, was arrested by the Spirit of God recalling the hallowed councils and the prayers of the departed parent. He became a Christian, and entered the gospel ministry. The preacher added, " And I am that wicked son. Oh, how much I owe to a mother's prayers!"

The religious exercises closed, and the convicts went to their cells. In the afternoon, the chaplain walked, as was his custom, along the corridors, and looking through the grated door of a cell, saw a prisoner sobbing as if his heart were broken. Several minutes passed before the prisoner looked up and discovered the chaplain. When he was kindly asked what was the matter, he replied, "Oh, it was that story the minister told us about his mother; I had just such a mother, and it brought her memory back." Then falling down upon his face, with convulsive grief he said, "It has almost killed me. I had just such a mother!"

There, within the cold walls of a prison, unaffected by sermons or prayers, the outcast became as a weeping child before the imaginary presence of a pious mother-coming with her familiar, tearful face, and voice of maternal love, to his dismal abode. Mothers! you exercise a solemn responsibility. The influence of your example and prayers may be felt long after you are laid in the grave,

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