poor heart has been wrung by disappointments, but I see now it was all for the best; my Heavenly Father would have all my heart, and so he, in his infinite wisdom, separated me from my idol, and now my affections, separated from earthly love, are fixed upon him, he is my rock, and my stay.  No earthly friend could go with me ’through the valley and shadow of death,’ but Christ can go with me, and open wide the gates of heaven, and usher my willing spirit into the presence of the happy throng that worship before the throne of God.”

It was a dreary day in mid-winter.  The wind howled in fitful gusts, and the falling snow was piled in huge drifts before it.  Annie, pale and laboring for breath, was bolstered up, in bed, for the angel of death was visiting the poor girl.  His icy fingers were upon her fluttering pulses, and the feeble current of life stood still.

“O,” said she, “the winds, in their wild fury, seem singing praises to God.  My heart is so attuned to praise, that all things seem to unite in the universal hymn of thanksgiving to our Saviour and our God.  O, Ellen, is there no music in those words, to your young heart?  And, mother, does it not come to you, in your declining age, and bid your wearied spirit seek that rest that remains for the people of God?”

She ceased to speak:  the breath became shorter and shorter, till it only came with convulsive gasps.  She once again opened her weary eyes, looked earnestly upon the face of her mother and her sister, then glancing round the apartment, seemed as though she were bidding a last adieu to all it contained—­then closing them forever upon earthly things, without a struggle or a groan, the spirit of Annie Somers passed gently away.

The storm continued its violence, and desolate indeed, was the cottage home of the mother and the sister, where lay the lifeless form of Annie, reposing in the long deep sleep of death.

It was Sabbath day—­a stormy Sabbath day, when the coffin of Annie was borne upon the shoulders of four men to its last resting place.

It was covered with a neat black velvet pall, at each corner of which hung suspended a heavy black silk tassel, which waved in the wind as it came careering on, in fitful gusts, one blast scattering a shower of snow upon the velvet pall, and the next, sweeping it away, and so they laid her in her grave, amid the howling of the wintry storm; but it disturbed not her repose.

Willie and Matilda sleep upon the banks of the Sandy river.  The father’s grave was made upon the banks of the far off Mississippi, and Annie rests by the side of the winding Androscoggin; her mother, too, is by her side; for she soon followed to the land of shadows.

Ellen has entered upon the responsible duties of wife and mother, and is acting well her part in the drama of life.  Her usually volatile spirit is chastened and subdued by the sorrows that have passed over it, and it is her earnest endeavor so to live, as to meet the approbation of God, and her own conscience and train her dear children for that better life that is promised to the pure in heart.