yet his prayer was answered in a far more glorious way than he ever dreamt of, nearly fifteen hundred years after he was seen standing there on the Mount with Elijah and the Saviour of the world. Cultivate the spirit of prayer while you are young; whenever you feel tempted to sin, one single word of earnest prayer will prevent you. If you do this you will go on from strength to strength until the evening of your days, whether it come sooner or later. Then you will be like fruitful almond trees, then you will be ripe for glory; too holy for this world you will fall asleep in Jesus, to awake clothed in white, walking on the green pastures by the living waters of the garden of God in heaven. I hope you all like our lesson to-day, and that you will remember it. It is a good thing to learn as many lessons as possible from the works of God while you are young -if you do, you will seldom while you live see one which does not remind you of Him, and many holy thoughts they will give you.

David. There is a very beautiful passage in our lesson in Cowper to-day, which tells us how happy those are who do so. I shall repeat it.

"Happy who walks with him! whom what he finds

Of flavour or of scent in fruit or flower,

Or what he views of beautiful or grand

In nature, from the broad majestic oak
To the green blade that twinkles in the sun,
Prompts with remembrance of a present God.
His presence, who made all so fair, perceived,
Makes all still fairer."

M. We shall finish this lesson with Montgomery's beautiful hymn on Prayer

66

Prayer the sublimest strains that reach
The Majesty on high.

Prayer is the Christian's vital breath,
The Christian's native air;

His watch-word at the gates of death:
He enters heaven with prayer.

Prayer is the contrite sinner's voice,
Returning from his ways;

While angels in their songs rejoice,
And cry, Behold, he prays.'

"In prayer on earth the saints are one,
In word, and deed, and mind:
When with the Father and his Son
Sweet fellowship they find.

"Nor prayer is made on earth alone;
The Holy Spirit pleads;

And Jesus on the eternal throne
For sinners intercedes.

"O thou by whom we come to God,
The Life, the Truth, the Way:
The path of prayer thyself hast trod,
Lord, teach us how to pray."

CHAPTER IX.

NETTLES-IDLENESS.

PROV. XXIV. 30-34.-"I went by the field of the slothful, and by the vineyard of the man void of understanding; and, lo, it was all grown over with thorns, and nettles had covered the face thereof, and the stone wall thereof was broken down. Then I saw, and considered it well; I looked upon it, and received instruction. Yet a little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of the hands to sleep so shall thy poverty come as one that travelleth; and thy want as an armed man.”

Eliza. I don't like nettles; they are idle things. We cannot learn much from them; our text teaches that, I think.

M. Yes; but it is only in the sluggard's. garden they are idle-nowhere else. They are very useful things, so useful that many of the necessaries, comforts, and even elegancies of life may be obtained from nettles. David. Well, that is very wonderful. I did not

think they were of any use either.

M. I shall tell you how much they can do, and then I am sure you will not say they are idle, but busy, useful nettles. When pulled young and boiled, they are a very wholesome, nutritious vegetable; lately, when there was a famine in Ireland and in the Highlands of Scotland, because of the failure of potatoes, many of the poor people lived for some time on boiled ttles.

Charlie. I never thought before that nettles were fit for food, that is most useful.

M. Yes, they feed the hungry, and they also heal the sick. In many parts of the Highlands and other places, the poor people are very far from a doctor. In cases of inflammation the remedy requires to be immediately applied, and they have always one ready in a bunch of nettles, which they beat upon the part affected it acts exactly like a blister, and generally removes the complaint. Now, for another very important use, what do you think of nettles clothing the naked?

Louisa. Well, I never heard anything like that. The nettle is the most useful plant we have talked about yet. We can easily see how it can feed the hungry and heal the sick, but how nettles can be made into clothes I cannot understand.

M. The common nettle has been long known as affording a large proportion of fibre in its stalk, which is not only made into coarse cloth-ropes and cordage, but also into sewing thread, and beautiful white linenlike cloths of very superior quality. The hemp and Canadian nettles yield a very strong fibre which is manufactured into cables and sails for ships. Then there is another very important use for nettles: they help to convey news to every part of the world; and last and best of all, they help to convey the Gospel to every country and nation. I think some of you can tell me how they manage to do this.

Janet. Yes, I can; when the cloth is worn out, the rags are sent to the paper-mill and made into paper; and this puts me in mind of the happy day we spent in Hailes Wood looking for wild flowers and

specimens for our Agricultural Herbariums, and our visit to Kate's Mill, where the overseer was so kind to us, and showed us how paper was made from the very beginning to the very end. I am sure I shall never despise nettles again. How true it is that God has made everything very good and very useful. I am sure none of us will think now that we cannot learn much from them.

and the lessons We shall begin

M. No, I am sure you will not; they teach are as useful as they are. with the nettles in the garden of the slothful, and the man void of understanding-are nettles of any use there?

Catharine. No, quite the contrary; they are useless weeds in it; they do no good themselves, neither will they let anything else do any good, and if you touch them they sting you.

M. These nettles are the exact picture of the owner of the garden; and it is a most appalling sight to see responsible beings spend their time as so many do, of no use to themselves or any one else, and frequently a hindrance to those who are anxious to do good.

Rachel. In our lesson for school to-day, Cowper blames those who spend their lives in a wrong way. He says

"Who then, that has a mind well strung and tun'd

To contemplation, and within his reach

A scene so friendly to his fav'rite task,

Would waste attention at the checker'd board?"

And he goes on mentioning several other ways in which time is wasted.

1. Cowper is quite right, if while you are young