more clearly and more distinctly. At length, as I passed under the doorway of the church, I found myself in a crowd, not only of my own parishioners, but of persons from the neighbouring villages, who had assembled on this solemn occasion; way was, however, immediately made for me, and I advanced towards the high altar, before which was the coffin of my beloved Aimée, covered with a white pall, and beyond it, in a semicircle, stood all her former companions. But there, in that sad hour-sad for us who remained, yet most blessed for her who was gone-were no garlands of roses, no flaunting ribands, no gaudy attire; each fair young creature wore a long white veil; and even the once blooming cheeks of Susette were pale with grief and moist with tears-nay, the very levity of Mademoiselle Victoire had given way on this affecting occasion, and she stood a monument of silent woe. Ah! did she not remember then all her cruel carriage towards the gentle Ichild whose cold remains were stretched before her. BLIO HE On the white pall lay the faded garland of the lily of the valley; an affecting emblem of her who had plucked those flowers and woven that garland, affecting to all, yet how much more so to me, who so well remembered the gay delight of the holy little fair one when she had obtained the object of her innocent and elegant desires-an emblem consecrated by holy writ, which says, As for man, his days are as grass; as a flower of the field, so he flourisheth; for the wind passeth over it and it is gone, and the place thereof knoweth it no more. Psalm ciii. 15, 16. No eye looked up when I approached the altar, though all, as I afterwards found, had been aware of my presence. I came up near to the coffin at the moment when the last note of the requiem was dying away along the vaulted aisles, and at the same instant Madame la Baronne came forward with the myrtle crown in her hand. The garland had been formed of perishable materials, but not so the crown-as compared with the garland of lilies, at least, it was imperishable-it was fresh and fair as it had first appeared, it thus formed a beautiful emblem of that "crown of glory which fadeth not away;" and it was an emblem which all present understood, though no one spoke to point it out. It was laid upon the coffin over the faded garland by the Baronne herself, and when she had stooped to kiss the pall, Madame Bulé and all her pupils stepped forward to follow her example, after which the service proceeded, and the remains of our little beloved one were consigned to the dust in the vault of the family of the chateau. I remained alone in the church when all the congregation had withdrawn, and it was then that I solemnly resolved to renounce the vanities in which I had been educated, and, with the divine help, to quit all earthly considerations to follow the truth as it is stated in the holy scriptures, unto all extremities to which my abandonment of the church of Rome might reduce me. I was speedily strengthened in this resolution by the afflictions of my country, and forced by persecution to fly from that land in which under more prosperous circumstances I might have been again involved in the mazes of error and of death. And here I close my little narrative, leaving my Aimée to rest in her cold grave in a distant land. This lily of the valley was indeed nipped ere yet it had attained its perfect growth; its stem was cut down to the earth whilst yet its flower was in the bud; but the root has not perished, it lives still beneath the sod, and in the morning of the resurrection it shall be translated from the wild forest of this world to the garden of our Lord, where it will bloom with a celestial lustre, and enjoy a never |