then in rapid and higher utterance, a string of blasphemous oaths was flung out of his mouth without connexion and without provocation. I dare scarcely call them to mind, and much less dare I detail the defiling expressions. It seemed as if satan used him as an instrument to assault my ears, and grieve my heart, by the catalogue of hell's blasphemies. I should have hastened out of the chamber, but his wife hearing him, came up. She listened a short moment, without any expression of surprise or fear; her ears and heart were evidently unmoved by the sounds that made me shudder. She looked anxious to know if he was sensible, but at last she said,

He only raves, he's maddled with fever, I think he knows nought. The doctor said he'd come soon.

Are you anxious for his recovery

I'se like, for he's all our dependance. I wish he may recover, but it does not appear to me very probable.

Do ye think not? why then it'll go badly with us!

How do you think it will go with him, if he dies?

Why, its the way of all flesh, and may be its better as its happened; for if he

lives he'll be a cripple most like, and he could do nought for his bread, aud the parish will do nought, because we've been better to do once, and we have this home of our own, and a pretty home it is its tumbling about our ears, and we've nought to prop it up with; but it'll be down soon, and then I shall have neither husband nor house, and they must allow us something. Though, when I applied for relief once before, when he was ill of a kick from one of the horses, they would do nought; but I cursed them to their face, for a set of hard-hearted parish overseers.

To tell you the truth, I think it looks as if there was a curse in the house, its rotten with curses.

She looked angry, and in a sullen tone said, May be its as wholesome as a finer man's.

Very likely, if that finer man is one like you and your wretched husband; and loads himself and his house with curses of his own invention; for a man that delights himself in cursing, will be cursed in riches as well as in poverty. You know it is a great God you call upon to curse you, and be can answer to the full all your desire. Suppose now I was to

tempt you to call upon God most solemnly to send down his curse on you, - and on all that you have, and to seal your doom with everlasting damnation in hell, would you do it.

Its fine talking; as if such a thing was likely.

'You ought to know that you do so, however, though God forbid that I should provoke you to it. I never knew either you or your husband before yesterday, and if I were to write down all that I have heard you and him say in these few hours, you would perhaps be surprised to see how many miseries and calamities you have called upon God to send down. And do you not think he hears? He that planted the ear will he not hear? Did you ever humbly ask God to bless you?

Nay, marry! we want no canting hypocrisy; and when ought vexes me, I like to let it out at once, and pay it off as it deserves.

You do not know your Bible.

Bible! Nay, we've som'at else to do. Then you may as well hear a word whilst you can. God has written in that sacred book, "This is the curse that goeth over the face of the whole earth, and every one that sweareth shall be CUT

OFF." I pointed to her husband, and she listened, "I will bring it forth, saith the Lord of Hosts, and it shall enter into the HOUSE of him that sweareth falsely by my Name." Here I looked round about the room, and pointing to the decaying roof, and the broken beam, continued, "And it shall remain in the midst of his house, and shall consume it with the timbers thereof and the stones thereof." Now I can verify the truth of God's word, for so it is; for you and your husband are wicked sinners, and break God's solemn commandment, and load your tongues with guilt.

Again she looked resentment, but spake not, though she seemed to bite her GUILTY TONGUE with anger.

Do you know the commandments of God? one of which is, "Thou shalt not take the Name of the Lord thy God in vain, for the Lord will not hold him guiltless that taketh his name in vain." And every friend of sinners should remind the man that delights in cursing, that God hath said, "So shall it happen to him; as he loved cursing, so let it 'come unto him; as he delighted not in blessing, so let it be far from him; as he clothed himself with cursing like as with

a garment, so let it come into his bowels like water, and like oil into his bones; Let it be unto him as the garment which covereth him, and for a girdle wherewith he is girded continually." Did you ever hear these awful words before?

We were here interrupted by another raving burst from the husband. O, I said, take warning! There lies before us the very example of all I have told you, and does it not strike your hard heart with some terror, when you hear these ravings of a delirious and wicked mind? It is the abundance of his blaspheming heart, which is full of nothing but curses and oaths, which is now pouring out, when he has no consciousness to restrain it, and no cause to excite it: perhaps he is sensible of pain; but this is the way that the evil spirits express their suffering; they blaspheme God in their torment, and their rage.

The woman heard all I said, and looked in a kind of amazement, but did not appear to soften in the least.

Alas! I said, there appears a curse upon your heart. Will you not for once in your life ask a blessing, and beseech the Lord Jesus, who will forgive all kinds of blasphemy, to turn your hard heart,