mother, sister, nor wife; but as a man sows so shall

'Ay, ay," said Semmit, his mind painfully agitated by the distressing circumstances suggested by the sick man's speech. "But maybe, sir, if I might make so bold as to say it, there may be some as would come for the sending for, if you would only give them a chance."

"Perhaps so," said the sick gentleman, quietly ; "but I do not care to give them that chance. I have no one amongst my best friends who could give me any-any-religious comfort. I thought I was past, completely past anything of the kind, but-well, I am either a fool or a madman, I expect, for my pains; but I have, since lying here, felt such a huge, agonizing need of some one or something, and I can't quite get rid of it."

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'Ay, sir, and that is God drawing you anigh Himself sure enough," said Semmit, excitedly. "Say you had lost God-talk about having no hope!' Well, it strikes me that, because you've got a great need, so you've got a great hope. If you had quite lost God, you would be satisfied with yourself anyhow and anywhere; but you're not satisfied. Oh, sir, do give your mind up to the seeking, and like enough you shall soon find Him who you said the other day you felt was lost to you."

Supposing you read me a verse or two out of the Bible," said the gentleman, languidly looking round

towards an ottoman which stood a little back at the side of his bed. "My landlady went out and bought me one to-day, but the print is too small, or my eyes too dim to manage to see.”

Semmit felt for his spectacles, and having found them, he placed them on, and turned to the chapter which he knew and understood best-the one which had been the subject of the young lady's address at the first Bible-class which he had attended.

Semmit was not a good reader, but he knew the words by heart. "Marvel not that I said unto you, Ye must be born again. . . . For God so loved the world, that He gave His only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in Him should not perish, but have everlasting life."

"Whosoever," repeated the sick man, feebly. Oh! can I get into that word? I, the scoffer-I, the blasphemer? No, no, I am cast off for ever."

"Well, sir, I think you make a grand mistake,” said old Semmit, warmly, "if you go to make 'whosoever' man's word, when it is God's own word and promise. God says nothing about measuring men's sins. He just speaks His own thoughts, and man, as I take it, has to take God at His word. He says 'whosoever,' therefore He must mean 'whosoever.' If He had meant to keep scoffers and swearers and such-like out, wouldn't He have said that 'whosoever believeth, excepting swearers and scoffers and such people, should not perish, but have everlasting life'"?

A knock at the door interrupted what the sick man was about to say in answer to Semmit's remark. The landlady entered the room, announcing the doctor, so Semmit hastily withdrew.

"Come back again soon," said the sick man, stretching out his hand to grasp the old sailor's; "I shall not rest, you know, until we have our talk out," he added in a whisper; and Semmit promised to look up again in an hour's time.

"Best not to leave it. He might be gone before morning," old Semmit mused as he left the house. "I -I wonder whether she would come if I made so bold as to ask her?"

The "she" was Semmit's lady.

SHE was sitting in her room, which faced the sea, waiting for her husband, who was to come to Inglestone some time during that evening. Old Semmit's anxious face came between her and her gaze across the sea.

"What troubles you, my friend?" she asked from the open window.

"Oh, a poor sick gentleman is dying, and he knows no peace-his sins are like a burden which well-nigh crushes him," said Semmit, all in one breath. "And I did think," he added, "that perhaps you would be so very kind as to come and comfort him with the Biblewords you teach us. Oh, ma'am, is it too much to ask?"

"Not at all too much," answered the lady, quickly. "I am expecting my husband some time to-night; shall we wait and both walk round in the morning?"

"Oh, please don't wait for anything, ma'am; he may be gone before then ;" and Semmit, worked up to a great pitch of anxious excitement, burst into tears. and sobbed audibly.

"I will come at once," said the lady, seeing how the old sailor's earnestness would not admit of any delay.

Semmit was indeed in earnest; he longed for the invalid gentleman to be at peace with God. He had asked him to help him; but how could he, an ignorant old sailor, be able to teach any one about the Bible? He could only tell them about his own faith. He had got for himself a knowledge of sin and its sure and certain reward-death. He had learnt for himself the only escape to this sure and certain death-a belief in Him whom God sent to be the Saviour of the world. Semmit could go into no learned explanation of his faith, but he knew that God had promised to forgive sin, when the one asking for pardon pleaded the merits of the Saviour who died for sinners. He took God at His word, and he knew that since he had done so he had trembled at the thought of doing what was wrong, as greatly as he had longed to be pure and true and upright in word and deed. Thus sorrow for sin, hatred of sin, and desire for holiness, were all a part of Semmit's belief in God's promise-forgiveness through His Son.

"I can't explain anything," Semmit had said when talking to the lady about it, "but I know that some