Fell from his arms abhorred!
[ SELF–RELIANCE. ]
"Well, my dear Miss Willoughby, how is your mother this morning," said a venerable looking clergyman as he pressed the hand of a fair young girl, apparently, not more than eighteen. Her face was pale with watching, and her eyes were red with weeping, and though she seemed in deep distress, there was a subdued and resigned manner about her, as she replied:
"Not any better, sir, I fear; she has had a very bad night, her cough has been so very troublesome." Saying this, she opened a door which led to an inner apartment, into which Mr. Montgomery entered, and approached the bed, followed by the afflicted daughter, who now tried to assume a composure of manner, very foreign to her feelings, as faintly smiling, she exclaimed, "Here, dear mamma, is our kind friend again." The poor sufferer looked anxiously at him. Her attenuated frame and sharpened features told the sad tale, that consumption had done its work, and the hand of death was upon her.
"Well, my dear madam," said the good pastor, "I will not ask if you are better; I will only hope the same spirit of resignation to the Divine Will fills your mind as when I left you, yesterday. Remember in whom you trust, and for whom. There are never–failing promises recorded there," pointing to a Bible that lay on the bed, "and thrice happy are they who can rely on them in affliction's hour. I have read them to you, and your own eye, you tell me, has often rested on them; you have only, therefore, to 'commit your way unto the Lord, and he shall bring it to pass.'"
"Oh, yes," replied the suffering woman, in a feeble tone, "I know it all; I know He is able and willing to take care of my hapless children. I can and do trust them to Him; feeling sure He will more than supply the place of the only parent left them; but, oh, my dear sir, convinced, as I am, of all this, it is, nevertheless, hard to leave them; may He forgive my weakness; but human nature is such, that—" here she paused from exhaustion.
"It is, my dear madam, meant that we should do so; and trial would lose the object for which it is sent, did we not feel its bitterness; but you must try, and rejoice that you are allowed to manifest both faith and hope, under so severe and trying a dispensation. Let me entreat you to remember the many instances recorded in scripture, where answer has been given from on high to the prayers of those who can faithfully cling to them." But while the worthy man strove to lead the sufferer beyond this sublunary sphere, his heart bled for the poor children she was leaving. The first blow she received, was the sudden news of her husband's death in the Crimea, which came to her ears so abruptly, that her nerves received a shock, from which she did not rally for months. This was followed by a letter, informing her that some property which had been left to her a few months previous to Captain Willoughby's departure, had been claimed by a distant branch of the family, as heir at law, the testamentary document being found invalid. These circumstances, joined to delicate health, following each other so quickly, proved too much for feeble nature, and she sunk under them.
Her excellent daughter, whose fragile form seemed little calculated to breast the storms of adversity that now threatened her, was unwearied in attention to her dying parent. She saw there were heavy trials before her, and knew they could not be averted, though she could not tell how she was to meet them; but there was a trusting feeling in her young heart, that must ever be inseparable from a trust in God's over–ruling providence; and as she sat through the long nights, watching by her mother's bed, a thousand vague shadows of the future flitted before her, and many schemes offered themselves to her mind; she tried to drive them off, for it seemed to her sinful. She durst not think, but she could pray ; and she did so; and oh! the eloquence of that simple trusting prayer, that her God would protect and bless her and the two young beings, whose sole dependance she was soon to be. How widely changed was her position in a few short months! The petted, and almost idolized child of doting parents, whose every wish had been anticipated, must now soon exert herself to support her orphan brother and sister.
Mrs. Willoughby, as is often the case with those suffering from pulmonary affection, went off very suddenly; and now was every threatened evil likely to burst on poor Helen's devoted head; but though weak in the flesh, she was strong in faith. Relying, as she had been early led to do, on her God, she seemed to rise with fresh energy under accumulated trials. She soothed and kissed the weeping children by turns, but their grief was so violent, they refused to be comforted.
The night her mother was consigned to the grave, was indeed a trying one to Helen. The good clergyman, who had gone back to the house after the funeral, now knelt in prayer with the bereaved ones, and commending them to the care of their Heavenly Father, took leave, promising to be with them early next day.