 mischief sprung; and it is this neglect of maternal duty against which we would so earnestly warn those who may not have thought about it. It is not enough to educate the mind, to provide bodily necessaries, to be indulgent in the gift of pleasure and amusement, the heart must be won and taught; and to do so with any hope of success, the character must be transparent as the day: and what difficulty, what hinderance, can there, or ought there to be, in obtaining this important knowledge to a mother, from whose breast the babe has received its nourishment, from whose arms it has gradually slipped away to feel its own independence, from whose lips it has received its first lessons, at whose knee lisped its first prayer? How comparatively trifling the care, how easy the task to learn the opening disposition and natural character, so as to guide with gentleness and love, and create happiness, not for childhood alone, though that is much, but for youth and maturity.

All these thoughts passed though Mrs. Hamilton's mind as she listened to her niece, and looked at the pale, sweet face lifted up to hers in the earnestness of her simple tale, as if unconsciously appealing for her protection against the bewildering and contending feelings of her own young heart. How she was effectually to remove these impressions of years indeed she knew not; her heart seemed to pray for guidance that peace might at length be Ellen's portion, even as she heard.

"You could scarcely have acted otherwise than you have always done toward Edward, my dear Ellen, under the influence of such a promise," she said; "your extreme youth, naturally enough, could not permit you to distinguish, whether it was called for by a mere impulse of feeling in your poor mother, or really intended. But tell me, do you think it would give me any comfort or happiness if I could see Emmeline act by Percy as you have done by Edward? To see her suffer pain and sorrow, and be led into error, too, sometimes, to conceal Percy's faults, and prevent their removal, when, by the infliction of some trifling pain, it would save his exposing himself to greater?"

"But it seems so different with my cousins, aunt; they are all such equals. I can not fancy Emmeline in my place. You have always loved them all alike."

"And do you not think a mother ought to do to, dearest?"

"But how can she, if they are not all equally deserving
