Commandment enjoins, and be out of the temptation to waste it in idleness and folly.

If you bring up your children and send them into the world without furnishing them with religious principles and habits, there is nothing you can give them to make amends for so great a want; they will be at the mercy of every accident of life, and unprovided with a refuge to shelter them in its distresses. We are told that pain and affliction are attendant upon all ranks; and I make no doubt that those above us have their share; but I am sure that it is a blessed consolation for the poor to have the thought present with them, that the Almighty is their friend, and cares for them, and is near them, and is always ready to assist them, if they will turn to Him. And, if the religion of Christ is thus our support in life, what must it be in the hour of death? what, in that inevitable moment, can be put in comparison with knowing that we have a treasure in heaven?

Your own good sense will suggest a great deal more than I can say, if you will only give the subject its due consideration.

You will pardon my having dealt freely with you in this letter; because you will believe it is from real affection to you, and the children that I have put my self to the pain of thus speaking my mind. My employments being quiet and still is perhaps the reason why I happen to have thought more on this subject than you have done, who lead a more active and busy life. Give my love to the children and to Thomas, and so no more at present from your loving sister and friend

SARAH GAUNTLET.

HALF-PENNY SAVING BANK.

To the Editor of the Cottager's Monthly Visitor.

SIR,

HAVING frequently witnessed the beneficial effect of the hints conveyed in your Magazine, I am induced to request the insertion of the following account of the method by which a Half penny Saving Bank, annexed to a Girls' Day School, has been lately established in a very populous Village, with the greatest success.

The object of this Bank is to amass for each child such a sum as may enable her, on leaving the school, to make her first deposit in one of the General Saving Banks; for which purpose the parents are requested to subscribe, at least, a half-penny a week, and as much more as their circumstances will admit of. This subscription will be every month deposited in the General Saving Bank in the name of the whole school, with whatever donations the patrons of the Village Bank may think proper to maké. A book is to be regularly kept, specifying the sum deposited by each girl; and, when she leaves the school, this sum, the interest upon it, and her share of the donations, (which are to be divided among the subscribers) will be given to her. In case of the death of a subscriber, the money, with the interest arising from it, must immediately be restored to her parents; but her portion of the Donations will remain in the General Saving Bank for the benefit of the survivors.

In order to increase the fund, the children are sometimes allowed to work for profit; and this part of the scheme has been found to be best promoted by suffering them to be thus employed by some respectable shopkeeper. I have only further to observe, that the habits of industry and oeconomy, inculcated on the young mind, are the essential ad

vantages of this plan, otherwise but of trifling benefit to the individuals. It was for these useful ends that the plan was formed, and in these has so completely succeeded, that I thought it right to request that it might be made known through the medium of your excellent work.

I am, Mr. Editor,

With great respect,

Your sincere well-wisher.

N.B. The author was chiefly indebted for the first hint that suggested this establishment, to a small publication entitled, "A Plan of a Penny Savings Bank, with a Working Fund, to enable Girls, by their Industry, and the payment of small Deposits, to clothe themselves, or assist their Parents*"

IDLENESS.

To the Editor of the Cottager's Monthly Visitor. SIR,

I OBSERVE that you do not talk enough about idleness in your little work. Now I think that there is nothing so essential to a servant girl's obtaining and keeping her place!-I have known many a girl lose a good place, because she had a dirty and careless appearance. Now if such would only keep themselves clean, without going into the extreme of dressing fine, they might gain much good by it. An idle girl, who goes about the house with her shoes down at heel, an untidy gown, her apron half torn off, her hair in dirty curl-papers, and a smutty face, is extremely disgusting; and many

* We think we have the plan of this "Working Fund" among our hoards; and we shall be glad to give it in our next Number.-Editor.

ladies would not like to have their meals prepared by any such dirty people. It is therefore my advice to all female servants, that when they go to ladies respecting their characters, they take care to be perfectly neat and clean, which will at once gain the good opinion of the lady with whom they are to live: but they must endeavour to preserve that good opinion by being equally neat and clean in whatever business they have to perform.

I am, Sir,

Ever a constant reader of your excellent littleWork,

and

AN OLD MAID.

LETTER FROM A FATHER TO HIS SON, AN APPRENTICE BOY.

MY DEAR BOY,

IN our last letter, we saw that the Duke of Lancaster was made king under the title of Henry the Fourth. We saw, too, that he had no right, at all, to the throne, as it properly belonged to the Duke of York's family, which was descended from Lionel Duke of Clarence, the elder brother of John of Gaunt, Henry's father.

There is no happiness to be had from that which is gained by foul means; and so Henry soon found it. He was constantly harassed by plots and rebellions. Those very persons who had helped him to get the crown, were now the first to endeavour to take it from him, when they saw how haughtily he carried himself towards his former friends. The Duke of Northumberland, a powerful nobleman, was one of those who had formerly assisted him, and who now rebelled against him; and this Duke had a son, a brave and gallant youth, but so fierce and fiery that they called him Hotspur. This family, and many

others, raised a great army against the king; and a great battle was fought between them at Shrewsbury, where, however, the rebels were completely beaten, and Hotspur was killed. The king himself was in this battle, and fought bravely. His son, too, was there, the same who was afterwards that brave king, Henry the Fifth. Here this Prince, young as he was, shewed that he knew how to fight, and gave a sort of earnest of the sort of man he was afterwards to be. He did wonders in this battle, and some people say that it was he that killed Hotspur. This prince, however, though he could fight so well, was altogether a very bad sort of young man; and his loose behaviour, his fondness for bad company, and his profligate living gave his old father a wonderful deal of trouble and distress: and you may depend upon it, that all the riches and greatness in the world will never make any one happy who has the affliction of an unthankful and wicked son. It is true that this young prince did, afterwards, become wiser and better, and that he became, indeed, a great king; but his bad behaviour had almost broken his father's heart first. Indeed, the old king, plagued by rebellions, vexed by his son's bad behaviour, and tormented in his conscience by remembrance of his own cruelty to the late king, and of the unjust means by which he gained the crown, seems to have had no peace and no happiness.

I do not often give you any things from books of Plays, because I am no great reader of such things myself, but every body knows what fine parts there are in the Plays of Shakspeare, who wrote several plays from different parts of the History of England. -He gives a beautiful speech of Henry the Fourth on Sleep, where the king seems to have been so barassed with cares, and vexations, and the stings of conscience, that he could get no sleep to close his eyes; and he seems to long to lay aside the trou