Christianity has been a form of sectarism, not differing from its minor subdivisions essentially in spirit, though necessarily somewhat more enlarged in its boundaries. Hence all nations who do not know the Divine Principle of the Universe by the name of God, have been branded as heathens and infidels. Mahometans have manifested the same spirit of limitation; and because the tribes of Eastern Africa worshipped the Creator under the name of Udali, instead of Allah, the Moors called them kafirs, which is the Arabic word for infidels. Hence their country came to be known to the civilized world by the name of Caffer-land, or Caffraria. But doubtless the angels judge quite differently of these matters. They are attracted toward the religious sentiment, without caring for its name. The sigh, and the tear, and the simple reverential thought, often rise up to them as prayer from the moon-lighted desert, while the heavy atmosphere of earth presses down, out of their hearing, pulpit orations, and many an unwinged response from gilded prayer-books. In every form of society, Nature has her priests, her prophets, and her poets too, though they pass away by thousands unrecorded, for want of utterance through literature and the Arts.

Among the poetic temperaments of Caffer-land was Marossi, a docile, contemplative child, an earnest observer of the earth and the heavens. "Mother, who made the stars?" was one of his earliest questions; and when told that Udali created them, he imagined the winds were his voice, and the sunshine his clothing. The deep, quiet, little soul, was overflowing with affection. It seemed an absolute necessity of his existence, to be near something he could love. He must nestle with his pet antelope under the shade of the mimosa tree, or fall asleep with his little hand within that of his mother. He was the youngest of her children,

When he was about eight years old, a Moravian missionary, who happened to be travelling that way, visited their cabin, and talked to them of the Christian's God, under the name of Utiko, which is an African word signifying The Beautiful. His discourse, imperfectly expressed in Caffer dialect, was still more imperfectly understood by the untutored boy; but still it made a deep impression on him. The missionary told them that Utiko was all Love; that his love descended in dew to refresh the flowers, and in sunshine to warm the earth, and into the soul of man, filling it with peace and good-will. Marossi never forgot this descrip. tion of the Christian's God. In the radiant beauty of sunset, in the mild glory of moonlight, in his mother's smile, in the lambent eyes of his antelope, he felt the presence of Utiko. It seemed strange to him that his father hated the Christians, and spoke scornfully of their sacred book. When he told of whole tribes killed by them, or carried off into slavery, the boy asked his mother, with sad astonishment, whether these people also believed in Utiko, who filled the souls of men with peace and good-will; and when she told him yes, his little brain was bewildered.

The secluded hamlet in which he was born was in a deep valley, girdled round by almost impassable mountains, which the foot of the white man had never trod, within his recollection. But a few weeks after the visit of the good missionary, the family were wakened at midnight by fearful shrieks and howls. For an instant, they supposed that lions or hyenas were among their flocks; but the crash of fire-arms soon announced a human foe. In vain the poor Caffers strove to defend their wives and children. Their humble cabins were all ablaze, their fields of maize and millet trampled down, and all who were not slaughtered, were bound hand and foot and dragged off toward the sea-coast. Terrible was the impression this scene made on the sensitive spirit of Marossi. To his dying hour, he never could forget those dusky forms struggling and bleeding in the fierce glare of the fire-light. When they were hurried away, driven like a herd of cattle across the country, he

asked where was his father; but his weeping mo. ther could not tell. Silently and sadly, he trudged along by her side, holding fast by her hand. But the march was long and wearisome, and many of the paths were rough and stony. Their feet began to bleed, and they lagged a little; whereupon the Christian drivers cursed them, and cut them with their whips. They swore they would shoot all the small brats, for they were not worth the time they cost to keep up with the drove. The Caffer children did not understand their brutal words, but they were frightened by their looks, and clung closer to their suffering mothers. On their route, they passed the cabin of a Dutch boor, to whom the slave-traders called aloud, and asked if he wanted to buy a brat. After a brief parley, they sold Marossi to him for an old jacket. Terrible were the shrieks of mother and child, when they were torn asunder. With frantic energy the poor widowed one tossed her arms in the air, and called her youngest and best beloved, who vainly struggled in the strong arms of the boor. The desolate child heard the loud snap of the whip, as they drove her away, and the sound cut deep into his tortured soul. That night, as he lay weeping on the mud floor of the Dutch cabin, he thought over the beautiful words of the Moravian missionary, and he could not understand how it was that these men believed in the same God.

Two wretched years he lived in the Dutchman's service, beaten by him, and kicked by his sons, whenever they drank too much peach brandy, or met with any accident that ruffled their tempers. Every seventh day they refrained from work, and sometimes a man came among them who read from a big book, and talked and prayed. But Marossi herded with the pigs and the dogs, and no notice was taken of him. Once he had his ears soundly boxed for making the dogs bark on a Sunday, but this was all the religion he was ever taught; and certainly the fact that dogs might bark every other day in the week, but that Utiko did not like to have them bark on the seventh day, was not remarkably well calculated to enlighten his benighted soul. And the heart of the orphan was starving, even more than his mind. He had not heard the tones of kindness since his mother was torn away from him. His only comfort was an antelope he had tamed, whose mild eyes reminded him of the playmate of his early childhood. But the boor's son soon took a fancy to the animal's beautiful skin, and swore he would have it for a jacket. When Marossi claimed the antelope for his own, and refused to part with it, the old Dutchman gave him a flogging for his impudence. Under such influences, clouds of stupidity of course gathered fast over the originally bright young soul; but the strong affections, which were now all centered on one small animal, could not

be easily stifled. He inwardly vowed that he would suffer anything, death itself, rather than see his favorite companion cut up to make the young boor's jacket. So he rose stealthily at midnight, and ran away with his beautiful antelope. It was a fearful undertakin for a boy of ten years to go forth alone into the wilderness, where hyenas laughed in the darkness, and lions made their lair. But he was less afraid of lions and hyenas, than of those Christian men, who whipped him for claiming his own, as they had whipped him for making a noise while the preacher talked of Utiko, who had sent a great prophet on earth, to proclaim peace and good-will.

The morning light showed stupendous mountain ridges, the sides of which he eagerly climbed, to avoid pursuers. The antelope was used to such rugged passes, and sprang lightly from rock to rock, sometimes apparently lost, but always returning to her master's whistle. From the cliffs above, the eagles swooped round him with wild screams, and in the ravines below, baboons pelted him as he passed. The sharp rocks cut his weary feet, but he was afraid to stop long, and ever and anon he walked through streams of water, lest the hounds of the Dutchman should get on his track. About noon,

he came among a billowy chaos of huge precipices, frightful in their fantastic grandeur, and skirted by dark, dense forests, through which tramped great herds of buffaloes and elephants. How awful was the landscape to that poor ignorant boy! Vague ideas of what his mother said of Udali the Creator, and what the missionary taught concerning Utiko, the Beautiful, flitted through his mind with ghostlike, oppressive solemnity. He wondered whether Udali lived up there among that sea of precipices, and whether Utiko knew that he, the friendless child, was traversing those great mountains all alone. The elephants had forced a way for him through forests tangled with interlacing boughs and rope-like vines. Through these deeply-shaded paths, the weary wanderer came at last in sight of a wide, dreary plain, where no verdure was. A few ostriches were seen in the distance, and here and there a tall Secretary-bird stalked awkwardly about in search of snakes. No rain had fallen for some time, and the country was so parched that not even the buzz of a wild bee, or the chirr of a grasshopper, broke the dismal silence. Marossi had a dread of entering upon this level tract, where no hiding-place of rocks, or thickets, could be found. But from what he had heard the preacher say, he judged that a Moravian settlement lay in that direction, and his heart yearned for the kind missionary who came to his father's hut, and told them of Utiko the Beautiful, who filled the whole heavens and earth with his love.

As he travelled on, even the ostriches disappeared, and no living creature could be seen, but my.

riads of ants crawling in black streams over the ground, or building their numerous pyramids of clay, on the sides of which, green and speckled lizards basked in the hot sunshine. The little streams that bubbled up in the mountains were heard no more, and neither roots nor berries could be found. But here and there wild water-melons lay on the sand, and with them Marossi refreshed himself and fed his panting antelope. Fortunately, he could sleep with comparative safety on these dreary plains, where there was neither food nor drink to allure wild beasts. Days passed, and the half famished boy again came to mountain ridges, without having seen a single human habitation. He climbed the summits eagerly, to search for roots, while his antelope browsed on the foliage. Far below him lay a verdant valley, through which flowed a silver stream, fringed with the graceful willows of Babylon. Flocks of zebras fed in the meadows, their glossy striped coats shining in the sun. And there, oh joyful sight! in a grove of mimosa trees, on the margin of the river, was a cluster of cabins! Tired and foot-sore as he was, the boy pressed forward with all his remaining strength, longing inexpressibly to hear the sound of a human voice. But when he came nearer, and saw a white man seated in front of the cabins, his heart dropped down like lead. He looked back anxiously toward the mountains, and doubted whether it were not best to fly and hide himself again in their dark recesses. But the smell of savory food was borne on the air, and he was almost starving. So, leading his antelope by a rope of grass, he walked up to the man, and said in broken Dutch, "Stranger, I am all alone in the world." The suppliant bend of his flexile form, the sad tone of his voice, and the pleading earnestness of his large brown eyes, touched the heart of the Scottish emigrant, who was, himself an exile in a strange land. He led the wanderer into his cabin, where the kind wife brought water for his weary feet, and bound soft bandages about them, while the little children came, one after another, to bring some article of food. When he had appeased his hunger, he looked up to thank them, and a whole circle of white faces smiled upon him affectionately. Poor persecuted child! He had not met such glances since they whipped his mother from him; and the unaccustomed kindness filled his swelling heart too full. He laid his head down on the neck of his antelope and wept freely; and thus the weary one fell asleep in that friendly cabin. Long and sweet were his slumbers, and he woke amid smiling faces and kindly tones.

Never did flower-bud, transplanted from nipping winds to sheltered nooks and genial sunshine, unfold more rapidly than did this wild human blossom. His pliant form moved with freer grace, his inno

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cent face beamed with affection, his faculties grew keen and active in the service of those he loved, while an intuitive politeness of the heart taught him to be always unselfishly considerate of them. They loved the beautiful brown boy, as if he were their own son, and from their friendly lips the Christian maxims of peace and good-will sank deep into his gentle heart.

When they went to England, two years afterward, they took Marossi with them. Wherever he went, he attracted the love of strangers by his bright intelligence, his affectionate docility, and deep religious feeling. The humid climate of Great Britain brought on consumption, during the. rapid progress of which his expressive countenance became more and more transparent, and lighted up with an inward radiance. He knew that he was dying, and he asked to be baptized into the Christian church. Many witnessed the interesting ceremony, and as they gazed upon his innocen tcountenance, they said to each other, "Verily, of such are the kingdom of heaven."

But though the soul of the young African was tranquil in the arms of a happy faith, many of the doings of Christians seemed dark and strange to him. At first, he thought the British were the real children of Utiko, and that Portuguese and Dutch must be the children of the devil. But he afterward learned that the British had carried on the slave-trade, yet worshipped Utiko in their temples, the same as now. This incongruity no explanation could ever make clear to him. And there was another thing which greatly perplexed his unsophisticated mind. The day he was baptized, the minister returned thanks to God for a great victory the British had gained over their enemies; and when he returned home, he heard Englishmen saying to each other that so many Frenchmen had been killed, and so many wounded. Suddenly there flared up before his imagination a vision of that terrible night in Africa, when he saw bleeding relatives and neighbors struggling in the lurid light of their own burning homes. He pondered deeply over this conversation of the Christians, and when he was alone with his friend and teacher, he spoke of it, and inquired whether the great prophet sent by Utiko had not told men to forgive their enemies, and always return good for evil. His teacher, somewhat embarrassed, answered, Yes; but the king must defend his country, and the troops must obey the king."

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'Does not the king then believe in Utiko and his prophet?" asked the simple young convert.

The Christian teacher did the best he could in his awkward position. He made no attempt to reconcile the practice of war with the gospel of peace, but contented himself with observing that many things above the comprehension of Marossi would be explained to him in heaven. The meek

"BIT!" Ah, yes--you may well cry out for your wounded finger! Why did you tease Polly?' the parrot seems to ask, as she glances at you with her keen eye of half-human inquiry-her beak open, her wings fluttering, and her claws grasping the ring, as she recovers from the energy of her assault ! And your little sister there, with her face so expressive of sympathy, and earnest sorrow for the mischance, and her fingers pressing nervously on her wrist, as if she shared the pain -she too seems to wonder at your folly.

You will probably be "bit" many times in your life, and worse than by a parrot's beak. And if you look around you, you may see innu

merable sufferers, who have more to complain of than yourself, just at present. There is oneperhaps, who has inherited wealth; he is “bit” if he credits the professions of those summer friends, who adhere to him only so long as they can serve themselves with what he has. Another is a lover of pleasure in her various enticing forms; another runs the race for the prize of ambition; another seeks fame, or labors for the gold that perisheth. All these are "bit" according to the disproportion of their zeal to their prudence; for the divinities whose favor they covet are more capricious and cruel than the bird of the crooked beak.