Buttercups and daisies Come into the meadows, Come into the meadows, Come into the meadows JENNY'S TRIAL AND TRIUMPH. "I WOULD not put up with such treatment as you get from that woman, Jenny-no, not if she were my own mother. If she had me to deal with she should get as much as she gave," said Martha, with a shake of her closed hand. is "But would that be right, Martha? Aunt Fanny my father's sister, and is doing her best, I suppose, to make him comfortable. My slow ways vex but by and by I may succeed in pleasing her, her; for, indeed, I am trying." "That's just where you and I differ. Please her! I would be very sorry," cried Martha, sharply. No. 209. MAY, 1862. F "What right has she to order you about, as if you were a servant ?" "She does not, I think, mean to be unkind to me; but oh, she is not my own dear- and, while Jenny's voice refused to utter the loved name, her blue eyes looked down through a cloud of tears. This bit of talk, and a great deal more, passed between two young friends on their homeward way from school one fine autumn afternoon. Jenny Brown and Martha Smith had been friends since they were very little children. They had played with the same toys, read the same stories, learned the same lessons; and yet Martha's fiery eye was the sad tell-tale of a temper which was passionate though affectionate, while Jenny's sunny smile spoke only of gentleness and love. Still, as we may gather from the angry remarks of her young companion, Jenny had some home trials. For two years she had been learning, by sad experience, what it is to grow up motherless. She could well remember the dreadful day of the funeral, and how sure she felt that she never would be happy again. But time heals every sorrow except those that sin makes; and Jenny had enjoyed some happy days even since her mother's death. She attended school as usual, and was always ready to meet her father with a smile when he came home from the saw-mill where he worked in the village. But a daughter's smile, though very pleasant, is not the only thing necessary to make a house comfortable; and, as Jenny was rather given to dreaming than doing, her three little brothers' elbows and toes had a decided tendency to peep out, and her father had almost forgotten how a nice dinner tasted. The neighbours shook their heads and said they pitied the poor man, while Jenny was sure she worked very hard, and wondered why things would go wrong. Such was the state of affairs when an unmarried sister of Mr. Brown's came to pay them a visit, and her quick glance and ready hand wrought so wonderful a change in the house that she was asked to make it her home for the present. At first Jenny was glad: aunt Fanny's presence took such a load of undone work from her shoulders; but she soon found that her aunt's tongue and temper were as quick as her eye, and that it was not always easy to give soft answers to rough questions. However, Jenny remembered that she had often heard her mother say, "It always takes two to make a quarrel;" and so she made up her mind neither to play first nor second in so ugly a game. But she knew more than that -she could recollect how her mother used to pray with her every evening, asking the Saviour to make her meek and lowly like himself, that, as she grew up, she might have a woman's best adorning the ornament of a meek and quiet spirit. These words, hardly understood at the time, came back to Jenny's mind now. It is not always easy to turn good advice and prayers into good practice, and to be pleasant when other people are very provoking. But these moments of trial are just the moments for triumph, too. The morning on which our story begins had been a very trying one to poor Jenny. As a rule, her aunt found fault with almost everything she did; and, perhaps, after having given her some piece of work, snatched it from her hands, saying that it was no use trying to teach such an unhandy creature. Bitter words are among the bitterest of bitter things; but when they touch some one we love they are almost unbearable. Jenny had been up early to put the housework in as forward a state as possible before setting out for school, and felt sure that she should win her aunt's praise for once, when suddenly an unforeseen storm burst on her head. "What's all this noise about ?" cried aunt Fanny, showing an angry face; "I would like to know if you call that sweeping a room-just knocking your brush against the furniture, and then leaving all the dust where it was? What did your mother intend to make you? A fine lady, like herself, of course." "Aunt Fanny, I won't bear it; how dare you speak so of my dear, dear mother ?" was just coming to Jenny's lips; but the first two words only made their escape from that door, and the rest of the sentence, and many more unspoken ones, rushed down her cheeks in a flood of scalding tears. "And now let me tell you," added her aunt, "that this day is your last at school. I talked to your father about it last night, and told him what |