"But you said just now he loved you; why didn't he take you up there as well?" “I asked mother about that one day, when she was telling me she should have to go away; but she said she thought God had some work for me to do in the world first before he took me home." And Susie dried her tears, and tried to be brave and choke back her sobs as she spoke. "What work will you have to do ?" asked Elfie, sitting down on the floor close to Susie's stool. Elfie always preferred rolling on the floor to sitting on any kind of seat; and she greatly enjoyed questioning Susie. "Mother said God would teach me that if I asked him," answered Susie. "I don't know yet what it will be." "Then why don't you ask him?" said Elfie in her straightforward fashion. "I do," whispered Susie. "I ask him every night; because I want to do it, and then go home to mother." "Is that what you do when you kneel down before you get into bed?" asked Elfie. Susie nodded. answered. "O Elfie, Jesus don't think you're street rubbish!" said Susie. "I think he cares for people all the more when he knows they're poor, because he was a poor man himself once." "A poor man!" exclaimed Elfie; “why, you said he was God's Son, and all the world was his." "So it is; but when he came down here, the people wouldn't believe he was God's Son, and so he lived like a poor man-as poor as you and me, I think, Elfie." But Elfie shook her head. "I'm street rubbish, but you ain't," she said. "I've found a verse about it,” said Susie, "where Jesus says how poor he was-The foxes have holes, and the birds of the air have nests, but the Son of man hath not where to lay his head.' There; that means Jesus had no home or comfortable bed, he was so poor," said Susie. "He was Elfie sat looking at her in dumb surprise. just as poor as me," she said. "Why didn't he go away, and leave the people, if he was God's Son ?" "Because he loved them, and he wanted them to "God hears what I say, too," she know it, and to know that God loved them too, and wanted them to love him and be happy." "Well, then, why didn't your mother ask him to let her stay and help you to do the work, if she didn't want to go away," said Elfie sharply. Elfie had never had any one to love her in all her life, and she could but dimly understand what Susie meant; but she did understand it a little, and all the vain long Susie knew not what to answer. The question puz-ings she had felt when looking at a mother kissing her zled her not a little; and to escape from Elfie's saying any more, she proposed reading a chapter from the Bible. Elfie had grown tired of playing, and was quite willing to listen. She could not read herself, and was full of wonder that Susie could; and for some time she chattered and questioned so much about this that Susie could not begin; but at last she grew quiet, and Susie turned to her favourite verses in St. Matthew-the story of young children being brought to Jesus. "That was kind of him to say, Let the children come to nie," said Elfie when Susie paused. 'Yes; the Lord Jesus is always kind," said Susie. "I wish he was here in London; I'd go to him," said Elfie; "it's nice to have anybody speak kind to you." "You can go to him, Elfie," said Susie. "The Lord Jesus has gone up to heaven again now; but he'll hear you just as plain as though he was in the room here." Elfie stared. "You don't think I'm going to believe that, do you?" she said sharply. "Why not? it's the truth," said Susie. "Maybe it is for fine folks that wants a lot of things to live, but not for a poor little street girl like me," answered Elfie. "Why don't you think it's for you, Elfie ?" asked her companion. "Because I know what I am, and I guess he'd soon find out I was street rubbish, as the fine folks call me in the market;" and Elfie clenched her fist angrily as she spoke. child sprung up in her heart now, as she said, in a subdued, gentle voice, "I wish he'd love me just a little." "He does love you," said Susie, "not a little, but a great deal." "Did he tell you to tell me so ?" asked Elfie eagerly. Susie knew not what to reply to this; but the thought stole into her heart, "Was this the work her mother had spoken of-was she to tell Elfie of the love of God, try to make her understand it, and lead her to love him?" But her silence made Elfie think she had no message for her, and she said, "You need not be afraid to tell me, Susie; nobody ever did love me, and nobody ever will; and I don't want any love either." But in spite of these words, so sharply and angrily spoken, Elfie burst into tears. Susie had never seen her cry before, and for very sympathy she burst into tears herself, as she threw her arms round her companion's neck, and drew her closely towards her. "Don't cry, Elfie; I'll love you," she said. "I'll love you ever so much; and you'll believe God loves you too; won't you?" she added coaxingly. Elfie clung to Susie, and held her in a passionate embrace. 66 Say it again," she whispered-" say you love me, Susie; it's what I've been wanting ever so long, I think." "Everybody wants it," said Susie. "God puts the feeling in our heart, mother said; and then he gives us people to love us, just that we may know how he loves us himself." "Tell me some more about it," said Elfie, still in the same subdued voice, and clinging fast round Susie's neck, her dirty tangled head of hair resting on her shoulder. "I don't know how to tell it, Elfie, only as the Bible tells it. Mother made me learn a good many verses about the love of God. I'll tell you some of them. 'God is love ;' 'Like as a father pitieth his children, so the Lord pitieth them that fear him;' God so loved the world, that he gave his only begotten Son, that whosoever believeth in him should not perish, but have everlasting life.' Now, don't you see God must love you, for you're in the world, and God so loved the world that he sent Jesus Christ to die that we might be saved?" "Saved!" repeated Elfie. "Yes; saved from our sins-the wicked things we do that makes God sorry, and angry too," said Susie. But Elfie did not care to hear about this; she wanted to know whether it was possible for God to love herwhether he had told Susie he would love her. "I'd do anything for that," she said, pushing back her tangled hair. "Do you think he'd like me better if I was to keep my face clean and comb my hair like you do ?" she asked. Susie smiled. "I think God does like people to be clean," she said; "and I'd like it, Elfie." "Then I'll do it," said Elfie in a determined tone. "I've thought it was no good. Before, I was just street rubbish, and nobody cared for me; but if you do, and God will, I'll wash my face; and perhaps he will byand-by, as the Lord Jesus his Son was a poor man himself." And Elfie went at once to fetch some water to wash her face, and Susie promised to help her to do her hair. IMPRESSIONS OF CHRISTIAN LIFE AND WORK IN AMERICA, THE UNIVERSITY OF VIRGINIA. NE of my principal objects in visiting | Everywhere one sees evidences of former industry the United States was to ascertain, and comfort. In fact, the Virginian proprietors and as far as possible from personal appear to have lived much like the squires and observation, the character and effi- farmers of Yorkshire. But the war ruined them. ciency of the leading Educational Institutions. I Their capital was swept away. Slave labour no had heard much of them-much in their favour, longer exists; the soil is untilled; the houses are much to their disparagement. Elementary train- falling to decay; and every second farm is for ing was generally represented as superior to that sale, at a price scarcely more than nominal. The of England; but the colleges were as generally little roadside stations, and the walls of Gordonsspoken of as little better than grammar schools. ville and Charlottesville, were covered with adThe Universities of Princeton, Pennsylvania, and vertisements of farms and estates to be sold. Columbia I had already visited; and I was now Wherever the cars stopped, I had dozens of maps glad of an opportunity of inspecting one less and papers thrust into my hands, or thrown into known in Europe, and which, from its retired the carriage. I was told that capitalists from position and comparatively recent origin, might the North, and even enterprising Scotchmen, are be regarded as a fair type of American colleges. making large and profitable purchases. This will do good in the end. It will infuse new blood into the somewhat stagnant veins of the old population of Virginia. Charlottesville, in which the University of Virginia is located, is about ninety miles west of Richmond. The railway to it winds through a picturesque country, with hill and dale, river and upland. The primeval forests have long since been cut down; but a second growth, almost equal in places to the old trees, covers large tracts. The towns along the route are few and small. Gordonsville is the most important. Large farms, well cleared and fenced, line the railway; and not a few of the residences upon them rival in size and appearance the old manors of England. The scenery increases in beauty towards the west. At Gordonsville a change is noticeable. The hills are higher; the outline is more varied; and a rapid river, a tributary to the James, rushes along between richly-wooded banks. Towards Charlottesville the hill-tops become peaked; and their graceful forms and variegated foliage remind one of the environs of Heidelberg. Further westward still, they rise gradually, until at length, in dense clouds, so that the walk was not agreeable. On reaching the College, I called upon Professor Gildersleeve, to whom I had an introduction from my friends at Brook Hill. His welcome was thoroughly Virginian. I must make his house my home; and then and there he sent off his servant to the town for my baggage. His kindness, cordial as it was unexpected, gave me an opportunity which I could not otherwise have enjoyed of becoming acquainted with a body of as highly-cultivated gentlemen, as efficient professors, and as accomplished scholars, as it has ever been my good fortune to meet. Knowing my object in visiting them, they gave me every in the distance, they unite with the grand range | of the Blue Mountains. In an upland vale, embosomed in these hills, and encircled by forests, and green glades, and cultivated fields, lies Charlottesville, a town of some three or four thousand inhabitants. Externally, it resembles other American towns, situated like it far from the great centres of commerce. Its houses are widely scattered, and mostly built of wood; its streets are broad, but generally in a state of nature, with rude wooden side-paths, and carriage-ways covered with mud or dust. There is now no evidence of that wonderful progress and business bustle one sees in the North. The thoroughfares look deserted; many of the houses and stores are tenant-facility for gaining information. I had free access less; and there is a painful aspect of stagnation and decline. In fact, the war almost ruined Charlottesville, and left desolate the rich agricultural region of which it is the centre. On alighting from the car, I was invited by a negro conductor to enter a rickety-looking omnibus, which, he said, would convey me to the best hotel. I entered accordingly, and took my seat. After waiting with praiseworthy patience for half an hour, deserted by both conductor and coachman, I called to the former, whom I chanced to see emerging from a neighbouring whisky-store :-"When are you going to start?" "D'rekly, sa'; jess gwine," was the reply, and he sat down on a rail. Again I waited a dreary interval, battling with flies and choked with dust. At last I got out, and demanded my bag, which my friend had prudently taken possession of, expressing my determination at the same time to take up my quarters in the wretched hotel beside the depôt. This brought matters to a crisis. The conductor shouted; the coachman came out of the whisky-store and made his way to the box as quickly as, under his peculiar circumstances, was possible; and we jolted up the streets to the hotel. The University, I was told, is more than a mile distant; and as there was no conveyance available, I set out on foot. The road is thoroughly American; it is a broad strip of rough ground, inclosed by rude fences, and having here and there along one side a few planks so laid as to help the pedestrian over channels of water and pools of mud. The day was hot, and the dust rose at all hours to library, class-rooms, lecture-halls, laboratories, and even to the chambers of students. As far as it was possible, during my short stay, I saw and judged of everything for myself. The University occupies a splendid site at the base of two conical hills, surrounded by a park of some three hundred acres. The buildings have an odd, fantastic appearance. One can scarcely divest himself of the idea, especially if he looks down upon them as I did from the hills overhead, that the whole group is some kind of exaggerated toy structure-the little domes, and pediments, and porticos, and colonnades are so quaint and formal. In the centre is a rectangular lawn, or campus, with a rotunda at its northern end, modelled after the Pantheon; on each side is a range of residences for professors and students, with miniature porches or porticos, of different elevations and various orders of architecture. Each house, I believe, is designed after the style of some noted Greek or Roman temple. Outside the central group are other ranges of buildings; and beyond these again, scattered over the undulating grounds, are the newer houses, chambers, class-rooms, and laboratories. The numerous colonnades have one advantage: they form cloisters which afford a pleasant promenade during the winter rains, and the intense heat of a Southern summer. The University was founded by Thomas Jefferson, author of the "Declaration of American Independence," and the third President of the United States. Mr. Jefferson was one of the earliest advocates of national education. Nearly a century ago, he declared that free schools were an essential part—one of the columns, as he expressed it—of the State edifice; and he affirmed that without such instruction, free to all, the sacred flame of liberty could not be kept burning in the heart of Americans. And he did not stop at the elementary department, but, with the sagacity of a true statesman, and the zeal of a genuine patriot, he laboured to establish colleges, and thus promote the higher mental culture of the nation, knowing that mental culture and national prosperity must advance together. His scheme for university training was large and comprehensive. It was not, like a recent scheme devised in our own enlightened and highly-favoured land, shorn of some of the noblest departments of human knowledge, and muzzled in obedience to ecclesiastical dictation; but, in addition even to the ordinary branches taught in universities, it embraced schools of applied science, such as are now just beginning to be considered an essential part of our best institutions. Mr. Jefferson's influence was sufficient to induce the State of Virginia to build and endow the University. He superintended the work. Day after day he rode over to it from his beautiful house of Monticello. He imported capitals and pediments from Italy, so as to carry out his own favourite ideas of architecture. He even accomplished a more difficult and delicate task. He felt that, if the University would prosper, the professors must be men of eminence; and he was aware that such men could not easily be found in a new country. He therefore set aside national feeling and prejudice, and resolved, in the interests of learning, to endeavour to select professors in England. He was successful. The names of Charles Bonnycastle, Thomas Hewitt Key, and George Long, who were among the first professors, gave celebrity to the new University, and gave an impetus to scientific research in it which it has never lost. The University has some striking peculiarities, and I was anxious to see, as far as possible from observation and inquiry on the spot, how the plan works. The official " Catalogue" tells us that, "In this institution there is no curriculum, or prescribed course of study, to be pursued by every student, whatever his previous prepara tion or special objects. In establishing the University of Virginia, Mr. Jefferson, for the first time in America, threw open the doors of a university in the true sense of the name, providing, as amply as the available means would permit, for thorough instruction in independent schools on all the chief branches of learning, assuming that the opportunities for study thus presented were privileges to be voluntarily and eagerly sought, and allowing students to select for themselves the departments to which they were led, by their special tastes and proposed pursuits in life, to devote themselves. "The wisdom of this plan has been amply vindicated by time and experience; and within the last few years many of the institutions of higher culture in the United States have to a greater or less extent remodelled their method of study in accordance with the example here set. This elective system commends itself especially to those who desire to make professional attainments in any department of knowledge. At the same time, the courses of academic study are so arranged as to provide for the systematic prosecution of a complete plan of general education. "While every student may thus select the schools he will attend, in the academic department he is required as a rule to attend at least three, unless, upon the written request of his parent or guardian, or for good cause shown, the faculty shall allow him to attend less than three." There are sixteen chairs, and the occupant of each is head of a school or department, which is independent of all others. Instruction is given, as in the Scotch colleges, wholly through lectures and text-books, combined with examinations. The examinations are of three kinds :-1. Daily; 2. Intermediate and final general examinations; and 3. Examinations for graduation. In the first, each professor, "before commencing the lecture of the day, examines his class orally on the subject of the preceding lecture, as developed in the textbook or expounded in the lecture." "Two general examinations of each class are held during the session in the presence of a committee of the faculty, which every student is required to stand. The first, called the intermediate, is held about the middle of the session, and embraces in its scope the subjects of instruction in the first half of the course. The second, called the final, is held in the closing week of the session, and embraces the subjects treated of in the second half of the course. These examinations are conducted in writing. The questions have each numerical values attached to them. If the answers are valued in the aggregate at not less than threefourths of the aggregate values assigned to the questions, those giving them are ranked in the first division, and certificates of distinction are awarded to them......The results, whatever they may be, are communicated to parents and guardians. The standing of the student at these examinations is taken into account in ascertaining his qualifications for graduation in any of the schools. "The examinations for graduation are held in the last month of the session. They are conducted by the professor in presence of the other professors. They are chiefly carried on in writing, but in some of the schools they are partly oral." The following note is appended to the regulations for the various examinations, and, simple as it appears, is worthy of more general consideration than it gets in some countries:-"As a due acquaintance with the English language is indispensable to the attainment of any of the honours of the institution, all candidates for graduation are required to exhibit in their examinations due qualifications in this respect." When a young man has thus passed through one department (say Latin, Greek, or Philosophy) —that is, when he has attended regularly all the prelections, and satisfied the professor in the daily and term examinations, and when he has scored a minimum of seventy-five per cent. at a final examination, by written papers, upon the whole course then he receives a certificate of graduation in that department. This system secures thorough teaching, for the credit of the professor is at stake; and it is the natural ambition of each to keep up a high standard in his own department. The professor, besides, has in this way full opportunity of developing his subject, and thoroughly testing and training his students. He is not cramped and fettered by the routine requirements of a fixed examination. He is not tempted to "cram" just as much knowledge into the head of his unfortunate subject as will secure a "pass," or, it may be, score a certain number of marks, before an Examining Board. He has a far higher aim. He aims at mental culture; and he leads his students along with him to the lofty walks of scientific or literary research. He is an independent investigator; and it is his great ambition to inspire his pupils with a kindred spirit, and prepare them for the independent pursuit of knowledge. As in Scotland, the collegiate and university functions are united. The men who teach and train are the men who examine for and confer degrees. The examinations being continuous throughout the course, and not merely terminal, "cram" is avoided, and real culture secured. The degree of Master of Arts is conferred only upon such students as have graduated separately in the departments of Latin, Greek, French and German, pure Mathematics, Natural Philosophy, Moral Philosophy, Chemistry, History, and Literature; and who have afterwards scored at least seventy-five per cent. of marks at a general written examination, conducted by all the professors, and extending over the whole course. These examinations are lengthened and severe; and if the degrees of the University of Virginia be few in number-as of necessity they must be under such a system-they are evidences of thorough scholarship. There are no honour degrees; every degree is considered such. I was deeply impressed with the manifest earnestness alike of professors and students. As there is no compulsion in any department, and as there is entire freedom of choice in regard to subjects, there is no sham, and no mere formality in attendance upon lectures. Every man feels that it is work alone which can secure what he aims at. Routine would be useless. It is a place for study, and not for routine. Its system is based upon this principle; and the character of the professors individually, and of the college generally, is dependent upon the thoroughness of the training given, and on the superior culture of the alumni and graduates. It would not do to have all the universities in a country conformed to the model of the University of Virginia, just because all the young men |