The young soldier respectfully and gently took my offered hand and held it in his own while my father continued, "You may imagine how my heart has ached and trembled for her-my pure white flower-my only, motherless child. A houseful of soldiers and no protector! But now I do not fear; I commit her to your charge: one bearing the name of my noble friend can never be so unworthy of it, and of the blood that runs in his veins, as to allow one breath of insult to blow upon one so young and fair and unprotected as she is!" "I trust I need not say your confidence is not misplaced, sir,” replied the latter; "while I remain in this house, Mademoiselle Léonie need fear nothing. It will be only too great a pleasure if I can, in any small degree, be a helper to her under these trying circumstances. A protector from my soldiers, I assure you, she would not require. Boisterous they may be, but no lady need fear them. To-night, my absence, and the excessive enjoyment of such comfortable quarters after a fortnight's incessant marching and camping out, and some hard fighting, led them to indulge in the indecorous mirth which annoyed and alarmed you; but you have nothing more to fear. In offering my help and protection, mademoiselle, would that I could substitute friendship," he said, now pointedly addressing me; "but, alas! I cannot hope you can accept that from one in this garb," glancing at his uniform. "That is needed to complete your likeness to my friend," rejoined my father; "he wore the uniform of a dragoon regiment—almost the same as your own; and, as for the cause of your being in this house, I have too little sympathy with this unhappy war to let it stand as a bar to my feeling friendship for a man whose duty leads him to fight against us in it. And now, Captain von Edelstein, let me hear that you really are the man I take you for. Take that seat" (pointing to one opposite), "and tell me of your family.” I must not attempt to detail the conversation that followed, as I think I could, it seems so stamped in my mind,-almost, I believe, the very words. But it would take long to do so, and there is no need. A few sentences served to establish our guest's identity. He was the only son of the youngest brother of my father's friend, | who, like himself, had been in the army, and had died when he (Captain von Edelstein) was quite a child. His uncle Conrad had been dead many years before his father's marriage, his mother had never even seen him; but his uncle Rudolph, who had inherited the family estates, and of whom he had known little, had remarked at their last meeting, some two years before, on his striking resemblance to the brother who had been cut off in the bloom of a most promising youth. He had resided with his widowed mother and sister in Munich, where they were still living. He had never heard my father's name,- —a fact easily accounted for by the early death of his own. For some time the conversation lingered over Munich. My father had many questions to ask-many brief but pregnant histories to hear. Then they spoke of various topics-literary, scientific, and general. I sat and listened with rare enjoyment. It was so new to me to hear a conversation; and this was one worth listening to. The stranger was a man of intellectual tastes and cultivated mind, and my father evidently keenly relished the having some one upon whom he could whet his long unused weapons of argument. In some things their opinions differed widely. I saw, running like a scarlet thread through all the stranger said-GOD; absolute trust in, reverence for, and submission to Him. It was not that their conversation turned on religious topics; indeed, I thought my father studiously avoided them,-doubtless on my account; but reference to, and acknowledgment of God, seemed ever falling, naturally and unconsciously as it were, from Captain von Edelstein's lips. It was strange, very strange to me; and, as I watched the varied expressions pass over his face from my shaded seat, the conviction grew upon me that Conrad von Edelstein had the light I so yearned after-he knew God, and God was light: knew him, not to fear and tremble in the dust before him; but knew him as an over-ruling providence, as a protector, a helper,—it even appeared, as a friend. At last my father turned to the subject the young Captain courteously acknowledged he had avoided, as one which it might be painful to discuss with him. But when asked, he frankly gave us his opinion of the position in which our unhappy country was placed. He acknowledged she had vast resources as yet undrawn upon, that armies were springing up as mushrooms, and that the spirit of the nation was rising to the emergency; but all, he said, would but lengthen the struggle. France might strain the strength and endurance of Germany to the utmost, but conquer her-never! | Not as she then was. Confusion, mismanagement, collapse, had been the history of her old armies; defeat, discouragement, and destruction waited on her new ones. The raw, unprepared masses, would be blown away like froth before German discipline and experience. The struggle might, he feared would be, long and terribleperhaps was only even begun; but of what the end would be he had no doubt. He spoke with generous warmth of the bravery of the French soldiers in the earlier engagements, with earnest compassion of the sorrow and misery he had witnessed. More than once his deep tones faltered as he recorded some thrilling tale of heroism, of patience, of suffering. My tears fell fast. I had scarcely realized before, the harrowing scenes which were daily being enacted so near to mewhich might so soon be brought to my own door, -ay, within it! At length Barbe brought in coffee; after which our guest-we no longer felt him to be stranger or enemy-took leave of us for the night, for my father was worn and weary with the exciting incidents of the day. HOW THE PASTOR OF THE DESERT WOOED HIS BRIDE. BY THE AUTHOR OF THE SPANISH BROTHERS," ETC. A page in the story of one of those obscure heroes who, in the dark days between the Revocation of the Edict of Nantes and the Revolution, brought to their fellow-Protestants that living water which was indeed the blood of the men who went for it in jeopardy of their lives. AIR lamb of my flock in the desert fed, Through thorny paths have thy Yet never, in sunshine, in storm, or in mist, On the vessel's deck, in the ocean's cave, And the bullets whistled, the swords flashed red, Still thy pale pure face and thy thoughtful brow Looked up to mine, as they do e'en now.Who knoweth what life hath in store for thee? Lay thine hand on thy heart, and answer me. "What if it befell thee to give that heart To one who on earth had an exile's part? Doomed to wander forlorn o'er mountain and plain, In the burning sun, in the drenching rain; Not even a stone to pillow his head; She raised her blue eyes, with tear-drops dim, And softly said, "I should follow him,” "My child, think once more; for I speak to thee Of things that have been, and again may be. One day, perchance, thou wilt sit at home, Watching and wondering, When will he come?' Lo, steps at the door! Hark, a voice in the street! Up springs the watcher-oh, what does she meet? A rude litter of planks, a cloak-covered form, With a wound in the side and the blood gush ing warm.— Say, would thy heart break 'neath its burden of pain, Or melt into tears, like the summer's first rain?" From cheek and from lip the bright roses have died, Yet, calm and unflinching, the maiden replied: "My hand on his heart, if the least throb I found, I would just say, 'Thank God!' and bind up the wound." "But what if a darker, more terrible doom Enveloped thy life with its mantle of gloom? If the fell ghastly arm of the dread gallows tree Were stretched over all that is dearest to thee? Alone on the ladder of death see him stand; Not a farewell word, for the drums beat loud: There was mystic fire in her blue eyes' glow, "Yea;—and bless Him for grace to His martyr given; Then look up to Him, and look on to His heaven." By an altar of stone, on the wild sea-shore, To hold one another till death should them Together partook of the bread and the wine, He was dearer to both than each was to each. THE ROMAN CATACOMBS AND THEIR RELIGIOUS TEACHINGS. PART III. sown upon the wandering winds, still-still the Lord knoweth them that are his, and counts the dust of his chosen. Tertullian ridicules the The hope of the resurrection is often strikingly expressed in the Christian epitaphs. The following example is of date A.D. 544 :-) HE doctrine of the Resurrection, which is peculiarly the characteristic of our holy religion as distinguished from all the faiths of antiquity, was every-heathen for believing the doctrine of metempsywhere recorded throughout the Catacombs. It chosis, and rejecting that of the resurrection. was symbolized in ever-recurring representations "God forbid that he should abandon to everlastof the story of Jonah and of the raising of Lazarus, ing destruction," he exclaims, "the labour of his and was strongly asserted in numerous inscrip- own hands, the care of his own thoughts, the retions. As the early Christians laid the remains ceptacle of his own Spirit!" of the departed saints in their last long restingplace, the sacred words of the Gospel, "I am the resurrection, and the life," must have rung with strange power through the long corridors of that silent city of the dead, and have filled the hearts of the believers, though surrounded by the evidences of their mortality, with an exultant thrill of triumph over death and the grave. This was a recompense for all their pains. Of this, not even the malignant ingenuity of persecution could deprive them. Even though the body were consumed, and its ashes strewn upon the waters or HIC REQVIESCIT CARO MEA NOVISSIMO VERO DI PER XPM CREDO RESVSCITABITVR A MORTVIS. Here rests my flesh; but at the last day, through Christ, I believe it will be raised from the dead. The next is from the Lapidarian Gallery in the Vatican : RELICTIS TVIS IACIS IN PACE SOPORE MERITA RESVRGIS TEMPORALIS TIBI DATA REQVETIO. You, well-deserving one, having left your [relations], lie in peace; you will arise: a temporary rest is granted you. In an epitaph of the year A.D. 449, we read: RECEPTA CELO MERVIT OCCVRRERE XPO AD RESVRRECTIONEM PRÆMIVM ÆTERNVM SVSCIPERE DIGNA. Received into Heaven, she deserved to go to Christ, [and was] worthy to receive the eternal reward of the resurrection. In the following, from the Catacomb of Naples, Christian confidence adopts the sublime language of Job:: CREDO QVIA REDEMPTOR MEVS BIBIT [sic] ET NOBISSIMO DIE DE TERRA SVSCITABIT ME IN CARNE MEA VIDEBO DOM. I believe, because that my Redeemer liveth, and in the till they should stand up upon their feet, an exceeding great army. But this sleep was a sleep of the body only, not of the soul. The primitive Christians were assured, as we have seen, of the immediate happiness of those who died in the faith. They believed that being absent from the body they were present with the Lord; that as soon as they passed from earth's living death they entered into the undying life and unfading bliss of Heaven. Though surrounded by the mouldering bodies of the saints in Christ, the eye of faith beheld their last day shall raise me from the earth, that in my flesh glorified spirits, starry-crowned and palm-bearing, I shall see the Lord. More briefly is this cardinal doctrine asserted in the following :— JVSTVS CVM SCIS XPO MEDIANTE RESVRGET. Justus, who will rise with the saints through Christ. HIC IN PACE REQVIESCIT LAVRENTIA QVI CREDIDIT RESVRRECTIONEM. Here reposes in peace Laurentia, who believed in the resurrection. For terse brevity the following would be hard to surpass: "Clementia, tortured, dead, sleeps, will rise." The very idea of death seems to have been repudiated by the primitive Christians. "Non "Non mortua, sed data somno," says Prudentius, in paraphrase of the words of our Lord; "She is not dead, but sleepeth." So also a Christian epitaph asserts: ALEXANDER MORTUUS NON EST SED VIVIT SUPER ASTRA, "Alexander is not dead, but lives above the stars." Hence the catacomb was designated the cometerium, or place of sleeping; and the funeral vault the cubiculum, or sleeping chamber. The dead were not "buried," as the pagan expressions conditus, compositus, situs indicate; but depositus, "laid down" in their lowly beds, till the everlasting morn should come, and the angel's trump awake them-consigned as a precious trust to the tender keeping of mother Earth, and "lying in wait for the resurrection." The saints were "fallen asleep" in Jesus; and on the bridal morning of the soul, they would awake with his likeness, and be satisfied. The primitive Christians believed that the Power which called a Lazarus from the tomb could wake to life again the slumbering millions of this valley of dry bones-vaster far than that of Ezekiel's vision among the white-robed multitude before the throne of God. They admitted no thought of a long and dreary period of forgetfulness, nor probation of purgatorial fires, before the soul could enter into joy and peace. The sublime reflections with which St. Cyprian concludes his treatise De Mortalitate, nobly express the grand consoling thoughts which sustained the primitive Christian, and which sustain God's saints in every age. We are but pilgrims and strangers here below," he exclaims; "let us then welcome the day which assigns to each one of us his resting-place, and restores us, released from this world's bondage, to the joys of Paradise. What exile longs not to return to his native land? Who that hastens home desires not a prosperous wind, that he may the sooner embrace the objects of his love? Our true native land is Paradise; the patriarchs are our true ancestors;—why then do we not hasten, yea run, to behold the land of our birth, and to behold our kinsmen? It is a large and loving company that expects us thereof parents, brothers, sons—a mighty multitude, evermore assured of their own salvation, but anxious still concerning ours. O the joy on either side, when we shall look upon them and embrace them! O the bliss of those celestial realms, where no fear of dying enters! O the rapturous prospect of life for evermore! There the glorious choir of the apostles awaits us; there the exulting company of the prophets; there the countless army of martyrs, crowned because they strove unto death, and conquered ! To them, brethren beloved, let us eagerly hasten; let us long to be with them the sooner, that we may the sooner be with CHRIST!" What a striking contrast to these holy hopes is the pagan's blankness of despair concerning the future! Compared with this assurance of blissful immortality, how cold and cheerless are their shadowy Elysium and their unsubstantial visions of the spirit-world! how terrible the gloomy realms of Tartarus-dark Lethe's stream, and Styx, and fiery Phlegethon! Like a gleam of heaven's sunshine in a dark benighted age are these rude inscriptions of the early Christians. Sublimer is their lofty hope-reaching forward beyond this world, and laying hands of faith upon the eternal verities of the world to come-than the imperishable renown of classic sages, or the Roman poet's boast of earthly immortality-Non omnis moriar. Even the high philosophy of Greece, and the noble Stoicism of the Roman mind, affords no consolation to the soul brought face to face with the solemn mystery of death. A forced, a sullen submission to the inevitable, is all that they can teach. They shed no light upon the world beyond the grave: DOMVS ÆTERNA, “an eternal home," and SOMNVS ÆTERNALIS, “an eternal sleep," is written on their tombs, frequently accompanied by an inverted torch, the emblem of despair. To them death is an unsolved and insoluble problem. Their loftiest reasonings lack authority to satisfy the mind. It is the gospel of Christ alone which brings life and immortality to light, which appeases the soul-hunger of mankind, and meets the yearning cry of the human heart. Even the thoughtful mind of Pliny can extract no comfort from the various theories concerning the future state, but looks forward to annihilation as the universal doom. "To all," he says, " from the last day of life is there the same lot that there was before the first; nor is there any more consciousness after death than there was before birth." Of Agricola, the wise and good, the philosophic Tacitus can only say, with an incredulous sigh, “If there be a place for the departed spirits of the just, if great souls perish not with the body, mayest thou calmly rest."+"That the manes are anything," says Juvenal, or that the nether world is anything, not even boys believe, 66 "Omnibus a suprema die eadem quæ ante primum, nec magis a morte sensus ullus aut corporis aut animæ quam ante natatem.' "Si quis piorum manibus locus, si non cum corpore extinguuntur magnæ animæ placide quiescas."-Vit. Agric. ET RAPTAM INFERNA ME POSVERE RATE. The cruel fates anticipate the day of life, and place me, snatched away, in the infernal bark. The desponding view of life in the following is like the bitter experience of the Hebrew moralist, "Vanity of vanities, all is vanity!” DECIPIMVR VOTIS ET TEMPORE FALLIMUR, ET MORS We are deceived by our wishes, misled by time, and death derides our cares: anxious life is naught. Of similar character is the following, recalling the complaint of Job, "Man cometh forth as a flower, and is cut down :” VIVE LACTVS QVINCVNQVE VIVIS. VITA PARVVM MVNVS EST. MOX EXORTA EST SENSIM VIGESCIT. DEINDE SENSI DEFICIT. Live joyful, whoever thou art [that livest]. Life is a small gift. It is scarcely sprung up when it imperceptibly flourishes, and then imperceptibly declines. The following is remarkable for its misanthropy ANIMAL INGRATIVS HOMINE NVLLVM EST. No animal is more ungrateful than man. The inspired apothegm, "We brought nothing into this world, and it is certain we can carry nothing out," is illustrated in the following EX OMNIBVS BONIS SVIS HOC SIBI SVMPSERVNT. Of all their wealth, they possess only this tomb. |