Hugh and his father were soon off.

"Is he dangerously hurt?" Mr. Wyndham asked the doctor in a low voice as they went upstairs.

"He is very badly hurt is all that I can say at present. It is his leg."

"Oh, Charley!" exclaimed Hugh, as he took his schoolfellow's hand, "I am so sorry!"

"It's good of you to come," answered the boy quickly. "I've been such a brute to you lately, Hugh!"

"You were a bit big for me, you see, Charley. But now you are in bed it won't matter. I'll stay with you and it'll be jolly."

"You forgive me, Hugh? Did you mind?"

But Hugh could not trust himself to speak. He just stooped down and caught his friend's hand-and Charley understood.

For a few days the boys were a good deal together,

"And God be with you, my son!" said his father gently.

The sad truth had broken in on the poor sufferer as he fought his way back from unconsciousness and stupor, and great were his sorrow and despair!

"Oh, Hugh!" he sobbed. "Come to me! Help me! You are the only one that can understand!" "Poor Charley!" whispered Hugh with trembling lips. "Talk to me; talk to me!" cried the sick boy feverishly-"you are a cripple, too, and so you must help me."

And the little hunchback drew near his friend, and spoke helpful words.

"It seems hard at first, Charley, much harder for you than me, for I've always been as I am-but I have lots of happy things in my life-and do you know, the happiest are really wrapped up in my burden. Your

friendship, Charley, is one of the best things, and I don't think I should have got that in the first place if I hadn't been a cripple; and lots of people are kind to me because of it, and most of the boys at school; and I enjoy heaps of things. And, Charley, boy, the best thing of all is "-and his voice softened-"that when you have a burden to carry you want Jesus Christ to be with you much more than if you were quite strong, and when you want Him, He comes, you know."

"I have never wanted Him," moaned Charley. "I have only wanted to be a great athlete, and now it is all gone!"

'Perhaps you will have different things to make up. I have had such a lot of make-ups; and you know, Charley, I've wanted to be strong, and like other boys awfully sometimes. But I guess you'll want Him most of all."

"I want somebody to help me," cried the sick boy. "Somebody very strong!"

Hugh's face lit up with his pleasant smile.

"He is strong to save, Charley. I often say that over to myself. For we lame boys must lean on somebody who is strong."

"You don't seem to have the horror of it, Hugh, like I have. A cripple sounds so awful to me!"

"Well, you see," answered the little hunchback wisely. "I know a lot more about it. I have lost the horror." "You talk as if Jesus Christ were your living Friend," said Charley, looking puzzled.

"He is!" answered Hugh simply.

"Ask Him to be mine," in smothered tones, "for I'm a cripple too now!"

So Hugh asked Him, and Charley joined in the boyish prayer.

As the time went on Charley Coates grew stronger, and, as his parents were in India, he went to spend the holidays with the Wyndhams, and he learned much of the true lore of life in his intercourse with them.

He was always rather shy of speaking about his own feelings to any one but Hugh; but the younger boy was far the elder in the spiritual life, and his simple childlike faith gave Charley a new ideal, and helped him to take up his crutches with the earnest resolve to be as brave as Hugh.

"I never thought when you first came to school, Hugh, that you would do so much for me. I thought I might help you, perhaps."

"So you did, old boy, an awful lot! But have I really done anything for you, Charley?" asked Hugh wistfully.

"Nobody else could have helped me like you have.

When I was ill I didn't want any one but you, and nobody but a cripple could have understood me as you did.” "I am so glad," said Hugh softly.

"And more even than that," continued Charley, putting his arm round his friend's neck. "I never thought anything about good things till I knew you. And when you first came to school, Hugh, and were so jo'ly and plucky, I somehow knew that you were a good boy, and you made goodness seem nice and brave, and not a bit milk-soppish, like I used to think it was. And even when I was so horrid I noticed that you were not a bit nasty about it. But when I lost my leg I understood how dreadful being a cripple really is, and I knew that you couldn't just have been bright and brave and good in spite of it-of yourself. And I learned then that it was Christ Who helped you. And He will help me, too, I know now." "Oh, Charley!" cried Hugh in a choking voice, "I've never been glad before that I was a hunchback, but I am now, if it has done all this for you!”

"You see, my son," said Mr. Wyndham, when Hugh told him about it all, "the burden that God gave you to carry, and which seemed so doubly hard to you because it showed, was full of blessing all the time. A blessing for Charley, whom you wanted so much to help, just because it showed."

"I won't call my crooked back a burden any more. We don't call a parcel of good things a burden, do we father? and there must be something very good inside my burden if it has really done this for Charley." "Yes, darling. The Hand of God was in it, which has drawn your friend unto Himself."

EDITH HENRIETTA FOWLER.

THE

HE oasis I am about to describe has an important place in Bible study. For more than forty years intelligent explorers were trying to discover it.

We first read of it in Gen. xiv. 7, as "En Mishphat," or (Kadesh). When that old world conqueror Chedorlaomer, King of Elam-a region below Babylon-made his great march of over twelve hundred miles, sweeping away all his foes, he evidently halted to rest his army at Kadesh.

Many many years passed away, and again it was visited by a huge array. For the Israelites after their escape from Egypt, and after their sojourn at the sacred mount of Sinai, proceeded on their way to the Promised Land, and they too halted at Kadesh. It was the spot from which they sent out spies.

An oasis is a place where water exists. Water in an Eastern land is the all-needful blessing. We Westerns have so many streams, rivers, brooks, lakes, or ponds,

that very rarely do we suffer from the want of water, but in deserts it is not so, you travel for days without finding any. Now deserts are not flat, but composed generally of ridges of barren hills with winding ravines or wadies as they are termed, valleys which twist in and out among the barren ranges-like a maze or network of passes. An oasis is usually most difficult for a stranger to find: there is nothing to guide you, no road, no track, except on the flat portions of the deserts, and these are rare-and one stony range is so like another in height and form, that you cannot spy out the spot. When you do, you find a paradise in the burning wa te, for the water gives life to trees, shrubs, and grass, and when the water supply is large, to crops of corn. For days you may have been travelling amongst hills baked brown, along valleys the very ground of which is hot. Almost stifled by the heated air, you surmount a ridge, turn a corner, and lo! a group of trees, water murmuring through grassy banks, birds flitting about or singing in the bushes, life and

hope revive. Great is the restful charm of colour to the eye weary with browns and yellows. The cool green of palm or mimosa is most grateful. Such is the general aspect of an oasis.

I have visited many a one, but in every desert the Bedouin know of others which they will not reveal to Europeans, for while there is so much animosity-tribe against tribe it is all important that some oasis should only be known to the tribe which lives nearest. To reveal where water may be found may destroy all chance of life to an Arab fleeing from his foes. Therefore, every enemy tries to secure the wells or the oasis, knowing that if they can but hold the water supply, their foe must be driven away into the pure desert, which means death.

I often think of one oasis I saw in the desert of Sinai : it is unmarked on any maps; my Bedouin took me to it after I had solemnly promised never to reveal its whereabouts. We were camped in a stony gorge-barren granite hills surrounding us, we climbed some low ridges, and there below, in a secluded dell, a large pool of pure water fed by a strong spring issued from the rock. Palm trees, papyrus, reeds and flowers, we re-filled our waterskins and returned happy to camp. If I were travelling there now, I do not think I could find the place, nature has so hidden it away.

Such being the general characteristics of an oasis, let us now go back to the one at Kadesh. From Holy Writ we see that it must have been large,-space enough for a multitude to camp at, and with a good supply of water; otherwise Chedorlaomer would not have selected it for his camp, nor would Moses. Later on probably Hobab who was "eyes" or guide to Moses, knew it. It must necessarily have been near the great highway tracks to Canaan. The ancient Egyptians knew of it, for inscriptions speak of "Kadesh of the Amorites," to distinguish it from "Kadesh on the Orontes," "Kadesh of the Hittites." Yet it was lost to modern explorers; even now in Smith's Biblical Dictionary as well as in many maps, the position is wrongly marked.

The Rev. J. Rowlands, chaplain to Bishop Alexander of Jerusalem, was first to re-discover the true site. He was travelling in the desert to examine the southern boundary of the Holy Land. He well describes the awful character of the desert.

"It was a confused chaos of chalk, and had the appearance of an immense furnace glowing with white heat, illuminated as it now was by the fierce rays of the sun. There did not appear to be the least particle of vegetation in all the dreary waste, all was drought and barrenness and desolation.":

He then describes his route, and the discovery. "Our excitement while we stood before the rock smitten by Moses, and gazed on the lovely stream which still issues forth from under the base of this rock was such as baffles description. We paced backwards and forwards, examining the rock and the source of the stream, looking at the pretty little cascades which it forms as it descends into the channel of a rain torrent beneath. The rock is a large single mass or small hill of solid rock, the only visible naked rock in the whole district. The stream running three hundred or four hundred yards loses itself in the sand."

Traveller after traveller fired by this description sought to visit this place. Professor Palmer, second to none in knowledge of Arab character and desert paths, was misled. The Sheykh of his party admitted afterwards that he had purposely kept the great professor from seeing this

oasis.

The Rev. F. Holland, who had "no peer" in his knowledge of the desert, left England purposely to try to find it. He was deterred "by the disturbed state of the country owing to constant raids of Arabs from the east, and by excessive drought."

To the good fortune and perseverance of Dr. Trumball, a celebrated American traveller, we owe its re-discovery. He had the good fortune to persuade the Bedouin to take him there. He found that the place is now 66 Ain Gades" which in Arabic has the same meaning as the Hebrew "Kadesh," i.e., "Holy."

The plain amongst the hills is several miles wide, affording ample camping ground for a host; near is a "water-bed of unusual fertility-fields of wheat and barley with remains of plantations." Dr. Trumball says: "It was a marvellous sight! out on the barren and desolate stretch of the burning desert waste. We had come with magical suddenness into an oasis of verdure and beauty unlooked for, and hardly conceivable in such a region. A carpet of grass covered the ground. Fig-trees laden with fruit nearly ripe enough for eating were along the shelter of the southern hill-side. Shrubs and flowers showed themselves in variety and profusion, running water gurgled under the waving grass. We had seen nothing like it since leaving Wady Feiran, nor was it equalled in loveliness of scene by a single bit of landscape of like extent even then."

And so in 1881, the lost oasis was found.

We now know where Miriam died, and also the spot from which the forty years wanderings of the Israelites began. It was the pivot of the wanderings. I think my story full of Biblical interest, as well as a good lesson in perseverance.

STUDIES IN THE BOOK OF JOSHUA.

1. What promises were given to Joshua regarding the presence of God?

2. What warning was given of the possible withdrawal of that presence?

3. Where did Joshua build an altar?

4. Find a command given to Joshua which was also

given to Moses when he met with God, and which is referred to by Stephen.

5. Find the record of the fulfilment of God's promise to Abraham in Gen. xiii. 15.

6. Find the record of the fulfilment of the judgment pronounced against Israel in Num. xiv. 29-31.

7. How did Joshua fulfil Moses' command in Deut. xi. and xxvii.?