THE YOUTH’S CABINET.

A Conversation about Death.

  
  
 
 

H mer is dead |”

“Ts she, my son?”
“Yes, sir, she’s
dead: Mary has just
come from the house,
and she says that she
stood by the head of the bed, and looked
over the headboard, and there she saw
her die. I am so sorry !”

.“ Are you sorry ?”

“O yes, sir, 1 am; 1 am so Sorry. It
made my heart ache to think of such a
loss as she will be.to her mother, and to
all of us children.¥ Does your heart ever
ache, papa %”

“Yes, Tommy. I’ve had my heart-
aches, and many of them; but you seem
to forget that it is only two short years
since our precious little Emma, your sis-
ter, was laid in the grave—the last of our
household, Tommy, except you and my-
self. I think, my son, that it is reason
for one’s heart to ache at such a time. It
is not every one who has a heart to feel
such sorrows as you have described. 0,
no: we need not be ashamed to cry,
when our tears flow from an affectionate
sorrow. I should regret that the fountain
of tears was ever dried up in your heart.
[ would have you always feel for the sor-
rows of others, and to sympathize with
their griefs, even to tears.”

“Yes, sir; our poor, sweet little sister
Emma—lI often have cried for her and
for you, papa, to think that your little
pet, as she always used to call herself,
would. sit upon your lap, and lay her
smooth.face beside yours 20 more.” -

“But your crying, Tommy, could not

call the dear one to life any more; nor
did my own keen sorrows and heart-aches
ever revive one feature of that sweet face,
or awake her bright smiles, or kindle a
spark of intelligence in that pretty eye of
hers. O no, Tommy; all was hushed
and closed forever; and I had, from that
time, only to live upon the past, and to
call to mind how the dear one did look,
and how she spoke, and how she smiled ;
and the music of her voice, too, all now
so hushed into stillness forever !”

“But you can remember her, can you
not, papa? and little Anna’s parents, they
can remember little Anna even though
she be dead, can’t they ?”

“©, surely they can, and the memory
of such a child will ever be sweet. ‘A
thing of beauty,’ says the poet, ‘is a joy
forever? and it has often revived me to
bear in mind that our Emma was ‘a thing
of beauty,’ and that I could always take
a mournful satisfaction in calling up her
image as pictured upon my mind. Here,
Tommy, read what Burns says, while his
heart was smarting under sorrow.”

‘Still o’er these scenes the memory wakes,
And fondly broods with miser care ;

Time but the impression deeper makes,
As streams thin channels deeper wear.’

“T believe, papa, I am sorry I told you
that little Anna was dead, and that I said
so much about it.”

“Why so?”

“ Because it makes you so sad.”

“© well, my son, you know it is said
in that best of all books, the Bible, that
it is better to go to the house of mourn-
ing, than to the house of feasting : and
so you will often have occasion through