SHORT TALES FOR LITTLE FOLK.

IS IT RIGHT?

How very stupid you were, Jane Wilson, this afternoon, you would not speak a word when we were working, you had no fun in you, and looked so grave, said Martha Moon to her school-fellow. Martha, I have made up my mind to try and sit quite still, and not talk, for you know very well when we do we are disobedient. I wonder what has come over you Jane; are you going to be very good? replied Martha, in a contemptuous tone. I do not intend to talk, returned Jane, in an afternoon, though you may laugh at me, and think I am setting myself up above others. I am sure I have no wish to do that; but I feel anxious to be a better girl, for a great deal of pains is taken with me, and I do not sufficiently attend to what I am told. If that is the case, said her companion, I hope I shall not often sit beside you. For my part, I see no harm in saying a word now and then, and enjoying a chat, when the mistress does not see me. But is it right, Martha, to do behind her back what we would not do if she was teaching? Perhaps not; but I do not care whether it is right or wrong. What has made you so particular, Jane? Last Sunday, when "our lady" was teaching us, she said we were to ask ourselves, when we were doing anything, if it was right? and if our consciences told us it was not, we were on no account to do what we knew to be wrong, or allow any one to ever persuade us; and that if we constantly did what was right in small matters, we should do so in great ones: it would become such a habit, that right

not wrong, would be the readiest. I do think, Martha, it would be a good plan, if we always got into the way of saying to ourselves, when we were doing anything, is it right? I believe there is some truth in what you say Jane, for I feel much happier when I do what is right, and I will endeavour to be more obedient. Do, dear Martha, for Christ "was obedient to the law for man," and He is our example; and let us earnestly pray, in the words of the Collect for Circumcision, that "we may in all things obey the blessed will" of God.

Missionary Entelligence.

MISSIONARY

YETTA.

EFFORTS IN MISSOURI.

(From the "Colonial Church Chronicle" for DECEMBER.)

REV. SIR,-I gladly avail myself of the present opportunity to give you some account of Church affairs in Missouri, one of the frontier Dioceses of the American Church.

This Diocese extends over a territory of about 64,000 square miles, and contains at present, besides the Bishop, only nine or ten Clergymen.

In St. Louis, the chief city, with a population of 60,000 souls, and where one faithful priest has gone to his rest, the Bishop has the care of five parishes, and only two Clergymen to assist him. Thus at best he has three parishes on his own unaided hands. During the prevalence of the Cholera, his labours were of course greatly augmented. He has been

everywhere the friend, and sometimes almost the only friend, of the sick and dying-risking his own life for the poor as well as the rich-ministering to those whom the pestilence made friendless-in season and out of season at the bed of death-burying the dead. Day and night he forgot his own needful rest when any of his flock needed his presence." Above all, he was daily in the open church; calling the people to their prayers, and leading them in their devotions.

If these almost incredible labours shall not remove him from his Diocese, we shall have cause to thank God, for it is His mercy alone that could sustain him. Such an accumulation of labours gives him but little opportunity to visit the distant portions of his immense Diocese, where his Visitations are needed and longed for by the people, hungering for his ministrations. And this again prevents the speedy establishing and nourishing of the Church in those parts. The country is filled or filling, with a substantial and well-to-do population-it is fast becoming a rich country, and all that is wanting is the Church, to make it one of the finest countries in the world. But of the Church, the great body of the people are entirely ignorant; they have only those crude notions of the Christian Religion which are propagated by the various sects of religionists, whose opinions and doctrines are daily assuming new and grotesque forms.

To establish the Church among such a people, (and it can be done,) requires a Clergy well-disciplined and energetic, who are able to endure hardness as good soldiers. Where shall they be obtained? Among the young Clergy who year by year are ordained from among the graduates of the divinity schools in the East, not five in a hundred will listen to

a proposition to go beyond the mountains-not five in a thousand will go beyond the Mississippi. It is impossible, therefore to expect that Missouri should be supplied with Clergy from the East; hence the Bishop is compelled to begin their training in his own Diocese.

For this purpose he has founded "The Mission" This is designed to be strictly a religious house, whose inmates, clerical and lay, devote their lives without stipend to the service of the Church. This service comprehends the ministrations of God's Word and Sacraments everywhere among the people, catechizing the children and youth, seeking for Christ's sheep that are dispersed abroad, while day by day their most assiduous attention is given to the School whose pupils are to be the future Clergy of the Diocese. The house has been established a little more than a year; it was begun in great weakness, apparently, its only endowment being, Faith and Poverty. It has pleased the good Lord, however, already to give it many tokens of His favour, and though at present it is "small, and of no reputation," yet are we full of hope and courage respecting it. It has a domain of about 400 acres of land, but the revenue arising from this is, and must be, for a long time, very small; it only gives room to stand. We have also the beginning of a Library, the books which belonged formerly to Kemper College, in great part the pious gifts of Churchmen in England. Owing to the want of buildings we are yet unable to receive above twentyfive boys into the Mission family, though many others from the families in the neighbourhood, both within and out of the Church, receive day by day the benefits of the School.

We begin with boys of the age of eight to twelve years, The course of instruction is modelled, as nearly as circumstances will permit, upon that of the best Grammar Schools in England; it will include also the College course, and the study of Divinity for those whom it shall please God to call to the order and ministry of the Priesthood. As you would suppose, the religious instruction of the pupils is made very prominent, and most carefully watched over; it is in strict accordance with that system of discipline by which the Holy Church brings up her children in the nurture and admonition of the Lord. By such a course of instruction we are sure, by the blessing of Almighty God, that our Christian boys will grow up Christian men and gentlemen-fitted, so far as a right system of discipline can fit them, for any station in life to which they may be called.

Thus they learn early the holy ways of the Church, they join their voices every day in its solemn acts of Divine Worship with a child-like simplicity they say the sweet Prayers, they chant the beautiful Psalms, they become early and frequent communicants, they learn early to practise self-mortification and self-discipline, and thus enfolded in the arms of the Church they are preserved from many dangers and delusions to which in other circumstances they would be exposed.

At present we are only two priests and one lay-brother as instructors, but we hope for a stronger force by-and-by, and far greater facilities for doing our work.

For these we are content to wait till it shall please God to give them to us. In the meantime we are glad and thankful if we are remembered in the prayers and alms-deeds of our