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January 6, igog. THE PRESBYTERIA I think there you would soon learn to appreciate red hair." "Ernest, your teacher is justly proud of you. You can both go." "Oh, I do hope you can promote him, Professor! Ever since I first noticed him in school, we've had a queer sort of understanding. I'm sure we could make the most of each other." "I sincerely hope he will be promoted!" snapped his teacher. Pat Dillon was promoted at Christmas, and from the day he entered Miss McClain's room?and looked into her eyes, he became a different boy. He was from the beginning her messenger, because, when she looked UD to select some one a nair nf eatrpr hhip pvpc hprrcrprl ? - ? i ? ?a - - ~ J "vbb^^ to be of service. The principal watched with interest the developing of the red-headed boy, by the tactful, intelligent, redheaded teacher. "Miss McClain has the best behaved grade in school. I've taught it twice," declared one senior to another whom she met in the hall, on her way to fill Miss Mc* Clain's vacant seat. "I'm certainly glad to hear it, for I'm awfully ner vons about teaching boys and girls of from ten to thirteen ; they are simply at an abominable age! I'm not surprised that she has these violent headaches to come on suddenly." "Don't you worry. If you want any information, just ask that red-headed boy; he's a treasure." The nervous senior found the report to be true, and everything had gone on smoothly until the arithmetic class was called, thp eifrht ruinils wprp at flip hnarrl # - o 1 1 " *"* " when suddenly the fire alarm rang. "The fire drill 1" exclaimed the senior excitedly. "Fire, fire, fire!" shouted a voice in the street below. The senior sprang from her seat and rushed from the platform. Pat raced down the aisle, caught her in his arms, and hurried her back to Miss McClain's desk. Interest in Pat's maneuvers had saved the grade from panic. Holding the struggling, half-hysterical senior, Pat gave the necessary number of sharp, commanding taps. The grade responded mechanically; but when the little girl who led the line looked into the smoky hall, and saw white-faced teachers struggling desperately to control themselves, and the crooked lines of crying girls, J ? A _ 1 ? - I ? # ? aim excited Doys, sne nesitaxea. . "Ernest, lead the line!" commanded Pat, "and every one hold on to the one in front!" From the foot of the stairs the principal saw Miss McClain's grade holding their lawful place next the wall. A line too compact to be broken, they came on past him, and in their rear came a red-headed boy, dragging an unconscious senior. In the morning paper was the principal's account of how Pat Dillon, in the absence of his teacher, had preserved the honor of the sixth grade. Miss McClain read it and was proud of her red-headed boy.?Christian Instructor. N OF THE SOUTH. * 17 A RAIN SONG. By Clinton Scollard. Don't you love to lie and listen, Listen to the rain, With Its little patter, patter, And its tiny clatter, clatter, And its silvery spatter, spatter, On the roof and on the pane? Yes, I love to lie and listen. Listen to the rain. It's the fairies?Pert and Plucky, Nip and Nimble-toes and Lucky, Trip and Thimble-nose and Tucky? On the roof and on the pane! That's my dream the while I listen, Listen to the rain. I can see them running races, I can watch their laughing faces At their gleeful games and graces, On the roof and on the pane! ?A Boys' Book of Rhyme. THE DAY OF HOPE. It was a glorious night when Christ was born; it was a sad night at noonday when he was crucified. The song of the night was changed to a cry of despair? when night was at noonday. It is never the day nor the night that makes either the song or the cry. Prisons become palaces, darkness turns to day?when the Christ is born and enters in. But palaces are prisons, and the light of noontide sinks into the darkness of midnight when he dies?when he, "the friend of sinners," dies. It is always so, oh heart of mine! It is Christ living who makes the day dawn rise in thee; it is the Christ denartincr wVir* Imvc u?u:?i 11 ' ?, 0 .. ? . vs ui<. uaiiui^s uciimu, even niougll the world may say it is noonday. Men often say that they are in the light, yet they do not know him; and, what is worse, they do not care for him.?Selected. THE WONDERFUL STORY. One sometimes wishes that he could read the marvelous story of the birth of Christ for the first time. Our very familiarity with it has to some extent diminished its beauty. And yet it is a strangely seared and canousea neart that can read the story without a thrill. We see the Shekinah glory gleaming forth from the sky in the quiet midnight hour and filling the humble shepherds with an agony of fear. We hear the Evangel spoken by angelic lips, "Fear not: for behold I bring unto you good tidings of great joy, which shall be to all people. For unto you is born this dav in the city of David a Savior which is Christ the Lord." And then we hear the bursting forth of the angelic choir into that gladdest, sweetest song that ever woke the echoes of this gray old world: "Glory to God in the highest, and on earth peace, good will toward men." Cast forth thy act, thy word, into the ever-living, everworking universe; it is a seed-grain that cannot die.? Carlyle. In character, in manners, in style, in all things, the supreme excellence is simplicity.?Longfellow.