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£2,025; Jamaica, £1,585; Demerara and Berbice, £4,500. A considerable portion of these sums was given by European residents; but that which was contributed by the Mission Churches was, in proportion to their means, in advance of the churches which have long had the Gospel. It should rebuke the limited and parsimonious giving which is a stigma on the professed followers of Christ at home.

MURDER OF THOMAS A BECKETT.

(See first page.)

THOMAS & BECKETT was born in London in the year 1117. He was educated at Oxford, became Archdeacon of Canterbury, and afterwards High Chancellor. This was a high position, but very often not a pleasant one. Poor Beckett found it so. King Henry and him could not agree. They quarrelled about matters relating to the Church and the State, things that people are very much disposed to quarrel about still. But we don't settle disputes in the same way now. One evening four Norman lords were with the king, who had been complaining of Beckett's treatment. They left his presence in anger, and finding Beckett in Canterbury Cathedral at the celebration of the "Vesper Service," they murdered him. How grateful ought we to be that our lot has fallen in so much more pleasant times than these,

THE JUVENILE REPORTER.

THE Reporter has the satisfaction of informing all his young friends, that the new Collecting Cards are ready, and may be had on applying to H. M. Matheson, Esq.,

112 LESSONS FOR THE SABBATH AND THE SCHOOL.

3, Lombard-street, London, E.C., or to the Secretary of the Juvenile Mission, 51, Great Ormond-street, London. Quantities will be sent to schools post free, on receiving a note stating the number. He earnestly hopes that no further time will be lost in getting them into use, and that more will be collected this year than last.

Another missionary will sail for China in the course of a few weeks.

The Reporter is very glad to find that his young friends in Regent Square, have made a good beginning with their Juvenile Association. The first quarterly meeting was lately held, when a most interesting address on China was delivered by the Rev. T. Gilfillan, formerly a missionary there. About £5 was paid in as the proceeds of the first quarter.

If the Editor will give him a corner, without grumbling too much, the Reporter intends to publish some passages from the best of the prize essays in a future number. Perhaps in the next, or next. As for himself, he is not very sure if he deserves the name of "Reporter" at all now, he has been able to do so little of late; but he hopes better times are coming.

LESSONS FOR THE SABBATH AND THE SCHOOL.

DATE.

SUBJECT.

TO LEARN.

Question.

July 12 Nathan's Parable. XLVI. & Gal. iii. 26-29.

26 Solomon's choice XLIX. 1 Cor. xiii. 1-3.

and greatness.

TO READ.

2 Sam. xii. 1–24.

2 Sam. xv. 1-19, & xviii. 9-18.

1 Kings iii. 5-15, & iv. 20-34.

Aug 2. Solomon's Tem-L. & LI. Rev. xxi. 22-25. 1 Kings v. 13-18,

ple.

& viii. 1-30

THE

JUVENILE MESSENGER.

THE BEGGAR BOY.

"GET away with you, you dirty old beggar boy. I'd like to know what right you have to look over the fence at our flowers?" The speaker was a little boy not more than eleven years old, and though people sometimes called it handsome, his face looked very harsh and disagreeable just then.

He stood in a beautiful garden, just in the suburbs of the city; and it was June time, and the tulips were opening themselves to the sunshine. O! it was a great joy to look at them as they bowed gracefully to the light with their necks of crimson, of yellow, and carnation. The beds flanked either side of the path that curved around a small arbour, where the young grape clusters that lay hidden among the large leaves, wrote a beautiful prophecy for the

autumn.

A white paling ran in front of the garden, and over this the little beggar boy, so rudely addressed, was leaning. He was very lean, very dirty, very ragged. I am afraid you would have turned away in disgust from so repulsive a spectacle, and yet God and the angels loved him!

He was looking with all his soul in his eyes on the beautiful blossoms, as they swayed to and fro in the summer wind, and his heart softened while he leaned his arm on the fence railing, and forgot everything in that longabsorbed gaze! Ah! it was seldom the beggar boy saw anything that was either very good or beautiful, and it was sad his dream should have such a rude awakening.

The blood rushed up to his face, and a glance full of evil and defiance flashed into his eyes. But before the boy AUGUST, 1857.

I

114

THE BEGGAR BOY.

could retort, a little girl sprang out from the arbour and looked eagerly from one child to the other. She was very fair, with soft hazel eyes, over which drooped long, shining lashes.

"How could you speak so cross to the boy, Hinton? she asked, with a tone of sad reproach quivering through the sweetness of her voice. "I'm sure it doesn't do us any harm to have him look at the flowers if he likes."

"Well, Helen,” urged her brother, slightly mollified and ashamed, “I don't like to have beggars gaping over the fence. It looks so low."

"Now, that's a notion of yours, Hinton. I'm sure, if the flowers can do anybody any good, we ought to be very glad. Little boy"—and the child turned to the beggar boy, and addressed him as courteously as though he had been a prince—“I'll pick you some of the tulips if you'll wait a moment."

"Helen, I do believe you're the funniest girl that ever lived!" ejaculated the child's brother as he turned away, and with a low whistle sauntered down the path, feeling very uncomfortable-for her conduct was a stronger reproof to him than any words could have been.

Helen plucked one of each specimen of the tulips, and there was a great variety of these, and gave them to the child. His face brightened as he received them and thanked her.

O! the little girl had dropped a "pearl of great price" into the black, turbid billows of the boy's life, and the after years would bring it up, beautiful and fair again.

Twelve years had passed. The little blue-eyed girl had grown into a tall, graceful woman. One bright June afternoon she walked with her husband through the garden, for she, was on a visit to her parents. The place was little

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changed, and the tulips had opened their lips of crimson and gold to the sunshine, just as they had twelve years before. Suddenly they observed a young man in a workman's overalls, leaning over the fence, his eyes wandering eagerly from the beautiful flowers to herself. He had a frank, pleasant countenance, and there was something in his manner that interested the gentleman and lady.

"Look here, Edward," she said, "I'll pluck some of the flowers. It always does me good to see people admiring them," and then releasing her husband's arm, she approached the paling, saying-and the smile round her lips was very like the old child one-" Are you fond of flowers, sir? It will give me great pleasure to gather you

some."

The young workman looked a moment very earnestly into the fair, sweet face.

"Twelve years ago this very month," he said, in a voice deep and yet tremulous with feeling, "I stood here, leaning on this railing, a dirty, ragged little beggar boy; and you asked me this very question. Twelve years ago you placed the bright flowers in my hands, and they made me a new boy-aye, and they made a man of me, too. Your face has been a light, ma'am, all along the dark hours of my life, and this day that little beggar boy can stand on the old place and say to you, though he's an humble and hard-working man, yet, thank God, he's an honest one."

Tear-drops trembled like morning dew on the shining lashes of the lady, as she turned to her husband, who had joined her, and listened in absorbed astonishment to the workman's words. "God," she said, "put it into my child-heart to do that little deed of kindness, and see now how very great is the reward that he has given me."