CHOSEN-CHASTENED-CROWNED.

CHAPTER I.

1827-1853.

EARLY LIFE.

"The hills that had been gold at sunrise,

Wear a deeper purple all the day."

ND, wherefore?

Mrs. Alexander.

Because the sun which

in the morning gilded, in the after hours expanded the purple heather of the lone hillside.

Thus, in the early dawn of life, as a child,—a very little child,-not yet three years old, "Our Mary" first experienced and gave expression to her enjoyment in the love of Christ,-the Foun

B

tain of Light,—in whose light, to the end of her earthly career she ever saw the Light of Life; in whose everlasting light she now rests from her labours," in whose light she shall find her "perfect consummation and bliss," when, with every member of the Church of the First-born, she shall live, and rise, and reign.

At the age of six months we see "Our Mary" in mourning garb,—a fatherless infant upon our mother's knee,—our mother, who, in the first hours of widowhood had been given faith to embrace the promise, "FEAR NOT, FOR I AM WITH THEE, BE NOT DISMAYED FOR I AM THY GOD; I WILL STRENGTHEN THEE, YEA, I WILL HELP THEE, YEA, I WILL UPHOLD THEE WITH THE RIGHT HAND OF MY RIGHTEOUSNESS." "I believe it, Lord," she said. "I believe it, Thou wilt never leave me nor forsake me. I take Thee at Thy Word, now, prove Thyself true and faithful to me and to my children." In this faith she returned from England to her desolated home in Ireland. She pressed to her heart her four orphan girls, the eldest six years, the youngest

six months old. Our precious mother had in the hour of bereavement heard the voice of "the God of all comfort." She had been born again of the "incorruptible seed of the Word," and this living principle soon manifested itself in diligent study of her hitherto unread Bible, and in earnest supplication for all that she and her children needed of spiritual blessing or temporal guidance, for at this time her interests centred in her Home, where, with her beloved sister who had long known and loved the Lord, she daily searched the Word of Life. She sought for texts in proof of the elementary truths of the Gospel; she studied, oh how she studied, the meaning of the word "Grace!" She loved the hymn, "Grace, 'tis a charming sound," and, although she was little familiar with theological terms, and less with theological controversies, she knew that she loved Him who had first loved her. Her experience at this time finds appropriate expression in the beautiful verses which her then "Baby Mary" wrote many years afterwards.