tunity to steal it, which they did despite our threats and tears. Many a happy hour have I spent on the seabrows with my kite when high up in the air with a good breeze we could do with her as we liked,-walk backwards or forwards, pay out or draw in at pleasure, and send messages or love letters up to her on the string. Wishing for a change of pleasure, we would thrust our stick into the ground or tie the cord to a bush or tree, while we dug earth-nuts or gathered a bouquet of blue-bells, buttercups, and daisies. Then tired and longing for bed we would get the string of our kite under one arm, while another held and wound on, and thus "run her down." Carefully folding up the tail with its many "bobs," and getting an arm between the "belly-band" and the kite, which we turned over our shoulder, we were soon on our way home, the happy owner of as good a kite as ever flew.

A few words on marbles, and then I close my relation of my boyhood's games. As we left our home for school on a bright morning our ears would be greeted with loud, and sometimes angry cries of "Yes, it is!" "No, it isn't!" "I say it is!" "Bar rests, bar slips, bar everything!" and without waiting to enquire or go to see, we exclaim, "Hurrah! marble time again!" And so it was. Away we hie to the scenes, and there we see a boy with clenched fist drawn behind him, and face flushed with rage standing over another, stoutly disputing a point, and ready to sustain it with a blow.

There is no game that lads engage in so fruitful of quarrels and fighting as this of marbles, for here the lower parts of our nature, selfishness and avarice, are brought into play. It is a game of gain and loss, and I have felt, when a boy, more real pleasure or pain when either marbles were won or lost, than I have in after life at the gain or loss of real useful things. And no game is so injurious to the person, or more disagreeable to parents, as this; for taking place on the bare ground, and with hands, and that, too, in a stooping position, the hands, especially the knuckles, get chafed and cut, and the clothes dirtied and torn. And what pockets, too! For what with thrusting in the hand with or for the marbles, when the said hand is covered with filth; and what with the weight of the marbles themselves, we often had to encounter warm rebukes and sundry chastisements from our tormented parents. And we often got punished, too, by our playmates. There is a game in which the loser has to hold his hand to the ground, with a marble between his first and second finger, at which all his game-fellows are entitled to shoot with a marble; but, although each boy is expected, by the laws of the game, to aim at the marble, so wicked and fond of giving pain are some, that by general consent at times the knuckles, and not the marble, would be aimed at and hit; when, should the victim be punished, as is seen by his shaking his hand, and putting it to his mouth, a peculiar zest is given to the sport. But here I must close; another generation of marble-players now exist, as both I and my often angry wife know to our

cost.

JOHAN BRENTZ, THE SUABIAN REFORMER.

"God's providence is mine inheritance."

THIS line, inscribed on one of the old houses in Chester by its pious builder, might be taken as the motto of every Christian man and woman; for none such

can look over their lives without seeing the wondrous way in which Divine Providence has often interfered for good, or brought good out of evil, ease out of difficulty, protection out of danger.

A life most remarkable for interpositions of this sort was that of Johan Brentz, the Reformer of Suabia in Germany. His name is little known, his talents were not of the most brilliant order, and he took no foremost place in his generation except by his faithfulness; he is a lesser star, eclipsed by the splendour of such suns as Luther, Melancthon, Zwingli; but well worth remembring for the series of providential preservations which attended him, and left him his life (though he was always ready to lose it for the sake of Christ) up to the great age of a hundred and seven years.

Born in the last year of the fifteenth century, he entered the university of Heidelberg in 1512, where the learned Ecolampadius was his instructor in Greek, that lately disinterred language, whose beauty had already won the hearts of all the scholars in Europe. But the treasure to which Ecolampadius desired to lead his pupils was the Sacred Scriptures; and Melancthon was one of those who studied them with Johan Brentz. Thus they became "wise unto salvation:" and forthwith Brentz (who at eighteen was made a schoolmaster) began to lecture on the Gospel of Matthew to his pupils, and all else who wished to hear. The Word of God was "precious in those days:" it was a great novelty to hear the pure facts of the life of our Lord read and commented on in the people's mother tongue; and Brentz found his hearers increase so numerously, that he had to seek a larger lecture-hall. Thereupon the priests stepped in, and forbade the young layman to lecture at all.

At three-and-twenty he received a call to become public preacher in the town of Halle, in Suabia, on the stipend of ten pounds a year. Certainly filthy lucre had no share in deciding his choice, for this salary was never increased; yet he and his family always had enough. Bitter opposition he met with, as soon as he was known to be one of those whom John Wesley called "brownbread preachers of the Gospel :" a man who would deliver the whole counsel of God, in the plainest and simplest words, and for no power on earth would alter one jot of what he found clearly revealed in his precious Bible. But numbers were induced by him to search the Scriptures for themselves, and found the Saviour therein; which recompensed Johan Brentz abundantly for every persecution.

His parents were among his converts. When they died, the priests would not permit them to be buried in what is called "consecrated" ground: a field outside the town was their resting-place. "Precious in the sight of the Lord is the death of His saints." Dear is their very dust in His sight; and doubtless, He noted that humble burial, and will raise to glory the poor bodies cast out by the malice of bigoted men.

Some comparatively quiet years passed over the heads of Brentz and his flock, (but when was there quiet for the faithful followers of our Lord Jesus during that seething sixteenth century?) until war broke out, and Spanish troops were quartered in Halle. Brentz's house was taken possession of, and he and his wife, and six children escaped to the neighbouring forest. He had destroyed or hidden all papers or books that he thought could compromise him; but a Spanish bishop searched closely, and found manuscripts which he denounced to the Emperor Charles V. A warrant came for his arrest; but the

chief magistrate sent him secret information to get out of his reach; and in miserable December weather he and his family hid again in the friendly forest. When the Spaniards left, they had plundered the pastor's house of everything. But Christians at that time, as earlier, had the God-given power to take "joyfully the spoiling of their goods."

Brentz's next escape was from the clutches of a legate, sent by Cardinal Granvelle to apprehend him. "Dead or alive, bring me the preacher," were the legate's orders, who began by cajolery, and tried to get Brentz into his house and make him prisoner; then he called together the town-council, and, having exacted from each member a solemn oath that he would never divulge the secret about to be told in the Emperor's name, the legate told them that the heaviest imperial vengeance would descend upon Halle if the preacher Brentz were not given up. And Charles V. was not a man to be trifled with; he was known to fulfil his threats to the letter. Now, through the providence of God, one of the councillors had been detained by some insignificant circumstance, until after the oath was given; and when he learned what was the design, he wrote on a card a few Latin words, and sent them by a sure hand to the preacher. Brentz read-"Quick, quicker, quickest! flee, Brentz, flee!" Immediately he rose from table and walked out of the town. Who should he meet but the legate! "You will come and breakfast with me to-morrow," said the priest, blandly, deeming by that time he would have him in his toils. As the Lord will," was the answer. Again he hid in the forest.

After some weeks he was banished formally from Halle. Duke Verich of Wurtemberg was friendly to the Reformation, and offered Brentz refuge in his dominions, provided he was not informed of the place chosen; "for then," said he, "when the Emperor demands you from me, I can say that I do not know where you are." The hunted pastor went to an obscure town among the hills, where he spent his time in writing a commentary on the twenty-third Psalm. An imperial envoy came, as Duke Verich had foreseen, and searched the Castle of Wurtemberg for him. Afterwards a commandant of Spanish troops announced at a banquet in Munich, that he was going to Stuttgart with a peremptory order from Charles V. that Duke Verich should give up Brentz dead alive. How pertinacious is the malice of the enemies of the Word of God! But now occurred the most striking of all the deliverances with which God preserved His servant. At the banquet was present an old lady, aunt to Duke Verich, who left the table forthwith, and wrote these tidings to her nephew, despatching them by a secret messenger.

Brentz had been summoned to Stuttgart by the death of his wife. Duke Verich sent for him, read him the letter, and told him to conceal himself as well as he could. The poor man took a big loaf of bread in his hand, and walked through the streets, uncertain of his course. "The steps of a good man are ordered by the Lord!" As he passed an open door, "an inward voice said, Enter that house." He obeyed, met no person, and went on to the very topmost loft, where hay and timber were stored. Here he lay down in a dark corner, and thanked God for the shelter. Every house in Stuttgart was searched by the Spanish troops, who even ran their spears through the beds, and opened chance for Johan Brentz in his open loft! round about them that fear Him, and

every chest and cupboard. Small "The angel of the Lord encampeth delivereth them!" The soldiers of

Charles V. did their duty well; but they could not find one whom God had hidden. They came up the stairs in that house, searched room after room. Brentz threw himself on his knees to meet the end in the posture of prayer. As he thus knelt he felt his feet touched by cold, sharp steel. One of the spears, passed through the boards to probe overhead, had actually rubbed by his flesh without wounding him! A minute after he heard the officer's order"March on; he is not here!"

What a thanksgiving broke from the heart of the saved man! Fourteen days had he lain in this loft, and God had fed him in a manner that reminds one of Elijah and the ravens. Day after day a hen came and laid her egg among the hay; and, what is not least strange, she never cackled or clucked when she had done so, as is the universal practice of domestic fowl. The Creator overruled her instinct, as He did that of the carnivorous ravens.

For two years afterwards Brentz was concealed under the name of Huldreich Engater, and acted as Duke Verich's bailiff, at a town in the Black Forest. The priest falling dangerously ill, he could not but visit him, and comfort him with the glorious truths of the Gospel wherewith he also himself had been comforted of God; and thus his secret was discovered. No harm came to him. On the contrary, great offers of preferment were made if he would leave Suabia. Our Edward VI. wanted him in England, and the Grand Duke of Prussia would have made him a bishop. "No," he said; "it was here I first learned to know the Lord Jesus Christ, and first preached the glad tidings. Here I have suffered for His name's sake, and here I hope to serve Him until I die."

Happier days came, and Brentz was free to resume his loved employment. By his advice all the monasteries were turned into colleges and schools, and as ducal superintendent he examined the pupils twice a year in their knowledge of Scripture, as well as in secular acquirements. There was no question in that earnest age, as now, whether it were better to leave the immortal soul fallow for Satan's seedlings by ignoring religion as a part of education.

As before stated, this good man lived to the unwonted age of one hundred and seven years, and with his latest breath exhorted those around him to cleave to the pure faith of the Bible. And he desired that his grave might be made in full view of his pulpit, to warn his successors in the ministry to preach the truth in simplicity and fervour.