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and only two of that profane party were left alive—the man at whose house the party had assembled, and who was compelled by his drunken companions, under threats of violence and death, to go with them in their daring act of profanity, and the person who occupied the chair on the occasion, and suggested the drinking of the toast. What effect was produced upon the mind of the latter by the sad fate which overtook his companions in such rapid succession, I cannot tell. Many persons who had become acquainted with the facts relating to that last meeting of the Hell-Fire Club, and the blasphemous orgies that attended it, looked on with awe; for they regarded these casualties which came upon the company of blasphemers as the judgments of Almighty God. And this feeling was terribly strengthened when, a few weeks later, they saw the leader in the act by which God was so daringly and wickedly defied, also swept away from the midst of the living by a very horrible death."

My informant then proceeded to relate the particulars connected with the death of this individual, which were of such a character as not to admit of their being minutely stated here. While on a journey, he received injury from the incautious use of a poisonous plant, that produced inflammation, gangrene, mortification, and death. The death scene of this man was very fearful. To the excruciating physical torture he had to endure were added the terror and anguish of despair. When his energies were prostrated by the agonizing pain which had seized upon him, and death stared him in the face, when the world for which alone he had lived was fading away, and the dread realities of the eternal world were all around him, then how eagerly would he have turned to the Blessed One whom he had in wanton wickedness blasphemed and defied! But he could not pray. He dared not hope that God would hear him now; and he howled, and raved, and blasphemed God in his delirium, until nature was exhausted, and life failed, and the wretched soul of the blasphemer passed beyond the veil to appear before its Maker.

"I never heard," my informant said, in reply to a question

of mine upon the subject, "that any other meeting of the infidel club was held afterwards. I believe some who once belonged to it still survive; but these judgments of the Almighty broke up the unholy association, and it became extinct. Those who had formed part of the sceptic league were too much horrified to have anything more to do with a fraternity against which the hand of the Lord had been so manifestly lifted up. Not a few who had made a boast of infidelity were silenced, if not cured of their scepticism. This was the case with the individual who is so recently deceased. He was greatly alarmed by the fate of his associates in wickedness, and I believe he repented. If ever a man prayed earnestly for pardon, I believe he did; and he became a changed man."

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"I think," I replied, "that the fact of his life having been lengthened out for so many years after his associates were taken away may be justly regarded as an indication that he did not pray in vain. When David, through Nathan's rebuke, was turned to God again, and made the acknowledgment, I have sinned,' the prophet was commissioned to say, 'The Lord also hath put away thy sin.' His conscience appears to have been less hardened than theirs, as he was only induced to join them in their excess of wickedness under pressure; and it was in consequence of his being wrought upon by the sudden death of some of his associates that the facts were brought to light. Otherwise, we should never have known the full extent of the depravity and blasphemy which characterized that club of infidel opposers of the truth, or the judgments that swept them from the earth. If he had not made known what took place at that last meeting, when God was so profanely set at nought, the destruction that came so rapidly upon the offenders would have been looked upon merely as the ordinary casualties of colonial life. My mind has been deeply impressed with the occurrences of the last few years in the breaking up of the Colonial Church Union, which was a conspiracy against God and His truth, and the judgments that fell upon so many of the chapel destroyers, most of whom have come to

a violent and untimely end. I had heard of this Hell-Fire Club,' and sometimes have seen a reference made to it by newspaper correspondents; but I never could succeed in gaining any knowledge of its history until now. Nor was I aware that it originated in the persecutions to which missionaries were subjected at Morant Bay, many years ago. When I was at Morant Bay, a little while since, I visited the dungeon in which the missionaries were imprisoned. The whole history is very instructive, and exhibits an impressive comment upon the words of the Psalmist concerning those who league themselves together in opposition to the cause of Christ: Thou shalt break them with a rod of iron. Thou shalt dash them in pieces like a potter's vessel. Kiss the Son, lest He be angry, and ye perish from the way when His wrath is kindled but a little.' The first part of the quotation receives illustration from the fate which befell the clique of blasphemers; the latter from the sparing mercy exercised toward him who repented and humbled himself before God."

VIII.

THE BLACKSMITH'S WEDDING.

There is a Power

Unseen, that rules the illimitable world,

That guides its motions, from the brightest star
To the least dust of this sin-tainted mould;
While man, who madly deems himself the lord
Of all, is nought but weakness and dependence.

Thomson.

MPORTANT issues sometimes proceed from very insignificant circumstances, and grand results from unpromising beginnings. It was in those days when slavery spread its gloomy shadow over the land, that a missionary, residing near the western extremity of Jamaica, was crossing the island from a southern town to the capital of the country situated on the northern shore. He was on horseback, and not very superbly mounted for the long and fatiguing ride which he had undertaken. The early part of his journey lay for some miles across a wide-stretching savannah, where the roads are constructed with logs of lignum-vitæ and logwood, laid across, and covered over with mud thrown up from either side. This, when hardened and baked in the burning rays of the tropical sun, makes, in the dry weather, a tolerably good pathway for horses and vehicles. But in the long rainy seasons it becomes an extended quagmire impassable to vehicles of any description, and through which the traveller on horseback has to pick his way with the utmost care, to avoid the danger of breaking the legs of his horse through his stepping into some of the deep holes with which the road abounds; and which are all the more perilous as, being filled with water by the daily rains, their depth cannot be very readily discerned.

Threading his way slowly and carefully for more than two hours along this difficult road, and often sinking nearly to the girths in the treacherous ground, from which the poor animal could extricate itself only by a desperate plunge, the traveller arrived at the foot of the mountains, bespattered to the shoulders with the mud through which for seven weary miles he had been urging his toilsome way. Here the road, though still rough, became more solid and pleasant to travel, tending upward along the rocky mountain side; its windings opening up to view beautiful valleys overspread with villages, and abounding with the luxuriant vegetation of the tropics. Numerous cottage gardens lay spread over the vale, or occupied the slopes of the hills; all of them filled with fruit trees of different kinds; the cocoa-nut, the plantain and banana, the star-apple, and all the varieties of the orange, grape fruit, lime and shaddock, exhibiting their rich and tempting burdens, and discovering the inexhaustible richness of a land which, but for the vices and cruelties of man, might be an earthly paradise. Slowly he pursues his way; for he compassionates the poor beast whose powers, by no means exuberant, have been largely exhausted in bearing him through the heavy roads that cost him so much time and toil to traverse. And he does not forget that the path before him, for some miles, is a steep ascent, leading over the range of hills and mountains which form the great back-bone of the island. The sun, now high in the firmament, pours down a full tide of heat; and it is with a feeling of grateful relief that, after climbing the rugged path for several miles, he enters an avenue formed by the plume-like branches of the bamboo. These, springing up from either side of the road in luxuriant growth, and meeting above at a height of twelve or fifteen yards, form an umbrageous arch almost impervious to the rays of the sun, deliciously cool and grateful, conveying to the mind of the wearied, sun-scorched traveller a pleasant sense of the meaning of the Scripture metaphor," the shadow of a great rock in a weary land." From this delightful shade, which extends over several

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