would occasionally lift his head from the hearth-rug on which he lay, and look his master wistfully in the face.  And thus my father spent the greater part of his time, sometimes in prayer, sometimes in meditation, and sometimes in reading the Scriptures.  I frequently sat with him, though, as I entertained a great awe for my father, I used to feel rather ill at ease, when, as sometimes happened, I found myself alone with him.

‘I wish to ask you a few questions,’ said he to me one day, after my mother had left the room.

‘I will answer anything you may please to ask me, my dear father.’

‘What have you been about lately?’

’I have been occupied as usual, attending at the office at the appointed hours.’

‘And what do you there?’

‘Whatever I am ordered.’

‘And nothing else?’

‘Oh yes! sometimes I read a book.’

‘Connected with your profession?’

‘Not always; I have been lately reading Armenian—­’

‘What’s that?’

’The language of a people whose country is a region on the other side of
Asia Minor.’

‘Well!’

‘A region abounding with mountains.’

‘Well!’

‘Amongst which is Mount Ararat.’

‘Well!’

‘Upon which, as the Bible informs us, the ark rested.’

‘Well!’

‘It is the language of the people of those regions—­’

‘So you told me.’

‘And I have been reading the Bible in their language.’

‘Well!’

’Or rather, I should say, in the ancient language of these people; from which I am told the modem Armenian differs considerably.’

‘Well!’

‘As much as the Italian from the Latin.’

‘Well!’

‘So I have been reading the Bible in ancient Armenian.’

‘You told me so before.’

‘I found it a highly difficult language.’

‘Yes.’

’Differing widely from the languages in general with which I am acquainted.’

‘Yes.’

‘Exhibiting, however, some features in common with them.’

‘Yes.’

’And sometimes agreeing remarkably in words with a certain strange wild speech with which I became acquainted—­’

‘Irish?’

’No, father, not Irish—­with which I became acquainted by the greatest chance in the world.’

‘Yes.’

’But of which I need say nothing farther at present, and which I should not have mentioned but for that fact.’

‘Well!’

‘Which I consider remarkable.’

‘Yes.’

‘The Armenian is copious.’

‘Is it?’

‘With an alphabet of thirty-nine letters, but it is harsh and guttural.’

‘Yes.’

’Like the language of most mountainous people—­the Armenians call it Haik.’

‘Do they?’

’And themselves, Haik, also; they are a remarkable people, and, though their original habitation is the Mountain of Ararat, they are to be found, like the Jews, all over the world.’