to herself, with exactly the same result.  The something decided for which she had been longing, the opportunity to show the world just where she stood, had come at last, and this was the way in which she was meeting it.  At last she knew by the heavy thuds which her heart began to give, that the question was decided, that the very moment Deacon Graves sat down she would rise; whether she would say any thing or not would depend upon whether God gave her any thing to say—­but at least she could stand up for Jesus.  But Mr. Parker’s voice followed Deacon Graves’; and this was what he said: 

“Am I to understand by your silence that there is not a Christian man or woman in all this company who has an unconverted friend whom he or she would like to have us pray for?”

Then the watching Angel of the Covenant came to the help of this trembling, struggling Ester, and there entered into her heart such a sudden and overwhelming sense of longing for Sadie’s conversion, that all thought of what she would say, and how she would say it, and what people would think, passed utterly out of her mind; and rising suddenly, she spoke, in clear and wonderfully earnest tones: 

“Will you pray for a dear, dear friend?”

God sometimes uses very humble means with which to break the spell of silence which Satan so often weaves around Christians; it was as if they had all suddenly awakened to a sense of their privileges.

Dr. Van Anden said, in a voice which quivered with feeling:  “I have a brother in the profession for whom I ask your prayers that he may become acquainted with the great Physician.”

Request followed request for husbands and wives, mothers and fathers, and children.  Even timid, meek-faced, low-voiced Mrs. Ried murmured a request for her children who were out of Christ.  And when at last Harry Arnett suddenly lifted his handsome boyish head from its bowed position, and said in tones which conveyed the sense of a decision, “Pray for me” the last film of worldliness vanished; and there are those living to-day who have reason never to forget that meeting.

“Is it your private opinion that our good doctor got up a streak of disinterested enthusiasm over my unworthy self this evening?” This question Dr. Douglass asked of Sadie as they lingered on the piazza in the moonlight.

Sadie laughed gleefully.  “I am sure I don’t know.  I’m prepared for any thing strange that can possibly happen.  Mother and Ester between them have turned the world upside down for me to-night.  In case you are the happy man, I hope you are grateful?”

“Extremely!  Should be more so perhaps if people would be just to me in private, and not so alarmingly generous in public.”

“How bitter you are against Dr. Van Anden,” Sadie said, watching the lowering brow and sarcastic curve of the lip, with curious eyes.  “How much I should like to know precisely what is the trouble between you!”