This was a delightful dwelling-place, but those who inhabited it,
were still more delightful than the beautiful garden or the smiling
groves. For it was the beauty of piety which was found in them,
united with that gentleness and amiability of character, that humble
spirit of cordiality, which our Saviour enjoins upon all his true
disciples.

These inhabitants, so good and so amiable, were the Grandpapa and
Grandmamma of Francis, and their domestics, who, with them served the
Lord, and lived in that peace, which His Spirit gives to such as
delight in His Word.

This dear Grandpapa then, since he was pious, was charitable, and
took particular pleasure in visiting his aged neighbors, especially
the poor peasants, to whom he always carried comfort and
encouragement from that gracious God, with whom he himself daily
endeavored more and more to live. He used generally to pay these
charitable visits in the middle of the day; after having read the
Holy Bible for the second time, in a retired summer-house in the
garden, near which a little gate opened upon a footpath, which,
passing through the orchard, led to the village.

Francis, who was already acquainted with his Grandpapa's habits,
never came to disturb him while he was in the summer-house, and
whenever he saw his Grandpapa going out of the little gate he took
good care not to follow him.

But in about an hour or two, he would go to meet him, sometimes
towards the road, at others, as far as the bridge over the stream;--
his Grandmamma was never uneasy, because she knew that Francis was a