TIMOTHY.
BY BISHOP T. U. DUDLEY.
In a little town called Lystra, in Asia Minor, a multitude is gathered in the market-place. Two strangers are the attraction, who have strange tidings to tell. Their story is of one Jesus, a King, who, they say, was born in Judea some fifty years before. They tell of marvellous deeds of mercy which He wrought, and of words as marvellous and as merciful that He spake. They tell that He died on a cross, but that, King of Death, He came back from the grave at His own appointed time. They declare that He did visibly ascend into heaven, and now sitteth there to pardon and to bless all who will believe on Him. And even while the crowd is listening to the words of the chief speaker, whose name is Paul, he looks fixedly upon a poor lame man, a cripple from his birth, who is among his auditors, and cries with a loud voice, "Stand upright on thy feet." Instantly the command is obeyed, and the life-time cripple leaps and walks.
Respectful attention straightway became enthusiasm. The market-place resounds with the shout, "The gods are come down to us in the likeness of men," and the priest who serves in Jupiter's Temple hastens with oxen and garlands to do sacrifice to the miracle-workers, despite their earnest remonstrance that they are but sinful men, come to tell them of the one living God.
But quickly there is interruption as effective as sudden from other strangers of the same distant nation, whose words persuade the fickle populace, and in a little while Paul is being dragged out of the city to all appearance dead. They have stoned the man to whom just now they would do sacrifice!
Among the listeners to the gospel Paul had preached, among the wondering spectators of the lame man's healing, among the on-lookers at the deed of violence, stands a boy, generous and warm-hearted, weeping manly tears over that which is done. His name is Timothy, and of him, as he sits there that day in his native town, his heart all aglow with the new hopes whereof he has heard, and his spirit all aflame with admiration for undaunted courage, and with pity for the innocent sufferer, our artist has given us the portrait. The Sacred Scriptures, which he has known from a child, have gained new meaning. He is reading the ancient writings with the new light which Paul has thrown upon them—the light from the open grave of Jesus.
He is the child from a mixed marriage, his mother a Jewess, but his father a Greek, and therefore he is but ill esteemed by the Hebrews who dwell in his town. The records of his life make no mention of his father, and from this fact it has been inferred that he died while Timothy was yet an infant. And we are plainly told that his education was all given by his mother, Eunice, and his grandmother, Lois, and that "from a child he knew the Holy Scriptures."
The face which the artist has drawn will represent to us what we should expect to be the appearance of a boy thus brought up, and the character which we judge him to have possessed, from the warnings and the advice given to him by his master and teacher, Paul. His piety, while sincere and intense, is yet of a feminine cast; his constitution is far from robust; he shrinks from opposition and responsibility; his tears lie close to their outlet, and are ready to flow and hide the suffering object; he will subject his body to denial greater than its strength will bear, and as the natural counterpart of these characteristics, he is in danger of being carried away by "youthful lusts." Such is Timothy when, after seven years have passed away, and the boy is grown to be a man, Paul, returning to Lystra to confirm and comfort the Christians there, will have him to be the companion of his journeyings and the best-loved friend of his heart.
There is not space in this article to recite the events of the career that followed. Let each of our boy readers search them out for himself, and learn of what doughty deeds a gentle spirit in a feeble frame is capable under the impulse of an earnest faith. Let us learn, moreover, from a life of noble devotion to high purpose so to devote our life, not, it may be of necessity, to proclaim a Gospel, as Timothy did, but surely to labor, not alone for self, but for our race.
He died a confessor of that faith he learned from the preacher at Lystra in his boyhood. "Out of weakness he was made strong." He, the timid, girlish, tearful boy, waxed valiant in the great fight, and is known to the Christian world as a saint of God and as the great Bishop of Ephesus.
[THE NEW DOLL.]
BY GEORGE COOPER.
You're a beautiful, beautiful dolly,
And dressed like a sweet little queen;
Not to care for you, dear, may seem folly,
When I've but a rag-doll so mean.
I know that its arms are the queerest,
Its head very funny and flat;
Its eyes anything but the clearest;
Yet old friends are best, for all that.
Your hair falls in ringlets so flaxen,
Your eyes are delightfully blue;
Your cheeks they are rosy and waxen,
You're charming, I'll give you your due.
Yet shall I give up Betsy Baker,
Who hasn't a shoe nor a hat,
Because you've a splendid dressmaker?
No! old friends are best, for all that.
You came Christmas morn, in my stocking;
I ought to be proud, I suppose;
And not to be pleased would be shocking:
Do, Betsy dear, turn out your toes.
Oh, you are my every-day dolly!
And this one in silk dress and hat
I'll put on the shelf: call it folly,
Yet old friends are best, for all that.
[THE SNOW BEN.]
BY WILLIAM O. STODDARD.
"We can beat that," said Joe Larkin, contemptuously, as he drew back and began to blow through his red fists. "That isn't any kind of a snow man."
"Like to know why," said Dan Madderley. "He's all right but his ears. We can make them of the same size, easy."
"Yes, but he ain't right anyhow. Everything's just stuck on outside. When I was in the city once, I saw a sculptor chiselling a man out of marble. 'Twasn't much like this thing."
"Well, of course it wasn't. Stone's better'n snow. Everybody knows that, I guess."
"No, it isn't. Not exactly. When you knock off a chunk of marble, you can't stick it on again."
"You might glue it, but I guess it would show the crack."
"Tell you what, boys," exclaimed Joe, with a new idea shining all over his face, "let's make a big snow marble down on the ice, and then let's dig it out into a man, just as the sculptors do."
There was an instant hurrah all around, and not one opposing vote; the half-finished snow man in Deacon Madderley's back yard was left to thaw down all alone, and in ten minutes more the whole crowd of young sculptors was down on the pond.
It was a warm day for winter, and the water was pouring over the dam in a hurry, but the ice was pretty firm up where the boys were, and the soft snow was in just the condition to pack nicely. At it they went, as if they had a whole marble quarry to make, and were afraid some of their marble might get away from them.
"I say, now, Joe," shouted Burr Whitcomb, as the great white pile came up to his shoulders, "who're we going to sculp out? Anybody in partikler?"
"Julius Cæsar."
"No, we can't. You never saw him, nor we didn't either."
"Yes, I did. I saw a picture of him once, with a brass helmet on his head, and a sword in his hand."
"That'd beat us, then," said Dan Madderley. "We'd better try George Washington."
"He's on horseback," said Joe, "and so is Andrew Jackson. No use for us to try a horse. Snow legs won't hold up. He'd come down all in a heap."
A dozen other great names followed, each bringing with it a chorus of doubts as to how he looked, and whether anything like him could be found in that heap of snow; but the shrill voice of little Billy McCoy settled the matter. He had followed his big brothers down upon the ice, and now he eagerly squeaked:
"Boys, why don't you scoop out Ben Franklin? Make him sitting down."
"Hurrah for you, Billy!" exclaimed Joe Larkin. "Guess we all know Ben. He's just the man."
"Guess he is," chirped Billy. "He's fat, too. You can make him real big."
On piled the snow, after that, until they had to reach up with their shovels. When Joe Larkin began to play sculptor, he had to dig his toes into the snow and climb.
"We'll make his head first," he sagely remarked; "and we'll cut out the rest of him to fit that."
"Dig away, Joe," shouted Burr Whitcomb, from the other side of the quarry. "Let's see which of us'll get in first to where old Ben is."
"We'll set him up with his hands in his lap," said Joe; "and we'll part his hair in the middle."
Pieces of shingle, whittled to a sharp edge, did very well for chisels, and no mallets were called for. It was easy to work that kind of marble, and it was just as Joe Larkin had said about mending it. He had to carve Ben's nose for him over and over again, and the last time he shaved it smooth with his jackknife.
"We'll make his hair long, Burr, and lots of it. That'll help hold his head up stiff, and we won't have to cut out so much coat collar. I say, you've made his arm on that side twice as big as this one."
"I can scrape it down. What'll we do for buttons?"
"Boys," said Joe, "pack a lot of round, hard snow-balls, and cut 'em in two. They wore the biggest kind of buttons when Ben was alive; big as dollars."
"How about his hat?"
"He'll look better bare-headed. You can't make a snow brim stay on—not unless it's three or four inches thick, and that won't do."
Joe was giving special attention just then to the parting of Benjamin Franklin's hair, but in a moment more he sang out, "Look here, boys, he never was as fat as all that."
They had been digging away industriously at their part of the great patriot, but they had carefully put on quite as much snow marble as they had cut away. They had made Ben look more like Daniel Lambert than anybody else; but Joe Larkin came down now, and he speedily effected a wholesome change.
"Looks as if he could lift himself and get up now."
"Well, ye—es," said Burr, doubtfully; "but what about his legs? We haven't left any room for 'em."
"Yes we have. But you see we began at the top."
"What's he a-sitting on, anyhow?"
"On the ice. Tell you what, boys, we'll have to make him cross-legged."
"He wasn't a tailor," squeaked Billy McCoy. "He was the lightning-rod man."
Billy had watched all that work with his round mouth half open, and had seemed to regard the job as in a manner under his supervision. But then he had that way of looking at almost any work, no matter who might be doing it, and he had never been known to make any charge for his advice.
It was too late now for any discussion of the matter, however, and all the boys were proud of the way they crossed Benjamin Franklin's legs for him.
"We'll hide one of his feet under him," said Burr. "Joe, can you cut out the other one like a boot?"
"Of course I can."
He did, but if the hidden foot was as large as the one he fitted at the end of Ben's right leg, he could not have needed a great deal more to sit on.
Billy McCoy himself remarked of it, doubtfully, "It's just the biggest foot I ever saw."
The pegs on the sole of that boot and the heel of it were the last touches required, and the young sculptors stood back, and walked around their great work, again and again, in almost silent admiration. Ben fairly looked warm and comfortable in the flood of noon sunshine that was pouring down upon him.
"He'll thaw out," grumbled Dan Madderley; and just then there came a great shout from the shore.
The sun had been at work as well as the boys, and the thaw he was making had had a day or two the start of them.
The shout came from Billy McCoy's biggest brother, Bob, and they saw him dance up and down with excitement, while he swung his hat and repeated it: "Boys! boys! come in! The ice is breaking away!"
So much trampling and running to and fro, and so much added weight of boys and sculpture, had helped the sun above and the rising water below the ice, and now they all had just about time to hurry ashore. Then the great crack Bob McCoy had noticed grew rapidly wider, and they could hear all the frozen surface of the pond crack and split in every direction.
There was some fun in watching the ice break up, but there was sorrow among the sculptors, for all that.
"It's an awful pity to lose such a snow man as that is."
"He didn't even have time to thaw out."
"We can make another."
"There never was just such a Ben Franklin as that."
Probably not, and now there he was floating out into the middle of the pond on a wide cake of ice, and drifting down toward the dam. The water was rising, for the snow was melting fast, and the cake of ice Ben was on rocked now and then in a way which made him seem to bow to his friends on shore.
"Isn't he polite, though!" said Billy McCoy. "Pity he can't swim."
"Swim!" exclaimed Joe Larkin; "I guess so. There he goes, boys. Just a rod or two more."
Most of them gave vent to their feelings in a volley of snow-balls which fell about half way short of their mark. Then they all stood still, for the swift water seemed to seize Ben's cake of ice with a sudden jerk, and swept it to the edge of the dam. For one short minute the brittle raft stuck on the edge, and then it broke right in two. With a great slushy splash the snow Ben went to pieces, and was carried over the slippery "apron," down among the foaming eddies below.
Every boy that was looking on drew a long breath and held it for a moment, and then there rose a chorus of shouts.
Joe Larkin led off with, "Good-by, Ben!"
And the rest followed with: "Hi! hi! hurrah! Good-by, Ben!"
Burr Whitcomb remarked, a little soberly, as he turned away: "Well, I don't care; he was the best snow man I ever saw. He looked a good deal like Ben Franklin."
[ARCHIE KIRK'S LEAP FOR LIFE.]
BY LILLIE E. BARR.
"Alice, may I? Say I may. I can do it, dear sister"; and as he spoke, Archie Kirk bent eagerly over his sister's chair.
Three weeks before, he and Alice had been rescued—the only survivors—from a fine ship that had gone to pieces off the coast of the island of St. Kilda, which is a little speck of land in the wide waters of the Atlantic, forming a part of the Hebrides.
They had been tenderly cared for by the good islanders, and the request which Archie had made of his sister, and which she was very reluctant to grant, was, that he might go with Hakon Bork—the son of the good woman who had given them food and shelter—in search of the eggs and down of puffins, a species of sea-bird upon which these simple people depend mainly for their subsistence.
THE PUFFIN-HUNTERS.
"You are so young, and it is such a terrible way to earn your bread," replied Alice, who shudderingly remembered watching Hakon but the day before fasten his rope to a stake, and then lower himself down the awful precipice, with nothing but his firm grip to save him from falling into the foaming, raging sea beneath. "You are too young, Archie."
"Why, Alice, I am ten years old, and boys much younger than I go down all alone. These people are very good to us, but they are also very poor. I feel mean to accept their charity, and do nothing in return, when Hakon says I can help him if I will."
"It is so terrible, Archie, and if I should lose you too!" cried Alice, whose heart was still full of sorrow for her lost parents.
"God is good, my sister," said Hakon, "and I will watch thy brother carefully."
"You are right, Hakon; go, Archie, I will trust you to God's care."
So Archie bravely pulled his bonnet over his brows, and set out with Hakon and another man. After climbing to the summit of the great rocks, Hakon and Archie stepped fearlessly into the basket, and were slowly lowered over the side of the precipice, on whose edge a piece of wood was made fast to prevent the jagged rocks from cutting the rope. Down, down they went, the boiling sea below, the frightful precipices above, but in all the little shelves and fissures the puffins had made their nests. By a separate line they indicated to the man above when they were to be lowered or raised, and thus they labored away cheerily for hours, collecting many eggs and much down.
Archie showed great skill and coolness, and won great praise from Hakon, and after this he went with him on all such excursions, and as time went on was readily trusted down in the basket alone.
So the months slipped away, and Archie had, with Hakon's help, made himself a rope, such as is used for the perilous work of puffin-catching. The mode of making these ropes is as follows: A hide of a sheep and one of a cow are cut into slips, the latter being the broader; each slip of sheep's hide is then plaited to one of cow's, and two of these compound slips are then twisted together, so as to form a rope of about three inches in circumference. The length of these ropes varies from ninety to two hundred feet, and they are so valuable that a single one forms a girl's marriage portion in St. Kilda. Archie prized his very highly, not only because it was in a measure his own making, but because all his friends had denied themselves in some way or other to procure it for him.
Archie's life was very simple and very hard, but he enjoyed it, and for many months he was very useful to Hakon. Then one day the neighbors brought home a mangled body and laid it down on Dame Bork's hearth-stone. No need to tell the wailing mother, or the sorrowful Archie and Alice, poor Hakon's fate. The men went silently out, and the neighbor women spoke such words of comfort as their own losses, or the constant danger of their loved ones, prompted. Tenderly the dead was buried, and then the little household awoke to the duties of the day.
When their humble breakfast was over, Archie took his bonnet and rope, and said to the old dame, as he had said with Hakon many a morning,
"Give me your blessing, mother."
"Oh, Archie," said Alice, "must you go—all alone must you go?"
"I have a brave heart, Alice, which is good company." And then, glancing at Hakon's old mother, he whispered: "For Hakon's sake, as well as for her own kindness, we owe her every duty;" and then kissing Alice, he went off to the rocks.
As Archie had not Hakon now to help him, he had to leave his basket at home, and adopt the much less common but much more dangerous practice of reaching the birds' nests by fastening a simple rope to a strong stake securely driven into the earth a short distance from the edge of the precipice, and then gradually lower himself to some projecting cliff likely to contain the eggs and down of which he was in search.
So this morning, having reached the cloud-capped peaks, he secured his rope carefully, and then cautiously lowered himself until he reached a spot where the rocks overhung and sheltered a wide ledge.
He was sure that he would be likely to reap here an ample harvest, and he dexterously swung himself forward and gained a resting-place. As he expected, he found a great number of nests, and was soon eagerly filling the large pockets which are used for this purpose with the eggs and down, the patient birds scarcely disturbing him by a flutter.
But in his ardor he had forgotten to fasten the rope tightly around his body; it slipped from his grasp, and after swinging backward and forward for some time, but without coming within his reach, at length settled many feet from the spot where he stood. For a moment he stood aghast. The sudden blow almost deprived him of the power of thinking, but gradually he recovered his senses, and began anxiously to look around for some means of escape.
Fearful was the prospect. The rock for hundreds of feet above was smooth as if chiselled by the mason's hand; many hundred feet below, the raging waters burst with terrific noise upon the pointed crags, while the depth to which he had descended, the solitude of the spot, and the roar of the waves, precluded all possibility of making himself heard.
One desperate chance alone remained: by a bold leap he might catch the dangling rope. It was an awful hazard, for if he failed, instant death would be the result. Yet if he remained on the rock, death, though slower, was no less sure. His resolution was taken. He lifted his eyes to heaven with one short strong prayer for help, then like a winged creature sprang forward, and grasped the rope.
Many a year passed before Archie Kirk told his sister and adopted mother of his leap for life on that day, when he, a lad twelve years old, had determined to fill the place of Hakon. He became the most expert bird-catcher and climber in the Hebrides, but he never again forgot to secure his rope. Nor in telling the story did he ever take any credit to himself. "God is good," he used to add, reverently; "the rope was in His hands, or I had not caught it."