Sybil was silent for several minutes. "Oh, father!" she then said, "isn't the time dreadfully near now? Fancy leaving you and dear mother! How can we?"
"You must go to your work, darling, and we must stay here to do ours. Is it not so?" Mr. Graham asked, in the dear, kind, soft voice that Sybil loved so much, and which she always called his "preachy voice." "But what shall give us comfort? what shall we think about when we are trying to do our several duties, though apart, I hope contentedly and well? That it is God who has called us to our several duties; it is His Almighty will which we have now and always to obey; but remember, not alone, not unaided, dear Sybil. Who will be our guide, stay, and comfort, when we are separated from one another?"
Sybil knew, but could not answer, because she was crying.
WOMAN OF POAH-BI.
"Your mother and I," Mr. Graham went on, "in commending our children to the Fatherly love and care of Him Who gave you to us, know that we place you in the safest keeping; and you yourselves have also both learnt, have you not, how to go to our Father and 'Supreme Ruler' in earnest prayer, whenever tempted to do what would displease Him? A missionary, you know, is one who is sent on a mission—to fulfil a duty. A missionary's children must not shrink from fulfilling, must not fail to fulfil, the mission on which they are sent, must they?"
Sybil looked comforted. She liked this last "Peep-show" very much, and kissed her father to show him that she did.
A few minutes later she said, "Do you know, father, I believe little Chu is really beginning to believe and understand properly, for the other day, when I was saying my prayers, she came and knelt down beside me, and she would never kneel to our God before, even when she saw the Christian woman at Poah-bi do so, with whom we stayed, and with whom she was such good friends. I shall often remember that woman and her dear little baby, which she tied to herself so funnily, because I liked them so very much.
"Poor little Chu!" Sybil then went on. "I shall be so glad to see her again when I come back to you, but I do not think she will like me to go away."
"Chu will have to be a great deal at school now. She has her work to do too, you know."