Such a sensation Sunday's preacher
made.
"Christian!" he cried, "what is your stock-
in-trade?
Alas! Too often nil. No time to pray;
No interview with Christ from day to day,
A hurried prayer, maybe, just gabbled
through;
A random text—for any one will do."
Then gently, lovingly, with look intense,
He leaned towards us—
"Is this common sense?
No person in his rightful mind will try
To run his business so, lest by-and-by
The thing collapses, smirching his good
name,
And he, insolvent, face the world with
shame."
I heard it all; and something inly said
That all was true. The daily toil and press
Had crowded out my hopes of holiness.
Still, my old self rose, reasoning:
How can you,
With strenuous work to do—
Real slogging work—say, how can you
keep pace
With leisured folks? Why, you could
grow in grace
If you had time . . . the daily Interview
Was never meant for those who wash and
bake.
But yet a small Voice whispered:
"For My sake
Keep tryst with Me!
There are so many minutes in a day,
So spare Me ten.
It shall be proven, then,
Ten minutes set apart can well repay
You shall accomplish more
If you will shut your door
For ten short minutes just to watch and
pray."
"Lord, if I do
Set ten apart for You"
(I dared, yes dared, to reason thus with
Him)
"The baker's sure to come;
Or Jane will call
To say some visitor is in the hall;
Or I shall smell the porridge burning, yes,
And run to stop it in my hastiness.
There's not ten minutes, Lord, in all the
day
I can be sure of peace in which to watch
and pray."
But all that night,
With calm insistent might,
That gentle Voice spake softly, lovingly—
"Keep tryst with Me!
You have devised a dozen different ways
Of getting easy meals on washing days;
You spend much anxious thought on
hopeless socks;
On moving ironmould from tiny frocks;
'Twas you who found
A way to make the sugar lumps go round;
You, who invented ways and means of
making
Nice spicy buns for tea, hot from the baking,
When margarine was short . . . and can-
not you
Who made the time to join the butter queue
Make time again for Me?
Yes, will you not, with all your daily
striving,
Use woman's wit in scheming and con-
triving
To keep that tryst with Me?"
Like ice long bound
On powdered frosty ground,
My erring will all suddenly gave way.
The kind soft wind of His sweet pleading
blew,
And swiftly, silently, before I knew,
The warm love loosed and ran.
Life-giving floods began,
And so most lovingly I answered Him:
"Lord, yes, I will, and can.
I will keep tryst with Thee, Lord, come
what may!"
ENVOY.
It is a wondrous and surprising thing
How that ten minutes takes the piercing
sting
From vexing circumstance and poison-
ous dart
Hurled by the enemy straight at my
heart.
So, to the woman tempest-tossed and
tried
By household cares, and hosts of things
beside,
With all my strength God bids me say
to you:
"Dear soul, do try the daily Interview!"
The Little House
One yestereve, in the waning light,
When the wind was still and the
gloaming bright,
There came a breath from a far countrie,
And the ghost of a Little House called
to me.
"Have you forgotten me?" "No!" I cried.
"Your hall was as narrow as this is wide,
Your roof was leaky, the rain came
through
Till a ceiling fell, on my new frock too!
"In your parlour flooring a loose board hid,
And wore the carpet, you know it did!
Your kitchen was small, and the shelves
were few,
While the fireplace smoked—and you
know it's true!"
The little ghost sighed: "Do you quite
forget
My window boxes of mignonette?
And the sunny room where you used to
sew
When a great hope came to you, long ago?
"Ah, me! How you used to watch the
door
Where a latch-key turned on the stroke
of four.
And you made the tea, and you poured
it out
From an old brown pot with a broken
spout
"Now, times have changed. And your
footman waits
With the silver urn, and the fluted plates.
But the little blind Love with the wings,
has flown,
Who used to sit by your warm hearth-
stone."
The little ghost paused. Then "Away!"
I said.
"Back to your place with the quiet dead.
Back to your place, lest my servants see,
That the ghost of a Little House calls
to me."
The House-Mother
Across the town the evening bell is
ringing;
Clear comes the call, through kitchen
windows winging!
Lord, knowing Thou art kind,
I heed Thy call to prayer.
I have a soul to save;
A heart which needs, I think, a double
share
Of sweetnesses which noble ladies crave.
Hope, faith and diligence, and patient
care,
With meekness, grace, and lowliness of
mind.
Lord, wilt Thou grant all these
To one who prays, but cannot sit at ease?
They do not know,
The passers-by, who go
Up to Thy house, with saintly faces set;
Who throng about Thy seat,
And sing Thy praises sweet,
Till vials full of odours cloud Thy feet;
They do not know . . .
And, if they knew, then would they greatly
care
That Thy tired handmaid washed the
children's hair;
Or, with red roughened hands, scoured
dishes well,
While through the window called the
evening bell?
And that her seeking soul looks upward
yet,
THEY do not know . . . but THOU wilt
not forget
A Woman in Hospital
I know it all . . . I know.
For I am God. I am Jehovah, He
Who made you what you are; and I can
see
The tears that wet your pillow night by
night,
When nurse has lowered that too-brilliant
light;
When the talk ceases, and the ward grows
still,
And you have doffed your will:
I know the anguish and the helplessness.
I know the fears that toss you to and fro.
And how you wrestle, weariful,
With hosts of little strings that pull
About your heart, and tear it so.
I know.
Lord, do You know
I had no time to put clean curtains up;
No time to finish darning all the socks;
Nor sew clean frilling in the children's
frocks?
And do You know about my Baby's cold?
And how things are with my sweet three-
year-old?
Will Jane remember right
Their cough mixture at night?
And will she ever think
To brush the kitchen flues, or scrub the
sink?
And then, there's John! Poor tired
lonely John!
No one will run to put his slippers on.
And not a soul but me
Knows just exactly how he likes his tea.
It rends my heart to think I cannot go
And minister to him. . . .
I know. I know.
Then, there are other things,
Dear Lord . . . more little strings
That pull my heart. Now Baby feels her
feet
She loves to run outside into the street
And Jane's hands are so full, she'll never
see. . . .
And I'm quite sure the clean clothes won't
be aired—
At least, not properly.
And, oh, I can't, I really can't be spared—
My little house calls so!
I know.
And I am waiting here to help and bless.
Lay down your head. Lay down your hope-
lessness
And let Me speak.
You are so weary, child, you are so weak.
But let us reason out
The darkness and the doubt;
This torturing fear that tosses you about.
I hold the universe. I count the stars.
And out of shortened lives I build the
ages. . . .
But, Lord, while such high things Thy
thought engages,
I fear—forgive me—lest
Amid those limitless eternal spaces
Thou shouldest, in the high and heavenly
places,
Pass over my affairs as things of nought.
There are so many houses just like mine.
And I so earth-bound, and Thyself Divine.
It seems impossible that Thou shouldst
care
Just what my babies wear;
And what John gets to eat; . . . and
can it be
A circumstance of great concern to Thee
Whether I live or die?
Have you forgotten then, My child, that I,
The Infinite, the Limitless, laid down
The method of existence that I knew,
And took on Me a nature just like you?
I laboured day by day
In the same dogged way
That you have tackled household tasks.
And then,
Remember, child, remember once again
Your own beloveds . . . did you really
think—
(Those days you toiled to get their meat
and drink,
And made their clothes, and tried to under-
stand
Their little ailments)—did you think your
hand,
Your feeble hand, was keeping them from ill?
I gave them life, and life is more than meat;
Those little limbs, so comely and so sweet.
You can make raiment for them, and are glad,
But can you add
One cubit to their stature? Yet they grow!
Oh, child, hands off! Hands off! And
leave them so.
I guarded hitherto, I guard them still.
I have let go at last. I have let go.
And, oh, the rest it is, dear God, to know
My dear ones are so safe, for Thou wilt
keep.
Hands off, at last! Now, I can go to
sleep.