She told the manager she would try, providing he would tell the audience of her great sorrow. She wanted the sympathy of the people—it would give her strength, while it would give them patience and tolerance.
After the manager had gone before the footlights and told the sad story the people waited in silence for the young singer to appear. There was no applause. The people felt the presence of death, or sorrow and heart aches. The accompanist struck the first note and the brave girl commenced to sing. The song was suitable for a sad heart to sing. She could sing her sorrow from the depths of her soul.
The crowded house sat spellbound. That song from her soul of sorrow thrilled every heart as it had never been thrilled before. The notes, clear and sweet, came laden with the tears her brave soul was holding back. The people sat in deep silence, but with beating and throbbing hearts and active minds. They pictured the dead mother in that distant town, sleeping silence—ah, never again, never to awaken to greet her daughter on her return.
And the singer pictured that angeled mother listening from that far off shore, and she sang to her while the audience listened. For as much as a minute the people sat in silence after the singer had left the stage, and then the cheers and tears told of the prize she had won.
VISITING THE OLD HOME
My last visit to the home of my childhood filled me with gloomy thoughts. Nothing remained of the old home but the ruins of the cellar walls. The house had been torn down and removed from the spot. I had expected to wander through the deserted rooms and try to recall the old hopes and memories that filled my soul when I lived in the old log cottage. These memories came back but slowly, because the old landmarks had been removed and there was nothing to suggest the old incidents that filled my life when a boy.
The location of the house was in a deep, narrow valley, with hills on three sides and a dense woods in front, with no other human habitation in sight. It was in this secluded spot I dreamed the dreams of dissatisfied youth. And yet these dreams are very dear to me now, as I dig them out of memory, clothed in their old rags and hunger and famished ambition. The memories of the pain I suffered in this dreamy spot came back to me like old friends who suffered with me in those days.
It was here that I held my dear old father’s hand while he passed over the bar and drifted out on the Sea of Death. How plainly the scene comes back to me as I stand on the crumbling walls and recall every feature of the room in which he passed away. He asked for me in the last hour and requested me to stay with him. Perhaps he understood me better than the older boys, or he may have believed that I understood him best of all the family.
It was not his desire to go. He had hoped for ten more years of life, but now he realized that the end was near at hand. He spoke not a word of being prepared to go nor did he ask me to meet him in heaven. He belonged to the class of thinkers who do not know, and, realizing that he knew nothing of the future, did not speculate on possibilities. The last words he said were: “You may look upon men when dying, but ah, my son, you will never know what death is until you come to die yourself!”