Good for evil

by Madeline Leslie

Paul Dudley, as the senior in age, must first be described. He was the third child and only son of a merchant in Philadelphia. His mother was the sole manager in the family; she averring that her husband had his share of labor in earning the money which supported them. He was engaged in a lucrative business which afforded his family every comfort, and some of the luxuries of life. He was an honest; upright man in the world's opinion, and in his own opinion; but though he took no advantage of his neighbor's necessity, he defrauded his Maker, of what was his due,— the first and best affections of his heart; and beside this, he defrauded his own soul of the comfort and support of religion.

Mrs. Dudley was a devoted mother. She was bound up in her family, for whom she was willing to work early and late; denying herself many luxuries, that her children might never feel the need of them. Two daughters, girls of good sense and a fair education, were already settled in homes of their own; the one just younger than Paul was betrothed to her father's junior partner; and Anna, the youngest, was still in school.

Though probably Mrs. Dudley would not have admitted the fact, it was allowed by all the others, that Paul was her favorite. From his very birth his sisters had been taught to yield their will and wishes to his. As he grew older they were called to wait upon him; to humor his whims; and in many ways involving self-denial and sacrifice, the whole family proved to his young lordship that his pleasure was their first consideration.

Of course under such training, it could not be expected that Paul would be otherwise than selfish and domineering, claiming their service as a right; petulant and irritable when his demands did not receive a due amount of attention.

When he entered College he was thrown into the society of Edward Wallingford; and admiring his abilities as a scholar, sought his friendship. For six years they had roomed, studied, talked and walked together. The ambition of Dudley's friend had stimulated his best efforts, while the constant society of a noble, ingenuous mind had done much toward counteracting for the time what was erroneous in his early training.

Edward Wallingford was the son of a gentleman who had accompanied his father from England at the age of ten years. They settled at length in New York, where they established a large iron and steel business. The younger Wallingford married soon after he attained his majority and took his wife to his father's house, where they lived only two years before the death of the Senior partner in the firm, produced a change in the business. Six months later, the elder Mr. Wallingford died, leaving his son his share in the iron works together with a few acres of rocky land just outside of the city proper.

Edward, the subject of our story, was the second child and the only one out of six children who lived to be seven years of age. Fearing, from these repeated afflictions, that the air and confinement of a city were the cause of the death of his loved ones, the father, in Edward's ninth year, purchased a place on the Hudson river, and removed his family there just before the birth of a tiny girl called Gertrude.

There amidst the picturesque scenery of that region, the children grew apace until Ned had reached his twelfth and Gerty her third summer; when a terrible affliction came upon them in the death of their father.

Mr. Wallingford had been greatly esteemed as a shrewd, successful businessman; the papers in noticing his death, remarked that he was a friend and supporter of all the benevolent enterprises of the day; but only the wife and children of the deceased knew how his large heart had beat in sympathy with every effort to advance the cause of the Redeemer's kingdom. To them it appeared for a time as if the sun had set in a total eclipse. Even after years had passed, and time had in a degree allayed their grief, they mourned his loss as the most tender husband, the most loving father, the most conscientious, humble and earnest Christian, it had been their lot to know.

Three years Mrs. Wallingford survived him; and then she too was called to her home in the skies. The summons was not a sudden one; for months she had felt her health to be declining, and to her the thought of being free from her body of sin and death was delightful. The only struggle she felt in exchanging the scenes of time for those of eternity, was when she thought of her children. But her faith in the promises of a covenant-keeping God at length prevailed over every doubt; she said to her faithful pastor: