"Yes."
"Well, then why didn't we send lots of missionaries fifty years ago? I wish I could go."
"Do you want to know, Charlie, how you can tell if you can be a missionary when you are a man?"
"Yes sir," said Charlie.
"Be a little missionary now. Be a Christian. Get new scholars to come to Sunday school. Live for other people all you can. One little person quit eating candy, and gave the money for the Lord, another bought a dozen eggs and raised chickens and sold them for the Lord. A little farmer boy raised potatoes on a little corner of land his papa said he could have, and then sold them for missionary money, and there are many other ways."
"Oh, I know, I know what I'll do!" said several at once. "I'm so thirsty."
"So am I." "No, wait." "Come on."
"We can all do something, then, can't we? I'm dry too."
And the one who was answering questions, together with for six little people, who had gathered around him, went out under the grape arbor, and down by the row of evergreens to the spring, and they all drank heartily from the old tin cup.
An hour later all the visitors had their faces turned toward home, and the children were thinking about being little missionaries at home.