The old lady informed me that she had another son in town whom I must visit. I did so; and found him living with his family in a little house (?), the front of which touched the edge of the bank, the back perched on two posts, with a deep ravine behind, where the water ebbed and flowed as the dams were raised and lowered. I made some remarks on the unhealthiness of the location; and the man said, "It's curious, but you can smell it stronger farther off than you can close by!" I thought, what an illustration of the insidious approaches of sin! He was right, so far as the senses were concerned; but his nose had become used to it. I was not surprised to be called soon after to preach a funeral sermon there. One of the daughters, a bright girl of twelve years, had died of malignant diphtheria. It was a piteous sight. We dared not use the church, and the house was too small to turn round in, what with bedsteads, cook-stove, kitchen-table, and coffin. On the hillside, with logs for seats, we held the service.
It was touching to see the mute grief of some of the little ones; one elder sister could with difficulty be restrained from kissing the dead. She was a fine girl in spite of her surroundings, and in her grief, in a moment of confidence, said her uncle had murdered a man down South, and it preyed on her mind; but she was afraid to tell the authorities, for the uncle had threatened to kill her if she told. This confession was made to the woman she was working for; and though I did not think it unlikely, I treated it as gossip. But with the facts related in the former part of this chapter before me, I have no doubt that she spoke the truth. One murderer has gone to meet the Judge of all the earth; the other is in State prison for life.
The cockle and chess are gone; but the wheat (the children) are left,—bright, young, pliant, strong,—what shall we do with them? Let them grow more cockle instead of wheat, and chess instead of barley? Or shall they be of the wheat to be gathered into the Master's garner? If you desire the latter, pray ye the Lord of the harvest that he will send more laborers into the harvest.
I once saw an old farmer in Canada who offered ten dollars for every thistle that could be found on his hundred acres. I have seen him climb a fence to uproot thistles in his neighbor's field. When asked why he did that extra work, he said, because the seeds would fly over to his farm. Was he not a wise man?
Perhaps no greater danger threatens our Republic to-day than the neglect of the children—millions of school age that are not in school, and in the great cities thousands who cannot find room. Is it any wonder that we have thirty millions of our people not in touch with the church?
XIV.
CHIPS FROM OTHER LOGS.
In the Rev. Harvey Hyde's "Reminiscences of Early Days," occurs the following interesting notes:—