{"collection":"scripture-revelation","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_71824/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_71824","id":"gutenberg_71824","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/71824","summary":null,"tags":["Aunts -- Juvenile fiction","Category: Children & Young Adult Reading","Category: Religion/Spirituality","Category: Short Stories","Children -- Conduct of life -- Juvenile fiction","Children's stories","Christian life -- Juvenile fiction"],"text":"Transcriber's note: Unusual and inconsistent spelling is as printed.\n\n[Illustration]\n\n[Illustration]\n\n\n\n                             Twilight\n\n                             Stories.\n\n\n                        By CATHARINE SHAW\n\n Author of \"Sunday Sunshine,\" \"The Strange House,\" \"At Last,\" etc.\n\n\n\nJohn F. Shaw & Co., Ltd.,\n    3, Pilgrim Street,\n             London, E. C.\n\n\n\n                            CONTENTS.\n\nCHAP.\n\n    I. A TICKET FOR EACH\n\n   II. WHAT THE SHEPHERD KNOWS\n\n  III. FOLLOWING\n\n   IV. KEPT AT HOME\n\n    V. ROBBIE'S CHRISTMAS EVE\n\n   VI. THE FLOWER OF HOPE\n\n  VII. MILICENT'S MUSIC\n\n VIII. SERVES HIM RIGHT\n\n   IX. NELLIE'S HINDRANCE\n\n    X. THE EARWIG\n\n   XI. LOST ON THE COMMON\n\n  XII. BLACKBERRYING\n\n XIII. THE STOPPED WATCH\n\n  XIV. THE MIDNIGHT A, B, C\n\n   XV. VERA'S CONTENT\n\n  XVI. A SEARCH FOR VIOLETS\n\n XVII. SUMMER DAYS\n\nXVIII. BECAUSE\n\n  XIX. THE HAUNTED ROOM\n\n   XX. AGATHA'S STORY\n\n  XXI. UNDER THE STARS\n\n XXII. KINDLED\n\nXXIII. TOM'S PERSUASIONS\n\n XXIV. A MESSAGE FROM AMERICA\n\n  XXV. HOW TO FIND\n\n XXVI. WORTH WHILE\n\nXXVII. MID-WINTER\n\n\n\n                        TWILIGHT STORIES.\n\nCHAPTER I.\n\nA TICKET FOR EACH.\n\n\"COME along, Auntie! The tea will not be in for a few minutes, and the\nfire is bright and the curtains are drawn. Just sit down and give us a\ntwilight talk. It is New Year's day, and of course we want something to\nhelp us on our way.\"\n\nTheir Aunt smiled. She had come to stay with them for a long visit.\nThe four gathered round her knew that she had passed through deep\ntrials, and they also knew that she had come out of them nearer to the\nCelestial City, like \"Christian\" from \"The Slough of Despond.\"\n\nThey did not guess that their love and sympathy helped her very much\ntoo.\n\n\"Well!\" she said, brightly, \"I was thinking this morning about God's\npromises, and I made up my mind to take one each day this year to live\nupon!\"\n\n\"How do you mean?\" asked Rose.\n\n\"Every morning to take some distinct promise, or assurance, out of\nthe Bible, and think about it whenever I could, and remind God of it\nwhenever I was in any difficulty. I'm going to call it my ticket!\"\n\n\"Your 'ticket,' Auntie?\" said Oswald, affectionately. \"I do not believe\nyou want a ticket to get into God's presence. Is that what you mean?\"\n\nThe others smiled, and Aunt Ruth laughed a little.\n\n\"Well\u2014it's just as well to have a ticket! The other day, do you\nremember? I went to a large concert. Inside was light and music, and\nfriends; outside was cold, dull weather, and policemen and hall-keepers\njealously guarding the way.\n\n\"I was glad to have a ticket then, I can tell you; and it struck me\nthis morning that there is nothing Satan likes better than to say, as\nthose hall-keepers did: 'This is not the way! Where's your ticket?'\"\n\n\"And how is that like God's promises?\" said Tom, bluntly.\n\n\"Like this. In God's presence is light and warmth and music. Satan\nwould keep us outside; but when we can say to him 'God said so,' he has\nnot a word to answer, and is obliged to let us pass!\"\n\n\"I see!\" said Tom.\n\n\"Let us all try this year to have a promise, or an assurance, every\nmorning. I am sure it will bring happiness.\"\n\n\"Have you got one for to-day?\" asked Jean, shyly.\n\n\"Yes,\" said Aunt Ruth, looking up. \"It is 'Certainly I will be with\nthee.'\"\n\n\"That's a ticket to a very good seat!\" said Oswald, with his eyes\nshining. \"I think your 'tickets' are a good idea, Auntie. We'll each\nsee if we can't get some for ourselves.\"\n\n\"But are the promises always applicable?\" asked Rose.\n\n\"I think I may say I have always found them so,\" said Aunt Ruth, \"for\nwhen by a promise we get into God's presence, it is wonderful what a\nfeast He spreads for us, 'enough and to spare'; worth all the trouble\nof getting in.\"\n\n\"Is it easy to find promises?\" asked Tom, \"For I should never know\nwhere to look.\"\n\n\"You would soon get used to it, especially as there are quite 30,000\npromises in the Bible.\"\n\n\"Are there, Auntie?\"\n\n\"Yes. Did you never hear the story of the old woman who put T.P. on\npretty nearly every page of her Bible? Some one asked her what T. P.\nmeant, and she said, with great satisfaction\u2014'T. P., Tried and Proved.\nI've tried and proved every one of those promises, and found God\nfaithful!'\"\n\n\"I like that!\" said Oswald. \"Now let's get a promise each for to-day!\"\n\n\"How would you like to have the same as mine?\" said Aunt Ruth, \"And\nto-morrow you can each get a fresh one for yourselves?\"\n\nThis met with great approval, and Jean wrote on a strip of paper and\nslipped it into her Bible\u2014\n\n\"Certainly I will be with thee!\"\n\n\n\nCHAPTER II.\n\nWHAT THE SHEPHERD KNOWS.\n\nAUNT RUTH sat in the chimney corner. It was a cold, snowy day, and the\nchildren had come in from a walk, and said it was bitter.\n\nThey gathered close to the fire, and all seemed inclined to stop there,\nrather than seek for employment or amusement.\n\n\"The fields looked so bleak,\" said Rose, warming her hands for the\ntwentieth time. \"We saw a shepherd leading home his sheep, Auntie!\"\nsaid Jean.\n\n\"Did you? How interesting! Not driving them, then?\"\n\n\"No, that was what I noticed and I thought you'd perhaps have a\ntwilight talk over that?\"\n\nJean smiled as she said it, and Aunt Ruth smiled too.\n\n\"So you are beginning to look-out for spiritual lessons from everyday\nthings?\"\n\n\"I like that sort of lesson,\" said Jean, \"so much better than geography\nand history!\"\n\n\"Ah! But we cannot properly learn the spiritual, unless we are in touch\nwith Christ in the everyday things!\"\n\n\"Can't we, Auntie?\" asked Tom, soberly.\n\nShe shook her head. \"Well,\" she said, \"directly Jean told me she had\nseen a shepherd leading his sheep, I thought of one of my favourite\ntexts.\"\n\n\"And that was?\" asked Oswald.\n\n\"'My sheep hear my voice, and I know them, and they follow Me; and I\ngive unto them eternal life, and they shall never perish, neither shall\nany man pluck them out of my hand.'\"\n\n\"Children! The sheep hear; and He knows them, each one; and they\nfollow; and He gives. There is a world of meaning in every one of those\nshort sentences. Many children and grown-up people, too, hear, and\nfollow, and forget the clause that comes between. Do you remember what\nthat is?\"\n\n\"'I know them,'\" said Rose, gently. She had been learning the whole\nverse, and could repeat it perfectly.\n\n\"Yes\u2014and what do you think they miss by forgetting that clause?\"\n\nThe children did not know, so they looked up earnestly.\n\n\"They miss assurance. The first clause and the third belong to\nthemselves, 'they hear, they follow'; but the second clause is all\nChrist's, 'I know them.' Here is safety and peace.\"\n\n\"Once there was a revival in a large school that I knew of, and one\nof the naughtiest girls was brought to Christ. Most of the mistresses\nthought it impossible that Lizzie could be really converted, and\nlaughed much at a younger teacher, who believed that there really was\na change in the girl. This young teacher at last was driven into a\ncorner in defending Lizzie's conversion, and said, in desperation,\n'Well\u2014Christ knows.' Very soon after the holidays came, and the young\nmistress left the school.\"\n\n\"But at the end of a year, she paid her friends there a visit; and when\nshe was hearing all the news, one of them said, 'You remember Lizzie,\nwho was such a naughty girl? Well, she is totally changed. Instead\nof being the most tiresome, she is the brightest of all the little\nChristians!\"\n\n\"Then the mistress took heart, and remembered how she had said, 'Christ\nknows'?\"\n\n\"Yes, dears, He knows His sheep, and they follow Him. And in proportion\nto our realising that He knows, so shall we be strong to follow Him\nclosely!\"\n\n\"That's very nice,\" said Tom. \"Thank you, Auntie.\"\n\n\"Another day we will have 'following,' for I think it will help us.\"\n\nThey looked up gratefully. They did want to learn more of Christ, and\nthis dear Aunt Ruth had learned in His School, and could help them\nbecause she had been close to Him herself.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER III.\n\nFOLLOWING.\n\n\"WHAT are you looking at, Auntie?\" The children crowded out of the\nFrench window, and stood on the verandah by her side, the stars and the\ndeep twilight sky sending a sort of thrill to their hearts.\n\n\"I was watching that old woman and her grandson on their way home. What\ndo you think I heard the boy say as he passed the hedge?\"\n\n\"What?\" asked Rose, curiously. Auntie always had something pleasant to\nsay.\n\n\"'I can't see the way, grannie, it's so dark!' he complained; and then\na gentle voice came out of the gloom, and I heard these words: 'If you\nkeep close behind, and follow me, we shall soon get into the light!'\"\n\n\"And I thought, children, that here was our promised twilight talk\nabout 'following' all ready to our hand!\"\n\n\"Now it seems to me that little Ted Jones is a picture of us.\"\n\n\"There are often places in our everyday lives which are dark and\nmysterious to us ignorant ones; sorrows, or trials, misunderstandings,\ndifficulties, sins, temptations\u2014you can all put your own special\ndifficulty into the story, and call it 'darkness.' The question often\ncomes to each of us, how are we to get out of this dilemma, or this\ndifficulty, or this bad temper, or temptation?\"\n\n\"I know well that it seems very real and large and overwhelming to\nus. But the Lord Jesus bids us follow Him closely, assuring us with\ntenderness that is wonderful, 'He that followeth Me shall not walk in\ndarkness, but shall have the light of life!'\"\n\n\"But,\" said Oswald, pressing closer to her side, \"there are so many\nthings that are so small, Auntie, and yet they worry you no end!\nPerhaps you've had a lesson to learn, and you've had a headache, or\nsomebody has thrown you over, and made it ache, and so your lesson\nisn't half prepared, and you get up in the morning feeling that the\nworld is dark and you cannot see any way out of the bother. Oh, there\nare heaps of things! That's only one! What can we do in such a case?\"\n\nThere was a pause for an instant. Aunt Ruth was trying to put herself\ninto Oswald's circumstances, and thinking how to bring her great Remedy\ndown to his need. To make him understand that Jesus Christ is a remedy\nfor all ills.\n\n\"I think,\" she said, slowly, \"the best plan would be to go to God, our\nFather, and tell Him just how the difficulty came, and then ask Him\ndefinitely 'in the name of Jesus,' to make some way out of it\u2014\"\n\n\"And then?\" asked Oswald, eagerly.\n\n\"Then I should do the next most obvious thing. Either look over the\nunfinished lesson if there is time, or go quietly into class if there\nisn't, and wait to see how God will help you. The answer may come in\nsome very simple way, but if you look for it, it will surely come, and\nyou must thank Him.\"\n\nOswald pressed her arm. Aunt Ruth was so comforting.\n\n\"Every one of us has our own special difficulty, and what is 'darkness'\nto Oswald may not appear at all bad to Tom!\"\n\nTom could hear a smile in his Aunt's voice as she turned towards him.\n\n\"The timid child who hates to go upstairs after dusk, feels itself\nquite safe if father is in front! So little Ted Jones could not see the\nway to go, and he felt afraid in the dark lanes lest he was not going\nright. But grannie knew! She had been that way before too many times to\nmistake, and if little Ted would only keep close to her, and trust her,\nshe would lead him safely home. Presently the cottage door would open,\nthere would be a flood of light, and little Ted would be at home!\"\n\n\"How nice!\" said Jean, with her eyes shining in the darkness.\n\nBut Aunt Ruth was speaking again. \"Jesus says 'He that followeth Me\nshall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of life. If any\nman serve Me, let him follow Me, and whither I am, there shall My\nservant be!\"\n\nThere was a moment's pause, and the children were looking up to the\nstarlit sky.\n\n\"But, sometimes,\" said Tom, in a low voice, \"the path seems difficult,\nand we lose sight of the Guide, perhaps, and cannot be sure He is\nthere\u2014\"\n\n\"Yes,\" said Aunt Ruth, \"I know that; but I think then the best way is\nto speak to our Guide. Tell Him we find the way rough and lonely, and\nask Him by his Spirit to reveal His presence to us. As surely as we do,\nwe shall get a comforting assurance that He is there; that He knows\nthe way, that He has been through all our temptations, and that He is\nsafely leading us Home! Oh, the rest of being sure that Jesus knows the\nway, children!\"\n\n\"I suppose,\" said Rose, \"that if we were more sure about Jesus we\nshould not be half so afraid!\"\n\n\"'Sure,'\" echoed Tom; \"how do you mean?\"\n\n\"I mean,\" hesitated Rose, \"that if we had more confidence in the way He\nwas leading us we should be more satisfied with our circumstances\u2014\"\n\nRose had touched upon one of the great problems of life. The others did\nnot know it, but Aunt Ruth did.\n\n\"Have I ever told you about the Alpine guide?\" she asked suddenly.\n\n\"No, I think not,\" said Rose, wonderingly.\n\n\"When people want to make an ascent of a difficult mountain, the first\nthing they do is to secure the services of a guide.\"\n\n\"This guide must be thoroughly qualified, strong and reliable, have\nclimbed that particular mountain many times before, and must be ready\nto undertake the charge of the traveller\u2014\"\n\n\"Oh, I see!\" exclaimed Jean.\n\n\"And then, when the traveller and the guide have made the compact, the\ntraveller gives himself over to do exactly as the guide says, doesn't\nhe?\"\n\n\"Of course he does,\" said Tom.\n\n\"And they start together, and the guide goes before in all the\ndifficult places. He cares for the traveller; he holds him up; he\nassures him that he knows the way. As they mount higher, the guide cuts\neach step in the ice, and the traveller must put his foot where his\nguide's have been, with unquestioning faith: herein is his only safety.\"\n\n\"Will he grudge his confidence when the summit is reached, and they\nstand beneath the vault of heaven with nothing between?\"\n\n\"So we, children, shall thank and praise our great Guide for His\nfaithfulness, and shall know those words true by and bye\u2014'He that\nfolloweth Me shall not walk in darkness, but shall have the light of\nlife'!\"\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IV.\n\nKEPT AT HOME.\n\nTWO girls sat at a window in a cosy bedroom overlooking the snowy\nprospect; a bright fire burned in the grate, and a little table was\nspread with afternoon tea.\n\n\"I wish you could go out and skate, Mary!\" said the elder of the two,\nlaying a gentle hand on the other's white one, and looking in her face.\n\nMary shook her head with a little half-smile.\n\n\"I suppose I ought not to have said so,\" Dorothy went on, \"for I expect\nit only makes you long the more\u2014\"\n\n\"No, it doesn't,\" said Mary. \"You see, Dorothy, I'm willing, and that\nmakes it so much easier.\"\n\n\"Easier to sit up there and mope, instead of going to parties, or\nskating, or even church? And then in front of you, perhaps, an\noperation in which you may lose your foot\u2014\"\n\nAnd as she said the words, Dorothy buried her face on Mary's lap and\ngave a sob.\n\nMary's little hand stroked her hair tenderly. \"Yes\u2014all that,\" she said,\n\"and yet I love God's will better than my own, and am sure He will\nallow nothing that He will not give me strength to bear.\"\n\nStill Dorothy sobbed, and Mary went on in the same tender, even tone,\nwhich had come to her because her heart was at rest in the heart and\nwill of God.\n\n\"I'll tell you what comforts me, Dorothy, most of all. I've two texts\nthat I live on just now; would you care to hear them?\"\n\nDorothy nodded, and sat up, drying her eyes. \"I've no business to\ndepress you!\" she exclaimed. \"Only I am so sorry!\"\n\n\"I know,\" answered Mary, \"but now listen to my texts and get comforted.\nOne is the down-hearted text, and the other is the triumphant one.\nListen! This is the down-hearted text\u2014I mean when Satan tries to make\nme down-hearted:\u2014'What time I am afraid, I will trust in Thee!'\"\n\n\"And the triumphant one is this,\u2014'I will trust, and not be afraid!'\nWhich will you have, Dorothy?\"\n\nDorothy smiled at her tone, and Mary said, \"Will you take the comfort\nthat Jesus wants to give you about me, and be sure He is doing His best\nfor me? I'm at the triumphant text to-night, you see!\"\n\nThere were bright tears glittering in her soft eyes for all that, and\nDorothy kissed her almost reverently.\n\n\"Well\u2014I'll take one of your texts, if I can't take the other!\" she\nsaid, \"At present!\"\n\n\"God must teach you Himself,\" said Mary, \"and then you will be able!\"\n\n\n\nCHAPTER V.\n\nROBBIE'S CHRISTMAS EVE.\n\n\"WHY, Mother, it is almost as light as day!\" said Robin, as the two\ncame out from the shade of the trees close to the village church. \"I\nwas never out so late before. Look at the church clock, it's just upon\na quarter past eleven.\"\n\n\"Yes,\" said his mother, trying to quicken her tired footsteps; \"and\nwe'll soon be home now, Robbie.\"\n\n\"I don't care,\" said Robin, a little sadly. \"I was never so old as this\nbefore, and I thought Christmas was always a happy day to everybody,\nand I'm sure it won't be to us to-morrow, Mammie! We've got nothing to\nkeep it with, and then there's father so ill, too.\"\n\n\"Yes, Robbie, I know that\u2014\" she assented, settling her great bundle of\nsticks more firmly in her arms, \"but the Lord has been speaking to me\nwhile I've been picking up the sticks in the moonlight, and I feel less\ntired.\"\n\n\"Has He?\" asked Robin in a voice of awe. He had been a very wretched\nlittle boy all that bright, crisp, Christmas Eve; like Christian and\nHopeful, he had got into Doubting Castle, and Giant Despair had been\nbeating him about cruelly! He had looked round on his circumstances,\nand had decided they were too hard to bear. There was mother with that\ntired face working for them all, and tidying up \"for Christmas,\" as\nshe said, waiting on their sick father, and washing and mending their\nthreadbare clothes once again. He had looked in the cupboard and not\na bit of fresh food for Christmas fare appeared to be there. He had\npeeped in the corners of the kitchen and shed, but no surprises lay\nanywhere that he could see.\n\n\"I did try to be a little Christian,\" he had murmured, \"but what's\nthe good? Other people have a good Christmas, but we haven't. God has\nforgotten all about father being ill, and mother and us not having\nenough to eat!\"\n\nSo when his mother had called him softly to come out with her and\ngather sticks for a Christmas fire, he had come with sorrowful steps,\nbeing still fast held in Doubting Castle.\n\nAnd now his mother was telling him that the Lord had been talking to\nher! and Robin felt almost afraid, for he had been turning his back on\nthe Lord in his heart all that long Christmas Eve!\n\n\"Yes,\" his mother went on, squeezing his hand, \"and what do you guess\nHe said to me, Robbie? He said, 'Don't you think, little mother, that\nI love you, and know how tired you are? Don't you think that I know\nhow father's groaning goes to your heart? Don't you think that I have\nlooked into the cupboard in the kitchen and know there is only one loaf\nthere to go round for all the children? Don't you think I see that\nthere's but a bit of tea and a mite of sugar, and no meat nor pudding\nnor anything?'\"\n\n\"And I said, 'Yes, dear Jesus, I know you have seen it all.'\"\n\n\"And He said, 'Haven't I told you that I will make a way of escape that\nyou shall be able to bear it?'\"\n\n\"And I said, 'Yes, dear Jesus, you have.'\"\n\n\"Then, Robbie, I began to think about the shepherds watching their\nflocks and the heavenly Host singing so long ago because Christ the\nLord was born, and I raised my head and wiped away my tears, and I said\nto myself, 'I've got my Saviour still,' and He has said to you and to\nme, 'I will never leave thee, nor forsake thee.'\"\n\nRobbie's little heart gave a thrill of happiness, and straight away,\nhe got out of Doubting Castle. The key of God's promise had opened the\ngate!\n\nWhen they got to the cottage door, a great hamper lay in the moonlight\non the white step.\n\nWarm clothes, apples, oranges, beef and groceries, crackers and nuts\nfor the children, and a great pudding.\n\nAnd on slip of paper was written:\n\n   \"Unto you is born a Saviour which is Christ the Lord.\"\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VI.\n\nTHE FLOWER OF HOPE.\n\nALL is bare in the garden! The wind blows round in gusts; the snow lies\nthick wherever the wind has not lifted it; the cold seems to have taken\npossession.\n\nDaisy looked out of the window on a dull February afternoon. The\nweather outside matched the chilled little heart. An arm came round her\nshoulders, and a gentle voice said, \"Well, little one, what is that\nhead of yours so busy over?\"\n\n\"Oh, I don't know, Auntie! I was looking at the snow, and\nthinking\u2014somehow\u2014the winter seems never-ending!\" There was great\nsadness in the young voice.\n\n\"Yes\u2014you have had a hard time of it, Daisy,\" said her aunt, lovingly.\n\n\"And it is not only that mother is gone,\" said the girl, with a choke,\n\"and that all the rooms are empty\u2014it is not only that\u2014\"\n\nShe paused, unable to proceed.\n\n\"I see all that,\" whispered her aunt, \"but I know well that it is not\nalways the sorrows people can see that are the hardest.\"\n\nDaisy looked up quickly, as if that were a ray of comfort.\n\n\"Jesus sees,\" proceeded her aunt, \"what we can hardly explain to any\none else, He understands.\"\n\nDaisy squeezed her hand, and then, as if impelled to go on, she added,\n\"I thought as I looked out on the wintry garden, as if my heart were\nsomething like that, and I don't see any help for it!\"\n\n\"Still, Daisy, beneath the snow and the frost, the plants are alive!\nThat is how the life of Christ is in your heart. Put on your shawl, and\nI will get mine. There is nothing like seeing\u2014\"\n\nDaisy ran with alacrity. Hope had begun to dawn in her heart.\n\nHer aunt led the way to a sheltered corner.\n\n\"Look!\" she exclaimed. There, beneath a holly bush, peeped out of the\nwhite earth a little patch of exquisite snowdrops!\n\n\"Oh! Auntie!\" said Daisy, and her eyes were full of tears, she did not\nknow why.\n\n\"Didn't I tell you the life was there?\" whispered her aunt. \"Hope thou\nin God, for I shall yet praise Him who is the health of my countenance\nand my God!\"\n\nWhen her father came home that night, there was a different atmosphere\nsomehow in the quiet room, and about his little girl. There was nothing\nthat he could say was altered, except that a bunch of snowdrops stood\nin a vase beside his plate; but Daisy's eyes had the light of hope in\nthem.\n\n\"The child has been talking to Jesus, I fancy,\" said his sister that\nnight, \"and any one who talks to Him finds the worst burden lifted!\"\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VII.\n\nMILICENT'S MUSIC.\n\n\"WHY, Milicent!\" exclaimed her aunt. \"Crying over your music, darling?\"\n\nMilicent was too miserable to mind being caught crying, though\ngenerally she was so brave that she would have resented the sympathy.\n\n\"I'm cold, and I can't get on; and Miss Seymour told me I was to do\nnothing till I had played this exercise twenty times.\"\n\nHer aunt went up to her and touched the little icy fingers, which with\ncontact with the cold ivory keys, were numbed and almost useless.\n\n\"Miss Seymour will let you warm them, I am sure, if I explained,\" said\nher auntie. \"Come here on my knee, and while you get warm we will have\na little talk. Then I will help you with your exercise afterwards, and\nyou shall see how quickly we will learn it.\"\n\nMilicent came almost reluctantly. Her hands ached intolerably, and\nshe felt wretched altogether. But the warm rays of the fire began to\nplay upon her chilled little frame, and as she nestled her head in her\naunt's neck, she felt comfort beginning to steal over her.\n\n\"Cold is very bad to bear,\" said her aunt, softly. \"I heard from a\nsoldier who came from South Africa that some of the poor fellows on\nduty at night would positively cry with the bitter cold.\"\n\nMilicent looked up suddenly.\n\n\"These are words said to you and to me, Milly, 'Endure hardness, as\ngood soldiers of Jesus Christ.'\"\n\n\"I didn't mean to cry,\" said Milly, \"only I couldn't get on.\"\n\n\"No, dear; and do you know when I saw your pitiful little face, I\nremembered what I heard at a missionary meeting a week or two ago? The\nyoung clergyman had been working for seven years all among the snows of\nNorth-West Canada\u2014\"\n\n\"'Working?'\" asked Milicent.\n\n\"Trying to tell the Red Indians and Eskimos, and the trappers and\nhunters about Jesus, our Saviour, of whom they have never heard.\"\n\n\"Oh, I see,\" said Milicent. \"Now I know what you mean.\"\n\n\"The missionaries there only get letters three times in the year; they\nhave to live almost entirely on dried meat and a little tea, and often\ngo very short of that! They never see the sun for nine months in the\nyear, and the snow is five feet thick on the ground!\"\n\n\"When they travel from place to place to tell the good news of the love\nof Jesus, they often cannot get to a hut by night time, and have to\ncamp in the snow. They scrape a big hole with their long snow-shoes,\nand then they put on every wrap they possess, and each gets into a long\nfur bag which covers them over head and all, and then they lie down in\nthe snow hole, and men and dogs go to sleep as close together as they\ncan for warmth.\"\n\nMilicent raised her head, and put out her hands to the blaze\nthoughtfully.\n\n\"They must love Jesus very much to bear all that for Him,\" she said at\nlength.\n\n\"Yes; and love the poor ignorant people, too, Milly!\"\n\n\"Do the Eskimos learn to love Christ, Auntie?\"\n\n\"Indeed they do. The children are taught to read, and to sing hymns,\nand to repeat Scripture; and by and by little Mission stations spring\nup and a church is built; and those who used to be cannibals and at\nconstant warfare with each other, learn to be kind and gentle and\nforgiving even as Christ is!\"\n\nMilicent's large eyes looked wistful. \"I wish I could do something for\nthem,\" she said, longingly.\n\n\"Milly, I felt that too, when I heard! But do you know what I thought?\nEvery day I can pray that God would support and bless those brave\nmissionaries in their hardships; and you can ask Him, too, that He may\ncomfort them and give them food to eat and cheer their hearts with His\npresence.\"\n\n\"So I will,\" said Milly in a low voice.\n\n\"And you can learn to knit warm gloves and caps for them, perhaps? Or\nwork to sell things and send them money.\"\n\nMilly nodded her head earnestly. Her heart was full of thoughts.\n\nThen her aunt rose and turned to the piano.\n\n\"Now, childie, we must do the next duty that comes to our hand. Let us\nhave a look at this tiresome music!\"\n\nMilly went at it with a good will, now, and soon conquered the\ndifficulty; and then, set free, she went up into her bedroom and knelt\ndown at her bedside for one moment.\n\n\"Lord Jesus,\" she said, \"I want to love Thee and serve Thee all my\nlife\u2014teach me how!\"\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VIII.\n\n\"SERVES HIM RIGHT!\"\n\n\"NOW, Aunt Ruth! See, the fire is blazing, and the wintry prospect is\nshut out, let us have a story or something!\"\n\nTheir Aunt glanced on their eager faces, illumined by the firelight,\nand she smiled as she paused an instant.\n\n\"Serves him right!\" she exclaimed, and the children looked round almost\nstartled. They heard such words from each other occasionally, but\ncertainly not from their gentle Aunt.\n\n\"'Serves him right,'\" she repeated. \"'He did it to me, and it's just as\nwell he should feel the pinch himself!'\"\n\n\"'What did he do, Rollo?' asked a school-fellow, curiously.\"\n\n\"'When I went down in class the other day, you should have seen the\nlook in George's eyes! As he took his place above me, he muttered\nbeneath his breath, \"You should have worked harder last night, then it\nwouldn't have happened!\" He knew I had a frightful headache, and could\nbarely see a line.'\"\n\n\"'Well,' said his school-fellow, 'George has got his deserts this\ntime, for Joey hid his book till the last minute, and then found it,\nas innocent as anything, and we knew he'd be bound to go down, for he\nhadn't a moment to prepare.'\"\n\n\"Rollo turned away, but his heart was heavy. It was all very well to\nbe glad that his overbearing school-fellow had gone down in class; but\nsuch a trick as that was beyond him.\"\n\n\"He raced off to his dinner at home, and his footmarks were the only\nones across the snowy fields.\"\n\n\"When he got in, the dinner was not quite ready, and he went and sat\ndown in front of the fire, by which his little crippled sister lay on\nher couch.\"\n\n\"'Isn't all right to-day, Rollo?' she asked, wistfully.\"\n\n\"He looked up, then back to the fire.\"\n\n\"'Nothing particular,' he mumbled.\"\n\n\"'I'm sure there is,' she said gently.\"\n\n\"'It's only that George Runton is such a cad, and I said it served him\nright to go down in his class\u2014'\"\n\n\"'Well? Did you get blamed for saying that?' she asked.\"\n\n\"'By nobody but myself. I had a sort of feeling it wasn't nice of me:\nbut I don't know why exactly. It did serve him right, and yet\u2014'\"\n\n\"'I know!' said Mary, very tenderly; 'it wasn't like \"His compassions\"\nwas it?'\"\n\n\"'His compassions?' asked Rollo, equally gently, for this little\nsuffering sister was his pet and darling.\"\n\n\"'Don't you know it says, \"His compassions fail not; they are new every\nmorning.\" I'm often glad of that.'\"\n\n\"'Why particularly?'\"\n\n\"'Because we're often hard in our thoughts on other people\u2014at least I\nam. But I'm often glad to remember that God is sorry for our mistakes\nwithout being hard, and He makes even our mistakes work round for our\ngood if we will trust Him.'\"\n\n\"Rollo looked dissatisfied.\"\n\n\"'Doesn't that help you at all?' asked Mary.\"\n\n\"'We're always paying each other out at school, or wishing we could,'\nobjected Rollo. 'I don't seem to be able to help it.'\"\n\n\"'Yes, I know; but when we get very tired of trying to be kind and to\npay back a kind action instead of a nasty word, it does help to say to\none's self, \"His compassions fail not.\"'\"\n\n\"'Well\u2014' said Rollo, with a long-drawn breath, 'I'll try it. And here's\ndinner!'\"\n\n\"He retraced his steps over the snow, and he looked up at the sky and\nsaw the little robin singing on the branches in spite of the cold,\nand he repeated to himself tenderly, thinking of Mary's face: 'His\ncompassions fail not; they are new every morning.'\"\n\n\"For a moment his heart stood still. What about Mary's years of\nhelplessness?\"\n\n\"But he remembered that she had meant what she said, and there was\nnothing but truth from those gentle lips and eyes.\"\n\n\"When he got inside school he was almost late. In his hurry, he\nstumbled up against George Runton, and nearly knocked him over. He\npaused for one instant, then said, hastily, 'I'm sorry you lost your\nbook, old fellow\u2014it was awfully vexing.' And so passed on into school,\nwith a wonderfully lightened heart.\"\n\n       *       *       *       *       *      *\n\nThere was silence for a minute round the bright fire, for Auntie had\nset the children thinking.\n\n\"I suppose we are all apt to be hard on someone!\" ventured Rose, at\nlast.\n\n\"Yes, I expect we are,\" said Aunt Ruth. \"We all have our different ways\nof showing it, and the things that make us hard differ with each of our\ndispositions. But God seems to me to stand like 'a shadow of a great\nrock in a weary land,' with His everlasting love ready to enfold us and\nprotect us and calm us.\"\n\n\"Why did you tell us this to-day, Auntie?\" asked Tom.\n\n\"Because\u2014\" she smiled archly, \"I had heard those words, 'Serve him\nright,' eight times within the last two days!\"\n\n\"Oh, Auntie!\"\n\nShe jumped up and turned up the gas. \"Who wants a game of dominoes till\nteatime?\" she said brightly.\n\nBut nevertheless, they did not forget her little story.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IX.\n\nNELLIE'S HINDRANCE.\n\nNELLIE had come out from home with rather a heavy heart. Her basket\nfull of fresh eggs for the Vicarage had been taken safely there, and\nnow she was returning. The twilight was deepening, and she stood still\nto hear a thrush's good-night song.\n\nYesterday a Missioner had come to their village, and Nellie had gone to\nthe service, and she had been dissatisfied with herself ever since.\n\nThe subject had been hindrances to prayer, and as Nellie stood beneath\nthe trees breathing in the soft spring air, she recalled almost every\nword the Missioner had said.\n\nShe felt they spoke home, and her face was very downcast as she\nremembered them.\n\n\"Where do you think your hindrances to prayer come?\" he had asked.\n\"I will tell you; it is not in your outside life, among your\nacquaintances, in the shop or the club, the market, the school, or the\npleasure party! You can have a smiling face there, and people say how\nnice you are and how pleasant! But the real man, and the real woman,\nand the real boy and girl are not seen in those places.\"\n\n\"It is at home, by your fireside, in the family life that we are\nourselves, and it is there the great temptation comes to us to have our\nprayers hindered by unworthy conduct.\"\n\nNellie remembered it all, and she remembered, too, that her conduct\nto-day had somehow \"hindered her prayers.\"\n\nHer mother had asked her to do several things in the morning that she\nthought most unnecessary. She felt sure that no other mother would have\nwanted such a thing on a Monday morning!\n\nShe was a dutiful girl, and she did not refuse to do them, but she did\nthem with an inward groan, which made them twice as hard to do.\n\nThen the children had seemed tiresome, and one of them had torn his\nclothes against some barbed wire; the clothes had to be mended before\nhe could go back to school in the afternoon. And while she was mending\nthem at the top of her speed, he would keep on jumping in and out of\nbed, where he was waiting, and hindered her more than she could say.\n\nAt last the mending was done, and the children raced off to school a\nlittle late.\n\n\"Mother might have let him wear his best for once!\" she grumbled to\nherself.\n\nAnd so all the afternoon she felt things were harder than she could\nbear.\n\nBut now, as she came under the quiet shade of the trees and tried to\nthink, she sat down on a grassy bank and buried her face in her hands.\n\nWhat was \"hindering\" her prayers, and her communion with God?\n\nThe Missioner said that the word \"hindered\" meant \"that you cut\nyourselves adrift\" from prayer.\n\nHe said that the mainland is like communication with God; and that if a\nperson rowed out to a rock, and, after mooring his boat to return, cut\nit adrift, he would sever himself from returning to the mainland!\n\nSo if we went out on to the sea of our daily life, and let pleasure or\nworry, work or care, cut us adrift from communication with God, all our\nhappiness and peace would go!\n\nYes, Nellie remembered every word, and sorrowfully she thought, \"What\nis separating me from communion with God?\"\n\nAt first she was not sure, but after a few moments of thinking it over,\nshe confessed to herself that it was not \"pleasure,\" for she thought\nshe did not get much of that; it was not \"work,\" though she had heaps\nof that; it was not \"care,\" for as yet she felt but little of that; it\nwas\u2014she paused\u2014she hated to acknowledge it to herself\u2014it was worry! She\nhad got into a kind of vexation with her life, and all that belonged to\nit. She could not alter it; the more she tried the worse it seemed to\nbe. What was she to do?\n\nShe did love God; she did wish to please Jesus all the day, more than\nanything else in the world; and yet here she was vexed and irritated by\nthe unalterable things in her lot, which (she told herself) her mother\ncould alter, but did not, and which galled and fretted her almost past\nendurance.\n\nWas there any remedy, or must she go home just as burdened as she came\nout?\n\nThe thrush still sang, though the dusk was falling now upon tree and\nmeadow.\n\nNellie felt she must go, but how could she till she had found rest?\n\nAh! With a start of joy, she raised her head. Rest? Then the words of\nher Saviour flashed upon her, \"Come unto ME all ye that labour and are\nheavy laden, and I will give you rest. Take my yoke upon you and learn\nof ME.\"\n\nNellie saw it now, and the struggle was ended. She had been wanting\nher own will and her own way; she had been wanting to set the crooked\nthings straight herself, but it was only God who could do it for her,\nafter all.\n\nThe Missioner had said the yoke of Christ, under which he walked so\npatiently, was the Will of God. Was that the solution of all her home\nfrets and worries? The Will of God! Yes, she would take it. She would\ndo as Christ said, \"Take the yoke upon her,\" and so find rest!\n\nSuch a peace stole over her that she could have cried her heart out;\nbut she knew she would be missed; and with an inward thanksgiving too\ndeep for words, she ran along the dark lane, and soon entered the\nlighted cottage.\n\nShe kissed her mother silently, and hastened upstairs, saying only,\n\"I sha'n't be a minute,\" and when she came down, they wondered at her\nbrightness, but did not know that in finding rest of heart in Jesus,\nher life had been \"transfigured.\"\n\n\n\nCHAPTER X.\n\nTHE EARWIG.\n\nWHEN I was a little child of about five, I remember very well how we\nused to play in the garden all the long summer days, and how insects\nand toads, hedgehogs and beetles, were our playthings, besides the\nintense enjoyment of climbing trees, high swinging, and other delights.\n\nBut fond as we were of insects, I had the most shrinking fear of an\nearwig.\n\nOne day, I thought I felt something crawl down my neck, and in an agony\nI asked my little brothers and sisters, and I daresay our busy nurse,\nto see if they could find it. Nobody took any heed of my distress,\ntill, in some way, I suppose, I came across my father.\n\nI never had any reason to doubt his tenderness, and whether he guessed\nthere was something wrong, or whether I ran to him and explained, I\ncannot now remember.\n\nBut what is indelibly impressed on my memory is this.\n\nHe took me at once to his room, and while cheeringly assuring me that\neven if it were an earwig, it would do me no harm, he began with the\nutmost tenderness to take off my frock, and to peep about my little\nshoulders; and still not finding it, he took off garment by garment,\ntill he satisfied himself and me that no earwig was there. Then he\ndressed me again, and with comforted heart we went downstairs together.\n\nShall I ever forget that little childish scene? Does it not rise before\nme every time I read those tender words in the 103rd Psalm, \"Like as a\nfather pitieth his children, so the Lord pitieth them that fear Him.\"\n\nNow, what I want you all to remember, dear children, is this. Let this\nlittle picture of an earthly father's pity, help you to understand the\nHeavenly Father's pity.\n\nWe all have troubles and fears, difficulties and temptations. Some\nmore, some less.\n\nLet us take them to the pitying Heavenly Father. The difficulty or fear\nmay be as unwarrantable as my dread of the earwig, or it may be a real\ndanger or temptation which assails us. But whatever it is, trust the\ngreat Father's love. Tell Him all about it, ask Him to help you, as He\nknows best how; leave it in His Hands how to do it, and receive His\nassurance of peace when you have done all this.\n\nThen at rest from your fears, and the worst of your difficulties, go\nhand in hand into the work of life, with a firmer trust than ever in\nyour Father's love.\n\nAnd the Heavenly Father is always near at hand!\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XI.\n\nLOST ON THE COMMON.\n\n\"WHY, Bertha! I've been looking for you everywhere,\" exclaimed her\ncousin Norman, a little reproachfully, \"Aunt Esther was quite in a\nfidget.\"\n\nIt was hot, and he had been sent out on the Common, and had been\nwandering about for an hour, calling and searching.\n\nBertha's eyes fell. She had not intended to set everybody hunting, she\nhad only felt miserable, and had wanted to be alone.\n\nShe loved the Common, and was always allowed to go out at the back gate\nand wander about, so long as she kept in sight of home.\n\nNorman threw himself on the grass in front of her; not that he felt\nparticularly friendly, but because he was tired. So they sat in\nsilence, till, a little rested, he raised his eyes to her woe-begone\nface.\n\n\"What's the matter?\" he asked, bluntly.\n\n\"I've been naughty again,\" said Bertha, simply.\n\n\"What about?\" with more interest.\n\nBertha felt the difference in the tone.\n\n\"I can't get on with Aunt Esther\u2014\"\n\n\"I expect you're sometimes in fault yourself,\" hazarded Norman, looking\nup.\n\n\"Ye-es\u2014oh, yes, I am; but she's so sharp! She's always after me: 'do\nthis,' and 'do that.' Mother never used to keep on so!\"\n\n\"Of course not,\" said Norman, briefly. He hoped Bertha was not going to\ncry about her mother, because he hated people to cry.\n\n\"And then when Father comes home, I know Aunt Esther tells him tales\nabout me, and that makes me mad\u2014\"\n\n\"Perhaps you fancy she does, and after all she doesn't,\" said Norman.\n\nBertha shook her head. \"I know it isn't nice of me to be always\nthinking such things about her; but, indeed, Norman, I can't help it,\nand I do feel so miserable.\"\n\nThe tears came now, and Norman did not so much mind, as he expected. He\nwas full of sympathy with his little cousin, but he did not see how to\nhelp her.\n\n\"I s'pose there's some way out of it,\" he said, consideringly, \"there\ngenerally is\u2014\"\n\nAgain Bertha shook her head.\n\n\"What did you do to-day?\" he asked, by way of suggesting a remedy.\n\nBertha brushed away her tears with her hand.\n\n\"Well,\" she said, \"I was busy in the breakfast-room, making those\ntoilet mats for the missionaries, and the room was rather\u2014\"\n\n\"Snippy,\" suggested Norman.\n\n\"Yes\u2014well, it was no harm; it was Saturday, and I was free to do it.\nAnd I wanted to finish a set, because I thought if Aunt Helen came this\nafternoon, I would get her to buy them\u2014for the missionaries, you know.\nBut Aunt Esther said she could not have such a mess all over the place,\nand began gathering my things together, and I felt cross, and begged\nher to wait and let me put them up; and she went on, and my bottle of\ngum got spilled between us, and went over the pink satin, and spoilt\never such a lot.\"\n\n\"What a shame,\" said the boy, flushing.\n\n\"Yes, it was; but, oh, I flew in such a passion. I stamped about the\nroom, and said all the nasty things I could think of; and when I hadn't\nany more words left, she just said, coldly, 'That is what you call\nworking for Christ, do you? You will not show your things to Aunt Helen\nthis afternoon, Bertha,' and left the room.\"\n\nNorman turned crimson, and Bertha saw his sympathy in his face.\n\n\"And so I came out here,\" she said, sorrowfully. \"It was quite\ntrue\u2014that part of it\u2014how dreadful it was of me to be in such a temper\nover His work, Norman! Now I don't know what to do. Shall I burn them\nall, and never do any more, if I can't be a better girl.\"\n\nNorman's brown hand was stretched out and took hold of her little one.\n\"Poor kiddie,\" he said, softly.\n\n\"What can I do, do you think?\" she asked, anxiously.\n\n\"Not burn the things!\" he said, decidedly. \"I think\u2014I'm not much of a\nhand at good sort of talk, you know\u2014but if we've done wrong\u2014if we know\nwe have\u2014\"\n\nBertha nodded.\n\n\"Then mother always says we ought to ask God to forgive us, and\u2014you\nwon't like me to say it\u2014and Aunt Esther. Mother says then we can begin\nagain, you know. Only it's awfully hard\u2014\"\n\nBertha raised herself from the ground. \"Yes, Norman,\" she said,\nsolemnly, \"I see. I'll do it. Ask God first, then Aunt Esther. I will.\"\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XII.\n\nBLACKBERRYING.\n\n\"I WONDER why it's been such a good year for fruit?\" said a little boy,\nlooking up in the face of an elder one who was resting against a stile,\nstill keeping a crutch in his hand and leaning on it, while a basket of\nblackberries lay at his feet.\n\n\"I suppose there has been just enough rain and just enough sun to suit\nthem, Tommy!\"\n\nThe tone made Tommy look up, and then his eyes wandered to the crutch,\nand back again to the patient face wistfully.\n\n\"If the blackberry hedges had nothing but sun, they would be scorched\nup, Tommy, boy! And if my life had been all pleasure, perhaps there\nwould have been no fruit on my bush!\"\n\n\"Fruit?\"\n\n\"Yes, don't you remember how the lesson in Sunday School, yesterday,\nwas 'He that abideth in Me, and I in him, the same bringeth forth much\nfruit?'\"\n\n\"Oh, I see!\" said Tommy.\n\n\"And if,\" pursued the elder boy, \"there had been nothing but rain and\nstorm and sorrow and pain, my little bush would have got mildewed and\nspoilt, and so no fruit would have come either.\"\n\n\"I like sunshine best!\" said Tommy. \"But\u2014what sort of things do you\nmean would have scorched up your bush?\"\n\nHe hesitated, for though several years younger than his companion, he\nhad a thoughtful little heart, and he began to guess.\n\n\"Being captain of our football team, perhaps; and first in all the\nrunning games; and top of my Form\u2014\"\n\n\"But those weren't harm?\" said Tommy. \"No\u2014o\u2014oh no! But it was so\npleasant; and I never thought it could be different, and I did not need\nGod then, and so I brought no fruit to Him. That's what I call sunshine\nthat scorches\u2014\"\n\nThe child put his hand on the brown big one, caressingly.\n\n\"So then in love\u2014yes, Tommy\u2014in love, my Father sent the rain and the\nstorm. He saw there would be no fruit on my little bush, and He knew\nI should be sorry; and so He\u2014\" Frank paused and looked down at the\ncrutch, which said all there was to say. It needed no explanation.\nTommy knew all about the long, painful illness which had resulted in\nthe loss of Frank's right leg.\n\nEverybody knew how patiently their school-fellow bore his deprivation.\n\n\"Your bush has lots of 'fruit' on it now, I think!\" said Tommy,\naffectionately.\n\n\"Tommy!\" said Frank, getting himself upright again to start for home.\n\"There are sunshine and storms in your life as well as mine! We don't\nall of us have the same lot. You've got no mother, and\u2014heaps of things\nthat are hard\u2014but every time you are brave and patient 'for Jesus'\nsake,' you are 'bearing fruit.' Think of that, Tommy! Doesn't it kind\nof feel nice?\"\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XIII.\n\nTHE STOPPED WATCH.\n\n\"THE sun's set, Jim,\" called Nellie, as she raked up the last bit of\nhay, \"and we shall have a fine day to-morrow to finish it, by the looks\nof the sky.\"\n\n\"Yes,\" he answered, turning towards the ferry boat, \"we've done for\nto-day, let's take a rest in the twilight till father's ready to go\nhome.\"\n\nNellie was nothing loth. She and her favourite brother were a great\ndeal together, and worked on the same farm on which their father had\nlived all his life.\n\nAs she got into the boat, she said, \"What time is it, should you say?\"\n\nHe took out his rather clumsy watch, and looked at it.\n\n\"It's gone wrong again!\" he said, \"I set it all right this morning, and\nI thought I'd done it this time. I doubt I must have it seen to. The\nman in the village isn't no hand at it, no more than I am myself. I've\ntinkered it, and I've altered it, and I've shaken it\u2014\"\n\nNellie laughed a little, and he laughed with her.\n\n\"It strikes me I must take it to the man as made it,\" he remarked\ngravely, and Nellie looked up at his tone.\n\n\"Do you know who did?\" she asked.\n\n\"Yes, a man in Windsor. But, funny enough, Nell, when I was shaking\nit this morning, thinks I to myself, 'Here's a help for you, Jim, in\nHeavenly things!'\"\n\n\"Because your watch had gone wrong?\" said Nell, her eyes questioning\nwith interest. She and Jim wanted to get on in Heavenly things, and\nthey often helped each other.\n\n\"Yes,\" he said, raising his head, and looking at the golden sky; while\nthe ripple of the water lapping against the boat as the river flowed\non, made soft, soothing music.\n\n\"Yes, Nell. Somehow, lately, I've felt that my works were rather out of\norder! Things haven't been so very comfortable at home\u2014as you know\u2014and\nI've had all that bother with mother and father about Meg Marston;\nand somehow I've tried my hardest to be patient and kind, and to wait\nwillingly till they saw things different; and it's all been no use.\nI've not been patient inwardly, nor outwardly either, for that matter.\nI've tossed and fumed and fretted. I've tried to set the outside of the\nwatch right, and I've poked at the inside, and I've shaken myself\u2014\"\n\nAgain Nell smiled. But this time there were tears in her gentle, dark\neyes. She knew better than any one what Jim had had to bear.\n\n\"And this morning, as I was trying to set my watch right, it suddenly\ndarted into my mind, 'Take it to the man as made it, Jim!' And all at\nonce I thought, perhaps, that was what my Saviour wanted me to do with\nmy 'works,' as I call my heart and my difficulties. So I just slipped\ndown on to my knees, Nell, with my watch in my hand, just as I was, and\nI said, 'Dear Lord, I am yours! You made me, you understand me. I've\nbeen trying to make myself go for months and I've failed. The 'works'\nhave stopped, and they want seeing to! Take me in hand; make me clean,\nset me right, keep me going, make me true to You, whatever else I am!'\"\n\nNell's tender face bent down, and she looked into the flowing, crimson\nwater for a minute in silence.\n\n\"And then?\" she asked, gently.\n\n\"Then I came downstairs, and found mother in the kitchen; and instead\nof passing by, and coming out without a word, I managed to say, 'It's\ngoing to be lovely for the hay,' and gave her a kiss, and so started to\nmy work.\"\n\n\"I'm awfully glad,\" said Nell.\n\n\"Yes, so am I. So all day, when I have thought how hard it is of mother\nand father about Meg, I've tried to think, too, that the Lord is\nsetting my 'works' right, and He has them in hand, and I've got no call\nto be so anxious about everything. He'll set them right, and me, too!\nBut here's father!\"\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XIV.\n\nTHE MIDNIGHT A, B, C\n\n\"I HATE learning Scripture! At least\u2014I don't like it\u2014or see the good\nof it,\" said Robbie, his eager tone diminishing as he got through his\nsentence, and his eyes met those of his father's, a patient invalid,\nsitting by the fire.\n\nIf there was one person Robbie was devoted to, it was his father. So\nwhile he was speaking, his eyes turned naturally to those quiet grey\nones, which had looked out on the world so tenderly for so many years.\n\nHe pushed his school Bible away, and went over and stroked the cramped\nthin hand, looking inquiringly into the dear face.\n\n\"Yes, Robbie, I understand that. I mean, that I remember the days when\nI thought it a great task to learn Scripture.\"\n\n\"Well\u2014is there any good?\" asked Robbie, hesitating, \"I don't mean in\nreading it, of course, but in learning it by heart\u2014just like a parrot?\"\n\n\"You have given me a good many questions to answer in that one\nsentence,\" said his father, fondly, \"but I'll answer one first. It is\ngood; I only wish I had learned more.\"\n\nRobbie opened his eyes wide.\n\n\"Sometimes I try to see how many Psalms and chapters, or portions, I\ncan say through, but I am always sorry there are not more\u2014\"\n\n\"Why? You can read them yourself.\"\n\n\"Sometimes\u2014but there are twilight hours, and the long dark night, and\nthen I can't read; and it is an inexpressible comfort to be able to\nrepeat to myself.\"\n\n\"Do you learn any now, father?\"\n\n\"Not as easily as I used, and with great pains, too. Over and over. We\ndon't learn so quickly when we are older.\"\n\n\"Oh, I see,\" said Robbie, looking into the fire meditatively.\n\n\"So learn your daily verse cheerfully, my boy, and say, 'It will be a\ncomfort to me by and by.'\"\n\n\"And the parrot?\" asked Robbie, smiling a little.\n\n\"He only repeats without thinking; we have a better reason than that,\n'Thy word have I hid in my heart, that I might not sin against Thee.'\"\n\nRobbie stroked the loved hand again; a touch of love which his father\nperfectly understood.\n\n\"Shall I tell you another thing I do, when I am ill, or the night seems\nlong?\"\n\nHis father spoke cheerily, and the boy looked up.\n\n\"I take the old game, 'I love my love with an A,' and turn it into a\nhelp to bring me nearer my God!\"\n\n\"I can't see how,\" said Robbie.\n\n\"I say to myself, when I am weary or wakeful, 'I adore my God with an\nA, because He is \"Abundantly able to save.\"'\"\n\n\"'I adore my God with a B, because He says, \"Behold the Lamb of God\nthat taketh away the sin of the world.\"'\"\n\n\"Oh, like 'capping verses,'\" said Robbie, smiling again.\n\n\"Something like; but my way gives more scope. I never get tired of it.\nIf I can't think of a verse beginning with C, for instance, I say,\n'I adore my God with a C, because He has said, \"I will not leave you\nComfortless,\"' and so to the end of the alphabet.\"\n\n\"There aren't many Z's, I should think?\"\n\n\"Enough to give me a feast. 'Zacchaeus, come down, for to-day I must\nabide at thy house,' or 'I am Alpha and Omega, the beginning and the\nending, saith the Lord.' There, Robbie!\"\n\n\"And what do you do for X?\"\n\n\"Ah! Yes; I use the verses where there are 'Excepts,' and call\nthem\u2014like this\u2014'I will not let Thee go 'Xcept Thou bless me.'\"\n\n\"Oh, I see! That's good!\"\n\n\"Now, let me hear you say your verses for this week, and we'll soon\nlearn them together\u2014you will, faster than I shall.\"\n\nRobbie went back to fetch his Bible, and soon, as his father said,\nthe six verses which he had learnt separately every day came into one\nwhole, and he could say them off.\n\nHe gave a great sigh, and then with a kiss on his father's forehead, he\nbounded off to play.\n\nBut he never forgot that day.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XV.\n\nVERA'S CONTENT.\n\n\"I COULD be perfectly happy if I could live always in a cottage like\nthat, and look-out on such a view!\" sighed Vera, as she and her mother\nsat one evening on a stile, and looked over into a peaceful field,\ncovered with daisies, and with a pond in front whose deep shadows were\nnow and then broken by snowy ducks swimming across them.\n\nHer mother smiled a little, but did not otherwise answer.\n\n\"I get so tired of the houses opposite us!\" Vera went on, \"And our\nholiday seems so soon over, and we have to go back to the dull streets\nand noisy trams. Don't you, mother?\"\n\n\"Yes, dear, a little, sometimes; but I am sure we ought not to\nencourage such a feeling\u2014\"\n\n\"I can't help it,\" interrupted Vera, a little vehemently, \"I was made\nso!\"\n\nHer mother gave a little laugh. \"That is very comfortable,\" she said,\narchly.\n\n\"Well, then\u2014I don't know how to help it!\" pursued Vera. \"I perfectly\nlove pretty scenery, and country flowers, and blue skies, and\u2014and\u2014\"\n\n\"Oh, stop, Vera! So do I; but now let us look at the other side. Think\nof the hundreds and thousands who have to live in the towns, and who\nhave not the great treat which you and I have been given, of spending a\nwhole fortnight in this sweet place.\"\n\n\"That doesn't make me more contented, it only makes me so sorry for\nthem that I can't enjoy myself one bit.\"\n\nVera dashed two or three tears from her eyes, and looked over the\npretty prospect.\n\n\"Well, dear, let us think of it like this. God, our loving Father, sees\nwhat we need. He knows all about us; all about our delight in pretty,\nrefined things; all about how tired and weary we have been, you with\nyour examinations, and I with the cares of home, and so He has sent us\nwhat will rest us, and help us to go on again.\"\n\n\"When I look at this holiday as His gift, and thank Him for it, it\nmakes every fresh beauty more beautiful; it helps me to pray for the\nweary ones who have not got one, and to plan how, in our little way, we\nmay shed brightness and pleasure round on those we do know\u2014\"\n\n\"You're always trying to do that!\" said Vera, \"But\u2014\"\n\n\"As to happiness being found in a country cottage,\" said her mother,\n\"if we do not make happiness in our everyday life for each other, by\nbeing loving and unselfish, we should not get it, though we might live\nin the most beautiful scenery in the world!\"\n\nVera put her hand in her mother's. \"I'll try,\" she said, impulsively;\nand her mother, with a bright smile, added some lines of George\nHerbert's, she often repeated to herself:\n\n  \"Not thankful when it pleaseth me,\n   As if Thy blessings had spare days;\n   But such a heart\u2014whose pulse should be\n       Thy praise!\"\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XVI.\n\nA SEARCH FOR VIOLETS.\n\n\"WHERE have you been all the afternoon, Aunt Ruth?\" asked Oswald, as\nthey assembled after school hours. \"We could not find you!\"\n\n\"Ah, I have a trophy to show you, though!\" said Aunt Ruth. \"Just look!\"\n\n\"Well, if I didn't think I smelled violets,\" exclaimed Rose; \"and I\ncould not believe it! Where\u2014if it is not a secret, Auntie?\"\n\n\"No secret at all. You see, I lived here years ago, and I know where to\nlook.\"\n\nThe four gathered round her little vase, and took turns in smelling,\ntill Jean said there would be no scent left.\n\n\"But where did they grow?\" asked Tom.\n\n\"I knew long ago a certain bank under a hedge, where, sheltered from\nthe winds and storms, and warmed by the sun, the violets grew and\nflourished. So this afternoon as I wanted a walk, I made my way to the\nold spot, and, presently, as I went along, something delicious seemed\nto surround me, and without thinking, I exclaimed, 'Violets!' And then\nlaughed at myself, for what else was I searching for? So when I had\nfound a few I sat down on the warm, sunny bank, and thought\u2014\"\n\n\"You always have 'thoughts,' I do believe, Auntie,\" said Oswald. \"Let's\nhave them, then!\"\n\n\"I thought\u2014I wondered whether we Christians could be like the violets.\"\n\nJean smiled. \"They are hidden,\" she said.\n\n\"And sweet,\" said Tom.\n\n\"And pleasant to look at, and have about you,\" said Rose.\n\n\"And they fulfil their Maker's purpose,\" said Oswald, slowly, as if\nconsidering; \"yes\u2014they certainly do that\u2014\"\n\n\"And when the great Gardener goes round His kingdom to seek them, there\nthey are, ready to look up into His face and greet Him with joy,\" said\nAunt Ruth.\n\n\"And He sent them rain and showers and sunshine to help them to grow!\"\nsaid Oswald.\n\nAunt Ruth's eyes gave a little flash. \"Yes!\" she answered earnestly;\n\"and He planted them just where He knew they would grow best; where He\nwished them to grow.\"\n\n\"That's nice,\" said Jean, \"for sometimes I'm discontented when things\ndon't happen right, and I almost wish I were growing somewhere else!\"\n\n\"I often do!\" said Tom, bluntly.\n\n\"Well,\" said Aunt Ruth, \"I fancy we all do. We think that any other\ncross but the one we have to carry would be more bearable. 'If we were\nin So-and-So's shoes, we could be much more contented!'\"\n\n\"Yes,\" said Rose; \"I often think if I were in my friend Gertrude's\nplace, I should not have half so many hindrances to being good!\" Her\neyes filled as she turned away.\n\n\"Well,\" said Aunt Ruth, \"if we are really wishing to please God in the\ncircumstances in which He has put us, what I took as my violet-text may\nbe a help to us; for though it speaks of humbleness, I think it is one\nof the most wonderfully exalting texts that can be!\"\n\n\"Let's have it, Auntie,\" said Oswald. \"I like your plan of making the\nBible into a book to live on!\"\n\nShe smiled brightly at that.\n\n\"Here it is, then,\" she said; \"'For thus saith the high and lofty One\nthat inhabiteth eternity, whose name is Holy; I dwell in the high and\nholy place, with him also that is of a contrite and humble spirit,\nto revive the spirit of the humble, and to revive the heart of the\ncontrite ones.'\"\n\n\"That's a very nice one,\" said Rose. \"Thank you, Auntie!\"\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XVII.\n\nSUMMER DAYS.\n\n\"WHERE did you spend your summer holiday?\" asked Aunt Ruth, in a\nsmiling but significant tone.\n\nThe fact was, the four children had got into rather a hot dispute one\nday at tea over a trifling difference of opinion, and Aunt Ruth had\ninterrupted with a quick, bright question, which had made them all turn\ntheir eyes towards her.\n\n\"Why?\" asked Tom, answering the tone of the question, rather than the\nwords.\n\n\"That is what we used to say at home when we wanted to change the\nsubject,\" said Aunt Ruth.\n\n\"Did you want to change the subject?\" asked Oswald. Then pausing, \"Oh,\nI see,\" with a conscious laugh. \"Well, I suppose it would be as well to\ntalk of something else, as we are never likely to agree over it.\"\n\n\"Oh, oh!\" said Tom, \"That is beginning again! Well\u2014Auntie\u2014as you know\nvery well where we spent our summer holiday, let's hear where you did.\"\n\n\"I'm quite willing. Come along to the summer-house, and when I hear\nthe bees humming among the pear blossoms, I shall get taken back in\nimagination to last year, and shall be able to tell you where I did\nspend mine.\"\n\nShe led the way out of doors, and the children scampered after her,\ncarrying certain camp stools and chairs, which were kept in the passage\nleading to the garden. Aunt Ruth had caught up her writing case, which\nJean wondered at, but when they were settled in their usual places,\nthis was explained by her producing from it a sketch, which she handed\nround.\n\n\"This is where I spent my summer holiday,\" she said lovingly, as if the\nplace were dear to her.\n\n\"Oh!\" said Rose. \"That is why you said you must come out near the pear\nblossoms. I see now. Were there bees there?\"\n\n\"It was an ideal place. I was in urgent need of rest and refreshment\nand quiet (as you know), and I heard of this little cottage on the\nborders of the Downs. This clematis-covered porch was my entrance,\nand the other door was the good woman's. I could go out on the Downs\nwith my camp chair, and sit and look at the sea, and feel the breezes\nblow round me, or I could bask in the sunshine to my heart's content,\nsheltered by the cottage from the cold winds.\"\n\n\"And the bees?\" asked Rose.\n\n\"Yes, the bees seem to link themselves with the restful thoughts of\nthose days, for when I was near the cottage, with its flowers, their\nsong seemed to tell me over and over again what I think I shall never\nforget\u2014\"\n\n\"And that was\u2014?\" asked Jean, putting her soft hand into her auntie's.\n\nAll the children knew that Aunt Ruth had had some great trial, but they\nhad never been told what it was.\n\n\"The lesson I learned in that peaceful time was, 'The Lord God is a sun\nand shield; the Lord will give grace and glory; no good thing will He\nwithhold from them that walk uprightly.'\"\n\n\"I learned, dears, that God wishes to be to us all a Sun and a Shield.\nAs a Sun, He warms and cheers us with the light of His countenance; as\na Shield, He shelters us from that which would hurt us and do us harm.\"\n\n\"Just as those hives were put in the sunniest place, so they were also\nput in a sheltered place. 'A Sun and Shield.' God is near us for both;\nand when the cold winds of trouble, or sorrow, or temptation blow, we\nmust hide in Him, for He is our Shield.\"\n\n\"Oh, I see!\" said Tom. \"Now, Auntie, what else did the bees say?\"\n\n\"Heaps of things! But I did not learn all, nor should I have time to\ntell you, either.\"\n\n\"I thought that they taught me that there was great good in being busy\u2014\"\n\nRose nodded approvingly.\n\n\"They worked steadily and patiently; they went about their tasks with a\nwill, and they gathered\u2014what?\"\n\nAunt Ruth turned round smiling on the four faces.\n\n\"Poison?\" she asked. \"Unkindness, quarrelling, selfishness, self-will?\nNo, no! What did they gather as they hovered over the pretty flowers?\"\n\n\"Sweetness!\" said Jean, gently.\n\n\"Yes\u2014that is a lovely word for it!\" exclaimed Aunt Ruth.\n\n\"They gathered 'sweetness,' enough and to spare. They brought it home\nfor those who did not go out; they stored it up for the rainy and dark\ndays, when the flowers might not be there. God had been their Sun\nand Shield, and they had done their part in gathering the sweetness\nwhich He had provided, so that others might be blessed and cheered and\ncomforted.\"\n\n\"Oh, Aunt Ruth, I shall always think of that when there is honey on the\ntable!\" said Oswald.\n\n\"Do, it is worth learning,\" she answered.\n\n\"What did you do all day, Auntie?\"\n\n\"I sat out in the sunshine and sketched most of the time, or watched\nthe bees and thought of what God could be to me if I would let Him.\"\n\n\"Then you did this drawing?\" said Tom.\n\n\"Yes, and a good many more. See, I have written underneath this one a\nfew lines I often say to myself from 'A Song in the day of the East\nWind,' written nearly three hundred years ago by Tersteegen; and it\noften reminds me of those sunny days:\"\n\n   \"'My heart in joy upleapeth;\n      Grief cannot linger there;\n    She singeth high in glory,\n      Amid the sunshine fair.\n    The sun that shines upon me\n      Is Jesus and His love,\n    And the fountain of my singing\n      Is deep in heaven above!'\"\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XVIII.\n\nBECAUSE.\n\n\"I WANT to love God and do what pleases Him,\" sighed Norman to himself;\n\"but I make such a poor hand at it. Here I'm at school all day, and my\nhead is cram full of lessons, and when I get to bed I'm so tired, and\nso dissatisfied with myself, that I feel quite disheartened.\"\n\nHe was on his way to spend the week-end with one of his school-fellows,\nwho lived among the mountains in Cumberland.\n\nHe had left the station some hours ago, and his friend's house was\nstill a long way off, and the evening shadows were falling over the\nland.\n\nHe knew his way pretty well, and was not anxious about his destination,\nso that he had plenty of time to think.\n\nHe was an earnest boy, and really wished to do right, but somehow he\nhad got into rather a muddle lately, and did not know how to extricate\nhimself.\n\n\"I don't doubt my love to Him,\" he pursued, \"but it's so cold and\nlifeless\u2014such a poor return, that sometimes\u2014\"\n\nThen he glanced up at the sunset clouds, and his troubled thoughts took\nthe form of a prayer\u2014a very simple, child-like one\u2014\"O God, show me some\none who will help me where I am going!\"\n\nWith a lightened heart, he made his way across the bridge, and now\ncould take in the glory and refreshment of the scene.\n\nWhen he reached his school-fellow's house he was, however, dismayed to\nfind that Jack had set out an hour ago to meet him, and they must have\nmissed.\n\nHe was asked into the library to wait, and there, seated by a fire, was\nan invalid gentleman who glanced up from his book to welcome him.\n\nAfter the first civilities had passed, the invalid asked Norman if\nhe would help him by turning over some leaves for him, as with his\ncrippled hands he found it difficult.\n\n\"I am searching for the 'Becauses,'\" he said, looking up with his\ngenial smile; \"and I want to find this one, 'We love Him \"because\" He\nfirst loved us!'\"\n\nNorman's face flushed as he turned over the pages as directed to the\nFirst Epistle of John, and the fourth chapter, and the nineteenth\nverse. Was this an answer to his questionings?\n\n\"I have been thinking a great deal about that one,\" Jack's father went\non; \"and it has comforted me to remember that though my love is often\ncold and faint, yet my salvation does not depend on that, for it is\nbecause He loved me that I am His at all!\"\n\nNorman's eyes flashed an answering look of joyful acquiescence, and\nsomething prompted him to say: \"That's just what I wanted, sir. I'd got\nall mixed up!\"\n\n\"Ah!\" said the invalid, \"We do! The more earnest we are in wishing to\nplease God, the more, I think, Satan tries to discourage us and make us\ndoubt that we are serving Him at all. And this is where my 'because'\ncomes in; not my love, but His, being my safety.\"\n\nThe invalid smiled happily; and then they heard Jack's step come\nbounding through the house, and his \"Hullo, Norman, have you come?\"\nsounded with a hearty, cheery welcome.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XIX.\n\nTHE HAUNTED ROOM.\n\n\"You will be disappointed if you expect too much,\" said Agnes, holding\nthe door in her hand and looking into five eager faces congregated on\nthe landing.\n\n\"Let us in, then, and we'll tell you!\" answered Hugh, a tall boy of\nabout fifteen. \"You are as bad as the 'penny-a-liners,' who pile up the\ninterest to the end of the chapter, and then leave you in the lurch!\"\n\nAgnes laughed a little at that, as she threw open the door of the\nchamber in their uncle's old house, which, for many a day, had had the\nrepute of being haunted.\n\nShe and her two sisters, with her brothers John and Hugh, had come to\nspend a fortnight of their Christmas holidays in this old-fashioned\nabode, where every corner seemed to have a history, if not a mystery;\nand Agnes Headley, ever on the look-out to do a little work for her\nHeavenly Master, found that she could carry out, in her present weird\nsurroundings, a thought she had long had in her mind.\n\n\"Come here, Florence,\" she said, holding out her hand to a little\ncousin, who, like themselves, had come for a visit; \"if you are at all\nnervous, we will got the lamp\u2014only\u2014\"\n\nFlorence disdained to acknowledge herself nervous, and was sure she\nshould not be frightened; so, taking her cousin Minnie's little soft\nhand, she entered the moonlit room with the rest, wondering what Agnes\nwould have to show them so very particular.\n\n\"Though this is uncle's haunted room, I must explain to you that we\nhave nothing to do with it for that reason; but, as what I have to show\nyou is kept here, I thought we could not have a better place in which\nto have our little talk.\"\n\n\"But we can't see anything,\" said Minnie, squeezing Florence's hand\nvery hard. \"I wish you would strike a match, Agnes.\"\n\n\"All in good time, Minnie. Here, John, light the lantern, and let us\nsee what there is to be seen.\"\n\nJohn, the eldest brother, though not in the secret, knew from\nexperience that Agnes generally had something pleasant in her little\npreparations, and took the lantern from her hand to do as she desired.\n\nWhen its fitful gleams shone out in the haunted chamber, the young\npeople looked round curiously, not without a certain creepiness in\ntheir hair and a shiver down their backs.\n\nThe room was not very large, but was gloomy and dark; the corners\nwere unlighted, and the moonlight shining along the floor was almost\nbrighter than the rays of the shaded light in John's hand.\n\nAt one end some garments hung against the wall, and, as their eyes\ngrew accustomed to the shadows, they could see dimly the shapes of\nold-fashioned armour, swords, and spears, arranged in set patterns,\nagainst the oak panelling.\n\nIn one corner a knight, with a coat of mail, stood up gaunt and still,\nhis visor down, his hand clasping his sword, his foot advanced, as if\nready to step forward to the fight.\n\n\"I don't like it much, Agnes,\" whispered Minnie, clinging to her side.\n\"I wish you would not make it so dark.\"\n\n\"There is nothing in the world to be afraid of,\" said her sister, \"and,\nif you will come here between me and Alice, you will feel all right,\nshall you not? But, if you are afraid, I will take you downstairs\nagain, only I did want you to hear about it, too, Minnie.\"\n\nThe little girl was reassured by the loving arms wrapped round her, and\nby the warm kisses pressed on her flushed cheeks.\n\n\"That knight in armour, who looks so terrible there,\" explained Agnes,\n\"is not a real man, though he has on real armour, which was used in\nreal warfare, long ago. So, before I tell you my story, Minnie and\nFlorence shall have a good look at him to make sure that it is only a\nwooden man, and not a hero of bygone ages come to life again.\"\n\nFlorence laughed a little nervously as she advanced to where John's\nlight shone brightly, but she was sufficiently courageous to touch the\nsteel-clad foot with her hand, and to peep up earnestly to see if there\nmight be any face behind those iron bars.\n\nBut no eyes looked out from the dark cavity, and no movement came\nfrom those rigid arms. Florence stepped back to Minnie's side with a\nwhispered:\n\n\"It's all right, Minnie; you needn't be one bit afraid\u2014he's not real.\"\n\n\"Now for the story!\" said Hugh, who had been impatient all this time,\nif not to get it over, at any rate to find out what it was.\n\n\"Come, then,\" answered Agnes, turning towards the window, and pointing\nto an old-fashioned settle covered with a warm rug. \"Sit down here,\nopposite to the old knight, and I will tell you what I have been\nthinking about.\"\n\nThey quickly obeyed, and now Minnie could feel her two sisters on\neither side of her, and could gaze up at the familiar face of the clear\nmoon, she began to feel enough at home to enjoy herself.\n\n\"You remember,\" began Agnes, \"that when Uncle Hugh came home from\nIndia, he bought this old house, furniture, pictures, and all, with\nthat money which had been unexpectedly left him?\"\n\n\"Yes\u2014yes,\" broke from several lips.\n\n\"The first day after we came, he called me into his library, and said\nthat he intended to make me a present of one of the old curiosities it\ncontained, and wished me to say what I would like best, reserving to\nhimself the right of altering my choice should it fall upon something\nhe could not part with.\"\n\n\"I was greatly at a loss, as you may suppose; but ever since I had seen\nthose knights standing in the hall downstairs, I had had an idea which,\nif he were willing, could now carry out; so I told him, if it were not\ntoo much to ask, to make me a present of one of his armed knights!\"\n\n\"You may guess that he had a good laugh at my request, but all the\nsame, he granted it.\"\n\nHugh and John felt as if they would have been very delighted to have\nhad the chance themselves of such a gift, but before they could say\nanything beyond a low exclamation of surprise, Agnes went on\u2014\n\n\"I asked him if he would be hurt if I did just as I liked with my\nknight; but very soon I found I had to take him into my confidence: so\nhe knows all about it, and approves.\"\n\n\"Well?\" asked Alice.\n\n\"My thought was this, as I stood and looked that first morning on those\nmotionless figures, dressed in armour, that had been used, now only\nshadows, as it were, of what once had been\u2014that each one of us living\nand breathing, and enjoying life had a set of armour which we ought to\nput on, but which often lay hidden away, rusty and useless, because we\ndisregarded the message our great Captain had sent us\u2014sent to each one\nwho loves and serves Him\u2014'Wherefore take unto you the whole armour of\nGod, that ye may be able to withstand in the evil day, and, having done\nall, to stand.'\"\n\n\"Oh, I see now!\" said John.\n\n\"You do not see all,\" answered Agnes, gently. \"That old knight in the\ncorner is not my knight, for I have pulled mine to pieces.\"\n\n\"Have you?\" asked Hugh, regretfully.\n\n\"Yes,\" said Agnes. \"Here is his armour, hanging up against the wall.\nI asked Uncle if I might divide his armour between us six, and he\nwillingly gave me leave. Now, what I want to know is this\u2014which of us\nis willing, earnestly and faithfully, to take his or her share of this\ninvisible armour, and begin this very day to clasp on one piece at any\nrate, that so we may make the first step towards 'taking unto us the\nwhole armour of God.'\"\n\n\"But, Agnes,\" objected John, \"many of us\u2014all, I hope\u2014have taken the\ngreat step of enlisting under the Captain; you do not mean that?\"\n\n\"Oh no,\" answered Agnes quickly, \"we are all soldiers; but we fail to\nput on the armour God has appointed in order that we may be able to\nstand! We walk along satisfied in our own strength, far too often.\"\n\n\"Oh, that's all right,\" answered John earnestly. \"I was only afraid\nlest for the sake of an illustration, and a very nice idea, Agnes, any\none might forget for a moment that, ere we can be soldiers, we must be\nredeemed by precious blood.\"\n\n\"I did not mean that,\" said Agnes, \"but was thinking of ourselves,\nbecause I hope we all home been washed in that precious blood.\"\n\n\"Then what is it you want us to undertake so seriously?\" asked Hugh\nfrom his dark corner.\n\n\"I want us all to choose a piece of this spiritual armour\u2014not because\none piece will do, but because one piece is better than none; when\nwe have got used to our one piece, we shall begin to think of trying\nanother!\"\n\n\"All right,\" answered Hugh. \"Go ahead, Agnes.\"\n\n\"Who will try to wield the sword\u2014the sword of the Spirit?\"\n\n\"I don't mind having that,\" said John. Agnes got up and crossed the\nroom, taking from the wall the sword which hung there.\n\n\"But this is not intangible,\" said John, hesitating.\n\n\"Only that something tangible may remind us\u2014\"\n\n\"For my own, or lent to me?\" he asked. \"For your own. Now, Hugh, you\nmay choose, there are five more things.\"\n\n\"What will you have, Agnes?\"\n\n\"The one that is left; Hugh, choose!\"\n\n\"I'll have the breastplate of righteousness, then; for I suppose you\nmean to take the Scripture list?\"\n\n\"You have guessed quite right. Alice, what for you?\"\n\n\"I'll have the truth one.\"\n\n\"That's the coat of mail, 'loins girt about with truth.' Florence, what\nwould you like?\"\n\n\"I don't remember the meanings exactly,\" answered Florence shyly, \"but\nI like the helmet. What is it, Agnes?\"\n\n\"'The hope of salvation,' joy now and always; do you like that,\nFlorence?\"\n\nA very soft little \"That will do for me!\" came up from a very faithful\nlittle heart.\n\n\"Now, Minnie?\"\n\n\"Might I have the shield? 'The shield of Faith.' But there'll be\nnothing nice left for you, Aggie!\"\n\n\"The very thing is left for her that is most suitable!\" exclaimed Alice\nwarmly.\n\n\"Her 'feet shod with the preparation of the Gospel of peace.' Agnes is\na thorough peacemaker, and she loves to tell people about the Gospel of\npeace, too.\"\n\n\"So I do; but not half as I ought,\" answered Agnes, lifting down the\npieces of armour and handing each to the various possessors.\n\n\"They will serve as reminders, 'with a vengeance,'\" said Hugh. \"Where\nshall we put them?\"\n\n\"I mean to hang mine up at home over my mantelshelf,\" said Agnes. \"It\nwill be quite an ornament, and if\u2014\"\n\n\"Yes,\" said John, taking up the word. \"If we think of them, and by and\nby take unto us the whole armour of God\u2014\"\n\n\"Agnes' kindness and thought for us will not be in vain,\" added Alice,\nkissing her warmly.\n\n\"To-morrow,\" said Agnes, \"we will have some more talk about our\ndifferent pieces of armour, for it will be easier to us to use what God\nhas provided, if we can understand the sorts of weapons which will be\nused against us.\"\n\n\"Oh! Tell us now, Aggie,\" exclaimed her little sister.\n\n\"Not to-night; let us go downstairs now, and try to make the evening\nbright to uncle Hugh.\"\n\nThe young people carried their armour to their respective rooms,\nplacing it in full view on chests of drawers, bureaus, &c., each\ntouched with Agnes' unselfishness, which had caused her, in that house\nfull of treasures to choose something which she meant but to receive\nand then to give away.\n\nWhen they reached the drawing-room, their uncle met them at the door\nwith an unusually bright look on his face.\n\n\"Agnes,\" he said, leading her up to an easel, which stood under the\nchandelier in the middle of the room, \"I have looked out another little\ntreasure for you, in remembrance of your knight! I felt, after what we\ntalked about yesterday, that it ought to belong to no one else.\"\n\nWhen Agnes reached the easel, what was her surprise to see a beautiful\noil painting of a soldier, clad in armour, kneeling before his\nsovereign, receiving from his hands the victor's laurels and rewards!\n\nHis face, patient with many a hardship, holy with many a self-denial,\nearnest with many a purpose, radiant with many a victory, his face\ntouched the hearts of the lookers on, all fresh from Agnes' earnest\nwords, and a silent sort of awe fell upon them, as they thought of what\nthey had undertaken, and of what the end would be.\n\nTheir uncle's voice, gentle and solemn, broke the pause\u2014\n\n\"'I have fought a good fight, I have finished my course, I have kept\nthe faith. Henceforth there is laid up for me a crown of righteousness,\nwhich the Lord, the righteous Judge, shall give me at that day.'\"\n\n\"I cannot attempt to thank you,\" said Agnes in a low voice, putting her\nhand in her uncle's, \"but\u2014\"\n\n\"Don't try to, my dear. Rather would I thank you for having turned my\nhaunted chamber into an armoury of light!\"\n\nThat night as Hugh, the last of the party, crossed the hall on his way\nto bed, he paused by the marble pillars and looked round.\n\nThe moon had left the windows of the haunted chamber, and had come\nround to the front, where it streamed along the pavement, touching the\nfeet of the gaunt knights, and casting fairy shadows from the ferns and\npalms between which they stood.\n\n\"'The whole armour of God,'\" he murmured softly, \"I wonder how long\nI shall be before I have strength to buckle it all on? But I'm glad\nthere are those words: 'I can do all things through Christ which\nstrengtheneth me!'\"\n\n       *       *       *       *       *      *\n\n\"Agnes, the best thing you can do is to come into the haunted room and\ntell us what you promised,\" said Hugh one evening soon after the giving\nout of the armour. \"We could not have a better place to sit, and we\nshall be uninterrupted.\"\n\n\"I do not mind, if you all like it best,\" answered Agnes. \"When shall\nwe begin?\"\n\n\"No time like the present,\" said John, laughing, and taking his sister\nround the waist; \"we will lead the way, Agnes, and face the haunted\nroom altogether, if need be!\"\n\nThe rest soon followed; and before long all were seated by the window,\nwhere the first rays of the moon were peeping in, instead of leaving\nit, as they had been a few days before.\n\n\"Well, Agnes?\" began Alice.\n\n\"I daresay some of you have thought of your pieces of armour since we\nhad our other talk?\" asked Agnes.\n\n\"I've thought ever so much,\" said Hugh.\n\n\"So have I,\" pursued Agnes, \"and I think we had better begin in the\norder in which we find the list in Ephesians. Who is it who has the\ncoat of Mail\u2014Truth? 'Loins girt about with truth'?\"\n\n\"That is my piece of armour,\" answered Alice. \"What have you to tell us\nabout that, Agnes?\"\n\n\"It seems to me that truth is a sort of strengthening of our minds; as\nin the East they would gird up their encumbering robes, so as to walk\nalong more bravely in a difficult path. Do you think of it like that,\nAlice?\"\n\n\"Yes,\" answered her sister. \"I was reading these words on Sunday:\n'Grace and truth came by Jesus Christ.' I suppose that has something to\ndo with my piece of armour.\"\n\n\"Of course it has!\" exclaimed Agnes eagerly. \"And it is so difficult to\ncombine those two things in the same person\u2014grace and truth. People can\nbe truthful, but they find it very hard to be gracious also; or they\nare so gracious that they fail to be truthful.\"\n\n\"I don't see how you mean,\" said Hugh.\n\n\"In this sort of way,\" answered Agnes. \"One day lately, I heard a girl\nsay something like this: Oh, you know, she asked me how I liked her\ndrawing, and I said it was sweetly pretty; but really, you know, it was\nnot a bit nice, nor a quarter as well done as so-and-so's.'\"\n\n\"Oh, Agnes! You did not hear me say that!\" exclaimed Alice, shocked.\n\n\"No, not you; but every day we hear this sort of compromise. If that\ngirl I spoke of, had been taxed with not speaking the truth, she would\nhave answered: Well, it was very pretty, or, if I didn't think so, she\ndid, and that made it quite true.'\"\n\n\"I would not have said such a thing for the world,\" exclaimed Alice.\n\n\"I am sure you would not; but I find, for myself, that these\ndifficulties meet one at every step, and that our being 'girt about\nwith truth' is an everyday necessity.\"\n\n\"I'm sure it is,\" said John, \"in a hundred ways. If we look-out for\nthem, they will come to us fast enough, and we shall get used to\nwatching ourselves.\"\n\n\"Is that all about Truth?\" asked Florence.\n\n\"Not half enough, but you must think it out for yourselves; we shall\nnot have time to-night for more than a few suggestions. We must now\nproceed to the 'Breastplate of Righteousness.'\"\n\n\"That's mine,\" said Hugh.\n\n\"All of us need it,\" answered Agnes, \"for I think it is one of our best\nweapons against Satan.\"\n\n\"How?\" asked Hugh.\n\n\"Don't you see that it is only as we carry the 'Breastplate of\nRighteousness' we can face Satan boldly, without fear?\"\n\n\"But,\" said Hugh, very soberly, \"I don't always feel bold when I meet\nSatan, for he often accuses me, and I have nothing to say!\"\n\n\"Yes,\" answered Agnes, \"and that is the very reason, I believe, why our\nGod has provided the Breastplate of Righteousness\u2014not ours but His\u2014the\nperfect righteousness of Christ, in which we may face all our foes with\ncalm confidence. Who shall lay anything to the charge of God's elect?'\"\n\n\"That is a nice thought,\" said Hugh heartily; and Agnes, glancing up at\nthe moment, saw the moonbeams resting on a very bright, earnest face,\nin which a look of peace had taken up its abode.\n\n\"It strikes me, we shall find all we need, every piece as we come to\nthem,\" said John.\n\nAgnes smiled to herself, and then Minnie, who was looking up in her\neyes, said, \"Shall we, Aggie?\"\n\n\"I should not wonder,\" she answered.\n\n\"But what comes next?\" asked Minnie.\n\n\"'Shod with the preparation of the Gospel of peace,'\" said John. \"That\nbelongs to Agnes, and it suits her.\"\n\n\"I wish it did,\" she answered; \"but I have thought of it like this. To\nhave feet always ready to do our Lord's bidding; to go everywhere, not\nwith our own poor, bare, tired feet, but shod with His Gospel of peace;\na covering which will make us welcome wherever we go.\"\n\n\"What next, Agnes?\" asked Hugh.\n\n\"'The Shield of Faith,' Minnie's great piece of armour.\"\n\n\"Yes, that's mine,\" nodded Minnie.\n\n\"Here we come across another reference to the power of Satan,\" said\nAgnes, \"and you see there is no disgrace in taking refuge under the\nShield. Satan hurls darts at those who are bearing God's name, and\ncarrying His armour, and he hopes by their terrible fiery nature to\nbeat down the combatant. But our Captain, who has not sent us out to\nbattle unarmed, has provided a shield, which not only protects us from\nthe fiery darts, but actually quenches them! The Shield of Faith.\nMinnie, whatever people say as you go on in life, whatever Satan may\nsay, take your Shield of Faith and answer, 'If God be for us, who can\nbe against us?' 'He that believeth shall not make haste.'\"\n\n\"I never knew what it meant before,\" said Minnie.\n\n\"If you think it over, you will find that Jesus is your Shield in more\nways than you can count; but I must leave you to find these out for\nyourselves. I think the other thought is the main one in our present\nsubject.\"\n\n\"Florence's Helmet is next,\" remarked Hugh, as Agnes paused.\n\n\"Yes\u2014the crowning of all\u2014the hope which lifts the head proudly before\nevery foe. Salvation! Victory at last; no defeat or dismay for those\nwho trust Him. 'Take the Helmet of Salvation,' and the joy of the Lord\nshall be your strength!\"\n\n\"Oh, Agnes,\" whispered Florence, \"how nice!\"\n\n\"And then,\" pursued Agnes, \"the last equipment must be taken in hand,\nand never put down till the fight is fought. 'Take ... the Sword of the\nSpirit, which is the Word of God.'\"\n\n\"I often think how our Lord conquered Satan when He was on earth. Don't\nyou remember that at every attack, He answered him by the Word of\nGod? Satan hates to have Scripture quoted to him. He knows its power,\nand would by every device urge the soldier to lay down this powerful\nweapon. But let us all be too wary for this. Let us brighten our Sword\nere we go to bed; let us grasp it afresh when we rise in the morning;\nlet us wield it in our hearts and in our lives all day, that so the\nWord of Christ may dwell in us richly, and we may be able to fight the\ngood fight of faith.\"\n\nAgnes paused, and all her listeners were silent.\n\n\"Do you catch my meaning, dears?\" she asked gently.\n\n\"Oh yes, Agnes,\" answered several voices, and then John spoke earnestly.\n\n\"Agnes, there's one thing I've learned from what you have been saying\n(besides many other things). As you went along, I came to this\nconclusion\u2014\"\n\n\"Well, John dear?\"\n\n\"That, though our one piece of armour will be a first-rate reminder all\nthrough this New Year, the upshot saying is this\u2014we must take unto us\nthe whole armour, or we shall not be able to stand!\"\n\n\"Rather,\" corrected Agnes, earnestly, \"that we may be able to stand!\nYou are quite right, John, it is the whole armour of God which we need.\"\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XX.\n\nAGATHA'S STORY.\n\nON Christmas Day, three children were walking down the lighted streets\nof a dark city, and were all, from different directions, wending their\nway to the same place.\n\nThis place was a mission-room in one of the crowded streets near the\nEast End.\n\nEven though it was Christmas night, there were a few people who\npreferred the warm mission-room to their own homes, and these children\nwere some of them.\n\nOne was a ragged boy who had no home.\n\nThe second was a little girl, who wandered in for the sake of the warm\nstove, for she was perished with cold.\n\nThe third was the clergyman's son, who came because his father came,\nand because on this night, he could not bear him to come alone.\n\nThe ragged boy, cold to the bones, with a body wasted by disease and\nwant, crouched down in a corner, intending to go to sleep till a cup of\ncoffee, which he knew would be given, should be offered him.\n\nThe girl put her feet as near the stove as she could, but she knew\nnothing about the coffee, and only prepared herself to wait till she\nwas warm, and then intended to slip out and go away.\n\nAnd the clergyman's son was longing to get home to his Christmas\npresents and the bright party he had left for his father's sake.\n\nBut every one of them received a Gift which they little expected, and\nwhich altered their whole lives from that day forth.\n\n\"Behold, I stand at the door and knock; if any man hear My voice, and\nopen the door, I will come in and sup with him, and he with Me.\"\n\nBy the time the clergyman had impressed this verse and its meaning\non the attention of his hearers, the poor little girl was warm, and\nshrinkingly giving a glance behind her, for fear she should be chidden,\nshe slipped out into the cold, windy, winter air.\n\nDrawing her thin little shawl closer around her, she ran as fast as she\ncould to the court in which was her home. She found her way up the dark\nstairs, and soon stood within her mother's attic.\n\nThere was a glimmer of fire in the grate, but it was too small to shed\nany light in the room.\n\n\"How long you've been!\" exclaimed her mother's voice from a corner,\nsounding near the floor, for bedstead there was none.\n\n\"No, I ain't,\" answered the little girl, remembering, as she said the\nwords, that she must have stayed full half an hour by that warm stove.\n\n\"I know it don't take you all this time to get that candle and a bit of\nbread; and there's yer brother been whining the whole time you've been\ngone.\"\n\nThe voice was sharp with pain and suffering, and at the same moment\nlittle Bill began his whining again.\n\nThe poor little girl lighted the farthing candle and cut her brother a\npiece of bread, then placed another by her mother's side, and lastly\nseized, rather than took, a piece herself, and sat down by the tiny\nfire to eat it.\n\nBut as she ate the first food she had tasted that day, before her eyes\ncame up a picture, living as it were, and she saw over again a Kingly\nStranger knocking for admittance, and promising to enter and sup with\nthose who opened to Him.\n\nThe little girl glanced round the wretched room: no loving hand had\nbeen there to put it tidy, no hope had entered it to make it bright, no\nrelief had come to cheer and comfort.\n\nAll that dreary Christmas Day, her mother had lain moaning on her\nmiserable straw, and her little crippled brother had cried for food\nsince early dawn, when the Christmas bells had sounded on the frosty\nair.\n\nAh! no help, no succour, no happiness; nothing but want, and sin, and\nmisery.\n\nAn hour before, a neighbour, pitying the wretchedness of the poor\nstarving family, had made her way up the dark stairs.\n\n\"It ain't much I've got to give,\" she said abruptly, \"but on Christmas\nnight, I don't like to feel as you've not had a bit in your mouths all\nday; so here's sixpence, and you're kindly welcome.\"\n\nWith that she laid down the little coin, and without waiting for thanks\nor to inquire how the invalid was, she hastened back to her room.\n\nAnd so it was to her kindness, they were indebted for that bit of\ncandle and loaf of bread.\n\nAgain the child heard the voice, \"I stand and knock; I will come in and\nsup.\"\n\n\"He said it was our hearts,\" she murmured to herself, looking still at\nthe picture in the fire.\n\n\"What?\" asked her mother sharply.\n\n\"The gen'lman said as He was askin' to come in, and if He came in, He'd\nmake the place as beautiful as a palace\u2014that He would!\"\n\n\"We don't want no one in here,\" gasped her mother; \"leastways, unless\nthey bring some'ut with 'em!\"\n\n\"The gen'lman said as He would, if we opened the door.\"\n\n\"Then open it!\" exclaimed the sick woman, rousing herself suddenly.\n\n\"It's our hearts,\" said the girl, musingly, \"and I daren't open the\ndoor for such as Him to come in; it ain't fit.\"\n\nThe sick woman threw herself back impatiently, but after a long, long\nsilence she said more softly:\n\n\"Say them words over again, Meg; I've heard 'em afore, and I believe\nit's the Saviour as is knocking and wants to come in.\"\n\n\"Yes, mother,\" answered Meg, eagerly; \"I couldn't call it to mind\nafore. It's the Saviour as sez He's a-coming in, if we'll have Him!\"\n\n\"He's waited a long time for me to open the door,\" said the sick woman,\n\"but\u2014if He'll forgive\u2014\"\n\n       *       *       *       *       *      *\n\nAnd the clergyman's son heard the message, as he had so often heard it\nbefore, and he turned away from it as he had so often turned before.\n\nBut when he reached his own chamber that night, after the pleasant\nfamily party was over, his mind went back to what he had witnessed in\nthat mission-room.\n\nThe little starving, emaciated, ragged boy had sat with his hungry eyes\nwaiting for the coffee; but, though the child had intended to go to\nsleep, he did not do it, for the clergyman made it so plain that the\nSaviour was knocking at his heart that he could not forget it, and he\nlistened with deep attention to every word.\n\n\"If any man hear My voice, and open the door, I will come in.\"\n\n\"That's me,\" he said; \"I'm anyone, anyhow. But I'm so 'ungry and so\ncold and so wretched, I don't see as 'ow He can care to come into my\nheart.\"\n\nSo he listened again; and again, he heard the words, \"He wants every\none of you to be happy and blessed.\"\n\n\"He's a kind 'un, then,\" said the boy to himself, as the rare tears\nfilled his sunken eyes. And then the cup of steaming coffee had come,\nand he had swallowed it quickly enough, and the kind clergyman had\nsaid a few words to him about the love of Jesus, and then the boy had\ncrouched down again in the same corner as before, too ill and miserable\nto move.\n\n\"My poor boy,\" said the minister, \"I am afraid you must leave here, we\nare going to shut it up.\"\n\n\"What, sir?\" asked the boy, rousing a little, while a deathly pallor\noverspread his face.\n\nThe sentence was repeated even more gently, but the child did not take\nit in. He started up and stretched out his arms, calling, in a voice\nin which love, and yearning, and joy were all expressed, \"Oh, come in,\ncome in; I've opened the door for yer!\"\n\nWith that his arms fell, and then they saw that he needed no more\nearthly care, for he had gone in to supper with the King of kings.\n\n       *       *       *       *       *      *\n\nThis was what the clergyman's son had seen, and as he stood in his room\nalone that night he thought that the knock had come to him too, and woe\nbe to him, if he disregarded it!\n\nHe knelt down by his bedside.\n\n\"So sinful,\" he whispered, \"so forgetful, so full of selfishness and\nself-seeking\u2014if Thou comest in, Thou King of Glory, it is Thou who must\nmake it fit, for I cannot. Nevertheless, if Thou dost knock\u2014and Thou\ndost, I hear Thee\u2014Thou shalt not knock in vain; for this very night I\nwill echo those dying words, 'Come in, come in!'\"\n\n       *       *       *       *       *      *\n\n\"Children,\" said Agatha, \"He knocks at your hearts to-night. He wants\nyou to let Him in, that He may bless you and dwell with you all this\ncoming year. You will not keep Him waiting, you will not hold the door\nfast! Surely you will say too, 'Saviour, come in, come in.'\"\n\nSo the moonlight city faded away, the little guests bade their\nentertainers good-night, and each one went home with new thoughts, and\nsome of them with new hopes for the New Year.\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXI.\n\nUNDER THE STARS.\n\nAUNT RUTH had been out all the evening, and when she came home the\nchildren were walking up and down the gravel path, waiting for her.\n\nThe darkness had fallen, and the young moon had set, so that there\nwas nothing now but the blue vault of heaven studded with twinkling,\nsparkling stars.\n\n\"I love starlight,\" said Jean, pressing close to her side.\n\n\"Yes; the stars seem to bring one so near to God!\"\n\n\"Where have you been Auntie?\" asked Tom.\n\n\"I've been to the prayer-meeting,\" she said. \"I want to tell you about\nthe old woman who went to the prayer-meeting last week! It's a lovely\nstory. I have wanted to get home quickly so that I might repeat it to\nyou\u2014\"\n\n\"Did she tell you?\" asked Oswald.\n\n\"No; she told a neighbour the next morning, and the neighbour told me,\nwith tears in her eyes, just now.\"\n\nAunt Ruth spoke in an unusually eager voice, and all the while she\nseemed gazing up into the sky.\n\n\"This is what the neighbour told me. There is a dear old woman who\ncomes to the prayer-meeting very often. She is very poor, and is\nthankful for any little bits of work that are put in her way.\"\n\n\"Last week, as she was coming home from the meeting, and looking up at\nthe stars, as we are, she suddenly thought, 'God is my Father! I'll\ntell Him!'\"\n\n\"So she said very simply and gently, 'Lord, you know we're very hungry,\nand there's nothing in the cupboard at home. Please, dear Father, send\nus something, because you know we are hungry.'\"\n\n\"So, with a heart at rest, she made her way home, and opened the\ncottage door.\"\n\n\"'Look here, wife,' called her invalid husband, 'here's a great basket\nthat somebody's sent us!'\"\n\n\"The old woman cast her eyes upon the hamper, and then, instead of\nopening it, she sank on her knees by the table.\"\n\n\"'Dear Lord,' she said, 'I knew you'd not forget your hungry children!\nThank you, dear, heavenly Father!'\"\n\n\"Then she rose with a wonderful happiness, and opened the basket.\"\n\n\"As she took out the things one by one, she told her neighbour 'it\nwas just like the Lord,' for there was bread, and butter, tea and\nsugar, and a piece of bacon! 'And didn't we have a good supper!' she\nconcluded.\"\n\n\"And did that really happen here, auntie?\" asked Rose.\n\n\"Really happened here!\" said Aunt Ruth. \"The Lord is the same Lord\nalways, 'rich unto all that call upon Him.'\"\n\n\"But sometimes we ask for things and don't get an answer?\" ventured\nTom, in his downright fashion. \"Why do you think that is, Auntie?\"\n\n\"I think it may be this,\" said Aunt Ruth, slowly, \"'your Heavenly\nFather knoweth what things you have need of.' Sometimes we ask for\nthings we think we have need of, and God sees that to have them would\nhave been the very worst thing for us.\"\n\nTom looked thoughtful for a minute, and the others were thinking of\ninstances when they had asked and not received.\n\n\"Then how are we to know?\" asked Tom at last.\n\n\"Ask for the thing you want, simply and trustfully, and say from your\nheart, 'If it is best for me, if it is according to Thy will\u2014Thou\nknowest best,' and then leave it.\"\n\nThere was a pause. Then, emboldened by the darkness and the tenderness\nof the conversation, Jean said softly:\n\n\"I did so want something the other day, and I prayed for it; I daresay\nyou'll think it nonsense, but I thought my tennis shoes were too shabby\nto go to that party in. But God did not send them, and I did not think\nI ought to ask mother for them\u2014\"\n\n\"Well?\" said Aunt Ruth gently, pressing her arm. \"What did you do?\"\n\n\"When I found mother said nothing about them, I felt bad for a little\nwhile; then I prayed again, and asked Jesus not to let me mind so much\u2014\"\n\n\"And then?\" asked Aunt Ruth softly.\n\n\"Then\u2014well, I forgot all about it in the end, and had a very nice\nafternoon.\"\n\n\"That is just the way I find the Lord Jesus does help,\" exclaimed Aunt\nRuth. \"To the old woman who is hungry, He sends bread and all she\nwants, and to the little girl who is worried about her shoes, He sends\nthe best thing for her in His wisdom and love\u2014an acquiescence in His\nprovision, and then forgetfulness of what she thought would spoil her\nday!\"\n\nThey turned indoors now, and Jean with tear-filled eyes ran up to her\nbedroom, and knelt down for one instant.\n\n\"Dear Lord Jesus,\" she whispered, \"I know you know best; help me to\ntrust you always!\"\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXII.\n\nKINDLED.\n\n\"AUNT RUTH,\" exclaimed Jean, \"do come and sit down by this fire. See!\nI've blown it into such a lovely blaze, because I know you love blazes.\"\n\nAunt Ruth laughed. \"Where did you find that nice pair of bellows?\" she\nasked. \"I never saw them before.\"\n\n\"I should think you hadn't!\" said Jean. \"I was searching in the garret\nthis afternoon for something mother wanted in that old chest of hers,\nand I came upon them, wrapped up in a sheet of old-fashioned paper, as\nyellow as yellow.\"\n\n\"Among her treasures?\" asked Aunt Ruth.\n\n\"Yes; she would hardly let me use them, they were such a treasure! But\nI told her they did nobody any good up there, hidden away, and if I\nleft them there they would be forgotten for another twenty years\u2014\"\n\n\"Where shall you keep them?\" asked Aunt Ruth.\n\n\"Handy!\" returned Jean, emphatically.\n\nWith which words she began blowing up the wood fire with fresh energy,\nenjoying the effect to the full, as who does not?\n\n\"Go it!\" said Tom, coming behind, \"Or let me.\"\n\n\"Oh! Here you all are!\" said Aunt Ruth.\n\n\"Yes, just ready for a nice twilight story,\" said Rose. \"They are\ngetting the tea, and there is just time.\"\n\nAunt Ruth was always willing, though she seldom suggested a talk unless\nthey did. Often she seized upon a little lesson from what was passing\nat the moment, which the children were grateful for, and did not forget.\n\n\"Well, come along, settle yourselves quickly,\" she said, \"for if Rose\nis right about the tea, there will not be much time.\"\n\nThey all gathered round her affectionately.\n\n\"Well, auntie?\" said Oswald, by way of a beginning.\n\n\"Well,\" she responded, \"it struck me as if by a flash when I saw Jean\nfanning the fire into that beautiful flame, how the dull fire was\ntypical of our dull hearts, cold and dead, the spark of love and faith\nnearly extinguished by adverse circumstances\u2014\"\n\n\"Yes, auntie,\" said Tom eagerly, \"what then?\"\n\n\"Then comes a force outside ourselves, and with the breath of living\npower, He fans the little sparks till they brighten and grow warm,\nfanned by the love of God, and the breath of the Holy Spirit.\"\n\n\"I don't understand much about the Holy Spirit,\" said Oswald, in a low\ntone, \"it always seems too high a subject for me.\"\n\n\"Yes, I can understand that, but if we think of the Holy Spirit as\n'He,' not 'it,' we shall better understand that He is a Person; not\nonly an influence, but Someone we may speak to and love.\"\n\n\"Does that make a difference?\" asked Rose.\n\n\"I am sure it does. We can pray to Him, if He is a Person\u2014unseen,\nindeed, but very near and very real. When we pray to Him, the first\neffect I think that we shall find, will be that the little spark of\nlove which we had to Jesus will brighten and glow.\"\n\n\"Oh! Now I see!\" smiled Jean, thinking of her dull fire.\n\n\"And then as the Holy Spirit becomes more to us\u2014more of a living\nreality\u2014the spark of our love to Jesus will grow and glow, and at\nlength burst into a bright flame, so that others will see in our faces\na beam of His holy love and holy life!\"\n\n\"And we shall be warm and happy,\" sighed Jean, in a comfortable rested\ntone.\n\n\"Well,\" said Oswald, hesitating a little, \"that's too difficult a\nsubject for me.\"\n\n\"I don't think it is, when you think it over,\" said Aunt Ruth, looking\nup. \"I heard a celebrated preacher once speak on this very subject. He\npressed his hearers very earnestly to make a decision then and there;\nto say 'Yes' to the Holy Spirit, and let Him enter their hearts. In the\nsolemn pause which ensued, the little girl next me seemed very earnest,\nbut it was not till afterwards that I knew about the great transaction\nthat had taken place in her life in that quiet church.\"\n\n\"As we were sitting in the train going home, her hand lovingly within\nmy arm, and her face close to my shoulder, I whispered, 'What answer\ndid you give, darling?' And she squeezed my arm earnestly, as she\nwhispered back, 'I said yes.'\"\n\n\"Since then, children, that girl has been a devoted servant of Christ,\nand has done much for Him.\"\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXIII.\n\nTOM'S PERSUASIONS.\n\n\"WE are going home to-morrow!\" said Jean, with a sigh. \"Auntie, are you\nnot very sorry? Now, confess!\"\n\n\"Very sorry to leave this nice place, and the sea, but not to be going\nhome.\"\n\nTom, who was sitting on the grass at her feet, looked up suddenly.\n\n\"Is our home going to be yours?\" he asked, gently and earnestly.\n\n\"I do not know, Tom!\"\n\n\"Have mother and father asked you? Don't answer if you'd rather not,\nauntie,\" he said, his cheeks burning, as he still looked in her face,\n\"but mother is better and back again now, and she said in her letter\nthis morning\u2014\"\n\n\"It was not curiosity,\" apologised Rose, \"but because we did so hope\nyou might be able.\"\n\nAunt Ruth's eyes filled. \"It makes me very happy to think you want me,\"\nshe said in a low tone; \"but I have not been able to decide yet.\"\n\n\"I am afraid I ought not to have asked,\" said Tom, earnestly; \"but as\nRose said, we were so hoping you would, as mother told us before we\ncame away, she hoped it would be settled so\u2014\"\n\nAunt Ruth did not gainsay it. She was looking earnestly at the quiet\nriver and the golden trees, lighted up just now by the setting sun.\n\n\"I do not mind your having asked me in the least, dears. I have been\nthinking about telling you about my\u2014 about the blow that came upon me\nlast year.\"\n\nTheir faces of sympathy and interest were enough encouragement to her\nto go on.\n\n\"You know I lost my dear father then, and when everything was settled\nup, instead of my having an income sufficient to keep me, through no\nfault of his, but because some investments had gone down, it was found\nthere was not nearly enough to keep me\u2014\"\n\nJean showered kisses on the hand she was holding, and Oswald opened his\nmouth as if to speak, but closed it again, and was silent.\n\nTom was the first to venture a remark, and his gentle, grave tone was\nfull of sympathy.\n\n\"I heard how bravely and sweetly you bore it, auntie\u2014\"\n\n\"There were many days when I could not; when I felt as if the waves\nwent over my head. You would not understand how many things hinged\non that insufficient income of mine; how hopes that had long been\ncherished were blighted\u2014\"\n\n\"And yet, auntie,\" said Rose, \"you told us the Lord was your 'Sun and\nShield.'\"\n\n\"So He was, and is; I do not forget that, dears.\"\n\n\"Several homes have been offered to me, and I have been waiting to see\nwhere God would let me go.\"\n\n\"To us, I hope,\" said Tom, earnestly.\n\n\"Your father and mother have been most kind, and not least in allowing\nme time to decide, so as to do nothing in a hurry.\"\n\n\"Mother is far from strong,\" said Rose. \"I know she would be very glad\nif you were never to leave us\u2014\"\n\n\"But you and Jean will be able to help her in a year or two,\" said Aunt\nRuth, \"what then?\"\n\n\"Time enough for that,\" said downright Tom, \"and if you're right in\ncoming to us now, when the next step comes, you'll be able to see it!\nEh, auntie?\"\n\nShe smiled happily, and bent forward to kiss his forehead, as he knelt\nbefore her.\n\n\"I've got hopes that in a year or two, there may be several things\naltered,\" he said, decidedly.\n\nAunt Ruth looked earnestly at him. \"What do you mean, dear?\"\n\n\"I mean that there are 'promises' for you, auntie, just as much as\nthere are for us.\"\n\n\"'Promises?'\" she asked, stroking his hair, and thinking that, for a\nboy of fifteen, he had been a wonderful comfort to her all this year.\n\n\"Yes,\" he answered, not guessing her thoughts; \"there's one that I've\nhad on my mind all the week, 'Casting all your care upon Him, for He\ncareth for you!'\"\n\n\"Yes\u2014\" she answered, with a long-drawn breath, as if some heavy care\nwere rolling off as she spoke, \"yes\u2014I must not forget that.\"\n\n\"And you'll come and settle down with us till some other home wants you\nmore than we do?\" asked Tom, with a gravity and sweetness which she\nwondered at.\n\nAunt Ruth was silent, still stroking his sunny hair.\n\n\"You seem to think there are a great many homes likely to want me!\" she\nsaid, hesitating, with a questioning, shy look in her eyes.\n\n\"I did not say a great many,\" said Tom, gravely. \"I know of one that\nisn't ready yet\u2014and in America\u2014and till then we want you!\"\n\nAunt Ruth pointed to the sunset, and rose to go in; but as Tom\nstruggled to his feet, she said softly: \"Tom, I don't think there is\nany home in America getting ready\u2014\"\n\n\"But I know there is,\" said Tom, bluntly; \"meanwhile, and always, 'He\ncareth for you,' auntie!\"\n\nThey went in at last, and as they were wishing good-night, Aunt Ruth\nsaid: \"Children, as you all seem to want me to live with you, I am only\ntoo happy to come.\"\n\nThere was a bright joy on every face, and not least on Aunt Ruth's\npatient one.\n\n\"You did persuade her well!\" whispered Rose to Tom on the stairs.\n\n\"I think it was God's assurance did it,\" said Tom. \"I told her that she\nas well as we had His promise, 'He careth for you.'\"\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXIV.\n\nA MESSAGE FROM AMERICA.\n\nSO the summer and the holidays had come to an end, and Aunt Ruth had\n\"settled down,\" as Tom called it, and filled her own quiet little niche\nvery happily.\n\nAfter their last evening's talk at the seaside, the others were very\ncurious to know whether Tom knew, really, of a home which was getting\nready for Aunt Ruth.\n\nTom only shook his head whenever they asked him. \"I know what I know,\"\nhe said gravely, \"and I have my own conclusions. It is not for me to\nsay to everybody what I think. I'm glad Aunt Ruth is going to be with\nus for the present! That's all I have to do with, and you won't get\nmore out of me if you ask me for a year!\"\n\nBut all the same for that, when he got a letter one morning from\nAmerica, he never mentioned the contents to anyone but his mother, and\nthey did not know of that. It was not his own secret he was keeping.\n\n\"What makes you so bright, Tom?\" asked his aunt wistfully one wintry\nday, as they sat over the fire together.\n\n\"Whenever I look at you, I say to myself, 'He careth for you,' auntie,\nand that does me good.\"\n\n\"But why, dear\u2014I am very happy,\" she added. \"You are all so loving, and\nI have such a much easier life than if I had to turn out on the world.\"\n\n\"Yes, 'He careth for you,'\" said the boy, smiling. \"You came and taught\nus to trust Him more than we ever did before, and now God lets me pass\nit back to you, so that you take courage to keep on!\"\n\nHe smiled at her lovingly, and went to fetch his lesson books.\n\nTom read and re-read that letter from America, and could not make up\nhis mind about it.\n\nThe letter said:\n\n   \"You cannot think how you have comforted me about your\nAunt Ruth! Tom! If you see any cause to tell her, or if you think it\nwill add to her happiness, show her this letter. No one knows what it\ncost me to leave her without a word\u2014but I seemed to have no right\u2014at\nleast, I thought so then. But sometimes I have thought\u2014Tom, I am\ngetting on nicely. Your text has been a great comfort, 'Casting all\nyour care upon Him, for He careth for you.'\"\n\n   \"God has cared for me wonderfully, and if you think that she whom\nI love would be happier to know there is some one working for her,\nthen\u2014then tell her, Tom, or show her this letter, and ask her if I may\nwrite the next to her.\"\n\nTom had gone up to fetch his books. As he stood in the cold,\nreading over these words, he felt perplexed. It seemed such a great\nresponsibility.\n\nThen he thought of his text, and knelt down for an instant. \"Casting\nall your care upon Him, for He careth for you.\"\n\nFor a minute he looked soberly at the letter, then with brightening\ncheeks, and ran downstairs. How thankful he was that the others were\nout!\n\n\"Aunt Ruth,\" he said, hesitating a little, \"I have a letter here which\nI was to give you or not, as I considered best. It was a great honour\nto be charged with so much, but I think if I were in your place, I\nshould like to see it.\"\n\nHe held out his hand, and it trembled. Aunt Ruth looked up earnestly.\n\"Who is it from, Tom?\"\n\n\"Some one you knew before your grand-papa died\u2014some one who went abroad\nbecause\u2014\"\n\nTom choked. \"You'll see what he says; it can't do any harm, and it may\nbe a Christmas present for you, auntie!\"\n\nHe caught up his books, and was gone before she could speak.\n\nPresently\u2014it seemed a good while to Tom in the cold\u2014Aunt Ruth came to\nhis door.\n\n\"Tom, dear,\" she said, with averted face, \"how can I tell you how glad\nI am that you told me! God has been very good to me, and, indeed, His\nassurance which I trusted has come abundantly true, 'He careth for\nyou.'\"\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXV.\n\nHOW TO FIND.\n\n\"WELL, I can't find it!\" said Nancy in rather an exasperated tone.\n\n\"I've been looking and peeping about for this twenty minutes, and I\ncan't find it!\"\n\n\"What is it?\" asked Tom lazily, from his book and his corner of the\nsofa.\n\n\"Why, a shilling! I was putting some change into my purse, and it\nrolled from under my very fingers!\"\n\n\"Perhaps you've made a mistake?\"\n\n\"No; but I'm sure I haven't. I have only half-a-crown in the world, and\nthat was in three sixpences and a shilling; and the shilling is gone!\nBesides, I heard it drop and roll away.\"\n\n\"We'll look after tea,\" yawned Tom.\n\nBut Nancy was not satisfied with that, and went on groping about in\nall the likely corners, almost ready to cry at her brother's lack of\nsympathy, and at her own want of success.\n\nMary was preparing the tea busily, and did not seem to be taking much\nnotice; but presently she said in her gentle voice, \"Perhaps you have\nnot light enough?\" and while Nancy looked up with relief at someone\nbeing interested in her trouble, Mary quietly slipped out of the room.\n\nPoor little Nancy sat down on the hearth-rug, and almost gave up her\nshilling; she had looked everywhere, she was certain.\n\nThen a light came in at the door, and there was Mary with a small lamp\nin her hand.\n\n\"Try this,\" she said, holding it out so that its light sent a beam into\nthe dark recesses round the fireplace.\n\nNancy started up with fresh energy, and then there was a sudden\nexclamation.\n\n\"Why, Mary\u2014!\"\n\n\"Have you found it?\" asked Mary joyfully.\n\n\"Yes; but I'd looked there heaps of times! It was just by the scuttle\u2014\"\n\n\"The light shone on it, I expect,\" said Mary, \"and then you saw it!\"\n\nTom looked up in his sister's face. \"A spiritual lesson, Moll?\" he\nasked, with a smile at her tone.\n\n\"I thought so,\" she answered, \"for, do you know, it exactly matched a\nvery curious experience I had a day or so ago. I was in darkness about\nsomething, and could not at all find out what God meant me to do. I\nsearched in the corner of experience, and in the corner of expediency,\nand in another of wishes, and in another of obstacles; when suddenly it\nflashed across me that light was what I wanted\u2014not so much searching!\"\n\n\"And then I thought of fetching the Lamp of God's Word; and as I turned\nover the pages, the Light shone on my difficulty, and I could see\nthe way out of it, shining as bright as Nancy's shilling in the dark\ncorner!\"\n\n\"And that was?\" asked Tom, while Nancy still held her recovered\nshilling in her hand, and looked earnestly at her sister.\n\n\"'Commit thy way unto the Lord, trust also in Him, and He will bring it\nto pass,'\" quoted Mary.\n\n\"Nice!\" said Nancy heartily.\n\n\"So I took the lesson to my heart, dears,\" added Mary gently, \"that\nwhen we are in a difficulty, it is very often because we have not\nenough light; and that light is to be found in the Word of God, which\nis there for anyone who seeks!\"\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXVI.\n\nWORTH WHILE.\n\nMARY, Cecil, Tom and Nancy were together in the cosy room where there\nalways seemed a bright bit of fire, and a tidy table and a warm welcome.\n\nMary, for once, sat muffled in a shawl in the arm-chair, and the rest\ngathered round her, glad to make her welcome to their circle, after her\nenforced absence of two days in bed with a bad cold.\n\n\"Now we are complete!\" said Nancy comfortably.\n\n\"Yes; I would not have believed that one person being away would make\nsuch a difference,\" said Cecil, looking round the room reflectively.\n\nTom did not add his quota of praise, but he looked very contented, and\nafter a few moments said, smiling, \"I expect you've had some thoughts\nup there, Moll, that would do us good! It's been mighty dry down here!\"\n\nShe put out her hand and touched her brother's softly.\n\n\"I have chiefly been learning a hymn!\" she said.\n\n\"A hymn!\" echoed Cecil. \"Whatever for?\"\n\n\"To have as 'a possession,'\" said Mary. \"You can't think how the Psalms\nI can say, and the hymns I have committed to memory, freshen me up if I\nam ill, and are so comforting to repeat to people in trouble.\"\n\n\"I never thought of that,\" said little Nancy.\n\n\"And what was your hymn?\" asked Tom.\n\n\"A very simple one, but holding in every verse a magnificent secret!\"\n\nCecil turned round and gazed at her.\n\n\"What?\" he asked.\n\n\"'Let Jesus Christ be praised!'\"\n\n\"How is that such a wonderful secret?\" said Tom.\n\n\"Just this,\" she answered earnestly, \"that if in every circumstance\nof life, in every difficulty, danger or fear, we can claim all that\nis stored up for us in that wonderful name Jesus, we have solace,\nstrength, victory assured to us. I know it, dears, and so will you, if\nyou will believe it.\"\n\nThe room got darker, and the silence was unbroken for some time. Mary's\nvoice had almost startled them with its fervour.\n\n\"What is the hymn called?\" asked Cecil presently.\n\n\"The first verse is:\"\n\n   \"When morning gilds the skies,\n    My heart awaking cries,\n      May Jesus Christ be praised\n    Alike in work or prayer,\n    To Jesus I repair,\n      Let Jesus Christ be praised!\"\n\n\"But I am specially fond of the sixth verse\u2014this:\"\n\n   \"The night becomes as day,\n    When from the heart we say,\n      May Jesus Christ be praised!\n    The powers of darkness fear,\n    When this sweet chant they hear,\n      May Jesus Christ be praised!\"\n\n\"I'll learn it,\" said Nancy, and perhaps the others thought the same,\nfor Tom said gently, as he smoothed his sister's hand, \"I should think\nit was almost worth while being ill!\"\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XXVII.\n\nMID-WINTER.\n\n\"HERE is the first Sunday in December, Mary!\" said Tom, as he went to\ndraw the curtains. \"We may as well sit in the firelight till the tea\ncomes in.\"\n\n\"Yes, do let us!\" said Nancy with a contented sort of sigh, as she\nnestled up close to her sister and laid her head on her shoulder.\n\n\"It will soon be the shortest day,\" remarked Mary. \"I do love the\nshortest day!\"\n\n\"Why?\" asked Cecil.\n\n\"Because I always feel as if 'the summer had begun,'\" smiled Mary.\n\n\"In mid-winter?\" asked Cecil.\n\n\"Yes. When the shortest day comes, I say to myself, 'My summer has\nbegun.' You cannot think how, to rejoice in the lengthening days, seems\nto shorten the winter!\"\n\n\"I daresay it does,\" said Tom reflectively.\n\n\"Every bit of hopefulness does one good, you know,\" Mary went on\nsoftly. \"You laugh at me for quoting 'Pa Gladden' so often, but he says\n'Human nature air always huntin' for the cheerful,' and I have noticed\nthat cheery people bring sunshine.\"\n\n\"I know one thing,\" said Cecil, \"gloomy people are never liked.\"\n\n\"Well, there is no better way of being cheerful than to have a firm\nhope in God,\" said Mary. \"I was reading the other day one verse with a\nwhole list of names, that David, in exulting thankfulness, calls the\nLord his God. Just listen to them, and see if your heart does not grow\nstronger and braver and more hopeful as I repeat them\u2014\"\n\nMary's little Bible was tucked into her workbasket close handy, and she\nleant down toward the blaze of the fire to read the very words.\n\n   \"'The Lord is my Rock, and my Fortress, and my Deliverer;\n     my God, my Strength, in whom I will trust;\n     my Buckler, and the horn of my Salvation, and my High Tower.'\"\n\n\"A pretty good list!\" said Cecil smiling. \"Where is it, Mary?\"\n\n\"The second verse of the eighteenth Psalm.\"\n\n\"All in one verse?\" asked Nancy.\n\n\"All in one verse! That is a verse for those who are out in the world,\nfighting the everyday battles; and there is another for the weak and\ntired ones, that is just as wonderful\u2014\"\n\n\"Well, let's have it,\" said Tom in his blunt hearty fashion, \"then we\ncan take our choice.\"\n\nMary turned over the leaves rapidly, and her gentle face glowed in the\nfirelight as she read from the 32nd of Isaiah:\n\n   \"'And a man shall be as an Hiding-place from the wind;\n     and a Covert from the tempest;\n     as Rivers of Water in a dry place;\n     as the Shadow of a Great Rock in a weary land.'\"\n\nThe little head that rested on Mary's shoulder nestled closer, as Nancy\nmurmured, \"That's a nice one for the shortest day; and the other one\nwill do for the New Year!\"\n\n\n\n                           THE END","title":"Twilight stories","tradition":"scripture-revelation","translated_text":null,"word_count":22128}