CHAPTER XXVI.

Selections from My Scrap Book.

Many of the selections given in this chapter were written by prisoners and given me by them. The others may not all be new to the reader, but I have thought them of sufficient value to thus preserve, as they may be reread with profit, and no doubt may be read here by many who have not seen them elsewhere. Such will surely feel the time it takes to read them well spent.

Many of the songs I have sung are not in print here, as they are familiar or may be found in popular books; others I thought might be copyrighted and I do not know the owner, etc. I have not meant to use any copyright selections without procuring the right to do so, but if through mistake any have been used I shall be glad to make due requital.

THE AUTHOR OF FLOWER MISSION DAY.

I once visited this sister, a saint, meekly lying upon her bed, and when I asked if she would like for Jesus to heal her, she said God could use her better in that condition.

E. R. W.

Jennie Cassady was born in Louisville, Kentucky, June 9, 1840. She came to earth through no royal line of ancestry. No booming cannon and flying flags proclaimed the birth of a princess. No jeweled hand beckoned her to a place of rank and title. Nothing in babyhood or girlhood distinguished her above what is visible in ten thousand homes to-day. But as she stepped over the threshold into womanhood, there fell upon her a great calamity--a cruel accident made her a cripple and an invalid for life. But in her afflictions she arose to a sublimity and sweetness of soul that has challenged the admiration of two continents. And out of the awful shadows that fell upon her she has gathered up the sunbeams of God's smiles and scattered them into the dark places of earth. Out of that one little darkened room in Kentucky there has gone forth an inspiration that has fired the heart of heroic Christian womanhood. And out of the darkness that smote her pathway leaped the lances of light that pierces the gloom of prison walls. A gleam from that radiant life touches the poet's fancy, and gives us these beautiful lines.

J. M. CROCKER, Prison Chaplain.

FLOWER DAY AT THE PRISON.

Composed and read by F. L. Platt at the Iowa State Prison at Anamosa, June 9th, 1894.

In a cottage in Kentucky, In the years that have gone by, Was a woman, oh, so lonely, She'd been given up to die.

As she lay upon her sick bed, Ere the spark of life had flown, Neighbors called, and strangers also, Whom before she had not known.

They had heard of her misfortune, Day and night she lingered there; And to make her life more cheerful Seemed to be their every care.

Now they come, with noiseless footsteps, As the rose is kissed with dew, Each one bringing in some sunshine, In "these flowers I've brought for you."

As she looked into their faces, Realizing death had come, "Take these flowers," she said, "I'm dying," They will brighten other homes.

Take them, give them to the children Who in orphans' homes are found, Who have parents silent sleeping Underneath some grassy mound.

Take them, place them by the bedside Of some one whose life is drear; They will bring a ray of sunshine, They will drive away a tear.

Take them, bear them to the prison, Where the trembling convict stands; They'll encourage and they'll cheer him, And they'll help him be a man.

They will speak to him of Heaven, Of a home with God above; They'll dispel the gloom and heartache, They'll recall a mother's love.

They'll remind him of a sister, With youth's bloom upon her brow, With whom he used to gather flowers When life was bright as yours is now.

They'll recall some little sweetheart In the early spring of life, Who, when summer flowers were blooming, He had asked to be his wife.

Oh, that wife! may God's own blessing Rest upon her loyal head; Though he's caused her many a heartache, She would love him were he dead.

Then with all these sacred memories Welling in these hearts of ours, Who in all this land of sunshine Could forbid this gift of flowers?

Bring the flowers with sweetest perfume, This is flower mission day; Some forlorn, discouraged prisoner, "You may rescue, you may save."

Blest the home that knows no sorrow, Blest that wife, whose tears are joy, Blest that mother who in old age, Can lean upon her darling boy.

Men, look up, the clouds have gathered, Some of them are silver-lined; There's a day when all creation Will be marshalled into line.

When these prison walls are sundered; When the grave gives up its dead, All may march the streets of Heaven Who by Jesus Christ are led.

LINES BY A PRISONER TO HIS WIFE.

These lines were handed me by the author. I insert them here because of their clear testimony to the saving grace of God and the love they manifest for wife and children:

Dearest wife, you know I love thee, Deep as yonder sky; Know that love can never fade, Affection never die.

Though in prison I am cast, And cannot now return, Yet on thee my love reclines, For thee my heart will burn.

God has made us one indeed, In ways the world can never know. One, like drops of water found Within the pure white snow.

God has made us one indeed; Has joined us, hand and heart; What God has joined together, wife, Let no man put apart.

As well might men uproot the earth As by their scoff or scorn Think to accomplish parting us Because our hearts now mourn.

Nay, dear wife, I feel for thee, As ne'er I felt before, Prizing thee with deeper strength For pining sad and sore.

While there you wait my glad release, The day that sets me free, Await my coming home to wife; Yes, wife and children three.

And I will come. Have patience, wife, The time will wear away, And day by day approaches near That glad releasing day.

With little baby in your arms, Two others at your knee; I know, dear wife, your heart is sad And longs to see me free.

To help you in your daily toil; To earn for them their bread; To clothe and help and comfort them, And find a shelter for each head.

But cheer up, wife, and so will I, As mankind surely may, Till darkness fade in morning light That ushers in the day.

And oh, what joy will visit us, What peace in that glad hour; Our home shall then renew its strength In all its silent power.

Here as I lay me down to sleep, In my narrow little cell, I think of the happy times we've spent In the shady wooded dell.

How we plucked the flowers beside our path, And strolled along the stream, Neither feeling aught of sorrow, For life was like a pleasant dream.

But alas, my dear one, all is changed; And we are parted now for years; But well we know that God will come And wipe away our falling tears.

Sin, dear wife, hast brought the change; Sin has caused our grief and pain; But now that I trust in Jesus I will never fall again.

In my very darkest moments Would you know what comforts me? 'Tis my living faith in Jesus, In Him who died on Calvary.

He died on the cross for you, dear wife, His precious blood was shed for me; All our sins on Him were laid When they nailed Him to the tree.

And now that blessed Saviour, Who was born at Bethlehem, Looks down from the heights of heaven On the sinful souls of men.

His thoughts are full of mercy, His heart is filled with love. He is pleading with the Father That we might come above.

So we will trust our Saviour, And follow where He leads; And say, in faith believing, He'll provide for all our needs.

So we'll walk close beside Him And let Him take our hand; As He points, with face all shining, To that bright and happy land.

And oft to others round us The story we will tell, How Jesus Christ saves sinners, The heavenly hosts to swell.

You will tell them, wife, how He found me, Sinful and all cast down, And how through love He raised me up And promised me a crown.

And when we see still others Caught in Satan's snare, We'll lead them on to Jesus, And leave them in His care.

And when He treats them gently, As He treats both you and me, Other sinners, looking on, To His bosom soon will flee.

For thus the world around us For Christ could soon be won; He'll end in glorious triumph The work He has begun.

All glory then to Jesus! Sing praises to His name! He saved lost sinners years gone by, And today He'll do the same.

In language very simple I've told to you, dear wife, My love to you, your love to me, And the love of Jesus Christ.

So we'll just keep on trusting In the Saviour God has given; And He will fill with peace Our journey on to heaven.

And we'll not forget the Father, But give thanks for all He's done, In giving us our Saviour, In His own beloved Son.

WOMAN'S LOVE.

TO MRS. WHEATON.

These lines are most respectfully presented as a prisoner's tribute of sincere respect:

O, woman's love, past understanding! So near to God's, so wondrous deep: Deep as the depths of space; expanding Till it blooms beyond death's mystic sleep

Throughout the earth, the rich and lowly It reigns supreme within her breast. O, woman's love! through its beauty holy She will win eternal rest.

Born of woman, purest, dearest Lily of fair Bethlehem, Christ to her will be the nearest In his bright home--Jerusalem.

A fadeless flower in beauty blooming 'Midst heaven's host of immortelles. His peerless love her soul perfuming She'll reign a queen mid arch angels

J. W. L.

Cole City, Ga., Sunday night, Nov. 17, 1889.

TAKE THIS MESSAGE TO MY MOTHER.

(Written by a Prisoner in Jackson, Miss.)

Take this message to my mother, It will fill her heart with joy; Tell her that her prayer is answered, Christ has saved her wandering boy:

Tho' through sin from home I've wandered, And I almost broke her heart; Tell her to be glad and cheerful, Never from the Lord I'll part.

CHORUS.

Take this message to my mother, It will fill her heart with joy; Tell her that her prayer is answered, Christ has saved her wandering boy.

How she wept when last we parted, How her heart did ache with pain When she said: "Good-bye, God bless you, We may never meet again."

O my boy, just look to Jesus, What a friend He is to all! Only trust Him, He will save you-- Can't you hear His sweet voice call?

In this world of sin are many Who have wandered far from God. Will your mother's prayers be answered? Listen, sinner, you, her boy.

You have ofttimes heard this warning, In your heart conviction's deep; God is calling to the wanderer Who asks mercy at his feet.

NOT LONELY NOW.

I am not lonely, mother, now, Though far from me you roam. One dried my tears and smoothed my brow, And stilled the sob and groan. I am not lonely, mother, dear, For Jesus dwells with me, e'en here.

All day I feel Him by my side; And when betimes would come The Evil One, I quickly hide Behind my Precious One. Think you I'm lonely, mother, dear, When Jesus thus is ever near?

And when at night I think of thee, As in my cell I sit, Bright vision of thy form I see By His own presence lit. Can I be lonely, mother, dear, When thy pure spirit is so near?

Farewell, my darling mother-friend, And if for aye, Oh! fare thee well! Whate'er betide, unto the end, Christ's love for me I'll gladly tell.

The following was written by a young brother who, with his wife, were with me for a time in my work. In thanking them for a kindness done me I used the words, "Jesus is looking on," implying that He would reward them. Only an hour or so afterward the young brother handed me these lines, suggested by my words:

Little did I think when I spoke the words that they would make so deep an impression upon his mind. How little we realize what a word may do.

JESUS IS LOOKING ON.

"The eyes of the Lord are upon the righteous and his ears are open unto their cry." Ps. 34.

[TUNE, "ARE YOU WITHIN THE FOLD TONIGHT?"]

1. While traveling as a pilgrim Across life's desert drear, My feet ofttimes are weary, Mine eyes oft drop a tear; But when I look to Jesus, All weariness is gone, My heart then joys within me To know He's looking on.

CHORUS.

Yes, He is ever looking on, With anxious ear our cry to hear. He hears each sigh, He sees each tear; He knows each heart "with sorrow riven," He hears each word of joy or moan, And whispers gently in our ear, I'm looking, looking on.

2. When troubles rage around me, And trials fiery come, My thoughts are then directed To my eternal home. Though walking on the mountain, Or on the verdant lawn, This is the thought that cheers me, He's always looking on.

3. When friends do turn against me, And frown and persecute, I'm then brought nearer Jesus, Than when my foes are mute. While Jesus walks beside me, His arm I'll lean upon, And ne'er forget the promise, He's always looking on.

4. Take courage, brother pilgrim, And let us journey on, For soon life's many trials Will all have passed and gone; Then sweeping up to glory We'll join the ransomed throng, And sing God's endless praises, While He is looking on.

HOW GOD CALLS MISSIONARIES OUT OF PRISON CELLS.

S. H. HADLEY.

_Superintendent of the Old McAuley Mission._

Some of the best missionaries this world ever knew are men who have been sentenced to long terms in prison. Wholly shut away from the world and its dreadful temptations, God had a chance to speak to them. Jerry McAuley was a wonderful example of this, and that drunken loafer and thief was finally used so wonderfully by the Lord God that his name has gone all over this world and has been an inspiration to millions. He was sent to prison from the Fourth Ward of New York for fifteen years at the age of nineteen.

One Sunday morning in the chapel the speaker was old "Awful" Gardener, an old-time ruffian and prize-fighter in New York, but God had got hold of him and he had been wonderfully saved. With tears streaming down his face, he told of the love of Christ, and he said, "Boys, I ought to be wearing the stripes the same as you are, and I feel a deep sympathy for you."

He also quoted some verses from the Scriptures, and after the boys had gone back to their cells Jerry found a Bible in the ventilator of his cell, and, looking it over aimlessly, tried to find the text that "Awful" Gardener had quoted, but instead he found that Christ came to save sinners, and the Holy Spirit showed him his dreadful past life. As the day grew into night, Jerry got down on his knees and began to pray. He had never prayed before, but now he cried to God for help and mercy. How long he was there he does not know, but some time during the night a glorious light dispelled the deep darkness of his soul, and he cried out, "Oh, praise God, I found Jesus, and He gives peace to my soul." The unusual sound brought the keeper, who asked, "What is the matter with you?"

Jerry answered, "I found Jesus, that's what's the matter with me."

He found some opportunities to breathe out the new-found hopes of his soul and the love of Jesus to the prisoners about him. Soon a revival broke out in the prison such as never had been seen before or since, and Jerry was the center of it all. He was pardoned in 1864, but when he got home he had no friends, no money, and he soon fell into bad company, and got to be a worse scoundrel than he ever was before. It was after this he became known as the dangerous East River pirate. He was reclaimed in 1868, and although he fell five times after that during the first eight or nine months, he was finally anchored to Christ.

Do you know that every drunkard uses tobacco? Jerry was no exception. Some faithful friends said to him. "Jerry, give up your tobacco for Jesus' sake," and he gave it up, and then he never fell afterward.

He was afterward married to Maria, his faithful wife, who also was redeemed from a drunkard's life, and in 1872 opened the world-renowned McAuley Mission, at 316 Water Street, down on the East Side, nearly under the Brooklyn Bridge.

He stayed here ten years, and then opened the Cremorne Mission, Thirty-second Street and Sixth Avenue, where he died in 1884, and had the largest funeral of any private citizen who was ever buried in New York.

The writer succeeded Jerry McAuley down there, and the work is going on night and day. Drunkards and thieves come in by the thousand, and, thank God, many of them are saved unto life eternal. The writer is also a convert of Jerry McAuley Mission.--_The Life Boat._

OUTSIDE THE PRISON WALLS.

Free, free at last he left the dreary jail, And stepped into the dewy April night; Once more he breathed, untainted, God's pure air, And saw the evening star's sweet trembling light. How strange! how strange! and yet how strangely dear The old familiar turf beneath his feet! How wonderful once more to be alone Unwatched, unguarded, 'neath the sky's broad sweep.

Free! free again--but O, so old and worn-- So weary with his wasted, ruined life-- Full twenty years the cell, his only home-- Full twenty years with hopeless misery rife! His thoughts sped backward till they reached that day When he had entered that grim house, a boy-- Naught but a boy in stature and in years, But with a heart all bare of hope and joy.

For in a dreadful moment, crazed with rum, His hand had laid a fellow creature low, And for that glass of brandy in his brain Full twenty years of wretchedness and woe. And now, a gray-haired man, he walked again The very path his boyish feet had pressed So many, many years ago; And now he wandered lonely, seeking rest.

Where should he go? Where now his footsteps turn? No living soul was there to welcome him! No friend of all his youthful days he knew Would greet again this wanderer in sin. Unconsciously, he sought his boyhood's home, The low, white cottage he had held so dear; 'Twas standing in its old accustomed place, But strangers had dwelt there for many a year.

Where next? The tears stood in his mournful eyes; His breath came thick and fast--he could not stir, But leaned upon the old familiar gate With thoughts of mother--O, could he find her? Where was she now--that mother, sweet and good, Who tried with tears and prayers to save her boy, Who knelt alone at midnight's solemn hour And mourned for him who should have been her joy.

His faltering steps at last he vaguely turned Unto the silent churchyard near the sea, And stood alone while pitying moonbeams spread Around his form a veil of charity. Alone with God in that still, solemn place, Alone with hundreds of the silent dead, The outcast stood with lowly, sin-sick heart, The cold night dew upon his drooping head.

At last he found her in a place apart, Where moonbeams sparkled through the willow boughs, And shone upon her simple headstone white That marked the limit of her narrow house. 'Twas but a snowy marble, simple, plain, That bore her name, her age, and just below-- "Died of a broken heart"--alas! he knew The cause of all that life and death of woe.

He flung himself face down upon the grass, Alone between the living and the dead, And wept and prayed beside the lonely grave Until in sorrow's slumber sunk his head. They found him in the morning, stiff and cold, His hands clasped o'er his mother's lowly grave, His head upon its turf, as though he thought That turf the bosom his poor heart had craved.

Upon his pallid cheeks the trace of tears Showed in the glowing ray of morning's sun, But o'er that face there shone a wondrous peace, A smile of joy now all his life was done. Men marveled that he looked so young again Despite his crown of sorrow-silvered hair, And tender-hearted women sighed and wept And smiled to think that they had found him there. Ah! God is good! with loving tenderness He saw the sad, repentant soul alone Weep out his sin upon his mother's grave, And gently led the weary wanderer home. This we believe: That now in Heaven's street The mother and her son are reconciled, And all the pain and sin of earth below Are blotted out, and he is God's own child.

--_Hattie F. Crocker, in Union Signal._

IF WE KNEW.

If we knew the heart's sad sighing In the secret hour; If we knew the bitter crying O'er the tempter's power, Slower would we be to censure, Kinder in reproof; From the erring, peradventure, We would not stand aloof.

If we knew the hard, stern struggle Of the one who fell, Toiling on 'mid grief and trouble That none but God can tell, Our thoughts, perhaps, would be kinder, Our help more pitiful-- Be of God's love a reminder To the tempted soul.

If we knew the fierce temptation, Could we feel the pain Of the deep humiliation, The tears shed all in vain, We, perchance, would be more gentle, Our tones more tender be; O'er his fault we'd draw the mantle Of fervent charity.

If we knew how dark and cheerless Seem the coming years, We might then appear more fearless Of each other's cares. Could our eyes pierce through the smiling Of the face so calm, See the bitter self-reviling, We'd apply the balm.

Did we walk a little nearer To Jesus in the way, Hear His voice a little clearer We would know how to pray. He has words of comfort given That we to them should speak, Ere the hopeless soul is driven His faith with God to break.

We shall know each other better, The mists shall roll away; Nevermore we'll feel the fetter Of this toil-worn clay. Only let us love each other, 'Tis our Lord's command, To each fainting friend or brother Reach a helping hand.

--_Anna L. Dreyer, of Missionary Training Home at Tabor, Iowa._

LITTLE GRAVES.

You have your little grave; I have mine. You have your sad memories; I have mine. For,

"There is no flock, however tended, But one dead lamb is there; There is no fireside, howsoe'er defended, But hath its vacant chair.

"The air is full of farewells to the dying, And weepings for the dead; The heart of Rachel for her children crying Will not be comforted."

I have pleasant thoughts sometimes about these little graves. I think what a safe place the little grave is. Temptations never come there. Sins never pollute there. Tears, pains, disappointments, bereavements, trials, cares, and snares, are all unknown in that silent resting place. And then, Jesus has the keys, and he keeps our treasures safely, and guards them securely. No mother's heart is anxious about a child that is laid in the little grave. No prayers of anguish go up for it as for those tossed by the storms of passion, sunk in the whirlpool of vice, or lost in the wide wilderness of sorrow and of sin. There is now no need of chiding, reproving, watching, and restraining. The chief Shepherd bears the lamb on his own bosom, and it is forever safe.

The little grave is a sacred place. The Lord of glory has passed into the sepulchre, and from it he has opened up the path of life. Hope blooms there, and hearts-ease and amaranth blossom amid the shadows that linger over it, and Jesus watches his treasures and counts his jewels in the little graves.

The little grave shall be opened by and by. The night is dark, but there is a flush of morn upon the mountains, and a gleam of sunlight glows along the distant hills. He who bears the keys of hell and of death, shall come back to open the little graves, and call the sleepers forth. Then cherub forms shall burst the silent tombs, and these green hillocks shall bear their harvest for the garner of our God.--Sel.

THE MOTHER'S WARNING.

Touch it not--ye do not know, Unless you've borne a fate like mine, How deep a curse, how wild a woe, Is lurking in that ruby wine. Look on my cheek--'tis withered now; It once was round and smooth as thine; Look on my deeply furrowed brow-- 'Tis all the work of treacherous wine. I had two sons, two princely boys, As noble men as God e'er gave; I saw them fall from honor's joys To fill a common drunkard's grave. I had a daughter, young and fair, As pure as ever woman bore. Where is she? Did you ask me where? Bend low, I'll tell the tale once more. I saw that fairy child of mine Linked to a kingly bridegroom's side; Her heart was proud and light as thine, Oh, would to God she then had died! Not many moons had filled their horn, While she upon his bosom slept; 'Twas on a dark November morn, She o'er a murdered husband wept; Her drunken father dealt the blow-- Her brain grew wild, her heart grew weak; Was ever tale of deeper woe A mother's lips had lived to speak? She dwells in yonder darkened halls, No ray of reason there does shine; She on her murdered husband calls. 'Twas done by wine, by cursed wine!

--_Temperance Banner._

HARRY'S REMORSE.

It's curious, isn't it, chaplain, what a twelve months may bring? Last year I was in Chicago, gambling and living in sin; Was raking in pools at the races, and feeing the waiters with ten, Was sipping mint juleps by twilight, while today I am in the pen.

What led me to do it? What always leads a man to destruction and crime? The prodigal son you have read of has altered somewhat in his time. He spends his money as freely as the Biblical fellow of old, And when it is gone he fancies the husks will turn into gold.

Champagne, a box at the opera, high steps while fortune is flush; The passionate kisses of women whose cheeks have forgotten to blush. The old, old story, chaplain, of pleasure that ends in tears, The froth that foams for an hour and the dregs that are tasted for years.

Last night as I sat here and pondered on the end of my evil ways, There rose like a phantom before me the vision of boyhood days; I thought of my old, old home, chaplain, of the schoolhouse that stood on the hill, Of the brook that ran through the meadow--I can hear its music still.

And again I thought of my mother, of the mother who taught me to pray, Whose love was a precious treasure that I heedlessly cast away; And again I saw in my vision the fresh-lipped, careless boy, To whom the future was boundless and the world but a mighty toy.

I saw all this as I sat there, of my ruined and wasted life, And the thoughts of my remorse were bitter, they pierced my heart like a knife. It takes some courage, chaplain, to laugh in the face of fate, When the yearning ambition of manhood is blasted at twenty-eight.

--_Composed and written by Harry S----while taking a retrospection of the past._

TWENTY--THIRTY-FOUR.

The line of dingy-coated men stretched along the broad granite walk and like a great gray serpent wound in and out among the wagon shops and planing mills that filled the prison yard.

Down beyond the foundry the beginning of the line, the head of the serpent, was lost at the stairway leading to the second floor of a long, narrow building in which whisk brooms were manufactured.

An hour before, on the sounding of a brass gong at the front, the same line had wound round the same corners into the building whence now it crawled. There, the men had seated themselves on four-legged stools before benches that stretched across the room in rows. Before each man was set a tin plate of boiled meat; a heavy cup of black coffee, a knife, a fork, and a thick bowl of steaming, odorous soup.

During the meal other men, dressed like the hundreds who were sitting, in suits of dull gray, with little round-crowned, peaked-visored caps to match, moved in and out between the rows, distributing chunks of fresh white bread from heavy baskets. Now and then one of the men would shake his head and the waiter would pass him by, but usually a dozen hands were thrust into a basket at once to clutch the regulation "bit" of half a pound. The men ate ravenously, as if famished.

Yet a silence that appalled hovered over the long bare dining-hall where eight hundred men were being fed. There was no clatter of knives and forks; there were no jests; they moved about as noiselessly as ghosts.

There were faces stamped with indelible marks of depravity and vice, but now and then the "breadtossers" would see uplifted a pair of frank blue eyes, in which burned the light of hope. Men were there who dreamed of a day to come when all would be forgiven and forgotten; when a hand would again be held out in welcome, and a kiss again be pressed to quivering lips. Men there were of all kinds, of all countenances, young and old; the waving, sunlit hair of youth side by side with locks in which the snow was thickly sprinkled. All these men were paying the penalty society imposes on proved criminals.

And now, their dinner over, they were marching back to the shops and mills of the prison, where days and weeks were spent at labor. Those men employed in the wagon-works dropped out of the line when they came opposite the entrance to their building. Those behind pushed forward as their prison-mates disappeared, and never for more than ten seconds was there a gap in the long, gray line.

The whisk-broom factory occupied the second floor of the building at the far end of the prison yard. On the ground floor men worked at lathes, turning out the wooden handles to the brooms that were finished, sorted and tied up-stairs. At the corner the line divided, sixty-five of the men climbed the stairway to the second floor, the other thirty entered the lathe-room below.

A dozen men in blue uniforms marched beside the line on its way from the mess-hall, six on each side, at two yards' distance. Their caps bore "Guard" in gold letters, and each guard carried a short, heavy, crooked cane of polished white hickory. On entering the work-room of the second floor, the men assembled before a railed platform, upon which a red-faced, coatless man stood behind a big desk. In cold, metallic tones he called the numbers of the convicts who in turn replied "Here!" when their numbers were spoken.

"Twenty-thirty-four!" called the red-faced man. There was no response.

"Twenty-thirty-four?" The red-faced man leaned over the desk and glared down. Then a voice from somewhere on the left answered "Here!"

"What was the matter with you the first time?" snapped the foreman.

The man thus questioned removed his cap and took three steps toward the platform. In feature the word "hard" would describe him. His head was long, wide at the forehead, and yet narrow between the temples. His eyes were small and close together. His nose was flat, and mouth hardly more than a straight cut in the lower part of his face. The lower jaw was square and heavy, and the ears protruded abnormally. A trifle above medium height with a pair of drooping, twitching shoulders, the man looked criminal.

To the question he replied doggedly, "I answered the first time, sir, but I guess you didn't hear me."

The foreman gazed steadily at the man. Their eyes met. The foreman's did not waver, but "2034" lowered his and fumbled nervously at his cap.

"All right," said the foreman, quickly, "but I guess you'd better report to the warden as soon as you get through in here. Don't wait for any piece-work. Go to him as soon as you have finished your task. I'll tell him you're coming. He'll be waiting for you at the front office."

"Yes, sir." The convict did not raise his eyes. He stepped back into the line.

Then, at the clap of the foreman's hands, the men broke ranks, and each walked away to his own bench or machine. Five minutes later, the swish on the corn-wisps as they were separated and tied into rough brooms, and the occasional tap of a hammer, were the only sounds in that long room where sixty-five men toiled.

Now and then one of the men would go to the platform where the foreman sat bent over half a dozen little books, in which it was his duty to record the number of "tasks" completed by each of the workmen "on his contract"--a "task" in the prison vernacular being the work each man is compelled to accomplish within a certain space of time. On the approach of a workman the foreman would look up and a few whispered words would pass between the two. Then the broom-maker would dart into the stock room, adjoining the factory, where, upon receiving a written requisition from the foreman, the officer in charge would give him the material he needed in his work--a ball of twine, or a strip of plush with which the handles of the brooms were decorated.

At ten minutes past three, 2034 crossed to the platform.

"What do you want?" asked the foreman, as he eyed keenly the man in the gray suit.

"A paper of small tacks," was the reply, quickly spoken. The order was written, and as 2034 moved towards the door leading toward the stock-room, the man on the platform asked in an undertone, "Anything wrong, Bill?"

"That's what I don't know, George," the foreman replied. "That man Riley's been acting queer of late. I've got an idea there's something up his sleeve. There's not a harder nut on the contract than that fellow, and by the way he's been carrying on, sullen like and all that, I'm fearing something's going to happen. You remember, don't you? What, no? He's that Riley from Acorn. He came in two years ago on a burglary job in Clive, where he shot a drug clerk that offered objections to his carrying off all there was in the shop. They made it manslaughter and he's in for fifteen years. There's another warrant ready for him when he gets out, for a job done four years ago in Kentucky. He's a bad one. A fellow like that is no good around this shop."

The guard smiled cynically at the foreman's suggestion that a convict may be too bad even for prison surroundings.

"But I've got my eye on him," continued the foreman. "I'm sending him up to the warden this afternoon. Say, George, when you go back, will you tell the warden Riley's coming up to call on him?"

"Sure, Bill," was the smiling reply of the guard as he moved away. Twenty-thirty-four had returned with a paper of tacks and gone directly to his bench.

It was a quarter of four by the foreman's watch when the door at the head of the stairway opened and the warden entered, accompanied by two friends whom he was showing through the "plant," as he preferred to call the prison.

"This is where the whisk-brooms are made," said the warden. "On the floor below, which we just left, you will remember we saw the boys turning out broom-handles. Well, here the brooms are tied and sewed through by hand, over at those benches. In the room beyond, through that door, we keep the stuff handy that is called for from time to time. In a further room is stored the material used in the manufacture of the brooms, the tin tips, the tacks, the twine, and about ten or twelve tons of broom straw."

As the warden ceased speaking, the foreman leaned across the desk and tapped him on the shoulder. "Riley's coming up to see you this afternoon. He's been acting queer--don't answer the call and the like."

The warden only nodded, and continued his explanation to the visitors.

"Now," he said, moving towards the door of the stock-room, "if you will come over here I'll show you our store-room. You see we have to keep a lot of material on hand. Beyond this second room the stuff is stored up, and is taken into the stock-room as it is wanted. Between the rooms we have arranged these big sliding iron doors that, in case of a fire, could be dropped, and thus, for a few minutes at least, cut the flames off from any room but that in which they originated. You see," pulling an iron lever which let the heavy iron sheet slide to the floor, "that completes the wall."

The visitor nodded. "Now, come on through the second room, and into the third," there, ranged regularly on the floor were huge bales of broom straw, and piled against the walls were boxes upon boxes of tacks, velvet, ornamental bits of metal, and all the other separate parts of the commercial whisk broom.

The visitors examined the tacks and the tins and felt of the bales of straw.

"Very interesting," observed one of the men, as he drew his cigar case from his pocket, and biting the tip from one of the cigars it contained, struck a little wax match on the sole of his shoe. He held the match in his hand till it had burned down, then threw it on the floor, and followed the warden and the other visitor under the heavy iron screen into the workingroom of the factory.

The foreman was busy at his books and did not observe the little party as it passed through on the other side of the broom-bins and out at the big door.

Two minutes later, 2034 happened to look out through the window across his bench and he saw the warden with his friends crossing the prison yards to the foundry. A guard just then sauntered into the room and stopped at the first of the bins. He idly picked up one of the finished brooms and examined it. His attention a moment later was attracted by some one pulling at his coat from behind. He turned.

"Why, Tommy, my boy, what is it?"

The two soft brown eyes of a little boy were turned up to him. "I'm looking for papa," replied the little fellow. "The foreman down-stairs said he come up here. Uncle George is back in the house, and mamma sent me out to find papa."

The guard patted the little fellow's head. "And we'll find him, Tommy," he said. He went over to the foreman's desk. "Bill, did the warden come up here? Tommy is looking for him; his mother sent him out."

The foreman raised his eyes from his books. "Yes," he replied, "he went in there, with a couple of gentlemen."

The guard looked down at the little boy. "He's in the store-room," he said, "you'll find him in there, Tommy."

Then he turned and walked out of the shop. The child ran on into the room beyond. His father was not there. The stock-keeper did not observe the little boy as he tiptoed, in a childish way, past the desk. Tommy passed on into the farther room. He knew he would find his father in there, and he would crawl along between the tiers of straw bales and take him by surprise.

He had hardly passed when the stock-keeper, raising his head from the list of material he was preparing, held his face and sniffed the air. Quietly he rose from his revolving chair and went to the straw-room door. He merely peered inside. Turning suddenly, he pressed upon the lever near the door and the iron screen slid down into place, cutting off the farther room. Then, snatching a few books that lay on his desk, he slipped out into the shop, and at that door released the second screen. As it fell into place with a slight crunching noise, the foreman turned in his chair. The eyes of the two met. The stock-keeper raised his hand and touched his lip with the first finger. He crossed rapidly to the desk.

"Get the men out! Get the men out!" he gasped. "The store-room is on fire!"

The foreman rapped on the table twice. Every man in that room turned and faced the desk.

"Work is over for today," said the foreman. His manner was ominously calm, and the men looked at one another wonderingly.

"Fall in!"

At the order, the dingy gray suits formed in the same old serpent, and the line moved rapidly through the door at the end of the room and down the outside stairs.

There, in front of the building, they were halted, and a guard dispatched to find the warden. He was discovered in the foundry. "Fire in the broom-shop!" whispered the guard.

The warden's face paled. He dashed through the doorway, and one minute later came around the corner of the building, just in time to see the first signs of flames against the windows of the rear room up-stairs.

Within five seconds, a troop of fifteen guards had drawn the little hand-engine from its house and hitched the hose to the hydrant nearest the shop. From all the other buildings the men were being marched to their cells.

"These men!" hurriedly whispered the foreman to the warden. "What shall I do with them?"

"Get 'em inside as soon as you can! This won't last long, the front of the building is cut off. It'll all be over in ten minutes."

The foreman gave an order. At that instant a woman came running down the prison yard. Reaching the warden's side, she fell against him heavily.

"Why, Harriet," he exclaimed, "what is the matter?"

"Oh," she gasped, "Tommy! Tommy! Where is Tommy?"

A guard at the end of the engine rail turned ashy white. He raised a hand to his head, and with the other grasped the wheel to keep from falling. Then he cried, "Mr. Jeffries, I--I believe Tommy is up there in the stock-room. He went to look--"

The warden clutched the man's arm. "Up there? Up there?" he cried.

The sudden approach of the woman and the words that followed had wrought so much confusion that the men had paid no attention to the foreman's command, and he had even failed to notice their lack of attention, in the excitement of that moment.

"Great God!" cried the warden. "What can I do--what can I do? No one can live up there!"

There was a crash. One of the windows fell out. "Get a ladder!" some one cried. A guard ran back toward the prison-house. Then, in the midst of the hubbub, a man in a dingy gray suit stepped out a yard from the line of convicts. His prison number was 2034. He touched his little square cap.

"If you'll give me permission, I think I can get up there," was all he said.

"You! you!" exclaimed the warden. "No, no; I will tell no man to do it!"

There was a second crash. Another window had fallen out, and now the tongues of flame were lapping the outer walls above.

The convict made no reply. With a bound he was at the end of the line and dashing up the stairway.

The warden's wife was on her knees, clinging to the hand of her husband. In his eyes was a dead, cold look. A few men bit their lips, and a faint shadow of a smile played about the mouths of others. They all waited. A convict had broken a regulation--had run from the line! He would be punished! Even as he had clambered up the stairs a guard had cried, "shall I shoot?"

The silence was broken by a shriek from the woman kneeling at the warden's feet. "Look!" she cried, and pointed towards the last of the up-stairs windows.

There, surrounded by a halo of smoke, and hemmed in on all sides by flames, stood a man in a dingy gray suit. One sleeve was on fire, but he beat out the flames with his left hand. Those below heard him cry, "I've got him!" Then the figure disappeared. Instantly it returned, bearing something in its arms. It was the limp form of a child.

All saw the man wrap smoking straw round the little body and tie round that two strands of heavy twine. Then that precious burden was lowered out of the window. The father rushed forward and held up his hands to receive it.

Another foot--he hugged the limp body of his boy to his breast! On the ground a little way back lay a woman, as if dead.

"Here's the ladder!" yelled the foreman, and that moment the eyes that were still turned upon the window above where stood a man in a dingy gray suit, witnessed a spectacle that will reappear before them again and again in visions of the night.

The coat the man wore was ablaze. Flames shot on either side of him and above him. Just as the ladder was placed against the wall, a crackling was heard--not the crackling of the fire. Then like a thunderbolt, a crash occurred that caused even the men in their cells to start. The roof caved in.

In the prison yard that line of convicts saw 2034 reel and fall backwards, and heard, as he fell, his last cry, "I'm a-comin', warden!"

He was a convicted criminal, and died in prison gray. But it would seem not wonderful to the warden if, when that man's soul took flight, the recording angel did write his name on the eternal Book of Record, with a strange cabalistic sign, a ring around a cross--that stands for "good behavior."--_The Youth's Companion._

HIS MOTHER'S SONG.

Beneath the hot midsummer sun The men had marched all day; And now beside a rippling stream Upon the grass they lay. Tiring of games and idle jest, As swept the hours along, They cried to one who mused apart, "Come, friend, give us a song."

"I fear I cannot please," he said; "The only songs I know Are those my mother used to sing For me, long years ago." "Sing one of those," a rough voice cried, "There's none but true men here; To every mother's son of us A mother's songs are dear."

Then sweetly rose the singer's voice Amid unwonted calm, "Am I a soldier of the Cross, A follower of the Lamb? And shall I fear to own His Cause?" The very stream was stilled, And hearts that never throbbed with fear With tender thoughts were filled.

Ended the song; the singer said, As to his feet he rose, "Thanks to you all, my friends, good-night, God grant us sweet repose." "Sing us one more," the captain begged, The soldier bent his head, Then glancing round, with smiling lips, "You'll join with me?" he said.

"We'll sing this old familiar air, Sweet as the bugle call, 'All hail the power of Jesus' name, Let angels prostrate fall;'" Ah! wondrous was the old tune's spell, As on the soldier sang, Man after man fell into line, And loud the voices rang.

The songs are done, the camp is still, Naught but the stream is heard; But ah! the depths of every soul By those old hymns are stirred, And up from many a bearded lip, In whispers soft and low, Rises the prayer that mother taught Her boy long years ago.

--_Safeguard._

PERFECT PEACE.

[Lines written by a lady on the steamship "Mongolia," near Malta. She was en route from China, where she had been a missionary for seventeen years, to her home in England. She gave the verses to Bishop Bowman, who was on the steamer with her, and he sent them to his wife, not knowing she had died a few days before he wrote his letter.--_A. Lowry._]

Lonely? No, not lonely While Jesus stands by; His presence always cheers me, I know that He is nigh.

Friendless? No, not friendless, For Jesus is my friend; I change, but He remaineth The same unto the end.

Tired? No, not tired, While leaning on His breast; My soul hath full enjoyment, 'Tis His eternal rest.

Saddened? No, not saddened By darkest scenes of woe; I should be, if I knew not That Jesus loves me so.

Helpless? Yes, so helpless, But I am leaning hard On the mighty arm of Jesus, And He is keeping guard.

Waiting? Oh, yes, waiting, He bade me watch and wait; I only wonder often What makes my Lord so late.

Joyful? Yes, so joyful, With joy too deep for words; A precious, sure possession, The joy that is my Lord's.

--_Divine Life._

SWEET REVENGE.

A few years ago while Robert Stewart was Governor of Missouri, a steamboat man was brought in from the penitentiary for a pardon. He was a large, powerful fellow, and when the governor looked at him he seemed strangely affected. He scrutinized him long and closely. Finally he signed the document that restored to the prisoner his liberty. Before he handed it to him he said, "You will commit some other crime and be in the penitentiary again, I fear."

The man solemnly promised that he would not. The governor looked doubtful, mused a few minutes and said, "You will go back on the river and be a mate again, I suppose?"

The man replied that he would.

"Well, I want you to promise me one thing," resumed the governor. "I want you to pledge your word that when you are mate again, you will never take a billet of wood in your hand and drive a sick boy out of a bunk to help you load your boat on a stormy night."

The boatman said he would not, and inquired what he meant by asking him such a question.

The governor replied, "Because some day that boy may become a governor, and you may want him to pardon you for a crime. One dark stormy night many years ago you stopped your boat on the Mississippi River to take on a load of wood. There was a boy on board working his way from New Orleans to St. Louis, but he was very sick of fever and was lying in a bunk. You had plenty of men to do the work but you went to that boy with a stick of wood in your hand and drove him with blows and curses out into the wretched night and kept him toiling like a slave until the load was completed. I was that boy. Here is your pardon. Never again be guilty of such brutality."

The man, cowering and hiding his face, went out without a word.

What a noble revenge that was, and what a lesson for a bully.--_Success._

NO TELEPHONE IN HEAVEN.

"Now, I can wait on baby," the smiling merchant said, As he stooped and softly toyed with the golden, curly head. "I want oo to tall up mamma," came the answer full and free, "Wif yo' telephone an' ast her when she's tummin' back to me.

"Tell her I so lonesome 'at I don't know what to do, An' papa cries so much I dess he must be lonesome, too; Tell her to tum to baby, 'tause at night I dit so 'fraid, Wif nobody here to tiss me, when the light bedins to fade.

"All froo de day I wants her, for my dolly dot so tored Fum the awful punchin' Buddy gave it wif his little sword; An' ain't nobody to fix it, since mamma went away, An' poor 'ittle lonesome dolly's dittin' thinner ever' day."

"My child," the merchant murmured, as he stroked the anxious brow, "There's no telephone connection where your mother lives at now." "Ain't no telephone in Heaven?" and tears sprang to her eyes. "I fought dat God had every'fing wif Him up in de skies."

--_Atlanta Constitution._

PERFECT THROUGH FAITH.

God would not send you the darkness If He felt you could bear the light, But you would not cling to His guiding hand If the way were always bright; And you would not care to walk by faith Could you always walk by sight.

'Tis true He has many an anguish For your sorrowing heart to bear, And many a cruel thorn-crown For your tired head to wear; He knows how few would reach home at all If pain did not guide them there.

If He sends you in blinding darkness, And the furnace of seven-fold heat; 'Tis the only way, believe me, To keep you close to His feet; For 'tis always so easy to wander When our lives are glad and sweet.

Then nestle your hand in our Father's And sing if you can as you go; Your song may cheer some one behind you Whose courage is sinking low; And, well if your lips do quiver, God will love you better so.

--_Selected._

A TRUE HERO.

Two men were sinking a shaft. It was dangerous business, for it was necessary to blast the rock. It was their custom to cut the fuse with a sharp knife. One man then entered the bucket and made a signal to be hauled up. When the bucket again descended, the other man entered it, and with one hand on the signal rope and the other holding the fire, he touched the fuse, made the signal, and was rapidly drawn up before the explosion took place.

One day they left the knife above, and rather than ascend to procure it, they cut the fuse with a sharp stone. It took fire. "The fuse is on fire!" Both men leaped into the bucket, and made the signal; but the windlass would haul up but one man at a time; only one could escape. One of the men instantly leaped out, and said to the other, "Up wi' ye; I'll be in heaven in a minute." With lightning speed the bucket was drawn up, and the one man was saved. The explosion took place. Men descended, expecting to find the mangled body of the other miner; but the blast had loosened a mass of rock, and it lay diagonally across him; and, with the exception of a few bruises and a little scorching, he was unhurt. When asked why he urged his comrade to escape, he gave a reason that sceptics would laugh at. If there is any being on the face of the earth I pity, it is a sceptic. I would not be called "a sceptic," today for all this world's wealth. They may call it superstition or fanaticism, or whatever they choose. But what did this hero say when asked, "Why did you insist on this other man's ascending?" In his quaint dialect, he replied, "Because I knowed my soul was safe; for I've give it in the hands of Him of whom it is said, that 'faithfulness is the girdle of his reins,' and I knowed that what I gied Him He'd never gie up. But t'other chap was an awful wicked lad, and I wanted to gie him another chance." All the infidelity in the world cannot produce such a signal act of heroism as that.--_Selected._

THE "KID."

It was not a long procession or a pleasing one but it attracted much attention.

There was a policeman in the lead. Beside him walked a stockey, bullnecked young fellow in a yellowish suit of loud plaid. His face was bloody and his right wrist encircled by the bracelet of the "twisters" which shackled him to his captor. The face of the policeman was also bloody and his clothes were torn. Behind these two walked three other patrolmen, each with a handcuffed prisoner.

The "kid" and his "gang" had been caught in the act of robbing a saloon, and the fight had been lively, although short. The prisoners had been taken to the detectives' office, and photographed and registered for the rogues' gallery. They were now on their way to court, and thence, in all probability, to jail.

At Broadway there was a jam of cars and heavy trucks, and the procession had to wait. Nobody has been able to tell just what happened, but they all agree as to the essential points. First the bystanders saw a streak of yellow, which was the kid; then a streak of blue which was the policeman. The prisoner had wrenched the twisters from his captors' hand, and made a dash across the tracks. The policeman, thinking, of course that he was trying to escape, had followed.

Then everybody saw a little child toddling along in the middle of the track. A cable-car, with clanging bell, was bearing down upon it with a speed which the gripman seemed powerless to check. The baby held up its hands, and laughed at the sound of the gong. On the other side of the street a woman was screaming and struggling in the arms of three or four men who were trying to keep her from sacrificing her own life to save that of her child.

Then the kid stood there with the child safe in his arms, the steel twisters hanging from his wrist. He set the baby down gently at his feet, loosened the clasp of the chubby hand on his big red fist, and quietly held out his wrist to the policeman to be handcuffed again. He had one chance in a million for his life when he made that desperate leap, but he had not hesitated the fraction of a second.

CHARGED WITH MURDER.

"Prisoner at the bar, have you anything to say why sentence of death should not be passed upon you?"

A solemn hush fell over the crowded court-room, and every person waited in almost breathless expectation for the answer to the judge's question.

"I have, your honor! I stand here convicted of the murder of my wife. Witnesses have testified that I was a loafer, a drunkard and a wretch; that I returned from one of my debauches and fired the shot that killed the wife I had sworn to love, cherish and protect. While I have no remembrance of committing the awful deed, I have no right to condemn the verdict of the jury, for their verdict is in accordance with the evidence.

"But, may it please the court, I wish to show that I am not alone responsible for the murder of my wife! The judge on this bench, the jury in the box, the lawyers within this bar and most of the witnesses, including the pastor of the church, are also guilty before God and will have to stand with me before His judgment throne, where we shall all be righteously judged.

"If it had not been for the saloons of my town, I never would have become a drunkard; my wife would not have been murdered; I would not be here now, soon to be hurled into eternity.

"For one year our town was without a saloon. For one year I was a sober man. For one year my wife and children were happy and our little home was a paradise.

"I was one of those who signed remonstrances against re-opening the saloons of our town. One-half of this jury, the prosecuting attorney on this case, and the judge who sits on this bench, all voted for the saloons. By their votes and influence the saloons were opened, and they have made me what I am.

"Think you that the Great Judge will hold me--the poor, weak, helpless victim--alone responsible for the murder of my wife? Nay; I, in my drunken, frenzied, irresponsible condition have murdered one; but you have deliberately voted for the saloons which have murdered thousands, and they are in full operation today with your consent. You legalized the saloons that made me a drunkard and a murderer, and you are guilty with me before God and man for the murder of my wife.

"I will close by solemnly asking God to open your blind eyes to your own individual responsibility, so that you will cease to give your support to this hell-born traffic."--_Sel._

MOTHER'S FACE.

There's a feeling comes across me-- Comes across me often now-- And it deepest seems when trouble Lays her finger on my brow; O it is a deep, deep feeling, Neither happiness nor pain! 'Tis a mighty, soulful longing To see mother's face again!

'Tis, I think, a natural feeling; Worst of me, I can't control Myself no more! It seems to stir And thrill my very soul! Try to laugh it off--but useless! Oh! my tears will fall like rain When I get this soulful longing Just to see her face again!

You won't know how much you love her (Your old mother) till you roam 'Way off where her voice can't reach you, And with strangers make your home; Then you'll know how big your heart is, Think you never loved before, When you get this mighty longing Just to see her face once more.

Mother! tender, loving soul! Heaven bless her dear old face! I'd give half my years remaining Just to give her one embrace; Or to shower love-warm kisses On her lips, and cheeks, and brow, And appease this mighty longing That I get so often now!

--_Sel._

ONLY SIXTEEN.

Only sixteen, so the papers say, Yet there on the cold, stony ground he lay; 'Tis the same sad story we hear every day. He came to his death in the public highway. Full of promise, talent and pride, Yet the rum fiend conquered him--so he died. Did not the angels weep o'er the scene? For he died a drunkard and only sixteen. Only sixteen.

Oh! it were sad he must die all alone, That of all his friends, not even one Was there to list to his last faint moan, Or point the suffering soul to the throne Of grace. If, perchance, God's only Son Would say, "Whosoever will may come."-- But we hasten to draw a veil over the scene, With his God we leave him--only sixteen. Only sixteen.

Rumseller, come view the work you have wrought! Witness the suffering and pain you have brought To the poor boy's friends; they loved him well, And yet you dared the vile beverage to sell That beclouded his brain, his reason dethroned, And left him to die out there all alone. What if 't were your son instead of another? What if your wife were that poor boy's mother? And he only sixteen.

Ye freeholders who signed the petition to grant The license to sell, do you think you will want That record to meet in the last great day When heaven and earth shall have passed away, When the elements melting with fervent heat Shall proclaim the triumph of right complete? Will you wish to have his blood on your hands When before the great throne you each shall stand? And he only sixteen.

Christian men! rouse ye to stand for the right, To action and duty; into the light. Come with your banners inscribed: "Death to rum." Let your conscience speak, listen, then come; Strike killing blows; hew to the line; Make it a felony even to sign A petition to license; you would do it I ween If that were your son and he only sixteen, Only sixteen.

THE DRESS QUESTION.

One day, at Louisville, riding with Mrs. Wheaton to visit the sick prisoners, she said, "Do you think it your duty to rebuke Christians who wear jewelry?" I saw her question was a kindly reproof to me, and said, "If the Lord wants me to give up the jewelry I have, He will show me." "Yes, He will," she answered; "for I am praying for you." The next morning the friend who was entertaining me told me her little eleven-year-old daughter, Emma, just converted, said, "Mamma, I wish you would read to me in the Bible where it says not to wear jewelry." The mother read the verses. Then the child said, "Mamma, if the Lord does not want me to wear jewelry, I don't want to;" and she brought her little pin and ring to her mother. I took my Bible and read, "Whose adorning, let it not be that outward adorning of plaiting the hair and of wearing of gold, or of putting on of apparel; but let it be the hidden man of the heart, in that which is not corruptible, even the ornament of a meek and quiet spirit, which is in the sight of God of great price" (1 Peter ii, 3, 4); and, "In like manner also, that women adorn themselves in modest apparel, with shamefacedness and sobriety, not with braided hair or gold or pearls or costly array, but (which becometh women professing godliness) with good works." (1 Tim. ii, 9, 10.) Then I thought: "The child is right. The Bible means just what it says." Then I recalled that Mrs. Wheaton had told me how she went one day to visit a poor, sick girl, to whom she had talked of the love of Christ until she was almost won. She went again with a wealthy woman, who was decked with diamonds. As they entered the room, the girl pointed to the jewels, and said: "O mother, mother! I have wanted them all my life!" The rich woman tried to hide her diamonds, and Mrs. Wheaton tried to turn the girl's attention again to the Savior, but in vain. Her last thought was of the diamonds, and her last words, "I have wanted them all my life!"

Sitting there, with this incident fresh in my mind, I quietly slipped off ring, watch, chain, cuff-buttons, and collar-stud; and gold, as an adornment, was put away forever.--_Abbie C. Morrow, in Revival Advocate, March 7, 1901._

SONGS USED IN MY WORK.

ROCK ME TO SLEEP, MOTHER.

"Backward, turn backward, oh time in your flight, Make me a child again just for tonight. Mother, come back from that echoless shore, Take me again to your arms as of yore; Kiss from my forehead the furrows of care, Smooth the few silver threads out of my hair; Over my slumbers your loving watch keep, Rock me to sleep, mother, rock me to sleep."

LIFE'S RAILWAY TO HEAVEN.

Life is like a mountain railroad, With an engineer that's brave; We must make the run successful, From the cradle to the grave; Watch the curves, the fills, the tunnels; Never falter, never quail; Keep your hand upon the throttle, And your eye upon the rail.

CHORUS:

Blessed Savior, Thou wilt guide us Till we reach that blissful shore; Where the angels wait to join us In Thy praise forevermore.

You will roll up grades of trials; You will cross the bridge of strife; See that Christ is your conductor On this lightning train of life; Always mindful of obstructions; Do your duty, never fail; Keep your hand upon the throttle, And your eye upon the rail.

You will often find obstructions; Look for storms of wind and rain; On a fill, or curve, or trestle, They will almost ditch your train; Put your trust alone in Jesus; Never falter, never fail; Keep your hand upon the throttle, And your eye upon the rail.

As you roll across the trestle, Spanning Jordan's swelling tide, You behold the Union Depot Into which your train will glide; There you'll meet the Superintendent, God the Father, God the Son With the hearty, joyous plaudit, Weary pilgrim, welcome home.

_By permission of Charlie D Tillman, owner of copyright._

MEET ME THERE.

1. On the happy golden shore, Where the faithful part no more, When the storms of life are o'er, Meet me there. Where the night dissolves away, Into pure and perfect day, I am going home to stay, Meet me there.

CHORUS:

Meet me there, Meet me there, Where the tree of life is blooming Meet me there. When the storms of life are o'er, On the happy golden shore, Where the faithful part no more, Meet me there.

2. Here our fondest hopes are vain, Dearest links are rent in twain, But in heav'n no throbs of pain, Meet me there. By the river sparkling bright, In the city of delight Where our faith is lost in sight, Meet me there.

3. Where the harps of angels ring, And the blest forever sing, In the palace of the king, Meet me there. Where in sweet communion blend, Heart with heart and friend with friend; In a world that ne'er shall end, Meet me there.

_Words and music copyrighted by W. J. Kirkpatrick, Philadelphia._

GOD BLESS MY BOY

1. When shining stars their vigils keep, And all the world is hushed in sleep, 'Tis then I breathe this pray'r so deep-- God bless my boy tonight.

CHORUS:

God bless my boy, my wandering boy, And keep his honor bright; May he come home--no longer roam-- God save my boy tonight.

2. I know not where his head may lie, Perchance beneath the open sky; But this I ween, God's watchful eye Can see my boy tonight.

3. As pass the days, the months and years, With all the change, the hopes and fears, God make each step of duty clear, And keep his honor bright.

4. And when at last his work is o'er, And earthly toil shall be no more, May angels guide him to the shore Where there shall be no night.

THE GREAT JUDGMENT MORNING.

Tune--"Kathleen Mavourneen."

One cold Winter eve when the snow was fast falling In a small, humble cottage a poor mother laid; Although racked with pain she lay there contented With Christ as her Friend and her peace with Him made.

CHORUS:

We shall all meet again on the great judgment morning, The books will be opened, the roll will be called; How sad it will be if forever we're parted, And shut out of heaven for not loving God!

That mother of yours has gone over death's river. You promised you'd meet her as you knelt by her bed, While the death sweat rolled from her and fell on the pillow; Her memory still speaketh, although she is dead.

You remember the kiss and the last words she uttered, The arms that embraced you are mouldering away; As you stood by her grave and dropped tears on her coffin, With a vow that you'd meet her, you walked slowly away.

My brother, my sister, get ready to meet her, The life that you now live is ebbing away, But the life that's to come lasts forever and ever, May we meet ne'er to part on that great judgment day!

MY NAME IN MOTHER'S PRAYER.

'Twas in the days of careless youth When life seemed fair and bright, When ne'er a tear, nor scarce a fear O'er cast my day or night. 'Twas in the quiet even tide, I passed her kneeling there, When just one word I tho't I heard My name, my name in mother's prayer.

CHORUS.

My name, my name in mother's prayer, My name in mother's prayer! There is just one word I tho't I heard My name, my name in mother's prayer.

I wandered on, but heeded not God's oft repeated call, To turn from sin and live for Him, And trust to Him my all in all. But when at last convinced of sin, I sank in deep despair, My soul awoke when memory spoke My name, my name in mother's prayer.

That kneeling form, those folded hands, Have vanished in the dust; But still for me for years shall be The memory of her trust. And when I cross dark Jordan's tide, I'll meet her over there; I'll praise the Lord, and bless the word, That word, my name in mother's prayer!

OVER THERE.

Come all ye scattered race, And the Savior's love embrace; You may see His smiling face Yet with care; He is on the giving hand, Will you come at His command, Will you with the angels stand Over there?

CHORUS.

Over there, over there, There's a land of pure delight Over there, We will lay our burdens down, And at Jesus' feet sit down, And we'll wear a starry crown, Over there.

Yes, He went to Calvary, And they nailed Him to the tree, That poor sinners such as we, He might spare; From the bitter pangs of death, He does with His dying breath, Seal an everlasting rest, Over there.

God has placed us on the field, To the foe we will not yield, On our tower we will stand, By His care. Wave the Christian's banner high, Hold it up until we die, And go home to live with God, Over there.

THIS WAY.

Our life is like a stormy sea, Swept by the gales of sin and grief, While on the windward and the lee, Hangs heavy clouds of unbelief; Out o'er the deep a call we hear, Like harbor bell's inviting voice; It tells the lost that hope is near, And bids the trembling soul rejoice.

CHORUS.

This way, this way, O heart oppressed, So long by storm and tempest driven, This way, this way, lo here is rest, Rings out the harbor bell of heaven.

O tempted one, look up, be strong; The promise of the Lord is sure, That they shall sing the victor's song, Who faithful to the end endure; God's Holy Spirit comes to thee, Of this abiding love to tell; To blissful port, o'er stormy sea, Calls heaven's inviting harbor bell.

MORE TO BE PITIED THAN CENSURED.

There's an old concert hall on the bowery Where were assembled together one night A crowd of young fellows carousing, To them life looked happy and bright. At the very next table was seated A girl that had fallen to shame; How the fellows they laughed at her downfall, When they heard an old woman exclaim:

CHORUS.

"She's more to be pitied than censured, She is more to be loved than despised; She is only a poor girl who ventured On life's rugged path ill-advised. Don't scorn her with words fierce and bitter, Don't laugh at her shame and downfall, Just pause for a moment--consider, That sin was the cause of it all."

There's an old-fashioned church 'round the corner, Where the neighbors all gathered one day, To listen to words from the parson, For a soul that had just passed away. 'Twas the same wayward girl from the bowery, Who a life of adventure had led; Did the parson then laugh at her downfall? No, he prayed and wept as he said:

SOME MOTHER'S CHILD.

At home or away, in the alley or street, Wherever I chance in this wide world to meet A girl that is thoughtless or a boy that is wild, My heart echoes softly: It is some mother's child.

CHORUS.

Some mother's child, Some mother's child, My heart echoes softly: It is some mother's child.

And when I see those o'er whom long years have rolled, Whose hearts have grown hardened, whose spirits are cold; Be it woman all fallen, or man all defiled, A voice whispers sadly: It is some mother's child.

No matter how far from right she hath strayed; No matter what inroad dishonor hath made; No matter what elements cankered the pearl; Though tarnished and sullied, she is some mother's girl.

No matter how deep he is sunken in sin; No matter how much he is shunned by his kin; No matter how low is his standard of joy; Though guilty and loathsome; he is some mother's boy.

That head hath been pillowed on tenderest breast; That form hath been wept o'er, those lips have been pressed; That soul hath been prayed for in tones sweet and mild; For her sake deal gently with some mother's child.

_Used by permission of Charlie D. Tillman, owner of copyright._

JUST TELL MY MOTHER.

'Twas in a Gospel Mission, in a distant western town, The meeting there that night had just begun, When in came a poor lost sinner who by sin had been cast down, Thinking perhaps that he might have some fun; But as he heard of Jesus' love, of pardon full and free, He sought it and the wanderer ceased to roam. And going to his room that night, his heart all filled with joy, He wrote a letter to the folks at home.

CHORUS.

Just tell my dear old mother, my wandering days are o'er, Just tell her that my sins are all forgiven, Just tell her that if on earth we chance to meet no more, Her prayers are answered and we'll meet in Heaven.

His mother got the message as she lay at death's dark door, Which told her of her boy so far away, How his sins were all forgiven and wandering days were o'er, And that his feet were on the narrow way. Her heart was filled with gladness, as it had not been for years, Her dear old face was all lit up with joy, As on her dying pillow she said amid her tears, God bless and keep my precious darling boy.

Your mothers have prayed for you, my friends, for many and many a day, Perhaps these days of life will soon be o'er, Come, give your hearts to Jesus, get on the narrow way, And meet her on that happy golden shore. Oh, come just now while still there's room, and pardon free for all. The Savior pleads, oh, do not longer roam. And then with Jesus in your heart, you will send the message To your dear mother, praying still for you at home.

SOON THE DEATH-BELL WILL TOLL.

When the last Gospel message has been told in your ears, And the last solemn warning has been given you in tears; When hope shall escape from its place in your breast, Oh, where will your poor weary soul find its rest?

CHORUS.

Soon the death-bell will toll--look after your soul; O, sinner be ready, for the death-bell will toll.

When the darkness of death shall compass you round, When the friends you have loved are all standing around; Unable to save you now from the tomb, Unable to alter your terrible doom.

When before the white throne of His Judgment you stand, "What have you to answer?" the Judge will demand; Oh, terrible moment to be standing alone, When mercy forever and forever is gone.

THE END OF THE WAY.

The following beautiful lines were written by a girl in Nova Scotia, an invalid for many years:

My life is a wearisome journey; I'm sick of the dust and the heat; The rays of the sun beat upon me, The briars are wounding my feet. But the city to which I am journeying Will more than my trials repay; All the toils of the road will seem nothing When I get to the end of the way.

There are so many hills to climb upward, I often am longing for rest, But He who appoints me the pathway Knows what is needed and best. I know in His word He has promised That my strength shall be as my day; And the toils of the road will seem nothing When I get to the end of the way.

He loves me too well to forsake me, Or give me one trial too much; All His people have been dearly purchased, And Satan can never claim such. By and by I shall see Him and praise Him, In the city of unending day; And the toils of the road will seem nothing When I get to the end of the way.

When the last feeble steps have been taken, And the gates of the city appear, And the beautiful songs of the angels Float out on my listening ear; When all that now seems so mysterious Will be plain and clear as the day-- Yes, the toils of the road will seem nothing When I get to the end of the way.

Though now I am footsore and weary, I shall rest when I'm safely at home; I know I'll receive a glad welcome, For the Savior Himself has said "Come." So, when I am weary in body, And sinking in spirit I say, All the toils of the road will seem nothing When I get to the end of the way.

Cooling fountains are there for the thirsty, There are cordials for those who are faint: There are robes that are whiter and purer Than any that fancy can paint. Then I'll try to press hopefully onward, Thinking often through each weary day, The toils of the road will seem nothing When I get to the end of the way.

Appendix.

The matter which I have here appended I thought of too much value to omit from this volume. The first article is explanatory in itself. The second is by a prisoner whom I have known for many years. The third (regarding Christ in Gethsemane) was written by a prisoner as a letter to myself. I hope the reader may profit by the reading of each page.

E. R. W.

THE PERSONNEL OF PRISON MANAGEMENT.

Address of C. E. Haddox, warden of the West Virginia penitentiary, to the National Prison Association, at its annual session, Louisville, Ky., Congress of 1903:

This is the age of industrial development. On every side we see colossal enterprises undertaken and prosecuted to a successful and profitable conclusion.

Great railroad systems span the continent, carrying millions of passengers and countless tons of freight, with safety, celerity and dispatch, to the doors of factory, workshop, store and consumer.

Immense industrial enterprises are constantly being projected, consolidated and carried on in a manner to excite the admiration, mayhap, the wonder and fear of mankind.

Colossal financial transactions amaze the minds of those uninitiated to the magnitude and the intricacies of such undertakings.

The unexplored recesses of the earth are exploited in a manner and on a scale heretofore undreamed of and unknown, and every department of enterprise is carried on to a degree that distinctly stamps this decade as the acme of industrial enterprise and achievements, the golden age of industrial prosperity, and the acquirement of material improvement and material gain.

If it be asked why such strides have been made along industrial lines, the answer is that it is due to ORGANIZATION AND SPECIALIZATION.

The PERSONNEL of the management have devoted their lives, their talent and their energies to the special work before them. They have been drilled and educated along special lines; they have been deaf and blind to outside matters not relevant to the work in hand, and by close and careful study, by unceasing and constant labor, care and effort, having evolved, projected and carried on these immense enterprises.

The National Prison Congress at its meeting this year is mindful of the material progress of the country.

This association is equally ambitious along the lines peculiar to itself to obtain from the various penal institutions of the country the highest and best results morally, educationally, reformatively, and as an incident, punitively and financially.

How shall we keep pace in penal improvements with the great material progress of the outside world?

The answer necessarily must be, that improvements in our department of work must come, as they do elsewhere, by the investigation, the study, the thought and the effort of those who are in actual control, of those who are in a position to see, to observe and to know.

In other words, the question as to whether prisons are to improve, whether their work shall continue to be of a higher and nobler character, whether we are finally and forever to break away from the customs of the galleys of France, the prisons of Hawes in England, of the Mamertine of Rome and of Rothenburg in Germany, will depend utterly, entirely and absolutely upon the personnel of the prison management of the country.

Prof. Henderson, in his admirable address delivered at the Philadelphia meeting in 1902, on "The Social Position of the Prison Warden," says: "Some institutions have no marked qualities; they have walls, cells, machinery, prisoners, punishments, but no distinct, consistent and rational policy."

Where this is true it means that the worst possible condition of affairs exists. Such an institution has the dry rot. It is managed (or rather mismanaged) by time servers, too careless to feel the high responsibility devolving upon them, and too listless to acquaint themselves with the many opportunities spread before them to improve and keep pace with the onward march of progress.

Such officers in their abuse, by inaction, of the opportunities afforded them, commit "Crimes against criminals" and through them against society.

On the contrary institutions which have distinct features and characteristics, have them as the result of the careful investigation, the patient research and thought of those who are in responsible and actual control, and these characteristics and features reflect the wisdom and intelligence of those who have given their energies and their lives to the special work before them.

THE BOARD OF DIRECTORS.

In the management of penal institutions a Board of Directors or of Control is, ordinarily, the nominal head.

By the laws of most states they are supposed to fix the administration policy, to restrict and define the powers and duties of the officers in actual and intimate control.

In some institutions they meet a day or so each month, in most institutions not so frequently. Their duties while at the institution may or may not be largely perfunctory, and as they are generally active business men at home in other channels, the day or two a month or quarter is apt to be regarded by the unthoughtful as a respite or surcease from other duties. The main duty of a Board of Directors or of Control may be said to be the determining of the general policy upon which the institution shall be conducted, and a cursory oversight of the conduct of its affairs.

THE WARDEN.

The warden or superintendent is the one official who can give tone, expression and color to the institution. He is distinctly and positively its actual managing head, and upon his intelligence, interest, zeal, tact and discretion will depend, almost entirely, its weal or its woe.

He must be a man of intelligence, and be willing and anxious to increase his fund of knowledge and information.

He should be a profound student not only of the ordinary subjects that attract the student, but of prison systems, of laws, business, government, society as it exists, and of human nature in all its many phases.

HE MUST BE AN ORGANIZER.

No difference how elaborate a system may be found in any institution of this kind, the warden will always be an intensely busy and greatly occupied officer.

If he would prevent chaos and confusion and obtain from every official the highest and best work of which he is capable, he must organize every department thoroughly. Every officer and every inmate must know his exact duties, so far as it is possible to know them, and be made responsible for those duties and the warden must be enabled to appreciate a high order of talent and the accomplishment of good work, and to locate the blame for omissions and short comings, and provide for their correction.

Thorough system in every detail will conserve the capacities of all his subordinates and leave him in a measure free to observe the actual conditions and to plan and to put into effect improvements along moral, industrial, physical and financial lines.

HE MUST BE A FINANCIER.

The financial question in every prison in the land is an extremely important one. Funds for prisons are doled out grudgingly, and the demand for absolutely necessary purposes is always far greater than the supply.

A warden performs no more important function than when he sees that the funds of the institution are so used as to effect the highest possible results, and that all the forces of the prison are so energized and conserved as to permit, under ordinary conditions, a satisfactory and proper earning and economizing power. With the many demands made upon him for means for increasing the usefulness of his institution, a high order of financial aptitude is an absolutely necessary characteristic in a successful warden.

DISCIPLINE.

Discipline in a prison is its first requisite. Nothing can be accomplished until officers and convicts are under its sway and control.

The warden who would have control of those under him must himself at all times, be under self control.

The maxim "No one knows how to command who has not first learned how to obey," is a trite and a true one. The population of a prison is made up of a heterogeneous collection of people whose first instincts have been and are, not to obey.

To bring such people into habits of obedience and control requires the highest type of skill, tact and discretion. Punishments and reward must be so blended and combined as to effect the needful results with the least possible friction, and in the most humane and rational manner possible.

No warden can afford to delegate the matter of enforcing discipline entirely or partly, if at all, to another. His first duty to himself, that he may know actual conditions as they exist, is to preside over or assist in, the trial of offenders and to order discipline.

Individual treatment is a necessity in our dealings with delinquents, and a study of the many phases of delinquency is a prime requisite in a successful warden's repertoire.

Brainard F. Smith says: "Many a prisoner has been reformed--or, if not reformed, made a better prisoner--by punishment."

Will the warden have any higher duty to perform than to face his delinquent delinquents and to order in merciful severity, rational punishments for their short-comings?

But a warden's disciplinary powers are apt to be taxed more severely in another direction. The great problem ordinarily, is not so much the discipline of convicts as that of subordinate officers. If subordinate officers will obey the spirit and the letter of the rules, the convict has the potential influence of a powerful example to aid him. "Like master like man."

In institutions where officers are appointed solely with reference to their fitness, comparatively little trouble should be had in the matter of proper official discipline. But where places are given to heelers, ward-workers and political strikers, the matter of efficient discipline is a question of grave concern to the warden. In the absence of better material, however, he must address himself to organizing what he has to the highest efficiency possible, and insist and require a rigid regimen and adhere to his demands and requirements with Spartan firmness.

THE PRISON SCHOOL.

The educational work of a prison is of the highest, I may say, of the first importance. The education of the hands to work comes naturally, partly as an incident of the necessary work carried on in prison.

Nearly all convicts are densely ignorant. The polished, scholarly, shrewd criminal of whom we hear so much, and to whom the papers and books give so much prominence, is the exception, not the rule, in prison.

If the prison is to have a reformatory feature, it must come very largely through the school. Many prison schools are such only in name. The work accomplished is very meager. The results are very unsatisfactory.

To no part of prison work should a warden address himself with more ardor and determination than so to organize the prison school as to make it the great positive factor in dispelling ignorance and its attendant viciousness, and in quickening and enlivening the moral sense in those whose moral judgment is exceedingly obtuse.

The course of study in a prison school is necessarily a very elementary one, and unless followed by a supplementary course of reading and study, will be of little permanent and practical benefit. Many prison libraries, largely the result of indiscriminate and heterogeneous donations of all kinds of literature, good, bad and indifferent, chiefly the latter, are not in a position to be a positive force.

Let the warden see that his library is so arranged, classified and used as to be a source of information, profit, help and pleasure to the inmates, and that a course of reading along rational lines is laid out, encouraged, and, if possible, adhered to, in order that the preliminary school course may not have been in vain.

COURAGE NEEDED.

The warden must be a man of courage. I do not refer to the kind of courage necessary to face a regiment of depraved and wicked men shorn of their power and their stimulus to do evil, but that high moral courage necessary to clean the Augean stables of abuses of customs, to reverse policies of long standing that are nevertheless wrong in principle and in practice, to fight against unjust, improper and unwise legislative propositions concerning his institution; the kind of courage that prompted the chaplain in Chas. Reade's "NEVER TOO LATE TO MEND," to fight and destroy the iniquitous prison system of Keeper Hawes and his minions; the courage that will keep to the fore-front a persistent opposition to prostituting penitentiaries into eleemosynary institutions and political cribs and feeding troughs for political strikers.

He must have the courage to weed out and eliminate useless barnacles in the shape of incompetent and worthless employes, and substitute in their stead men of capacity, character and intelligence, who are in love with their work and believe in its dignity and usefulness; the courage to face demagogues in their efforts to take from the prison its educative, moral, reformatory and economic force, the right of the unfortunate inmates to learn the gospel of labor under right and just conditions.

OPTIMISM NECESSARY.

The warden needs to be intensely optimistic. He must have a reserve fund of enthusiasm. He must believe profoundly in the high character of his office and educate others constantly to believe in it. The ignorance of the great mass of the people as to the real function of penitentiaries and the methods by which they are carried on is amazing and mortifying to prison officials.

A part of the warden's mission is to acquaint the outside world with conditions as they exist inside, and to inspire the interest and support of the general public in measures for bettering and improving prison conditions. Legislative bodies especially, need to be brought into closer relations and the law makers made to realize their duty to the public and the convict in the enactment of wise, proper and righteous legislation.

Longfellow, in his beautiful poem, "THE BUILDING OF THE SHIP," tells why the master builder achieved success. It was because

"His heart was in the work and the heart Giveth grace to every art."

The warden's heart must be in his work. His whole soul must be animated and permeated with an honest and sincere desire to bring penology up to a higher and nobler standard.

He must have a reserve force of enthusiasm that will not be daunted and destroyed by temporary failures or the lapses of some discharged or pardoned convicts, who, in spite of care and pains, will return to their evil ways. The enthusiasm that can bear the harsh and ignorant criticism and misrepresentations incident to his work; the enthusiasm that in its contagion will inoculate directors, subordinate officers, the press and the people with a desire for more light on penal problems and a purpose to be governed by that light; the enthusiasm that will beget great patience for the exacting, difficult and trying problems before him; that will make him believe that "a convict saved is a man made"; that will make him believe with the great English novelist "It is never too late to mend," and that as infinite care and pains finally brought Robinson, the twice convicted thief, up to the estate of honest manhood, so, infinite care and pains should be exerted with every man under his charge.

Pessimism has no rightful place in a penitentiary. In the language of Socrates, "Why should we who are never angry at an ill-conditioned body, always be angry with an ill-conditioned soul?"

The ignorant Hawes believed in the profitless crank, the black-hole, the deprivation of food, of bed, of clothing, the tortures of the waist jacket and the collar, and a sign over the door, "ABANDON HOPE ALL YE WHO ENTER HERE."

The twentieth century warden believes in the gospel of productive labor, of education of hand, head and heart, in the deprivation of privileges, largely as punishment, the segregation of the desperate and nearly hopeless, the enlightenment of an all-powerful, all potential, all influential example and the motto of Pope Clement, "It is of little advantage to restrain criminals by punishment unless you reform them with training and teaching."

THE CHAPLAIN.

The chaplain occupies an extremely important but delicate position in prison management. It is possible for him to be of vast influence and power for good.

The chaplain needs to be a man of large heart, aided by an abundance of sound common sense. He needs to bear in mind constantly, in the difficult and delicate work he is called upon to perform, that the discipline of the prison must be upheld and enforced.

Associate officers are frequently disturbed with the fear that the chaplain's influence will subvert the discipline of the prison; that the shrewd, unprincipled convicts by pouring into his ears their imaginary tales of woe, may succeed in working him.

The chaplain's first requirement, if he would succeed, is not to lose sight of the majesty of the law and of the prison rules.

The chaplain and the warden should go hand in hand, the one sustaining the other. They need to have a perfect understanding, neither mistrusting the other. Frequent conferences ought to enable them to proceed along proper lines. The chaplain's opportunities are limitless. I do not undertake to say what direction his duties shall take him. That will be discussed fully in the Chaplain's Association.

It is personal, individual work that counts in a prison. All the chaplain's work should be thought out beforehand, be methodical, premeditated, intentional, systematic and thorough. His chapel service should be rational, of the proper length, with exercises, song service and preaching service carefully chosen. There should be no room in a prison service for the spectacular, the highly emotional and the haphazard sermons and addresses of a chance visitor. A reasonably rigid censorship ought to be exercised over the contributions of outsiders to the chapel service.

The influence of sight seers and idle visitors to prisons, always bad, reaches the acme of its perniciousness in the chapel service, if unrestrained and unguided by prison officials of experience and firmness, who alone are in a position to know that sickly sentimentality is the worst possible pabulum to offer men already too eager to justify their evil deeds.

THE PHYSICIAN.

A physician's duties in a prison are necessarily onerous, important and difficult. Convicts are constantly claiming that they are unable physically to do the work assigned them. No one can determine the truthfulness of their statements except the physician, and to determine whether the convict is really ill or exercising his usual finesse to shirk his duties, requires keen judgment of human nature as well as an accurate knowledge of his profession.

The convict, housed and hemmed in, is peculiarly susceptible to hallucinations and to thinking that he is afflicted with imaginary ills.

A physician needs a large fund of good judgment, will-power and common sense to combat successfully with this class of people. How far he should use some of the subterfuges supposed to be employed by physicians in the outside world in dealing with people afflicted with hypochondria, I am unable to say, but a certain amount of cheerfulness coupled with firmness is undoubtedly of great value.

SUBORDINATE OFFICERS.

The subordinate officers of a prison are very important factors in the management of a prison. They come in actual, continual, personal contact with the men.

No difference how capable and zealous may be the warden and his deputy, unless they have men of character, zeal, intelligence and discretion to carry out their orders and wishes faithfully and well, all their plans will come to naught.

Guards, keepers and watchmen should be of good moral character. It is useless to talk about reforming convicts unless they have continually the benefit of good examples set before them. Precept amounts to nothing unless re-enforced by good examples.

They should be educated and intelligent.

Their duties are largely discretionary, and in their contact with convicts a high order of intelligence is necessary to know the right thing to do. Strict integrity and truthfulness are prime requisites. An officer's word should be beyond question and he should be absolutely impartial in his dealings with his men.

No special system will bring the highest results with any kind of men behind it. Any system with men of character, conscience and capacity will achieve great good. Any system with men of bad character, ignorant, careless and indifferent, will fall to the ground.

A common impression prevails that any one is good enough for a prison guard, and if he is too old, too feeble and decrepit or too lazy for other work, his political strikers will try to unload him on the penitentiary authorities.

Prison Directors, Wardens and all in authority should set their faces resolutely against this erroneous and terribly harmful idea. Partisan politics should not be a factor in the appointment or the retention of any prison officer. All subordinates should be appointed under civil service rules and be required to pass a civil service examination, and after entering upon his duties be required to take up a course of study on penological questions and problems and be otherwise carefully schooled and drilled along the lines of their work. If time demonstrates their unfitness for the position they should be summarily removed. If they manifest an aptitude and an interest in their work they should be encouraged, promoted and protected against removal for partisan reasons.

Whenever directors in banks are elected with reference to their political proclivities and not with reference to their business sagacity, it will be proper to select prison officials for the same reason.

Whenever great business firms discharge their managers because their political views do not coincide with those of the owners, then and not till then should prison officials step down and out for political reasons.

What would be thought of directors of a business enterprise or the regents of a university who selected their business manager, their teachers, with regard to their views on finance or on the tariff, or who would remove a faithful, efficient and capable servant after years of experience in his work, merely because he did not coincide with the political views of the majority of his directors in a matter in no way germane to his work?

As Boards of Directors spend but a small percentage of their time at the institutions they control, it necessarily takes them years to get a clear insight into all the details of its work, and to make a change just when, through the process of time, the director becomes fitted for his work, is the height of unwisdom and folly. Boards of Charity and Correction having charge of all the institutions in the State would certainly be much more desirable. Such officers could devote their entire time and attention to the work, and thus be able to give all the institutions of the State uniform treatment and attention. Boards of Directors or of Control should be appointed and reappointed as long as they are efficient and manifest an interest in the work.

And so with all other officers from the warden down, and each should feel and know that faithfulness and efficiency is the only standard, and that they would not be expected, required or permitted to weaken their influence or their energies by undue or active participations in political effort or political manipulations.

The surest sign of unfitness for prison work and lack of interest in the work is an undue activity in political caucuses and conventions. The official practically advertises that he cannot hope to hold his place on account of his efficiency, but expects to do so because of his services as a political henchman.

THE DEMANDS OF THE AGE.

As this age demands a high order of talent and effort in the industrial, so it should demand and require great ability and power in the penal world.

The third of a century of the life of the National Prison Congress has witnessed great progress in the domain over which it has advisory power. Many problems pressing for solution demand the highest functions of those in control.

Do punishments deter men from crime?

Do the universal customs of the times foster and beget much of the crime committed?

Does war beget murder elsewhere?

Is social vengeance a failure, and are other means necessary to prevent crime?

Should not executives now clothed with power to terminate or shorten sentences of imprisonment also have power to lengthen terms of imprisonment or to change from a definite to an indefinite term whenever they become in possession of facts regarding the convict's previous life or present character, which were unknown to the sentencing judge?

Should not United States prisoners incarcerated in the various state prisons have the restrictions of the indeterminate sentence and the parole, thus securing a uniform system of treatment for all prisoners and greatly promoting the discipline?

Should we go back of the commission of crimes and ascertain if the State itself is not committing a crime in imposing and permitting conditions that beget crime?

Should not the pardoning power be exercised frequently before the convicted man ever reaches the prison at all? Could not many a man be saved by being put on probation from the start, who otherwise would be in great danger of being lost?

Does the discipline of prisons have anything to do with the commission of offenses by convicts when released? Does the enforced restraint exerted to the very last moment of his release and then wholly relaxed, cause the released convict to swing to the other extreme like Jean Valjean, who after nineteen years of imprisonment for stealing a loaf of bread and an attempt to escape, robbed his benefactor, the Bishop, of his plate, and upon being forgiven robbed little Gervais of his forty sou piece, but afterward got his bearings, attained his balance and lived an honorable life?

Should any prisoner ever be released at the prison door, or should he not for his own sake as well as society's be required to live a period on probation and under oversight, subject to return for violations; in other words, should not paroles be, under proper restrictions, the universal and only rule?

To the solution of these and countless other problems let the highest order of talent, the best combination of head, heart and brain be summoned: let every prison be a school for study and investigation, and be engineered and controlled by men of skill, drilled and educated along these lines, and who are animated by a desire to contribute their full share towards the upbuilding and uplifting of the race and the amelioration of the woes that beset mankind.

MEDITATIONS OF A PRISONER.

PREFACE.

To any one who may read these lines I will say: Do not criticise; I know you will find many mistakes, but I hope you will remember they are written by one who has not had the advantage of an education. My school days ended when I was nine years old. Knowing this, I hope you will excuse mistakes. Respectfully yours,

E. S. K.

I often wonder if the busy world ever gives a thought to the men incarcerated in places made for the punishment of crime and reformation of criminals, but often failing of reaching the desired result. Why is this failure? It must be from defect in the law or prison discipline. Some think perhaps the rigid enforcement of the law in its severest way is right, and that the prisoner should be shown no mercy. But this is wrong in every detail and should be just the reverse, so far as consistent with good order and discipline.

A judge in sentencing a prisoner should give a sentence consistent with justice and mercy, regardless of public sentiment, considering his own judgment, and not the possible consequences of his act on his future. Until this is more generally practiced, I am afraid there will be many too severe sentences passed on minor criminals and first offenders, as now, which will work to the injury of the convicted instead of his reformation. In my humble opinion, one year would give the lesson desired to many a novice in crime who is now serving from three to ten years. It should be remembered that short sentences give a novice in crime a wholesome dread of the law and fear of prison life, while custom and association with criminals tend to harden. The cases of old offenders, require more severity as regards time of confinement. Nor can we say to the jurors--or, rather, gentlemen of the jury--be very careful of what you do. Don't treat the trust you have in charge too lightly; give it all the consideration you are masters of. Remember you have the liberty, and, perhaps the life, of your fellowman at stake. Be very careful of what you do. Allow no personal motive to interfere with your duty, for, if we believe in the Bible, those who do so will answer in the hereafter for actions in this life. Beware, then, of how you mete out justice to your fellowman. Do unto others as you would have others do unto you. Weigh well the evidence given against the prisoner. If you find that there is a motive on the part of the witnesses to convict the prisoner being tried, you may rest assured they will trifle with the truth. In such cases a juror should try and put himself in the defendant's place and try to assume his feelings and condition, as much as possible, and see how he would act in a like case. If all jurors would do this, I think they would give a just and true verdict in nearly all cases. But I fear as things are now they let the press have too much weight with the rendering of a just verdict, and it may be of what their friends will say to them if they have a different opinion. Yet the man who does such a thing is a coward, a devil incarnate, and unfit to be at large. Such action may be the cause of making a criminal out of a so far really honest man. May God forgive them who recklessly tamper with the liberty of their fellowman. Some may think I am not for punishment of crime. If so, they are wrong. I believe in punishment of crime. But I believe in tempering justice with mercy. There should be no lingering doubt in a person's mind when he gives his verdict against the prisoner. It is a very easy thing to place a man in prison, but oh! so hard to get him out. A lie sworn to and believed is one of the hardest things in the world to get righted. And I know from personal experience what it is. Though it seems hard to say a lie is more readily believed against a person charged with a crime than the truth, yet it seems easier to a great many to believe bad rather than good of their neighbor. Yet, thank God, it is not so with all. We have many noble and true Christians yet in this vale of tears--gentlemen and ladies who practice what they say by many kindly acts to the poor, unhappy men who are unfortunate enough to get behind prison bars. God bless them for such acts. It does not hurt them, and gives to the unhappy prisoner a little happiness--a ray of sunshine through the clouds that surround him. Continue your noble work. You will be the gainer in the end, from the knowledge that you have done in the Lord's work, if in no other way. Oh, could you see the happiness beam from the eyes of some of those here, after the call of some who take friendly interest in them, you would know the good they are doing. Others seem to say: Oh, well, I am forgotten by all. Poor heart; what a sad lot. It would seem the sooner that death ended their misery the better. But while there is life there is hope. I must say that many ladies of C---- are very kind in giving up their own pleasures on Sundays that prisoners in this prison may have some little change in their life. The visiting chaplains always bring a choir with them, and to them we give our heartfelt thanks, with a God bless you. I love to read of the progress made in these penal institutions where reform is practiced. I am sure the prisoners must take an interest in it all, for it is all for their own good. The Stillwater prison and Elmira prison must be models of neatness and good order, with a perfect system of discipline. It would be well for all prisons to copy them. If prisons are supposed to be erected for the purpose of reformation, why not make them in reality what they are intended to be? Of course, there are many different kinds of crime committed by men of different temperaments, all of which are thoroughly understood, or as nearly as possible. For example, take the greatest crime committed in the eyes of the law--murder--which is often called murder when there is no ground for it. The public outcry when one man is unfortunate enough to take the life of another at a time when he may have every reason to believe his own life is in the greatest danger. The cry is raised by some one, possibly an eye-witness--Murder! It is taken up by the press and conveyed to every one, and possibly a slight coloring given to it. The people believe it all. The consequence is the public mind is prejudiced against the prisoner, and it takes a great amount of proof by the defendant to change that belief, and should he not be able to produce this evidence, in spite of all he can say he is convicted of the crime of murder, when in reality he is guilty of manslaughter, if anything. For, no matter how truthful a man he may be known to be, his word, unsustained by evidence, is not accepted; while, on the other side, no matter how untruthful a witness be known to be, he is given credit for the truth. What kind of a state of affairs is this? No wonder we often hear the cry go up from some poor wounded or crushed heart saying: O, God, is there no mercy left in man? Is humanity wholly dead? Must death overtake me here? Shunned I am by all whom I once called friends--wife, children, it may be a brother--but never by a mother, God bless her.

Let us take a look at this class of sufferers. What will we find them? Idle? No. They are as a rule men attending to their work and submitting to all the courtesies of life, only asking the same in return. Surely, such cannot be very bad men, who, hearing the cry of distress, respond at once to the appeal. I know some such to have a heart as tender as a woman. Yet you will shut them up, it may be forever. Don't understand me to say that murder is not committed. Of course it is, and the law should deal with it accordingly. All true men regret the taking of human life, even on the field of battle. How much more so under other circumstances? And the causes are many which make men do this; some of them hard to understand, may be. In many cases of this kind they deserve punishment and should be punished. But, for God's sake, let the punishment be consistent with justice and mercy. If ten years is not sufficient punishment to make man control himself in future, why not be merciful and kill him at once? For as we hope for mercy, so must we show it to others. All other crimes should be dealt with accordingly. Give a man a chance to reclaim himself. Should he return to a life of crime in preference to an honest one, the law has its remedy and can act accordingly. This is well worth a trial, and by all means should be given one. But I hear some one who never gave these things a thought say: How is this to be done? I will answer, Very easily, if it receive the support of our legislative body, by the recommendation of the state governor. Provide your prisons with workshops of different kinds--provide them with schools, and teach the prisoners how to make a living by some useful trade. Give them a chance to improve themselves by an education. Make the prison a place of reformation, one of improvement as well as punishment, and instead of increasing crime you will reduce it, which should be the aim of all having the good of their fellowman at heart, and society will be the gainer. I would give a prisoner who would show by his conduct a spirit of reform a parole after half of his time, with conditions attached, as is done in the Minnesota state prison, so that, should he fall back into his old way of living, he would be returned to prison to serve out the remainder of his sentence. By this means you to all intents and purposes hold a power over him, and he will be very careful as to what he is about. This habit in time will grow upon him and be the cause of making him a good citizen and trustworthy member of society. To men serving life sentences I would, on the recommendation of the prison warden, give a parole after manslaughter sentence has been served. This is a class of men that deserve some looking after by the kindly interest of humane persons. Give them hope and encouragement. Do not leave them to their own morbid thoughts; you cannot tell what drove them to an act they will regret, whether in or out of prison. If hasty once, it is no reason to suppose they will be so again. Why not, then, look after them? Let some of you Christian people talk with them, and if you find they ought to be assisted, help them. You know not what good you may do, and without such aid a poor and friendless man in prison is without hope. Will you, as Christians, let him die believing the word Christianity a mockery? God forbid. I know there are many good Christians that feel and mean what they say. But I am afraid that many of the less courageous are deterred from doing all they would like to do by the sneers of the hard, cruel world. But this should only spur you on. If you feel you are right, push on; do not stop half way.

In connection with the parole law we should have our prisoners graded as first, second and third class, giving to the second grade or class advantages above the third, and to the first above the second, giving them a motive to reform their ways while yet in prison, and their partial liberty from the first class by parole. By this means you instill into the prisoner a habit for good which in time will take root and prove a blessing, not only to the prisoner, but also a source of pleasure to those bringing it about. It must be expected that some will fall again; but why should the many suffer for the few? I have heard and read such sayings as this: The worst men are the best behaved while in prison if there is anything to be gained by it. I dispute this. No man can control or hide his real nature for any great length of time. Nature is bound to come to the surface sooner or later. The officers and guards of a prison should be men strict in the enforcement of the prison rules, humane and just in all their actions, men who by their own actions and deportment will gain and hold the respect of those under their charge. They should reward the good as well as punish the evil in men. It would, in my humble opinion, be nothing but true justice to the prisoner to put the whole power of pardoning, commuting and paroling prisoners in the hands of the governor. I do not say a judge will not give justice where clemency is asked. But it may be the case that a judge on the board of pardons has sentenced the prisoner, and probably in some way became prejudiced against the applicant, and it might be the cause of influencing his vote; consequently, it would look like a piece of injustice to the prisoner to allow that judge to sit on his case. I think it would be well for a governor to make himself perfectly acquainted with all pertaining to the mode of life of the prisoners, as much as possible. It ought to be remembered that when the prison doors close on a man your duty is only half done to yourself, the prisoner and society at large. He needs looking after mentally, morally and physically. Do not leave him to his own morbid thoughts, but help him to forget his surroundings as much as possible. Give him hope, for without hope we are lost to ourselves and the world. It is possible some will say they ought to be; but it must be a very heartless person who makes this remark. Remember, while you are walking about to-day, feeling self-conscious of your own strength to resist any and everything in the line of temptation, the time may come when you will lose control of yourself; or, it may be, some one dear to you will fall. In such cases, how many excuses you can find for yourself or him. Can you find none for those now suffering for the same? I feel impelled by some power to speak of those very people in a few lines. Perhaps it may catch their eye. Why will you follow one to prison with hate, malice and persecution, one who would not harm a single hair of your head, one who never had or has a single bitter thought against you, one that nightly asks God's protection to you and yours? And yet you persecute him, or it may be them, with all the might you can. Is it not enough that he has lost home, friends, wife, children and happiness at one false move? Is it not enough that he is condemned to a living death, hearing every hour of the day the clang of the iron bars that shut him out from the world, that separate him from all he loves? I say to you, is this not enough to satisfy the most bitter feelings of any avowed enemy? It ought to be. Yes, this ought to satisfy you without trying to obliterate the memory of the father from the child's heart and without denying him the privilege of communicating with them; without denying him the pleasure of doing something for them and of one day seeing them, which is all he has left to live for. To all to whom these lines refer, who read them, I will say, change all this. Ask God's help to give you strength to do right. In time you will feel a restful peace come to you, and it will make you content, if not happy. Try this, and may God in his mercy show you the way. And to all prisoners who may be suffering from the persecution of injustice by others, I will say the same. Say with all your heart: God forgive them, they know not what they do. And you will always find a comfort in helping one another. For as we hope to be forgiven, so must we forgive. What use in saying the Lord's prayer--Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive those who trespass against us? We must consider well the meaning of those lines, and if we cannot or do not comply with all they mean it is better for us not to use them. I thank God from my heart, I can say I forgive all my enemies. I have nothing but a kindly feeling for all mankind. I do not mean to say that I am not ruffled at times, for I am; I would not be human if I were not.

There is one class of men who come to prison that should command the attention of our lawmakers--namely, married men. Not on their own account, for they should pay the penalty of the law as well as another, but on account of their families. It must be remembered that when you take away the father and supporter of a family you leave them without the means of support; and if the mother happens to be a sick and weakly person, what is to become of them?

To be sure, we have the orphans' home and the alms-house, but this is only taxing more heavily the already over-burdened taxpayers of the country. Then it would be a commendable act of the legislative bodies to enact laws to provide for the improvement of such married men and give the earnings of their labor to their families. This, to me, looks reasonable and just, and easy of accomplishment, and should be acted upon by all means. Let me draw you a picture from my imagination: We will visit a family who are in easy circumstances these cold nights. What do we see? Well-clad and well-fed children, a happy, contented look rests upon the wife's and husband's faces. Why should it not be so? They have plenty to eat and wear; a full bin of coal. Again, visit one where the husband may be languishing behind the prison bars, but of the same class. It is not so cheerful, but still no want is felt, and the father and husband, although chafing at confinement, feels that his family is not in want. This, of course, will be a consolation to him. Now let us visit another house, where they have always lived from hand to mouth. The father is gone. The mother and children, poor souls, ill-clad, ill-fed, and, my God, it may be, no fire. What a picture to contemplate. It makes me shudder to think of it. Now come with me behind the prison bars and see the head of this family. Knowing the want and needs of his family, and knowing how impossible it is for him to alleviate their suffering, it is enough to drive a man insane. But, on the other hand, if this man could earn something for his family's support, it would relieve his mind of a heavy burden. Think well of this, and in the name of God change the law that certainly works contrary to what it was intended for. As it now stands, you simply provide punishment for the criminals. In so doing you cause untold suffering and shame to innocent ones. In God's name, let it cease to be so. Now, then, for fear I may tire the reader, I will close. Very respectfully,

E.

CHRIST IN GETHSEMANE.

---- State Prison.

January 18, 1886.

Mrs. Elizabeth R. Wheaton, Prison Evangelist.

My Dearest Sister:--

"What might a single mind may wield, With Truth for sword and Faith for shield, And Hope to lead the way: Thus all high triumphs are obtained, From evil good--as God ordained The night before the day!"

"And being in an agony, He prayed."--St. Luke 22:44.

When the last supper was over, and the last hymn had been sung, our Lord and His Apostles--with the one traitor fatally absent from their number--went out of the city gate, and down the steep valley of the Kidron to the green slope of Olivet beyond it. Solemn and sad was that last walk together; and a weight of mysterious awe sank like lead upon the hearts of those few poor Galileans as in almost unbroken silence,--through the deep hush of the Oriental night,--through the dark shadows of the ancient olive-trees,--through the broken gleams of the Paschal moonlight,--they followed Him, their Lord and Master, who, with bowed head and sorrowing heart, walked before them to His willing doom.

That night they did not return as usual to Bethany, but stopped at the little familiar garden of Gethsemane, or "the oilpress." Jesus knew that the hour of His uttermost humiliation was near,--that from this moment till the utterance of that great cry which broke His heart, nothing remained for Him on earth, save all that the human frame can tolerate of torturing pain, and all that the human soul can bear of poignant anguish--till in that torment of body and desolation of soul, even the high and radiant serenity of His divine spirit should suffer a short but terrible eclipse. One thing alone remained before that short hour began; a short space was left Him, and in that space He had to brace His body, to nerve His soul, to calm His spirit by prayer and solitude, until all that is evil in the power of evil should wreak its worst upon His innocent and holy head. And He had to face that hour,--to win that victory,--as all the darkest hours must be faced, as all the hardest victories must be won--alone. It was not that He was above the need of sympathy,--no noble soul is;--and perhaps the noblest need it most. Though His friends did but sleep, while the traitor toiled, yet it helped Him in His hour of darkness to feel at least that they were near and that those were nearest who loved Him most. "Stay here," He said to the little group, "while I go yonder and pray." Leaving them to sleep, each wrapped in his outer garment on the grass, He took Peter and James and John, the chosen of the chosen, and went about a stone's-throw off. But soon even _their_ presence was more than He could endure. A grief beyond utterance, a struggle beyond endurance, a horror of great darkness, overmastered Him, as with the sinking swoon of an anticipated death. He must be yet more alone, and alone with God. Reluctantly He tore Himself away from their sustaining tenderness, and amid the dark-brown trunks of those gnarled trees withdrew from the moonlight into the deeper shade, where solitude might be for Him the audience-chamber of His Heavenly Father. And there, till slumber overpowered them, His three beloved Apostles were conscious how dreadful was the paroxysm through which He passed. They saw Him sometimes with head bowed upon His knees, sometimes lying on His face in prostrate suffering upon the ground. And though amazement and sore distress fell on them,--though the whole place seemed to be haunted by Presences of good and evil struggling in mighty but silent contest for the eternal victory,--yet, before they sank under the oppression of troubled slumber, they knew that they had been the dim witnesses of an unutterable agony, in which the drops of anguish which dropped from His brow in that deathful struggle looked to them like gouts of blood, and yet the burden of those broken murmurs in which He pleaded with His Heavenly Father had been ever this, "If it be possible,--yet not what I will, but what Thou wilt."

What is the meaning, my beloved sister, of this scene for us? What was the cause of this midnight hour? Do you think that it was the fear of death, and that that was sufficient to shake to its utmost center the pure and innocent soul of the Son of Man? Could not even a child see how inconsistent such a fear would be with all that followed;--with that heroic fortitude which fifteen consecutive hours of sleepless agony could not disturb;--with that majestic silence which overawed even the hard Roman into respect and fear;--with that sovereign ascendency of soul which flung open the golden gate of Paradise to the repentant malefactor, and breathed its compassionate forgiveness on the apostate priest? Could He have been afraid of death, in whose name, and in whose strength, and for whose sake alone, trembling old men, and feeble maidens, and timid boys have faced it in its worst form without a shudder or a sigh? My friend, the dread of the mere act of dying is a cowardice so abject that the meanest passions of the mind can master it, and many a coarse criminal has advanced to meet his end with unflinching confidence and steady step. And Jesus knew, if any have ever known, that it is as natural to die as to be born,--that it is the great birthright of all who love God;--that it is God who giveth His beloved sleep. The sting of death--and its only sting--is sin; the victory of the grave--and its only victory--is corruption. And Jesus knew no sin, saw no corruption. No, that which stained His forehead with crimson drops was something far deadlier than death. Though sinless He was suffering for sin. The burden and the mystery of man's strange and revolting wickedness lay heavy on His soul; and with holy lips He was draining the bitter cup into which sin had infused its deadliest poison. Could perfect innocence endure without a shudder all that is detestable in human ingratitude and human rage? Should there be no recoil of horror in the bosom of perfect love to see His own,--for whom he came,--absorbed in one insane repulsion against infinite purity and tenderness and peace? It was a willing agony, but it was agony; it was endured for our sakes; the Son of God suffered that He might through suffering become perfect in infinite sympathy as a Savior strong to save.

And on all the full mysterious meaning of that agony and bloody sweat it would be impossible now to dwell, but may we not for a short time dwell with profit--may not every one whose heart--being free from the fever of passion, and unfretted by the pettiness of pride--is calm and meek and reverent enough to listen to the messages of God, even be they spoken by the feeblest of human lips,--may we not all, I say, learn something from this fragment of that thrilling story that--"being in an agony, He prayed"?

"The chosen three, on mountain height, While Jesus bowed in prayer, Beheld His vesture glow with light, His face shine wondrous fair."

To every one of us, I suppose, sooner or later the Gethsemane of life must come. It may be the Gethsemane of struggle, and poverty and care;--it may be the Gethsemane of long and weary sickness;--it may be the Gethsemane of farewells that wring the heart by the deathbeds of those we love;--it may be the Gethsemane of remorse, and of well-nigh despair, for sins that we will not--but which we say we cannot--overcome. Well, my dearest sister, in that Gethsemane--aye, even in that Gethsemane of sin--no angel merely,--but Christ Himself who bore the burden of our sins,--will, if we seek Him, come to comfort us. He will, if being in agony, we pray. He can be touched, He is touched, with the feeling of our infirmities. He, too, has trodden the winepress of agony alone; He, too, has lain face downwards in the night upon the ground; and the comfort which then came to Him He has bequeathed to us--even the comfort, the help, the peace, the recovery, the light, the hope, the faith, the sustaining arm, the healing anodyne of prayer. It is indeed a natural comfort--and one to which the Christian at least flies instinctively. When the water-floods drown us,--when all God's waves and storms seem to be beating over our souls,--when "Calamity comes like a deluge, and o'erfloods our crimes till sin is hidden in sorrow"--oh, then, if we have not wholly quenched all spiritual life within us, what can we do but fling ourselves at the foot of those great altar stairs that slope through darkness to God? Yes, being in an agony, we pray; and the talisman against every agony is there.

And herein lies the great mercy and love of God, that we may go to Him in our agony even if we have never gone before. Oh, if prayer were possible only for the always good and always true, possible only for those who have never forsaken or forgotten God,--if it were not possible for sinners and penitents and those who have gone astray,--then of how infinitely less significance would it be for sinful and fallen man! But our God is a God of Love, a God of Mercy. He is very good to us. The soul may come bitter and disappointed, with nothing left to offer Him but the dregs of a misspent life;--the soul may come, like that sad Prodigal, weary and broken, and shivering, and in rags; but if it only come--the merciful door is open still, and while yet we are a great way off our Father will meet and forgive and comfort us. And then what a change is there in our lives! They are weak no longer; they are discontented no longer; they are the slaves of sin no longer. You have seen the heavens gray with dull and leaden-colored clouds, you have seen the earth chilly and comfortless under its drifts of unmelting snow: but let the sun shine, and then how rapidly does the sky resume its radiant blue, and the fields laugh with green grass and vernal flower! So will it be with even a withered and a wasted life when we return to God and suffer Him to send His bright beams of light upon our heart. I do not mean that the pain or misery under which we are suffering will necessarily be removed,--even for Christ it was not so; but peace will come and strength will come and resignation will come and hope will come,--and we shall feel able to bear anything which God shall send, and though He slays us we still shall seek Him, and even if the blackest cloud of anguish seem to shroud His face from us, even on that cloud shall the rainbow shine.

You do not think, my sister, that because God never rejects the prayer of sinner or sufferer, that therefore we may go on sinning, trusting to repent when we suffer. That would be a shameful abuse of God's mercy and tenderness; it would be a frame of mind which would need this solemn warning, that agony by no means always leads to prayer; that it may come when prayer is possible no longer to the long-hardened and long-prayerless soul. I know no hope so senseless, so utterly frustrated by all experience, as the hope of what is called deathbed repentance. Those who are familiar with many deathbeds will tell you why. But prayer--God's blessed permission to us, to see Him and to know Him, and to trust in Him--_that_ is granted us not for the hours of death or agony alone, but for all life, almost from the very cradle quite to the very grave. And it is a gift no less priceless for its alleviation of sorrow than for its intensification of all innocent joy. For him who would live a true life it is as necessary in prosperity as in adversity,--in peace as in trouble,--in youth as in old age. Here, too, Christ is our example. He lived, as we may live, in the light of His Father's face. It was not only as the Man of Sorrows, it was not only in the moonlit garden of His agony, or on the darkening hills of His incessant toil, that prayer had refreshed His soul; but often during those long unknown years in the little Galilean village,--daily, and from childhood upwards, in sweet hours of peace, kneeling amid the mountain lilies or on the cottage floor. Those prayers are to the soul what the dew of God is to the flowers of the field; the burning wind of the day may pass over them, and the stems droop and the colors fade, but when the dew steals down at evening, they will revive. Why should not that gracious dew fall even now and always for all of us upon the fields of life? A life which has been from the first a life of prayer,--a life which has thus from its earliest days looked up consciously to its Father and its God,--will always be a happy life. Time may fleet, and youth may fade,--as they will, and there may be storm as well as sunshine in the earthly career; yet it will inevitably be a happy career, and with a happiness that cannot die. Yes, this is the lesson which I would that we all might learn from the thought of Christ in the garden of Gethsemane;--the lesson that Prayer may recall the sunshine even to the dark and the frozen heart; but that there is no long winter, there is no unbroken night, to that soul on which the Sun of Righteousness has risen with healing in His wings.

And that because true prayer is always heard. We read in the glorious old Greek poet of prayers which, before they reached the portals of heaven were scattered by the winds; and indeed there are some prayers so deeply opposed to the will of God, so utterly alien to the true interests of men, that nothing could happen better for us than that God should refuse, nothing more terrible than that He should grant them in anger. So that if we pray for any earthly blessing we may pray for it solely "if it be God's will"; "if it be for our highest good," but, for all the best things we may pray without misgiving, without reservation, certain that if we ask God will grant them. Nay, even in asking for them we may know that we have them,--for what we desire to ask, and what we ask, we aim at, and what we aim at we shall attain. No man ever yet asked to be, as the days pass by, more noble, and sweet, and pure, and heavenly-minded,--no man ever yet prayed that the evil spirits of hatred, and pride, and passion, and worldliness, might be cast out of his soul,--without his petition being granted, and granted to the letter. And with all other gifts God then gives us His own self besides,--He makes us know Him, and love Him, and live in Him. "Thou hast written well of me," said the Vision to the great teacher of Aquinum, "what reward dost thou desire?" "Non aliam, nisi te Domine"--"no other than Thyself, O Lord," was the meek and rapt reply. And when all our restless, fretful, discontented longings are reduced to this alone, the desire to see God's face;--when we have none in Heaven but Him, and none upon earth whom we desire in comparison of Him;--then we are indeed happy beyond the reach of any evil thing, for then we have but one absorbing wish, and that wish cannot be refused. Least of all can it be refused when it has pleased God to afflict us.

"Ye now have sorrow," said Christ, "but I will see you again, and your heart shall rejoice, and your joy no man taketh from you." Yes, when God's children pass under the shadows of the Cross of Calvary they know that through that shadow lies their passage to the Great White Throne. For them Gethsemane is as Paradise. God fills it with sacred presences; its solemn silence is broken by the music of tender promises; its awful darkness softened and brightened by the sunlight of heavenly faces, and the music of angel wings.

"I am baptized into thy name, O Father, Son, and Holy Ghost! Among thy seed a place I claim, Among thy consecrated host; Buried with Christ and dead to sin, Thy Spirit now shall live within."

"And we have seen and do testify that the Father sent the Son to be the Savior of the world."

Your Brother in Christ,

L. J.

DIRECTORY OF PENITENTIARIES, STATE REFORM SCHOOLS, STATE INDUSTRIAL REFORMATORIES, ETC., OF THE UNITED STATES AND CANADA.

UNITED STATES PRISONS.

United States Penitentiary, Fort Leavenworth, Kansas.

United States Penitentiary, Atlanta, Georgia.

United States Penitentiary, McNeil Island, Washington.

United States jails in the Indian Territory: Vinita, Muskogee, South McAlester and Ardmore.

United States Jail, Fort Smith, Arkansas.

United States Jail, Guthrie, Oklahoma.

DISTRICT OF COLUMBIA.--District Jail, Reform School, and Reform School for Girls, Washington.

There are several small United States jails in Alaska and within the States occupying rented quarters.

STATE INSTITUTIONS.

ALABAMA.--Penitentiary, Wetumpka; two prisons at Pratt Mines. Boys' Industrial School, East Lake.

ARIZONA.--Territorial Prison, Yuma.

ARKANSAS.--Penitentiary, Little Rock.

CALIFORNIA.--Prisons, Folsom and San Quentin. State Schools, Whittier and Ione.

COLORADO.--Penitentiary, Canon City. Reformatory, Buena Vista. Reform School for Girls, Denver. Industrial School for Girls, Morrison. Industrial School for Boys, Golden.

CONNECTICUT.--Prison, Weathersfield. Reform School, Meridan. Industrial School for Girls, Middletown.

DELAWARE.--Ferris Industrial School and Industrial School for Girls, Wilmington.

FLORIDA.--Stockade Camps (13 in 1900). Prisoners farmed out, mining phosphate. Reform School, Marianna.

GEORGIA.--Woman's Prison, Milledgville. Stockades at mines and farms; prisoners leased.

IDAHO.--Penitentiary, Boise City.

ILLINOIS.--Penitentiaries, Joliet, Chester. Reformatory, Pontiac. Industrial School for Girls, South Evanston. Home for Female Offenders, Geneva. Erring Woman's Refuge, Chicago.

INDIANA.--Prisons, Jeffersonville, Michigan City. Woman's Prison, and Reform School for Girls, Indianapolis. Reform School for Boys, Plainfield.

IOWA.--Penitentiaries, Fort Madison, Animosa. Industrial Schools: Boys, Eldora; Girls, Mitchelville.

KANSAS.--Penitentiary, Lansing. Reform School, Topeka. Industrial Reformatory, Hutchinson. Industrial School for Girls, Beloit.

KENTUCKY.--Penitentiaries, Frankfort, Eddyville. Reform School, Lexington. Industrial School of Reform, Louisville.

LOUISIANA.--Penitentiary, Baton Rouge. Boys' House of Refuge, New Orleans.

MAINE.--Prison, Thomaston. Reform School, South Portland. Industrial School for Girls, Hallowell.

MARYLAND.--Penitentiary, Baltimore. House of Refuge for Boys, Female House of Refuge, and St. Mary's Industrial School, Baltimore. Industrial Home for Colored Girls, Melvale. House of Reformation for Colored Boys, Cheltenham.

MASSACHUSETTS.--Prison, Charlestown. Reformatory, Concord. Reformatory Prison for Women, Sherborn. Industrial School for Girls, Lancaster. Lyman School for Boys, Westboro. State Primary School, Monson.

MICHIGAN.--Prison, Jackson. Branch prison and House of Correction, Marquette. House of Correction and Reformatory, Ionia. Industrial School for Boys, Lansing. Industrial Home for Girls, Adrian.

MINNESOTA.--Prison, Stillwater. Reformatory (for 16 to 30 years old), St. Cloud. State Training School, Redwing.

MISSISSIPPI.--Penitentiary, Jackson. Farms.

MISSOURI.--Penitentiary, Jefferson City. Reform School for Boys, Boonville. Industrial Home for Girls, Chillicothe. House of Refuge, St. Louis.

MONTANA.--Prisons, Deer Lodge, Billings. Reform School, Miles City.

NEBRASKA.--Penitentiary, Lincoln. Industrial School for Boys, Kearney. Industrial School for Girls, Geneva.

NEVADA.--Prison, Carson City.

NEW HAMPSHIRE.--Prison, Concord. Industrial School, Manchester.

NEW JERSEY.--Prison and Industrial School for Girls, Trenton. Reform School, Jamesburg.

NEW MEXICO.--Penitentiary, Santa Fe.

NEW YORK.--Prisons, Sing Sing, Auburn (also one for women). Reformatories, Elmira; Ellensville; Bedford. Institutions also at New York, Buffalo, Rochester, Syracuse, Hudson and Albion.

NORTH CAROLINA.--Penitentiary, Raleigh. Prisoners mostly on State Farms.

NORTH DAKOTA.--Penitentiary, Bismark.

OHIO.--Penitentiary, Columbus. Reformatory, Mansfield. Industrial School, Boys, Lancaster; Girls, Delaware. House of Refuge, Cincinnati.

OREGON.--Penitentiary, Reform School, Salem.

PENNSYLVANIA.--Penitentiaries, Philadelphia, Allegheny. Industrial Reformatory, Huntingdon. Reform School, Morganza. House of Correction, Philadelphia. House of Refuge, Glen Mills.

RHODE ISLAND.--Prison, Work House and House of Correction, Sockanosset. School for Boys, and Oaklawn School for Girls, Howard.

SOUTH CAROLINA.--Penitentiary, Columbia. State Farms.

SOUTH DAKOTA.--Penitentiary, Sioux Falls. Reform School, Plankinton.

TENNESSEE.--Penitentiaries, Nashville, Petros. Industrial School, Nashville.

TEXAS.--Penitentiaries, Huntsville, Rusk. House of Correction and Reformatory, Gatesville.

UTAH.--Penitentiary, Salt Lake City. Reform School, Ogden.

VERMONT.--Prison, Windsor. House of Correction, Rutland. Industrial School, Vergenes.

VIRGINIA.--Penitentiary, Richmond. Laurel Industrial School, Glen Allen.

WASHINGTON.--Penitentiary, Walla Walla. Reform School, Chehalis.

WEST VIRGINIA.--Penitentiary, Moundsville. Reform School for Boys, Pruntytown. Girls' Industrial School, Salem.

WISCONSIN.--Prison, Waupun. Reformatory, near Green Bay. Industrial School for Boys, Waukesha. For Girls and Boys, Milwaukee.

WYOMING.--Penitentiary, Rawlins.

PRISONS IN CANADA.

Penitentiaries or Prisons, Kingston, Toronto, St. Vincent de Paul, Dorchester, New Westminster, and Stony Mountain.

* * * * *

"_IT WILL STIR THE SOUL._"

A NEW AND WONDERFUL BOOK.

OLD-TIME RELIGION.

BY REV. S. B. SHAW.

* * * * *

Including an account of the Greatest Revivals since Pentecostal Days, and telling how to bring about an old time revival. Also recording many remarkable answers to prayer.

MAKE MONEY AND DO GOOD

By selling good books that the people want. The first edition of 10,000 copies of this new book is already selling rapidly and is doing great good. It will attract both saint and sinner. Some of the old time sermons that moved the multitudes toward God, like men slain in battle, until their cries seemed to rend the very heavens, are recorded in this book. The description of sin and depravity, of hell and the judgment, by such men as Edwards, Bunyan, Fletcher, Whitfield, Finney, Caughey, Finley, and many others, will waken the slumbering conscience and reveal the wrath of God against sin and this evil generation.

FROM TESTIMONIALS RECEIVED, WE SELECT A FEW.

=Michigan Presbyterian:= "A mine of gold. Thoroughly practical. Intensely interesting. It will stir the soul."

=The Way of Faith:= "In this timely book the author discusses 'Old Time Views of Sin and Depravity,' 'Old Time Conviction and Repentance,' 'Old Time Conversion,' and so on through ten chapters. Old time revivals are described and incidents related which are calculated to thrill the reader and beget a longing desire for the return of the Old Time Revival Power."

=Bishop N. Castle:= "It surely has the old time swing. It is rich in sentiment, thrilling, heart-inspiring. It certainly will have a large sale."

=The Free Methodist:= "An excellent compilation of facts in connection with old time revivals and contains much solid truth respecting old time repentance, conversion, and righteousness. The author quotes from 'Fletcher's Appeal,' Bunyan's 'Pilgrim's Progress,' James B. Finley, James Caughey, and other noted 'old time' writers and evangelists. The work is full of interest and can but do good. We bespeak for it a large sale."

=Religious Telescope:= "'The Old-Time Religion,' by S. B. SHAW, is a new book, which is a revelation of the awful corruption of sin and of the mighty transforming power of the grace of God. Other books by the same author have had a sale of nearly a HALF MILLION copies, and we consider this book fully equal, if not superior, to any of them."

320 PAGES, 5 BY 8 INCHES.

Price, per copy, post-paid: Cloth, $1.00; Paper, 35 cents.

Be early in the field. Secure a copy of the book. It will be all the outfit needed. Write us at once for terms to agents.

S. B. SHAW, Publisher,

212 West Chicago Avenue, CHICAGO, ILL.

RELIGIOUS BOOKS

THAT STIR THE SOUL

Books worth having. Books that record facts. Books that do good and permanent good. Books that reveal heaven and hell. Books that melt hearts to tears. Books that awaken conviction and WIN SOULS. Books that people love NEXT TO THEIR BIBLES. See list below.

HALF MILLION SOLD

ALL BOOKS ARE UNIFORM IN SIZE. 5 x 8 INCHES

=The Great Revival in Wales=, Shaw. Compiled, Concise, Complete. Includes full account of Great Revival in Ireland in 1859. In great demand 256 pages.

Cloth 75c Paper 25c

=Miracles in the Slums=, Rees. Timely, True, Touching, Rightly named. 40 illustrations. Selling fast. 304 pages. Cloth $1.00

=Spiritual Flashlights=, Perry. New, Neat, Nothing like it. Selected from hundreds of writers. 153 topics. Alphabetically arranged. 408 pages. Cloth $1.00

=Old Time Religion=, Shaw. Primitive, Pathetic, Powerful. Contains accounts of greatest revivals since Pentecost. Stirs hearts, wins souls, and will help to bring about an old time revival. 288 pages.

Cloth $1.00 paper 35c

=Wayside Sketches=, Cooke. Bright, Bracing, Biographical. 28 illustrations. 382 pages. Cloth $1.00

=Touching Incidents and Remarkable Answers to Prayer=, Shaw. Attractive, Absorbing, Authentic. 300,000 sold. 320 pages.

Cloth $1.00 Paper 35c

=Children's Edition of Touching Incidents=, Shaw. 42 illustrations. 128 pages. 125,000 sold.

Cloth 60c Board 35c

=Dying Testimonies of Saved and Un-Saved=, Shaw. True, Thrilling, Triumphant. 160,000 sold. 320 pages.

Cloth $1.00 Paper 35c

=The Men Behind the Bars=, Sanders. Interesting, Instructive, Illustrated. 320 pages. Cloth $1.00

=God's Financial Plan=, Shaw. Searching, Scriptural, Spiritual. Largest sale of any book of its theme ever published. 320 pages.

Cloth $1.00 Paper 35c

=Traits of Character=, Kletzing. Elevating, Entertaining, Excellent. 180 illustrations. Cloth $1.00

Any =FOUR= of the above books sent POST PAID to one address,

Cloth $3.00 Paper $1.10

Any THREE of the above books sent =POST PAID= to one address,

Cloth $2.50 Paper 90c

ONE THOUSAND AGENTS WANTED

WRITE FOR TERMS AND LARGE ILLUSTRATED CATALOGUE

Address, S. B. SHAW, Publisher,

212-214 W. Chicago Avenue, CHICAGO, ILLINOIS.

* * * * *

Transcriber's note:

Page xviii: In the table of contents for CHAPTER XI., the transcriber has changed the incorrect page number 88 to 87.

Page xix: In the table of contents the words "CHAPTER XVIII" are missing and have been added by the transcriber.

Page 169: "who was chosen of God as the agent". The transcriber has inserted the word "as" where a blank space occurred.

Text enclosed by underscores is in italics (_italics_).

Text enclosed by equal signs is in bold face (=bold=).

Small capital text has been replaced with all capitals.

Variations in spelling, punctuation and hyphenation have been retained except in obvious cases of typographical error.