Part 10

Hour by hour, with skillful pencil, wrought the artist, sad and lone, Day by day, he labored nobly, though to all the world unknown; He was brave, the youthful artist, but his soul grew weak and faint, As he strove to place before him, the fair features of a saint; Worn and weary, he strove vainly, for the touch of Heavenly grace, Till, one day, a radiant sunbeam fell upon the up-turned face, And the very air was flooded with a presence strangely sweet, For the soul, within the sunbeam, seemed to make the work complete; Swift as thought the artist's pencil deftly touched the features fair, Night came down, but one bright sunbeam left its soul imprisoned there; And around his dingy garret gazed the artist, wondering, For the work sublime illumed it like the palace of a king; And within the artist nature flamed his first fond love divine, Which bewildered all his senses, as with rare, old, ruby wine. Yearningly, he cried: "I love thee," to the radiant saintly face, But the never-ceasing answer was a look of Heavenly grace. Out into the world he wandered, questioning, searching everywhere, And the stars above, full often, heard his soul burst forth in prayer: "God in Heaven, in mercy, hear me! Hear thy suppliant's pleading cry, Lead, oh lead! my footsteps to her. Grant but this, or let me die." Friends forsook and want pursued him, still he struggled on alone, Till, at last, outworn and trembling, reason tottered on its throne, And he seemed the helpless plaything of some mad, relentless fate, Till the Sisterhood of Mercy found him lying at their gate; Made him welcome, gave him shelter and with ever-patient care Bathed his brow and brushed the tangled, matted tresses of his hair. Long he lingered on the borders of the holy-land of death, One fair Sister, by his bedside, counting low each fluttering breath. Softly fell the evening shadows, shutting out the golden glow, Of a gorgeous, lingering sunset, gilding all the earth below, When, upon his pillow turning, swift came to him hope's bright gleams, For the anxious face above him was the loved one of his dreams. But her life was one of mercy, and the band across her brow, Gave the spotless testimony of a maiden's holy vow. "Is this Heaven? Are you an angel?" swift he questioned her, the while She smoothed back his wavy tresses, only answering with a smile; "Tell me truly, couldst thou love me, since thou wouldst not let me die?" But she pointed to the band about her brow and breathed a sigh. In her hours of patient watching, she had learned the bitter truth, That the Sisterhood of Mercy has its anguish and its ruth; Nevermore she came, well-knowing, from temptation se must fly, For his eager, tender questions in her heart had found reply. Every morning he would question: "Will she come to me to-day?" And the tender, truthful Sisters shook their heads and turned away, For adown his classic features passed the shadow of his pain, As he closed his eyes and murmured: "She will never come again." In his dreams, one night, he fancied she had bent above his bed, And his loving arms reached upward, but the vision sweet had fled. Hopeless, in his great heart-hunger, through a storm of wind and rain, To his picture turned the artist, bowing low with grief and pain; Open wide he threw the shutters of his garret casement high, Heeding not the vivid lightning, as it flashed athwart the sky. On his lowly couch reclining, soon in weariness he slept, While the storm clouds o'er him thundering, long and loud their vigils kept. Wilder grew the night and fiercer blew the winds, until at last, Like a bird of prey or demon, through the shattered casement, passed The old shutter, rending, tearing every wondrous touch and trace Of the artist's patient labor, from the radiant, saintly face; And the jagged bands of lightning, as they flashed along the floor, Lit the crushed and crumpled canvas, worthless now forevermore. And the artist, slowly rising, groped his way across the room, Feeling, knowing he had lost her, though enshrouded in the gloom. Then besought his couch and murmured: "It is well, God knoweth best." And the sunbeams of the morning found a weary soul--at rest.

A FRIEND OF THE FLY.

With a fly-screen under one arm and a bundle of sticky fly-paper under the other, an honest agent entered a grocery store one day in the summer and said: "Why don't you keep 'em out?"

"Who vash dot?" asked the grocery-man.

"Why, the pesky flies. You've got 'em by the thousand in here, and the fly season has only begun. Shall I put fly-screens in the doors?"

"What for?"

"To keep the flies out."

"Why should I keep der flies oudt? Flies like some shance to go aroundt und see der city de same ash agents. If a fly ish kept out on der street all der time he might ash vhell be a horse."

"Yes, but they are a great nuisance. I'll put you up a screen door there for three dollars."

"Not any for me. If a fly vhants to come in here, und he behaves himself in a respectable manner, I have notings to say. If he don't behave, I bounce him oudt pooty queek, und don't he forget her!"

"Well, try this fly-paper. Every sheet will catch five hundred flies."

"Who vhants to catch 'em?"

"I do--you--everybody."

"I don't see it like dot. If I put dot fly-paper on der counter somebody comes along und wipes his nose mit it, or somebody leans his elbow on her und vhalks off mit him. It would be shust like my boy Shake to come in und lick all der molasses off, to play a shoke on his fadder."

"Say, I'll put down a sheet, and if it doesn't catch twenty flies in five minutes I'll say no more."

"If you catch twenty flies I have to pry 'em loose mit a stick und let 'em go, und dot vhas too much work. No, my agent friendt; flies must have a shance to get along und take some comfort. I vhas poor once myself, und I know all about it."

"I'll give you seven sheets for ten cents."

"Oxactly, but I won't do it. It looks to me like shmall beesness for a big agent like you to go around mit some confidence games to shwindle flies. A fly vhas born to be a fly, und to come into my shtore ash often ash he likes. When he comes I shall treat him like a shentleman. I gif him a fair show. I don't keep an axe to knock him in der headt, und I don't put some molasses all oafer a sheet of paper und coax him to come und be all stuck up mit his feet till he can't fly away. You can pass along--I'm no such person like dot."

ANSWERED PRAYERS.

BY ELLA WHEELER WILCOX.

I prayed for riches, and achieved success,-- All that I touched turned into gold. Alas! My cares were greater, and my peace was less When that wish came to pass.

I prayed for glory; and I heard my name Sung by sweet children and by hoary men. But ah! the hurts, the hurts that come with fame! I was not happy then.

I prayed for love, and had my soul's desire; Through quivering heart and body and through brain There swept the flame of its devouring fire; And there the scars remain.

I prayed for a contented mind. At length Great light upon my darkened spirit burst. Great peace fell on me, also, and great strength. Oh! had that prayer been first!

GOD IN THE AMERICAN CONSTITUTION.

BY T. DE WITT TALMAGE.

Not only because of the kindness of God to this nation in the past should such a reverential insertion be made, but because of the fact that we are going to want Divine interposition still further in our national history. This gold and silver question will never be settled until God settles it. This question of tariff and free trade will never be settled until God settles it. This question between the East and the West, which is getting hotter and hotter, and looks toward a Republic of the Pacific, will not be settled until God settles it. We needed God in the one hundred and twenty years of our past national life, and we will need Him still more in the next one hundred and twenty years. Lift up your heads, ye everlasting gates of our glorious Constitution, and let the King of Glory come in! Make one line of that immortal document radiant with Omnipotence! Spell at least one word with Thrones! At the beginning, or at the close, or in the centre, recognize Him from whom as a nation we have received all the blessing of the past and upon whom we are dependent for the future. Print that one word "God," or "Lord," or "Eternal Father," or "Ruler of Nations," somewhere between the first word and the last. The Great Expounder of the Constitution sleeps at Marshfield, Massachusetts, the Atlantic Ocean still humming near his pillow of dust its prolonged lullaby; but is there not some one now living, who, in the white marble palace of the nation on yonder hill, not ten minutes away, will become the Irradiator of the Constitution by causing to be added the most tremendous word of our English vocabulary, the name of that Being before whom all nations must bow or go into defeat and annihilation,--"God?"

THE ENCHANTED SHIRT.

BY JOHN HAY.

The king was sick. His cheek was red, And his eye was clear and bright; He ate and drank with a kingly zest, And peacefully snored at night.

But he said he was sick--and a king should know; And doctors came by the score; They did not cure him. He cut off their heads, And sent to the schools for more.

At last two famous doctors came, And one was poor as a rat; He had passed his life in studious toil And never found time to grow fat.

The other had never looked in a book; His patients gave him no trouble; If they recovered, they paid him well, If they died, their heirs paid double.

Together they looked at the royal tongue, As the king on his couch reclined; In succession they thumped his august chest, But no trace of disease could find.

The old sage said, "You're as sound as a nut." "Hang him up!" roared the king, in a gale, In a ten-knot gale of royal range; The other grew a shadow pale;

But he pensively rubbed his sagacious nose, And thus his prescription ran: "The king will be well if he sleeps one night In the shirt of a happy man."

Wide o'er the realm the couriers rode, And fast their horses ran, And many they saw, and to many they spake, But they found no happy man.

They found poor men who would fain be rich, And rich who thought they were poor; And men who twisted their waists in stays, And women that short hose wore.

They saw two men by the roadside sit, And both bemoaned their lot; For one had buried his wife he said, And the other one had not.

At last they came to a village gate; A beggar lay whistling there; He whistled and sang and laughed, and rolled On the grass in the soft June air.

The weary couriers paused and looked At the scamp so blithe and gay, And one of them said, "Heaven save you, friend, Yon seem to be happy to-day."

"Oh yes, fair sirs," the rascal laughed, And his voice rang free and glad; "An idle man has so much to do That he never has time to be sad."

"This is our man," the courier said, "Our luck has led us aright. I will give you a hundred ducats, friend, For the loan of your shirt to-night."

The merry blackguard lay back on the grass And laughed till his face was black; "I would do it, God wot," and he roared with fun, "But I haven't a shirt to my back."

Each day to the king the reports came in Of his unsuccessful spies, And the sad panorama of human woes Passed daily under his eyes.

And he grew ashamed of his useless life, And his maladies hatched in gloom; He opened the windows, and let in the air Of the free heaven into his room;

And out he went in the world, and toiled In his own appointed way, And the people blessed him, the land was glad, And the king was well and gay.

PRAYING FOR PAPA.

A man who had been walking for some time in the downward path, came out of his house and started down town for a night of carousal with some old companions he had promised to meet. His young wife had besought him with imploring eyes to spend the evening with her, and had reminded him of the time when evenings passed in her company were all too short. His little daughter had clung about his knees and coaxed in her pretty, wilful way for "papa" to tell her some bedtime stories, but habit was stronger than love for wife and child, and he eluded their tender questioning by the special sophistries the father of evil advances at such times from his credit fund, and went his way.

But when he was a few blocks distant from his home, he found that in changing his coat he had forgotten to remove his wallet, and he could not go out on a drinking bout without money, even though he knew his family needed it, and his wife was economizing every day more and more in order to make up his deficits, and he hurried back and crept softly past the windows of the little house, in order that he might steal in and obtain it without running the gauntlet of either questions or caresses.

But something stayed his feet; there was a fire in the grate within--for the night was chilly--and it lit up the little parlor and brought out in startling effects the pictures on the wall. But these were as nothing to the pictures on the hearth. There, in the soft glow of the fire-light knelt his child at the mother's feet, its small hands clasped in prayer, its fair head bowed; and as its rosy lips whispered each word with distinctness, the father listened, spell-bound to the spot:

"Now I lay me down to sleep, I pray the Lord my soul to keep; If I should die before I wake, I pray the Lord my soul to take."

Sweet petition! The man himself, who stood there with bearded lips shut tightly together, had said that prayer once at his mother's knee. Where was that mother now? The sunset gates had long ago unbarred to let her through. But the child had not finished; he heard her say "God bless mamma, papa, and my ownself"--and there was a pause, and she lifted her troubled blue eyes to her mother's face.

"God bless papa," prompted the mother, softly.

"God bless papa," lisped the little one.

"And--please send papa home sober"--he could not hear the mother as she said this, but the child followed in a clear, inspired tone:

"God--bless--papa--and--please--send--him--home--sober. Amen."

Mother and child sprang to their feet in alarm when the door opened so suddenly, but they were not afraid when they saw who it was, returned so soon. That night, when little Mamie was being tucked up in bed after such a romp with papa, she said in the sleepiest and most contented of voices:

"Mamma, God answers most as quick as the telegraph, doesn't he?"

BECALMED.

BY SAMUEL, K. COWAN.

It was as calm as calm could be; A death-still night in June; A silver sail on a silver sea, Under a silver moon.

Not the least low air the still sea stirred; But all on the dreaming deep The white ship lay, like a white sea-bird, With folded wings, asleep.

For a long, long month, not a breath of air; For a month, not a drop of rain; And the gaunt crew watched in wild despair, With a fever in throat and brain.

And they saw the shore, like a dim cloud, stand On the far horizon-sea; It was only a day's short sail to the land, And the haven where they would be.

Too faint to row--no signal brought An answer, far or nigh. Father, have mercy; leave them not Alone, on the deep, to die.

And the gaunt crew prayed on the decks above; And the women prayed below: "One drop of rain, for Heaven's great love! Oh, Heaven, for a breeze to blow!"

But never a shower from the cloud would burst, And never a breeze would come: O God, to think that man can thirst And starve in sight of home!

But out to sea with the drifting tide The vessel drifted away-- Till the far-off shore, like the dim cloud, died; And the wild crew ceased to pray!

Like fiends they glared, with their eyes aglow; Like beasts with hunger wild: But a mother prayed, in the cabin below, By the bed of her little child.

It slept, and lo! in its sleep it smiled,-- A babe of summers three: "O Father, save my little child, Whatever comes to me!"

Calm gleamed the sea, calm gleamed the sky, No cloud--no sail in view; And they cast them lots, for who should die To feed the starving crew!

Like beasts they glared, with hunger wild, And their red-glazed eyes aglow, And the death-lot fell on the little child That slept in the cabin below!

And the mother shrieked in wild despair: "O God, my child--my son. They will take his life, it is hard to bear; Yet, Father, Thy will be done."

And she waked the child from its happy sleep, And she kneeled by the cradle bed; "We thirst, my child, on the lonely deep; We are dying, my child, for bread.

"On the lone, lone sea no sail--no breeze; Not a drop of rain in the sky; We thirst--we starve--on the lonely seas; And thou, my child, must die!"

She wept: what tears her wild soul shed Not I, but Heaven knows best. And the child rose up from its cradle bed, And crossed its hands on its breast:

"Father," he lisped, "so good, so kind, Have pity on mother's pain: For mother's sake, a little wind; Father, a little rain!"

And she heard them shout for the child from the deck, And she knelt on the cabin stairs: "The child!" they cry, "the child--stand back-- And a curse on your idiot prayers!"

And the mother rose in her wild despair, And she bared her throat to the knife: "Strike--strike me--me; but spare, oh, spare My child, my dear son's life!"

O God, it was a ghastly sight,-- Red eyes, like flaming brands, And a hundred belt-knives flashing bright In the clutch of skeleton hands!

"Me--me--strike--strike, ye fiends of death!" But soft--through the ghastly air Whose falling tear was that? whose breath Waves through the mother's hair?

A flutter of sail--a ripple of seas-- A speck on the cabin pane; O God; it's a breeze--a breeze-- And a drop of blessed rain!

And the mother rushed to the cabin below, And she wept on the babe's bright hair. "The sweet rain falls the sweet winds blow; Father has heard thy prayer!"

Bu the child had fallen asleep again, And lo! in its sleep it smiled. "Thank God," she cried, "for His wind and His rain! Thank God, for my little child!"

IN THE BOTTOM DRAWER.

I saw wife pull out the bottom drawer of the old family bureau this evening, and went softly out, and wandered up and down, until I knew that she had shut it up and gone to her sewing. We have some things laid away in that drawer which the gold of kings could not buy, and yet they are relics which grieve us until both our hearts are sore. I haven't dared look at them for a year, but I remember each article.

There are two worn shoes, a little chip hat with part of the brim gone, some stockings, pants, a coat, two or three spools, bits of broken crockery, a whip and several toys. Wife--poor thing--goes to that drawer every day of her life, and prays over it, and lets her tears fall upon the precious articles; but I dare not go.

Sometimes we speak of little Jack, but not often. It has been a long time, but somehow we can't get over grieving. He was such a burst of sunshine into our lives that his going away has been like covering our every-day existence with a pall. Sometimes, when we sit alone of an evening, I writing and she sewing, a child on the street will call out as our boy used to, and we will both start up with beating hearts and a wild hope, only to find the darkness more of a burden than ever.

It is so still and quiet now. I look up at the window where his blue eyes used to sparkle at my coming, but he is not there. I listen for his pattering feet, his merry shout, and his ringing laugh; but there is no sound. There is no one to climb over my knees, no one to search my pockets and tease for presents: and I never find the chairs turned over, the broom down, or ropes tied to the door-knobs.

I want some one to tease me for my knife; to ride on my shoulder; to lose my axe; to follow me to the gate when I go, and be there to meet me when I come; to call "good-night" from the little bed, now empty. And wife, she misses him still more; there are no little feet to wash, no prayers to say; no voice teasing for lumps of sugar, or sobbing with the pain of a hurt toe; and she would give her own life, almost, to awake at midnight, and look across to the crib and see our boy there as he used to be.

So we preserve our relics; and when we are dead we hope that strangers will handle them tenderly, even if they shed no tears over them.

EMULATION (UP TO DATE).

BY JAMES CLARENCE HARVEY.

"He who would thrive must rise at five," The old folks used to say, And so, of course, to thrive the more, Tis better still to rise at four, And make a longer day.

Still smarter he who wakes at three, And hurries out of bed; And he who would this man outdo Must rise when clocks are striking two, To earn his daily bread.

To rise and run at stroke of one, Advantage still may keep; But he who would them all forestall Must never go to bed at all, And die for lack of sleep.

DESTINY OF OUR COUNTRY.

BY R. C. WINTHROP.

Here, then, sir, I bring these remarks to a close. I have explained, to the best of my ability, the views which I entertain of the great questions of the day. Those views may be misrepresented hereafter, as they have been heretofore; but they cannot be misunderstood by any one who desires, or who is even willing, to understand them.

Most gladly would I have found myself agreeing more entirely with some of the friends whom I see around me, and with more than one of those elsewhere, with whom I have always been proud to be associated, and whose lead, on almost all occasions, I have rejoiced to follow.

Our tie, however, I am persuaded, still remains to us all--a common devotion to the Union of these States, and a common determination to sacrifice everything but principle to its preservation. Our responsibilities are indeed great. This vast republic, stretching from sea to sea, and rapidly outgrowing everything but our affections, looks anxiously to us, this day, to take care that it receives no detriment.

Nor is it too much to say, that the eyes and the hearts of the friends of constitutional freedom throughout the world are at this moment turned eagerly here,--more eagerly than ever before,--to behold an example of successful republican institutions, and to see them come out safely and triumphantly from the fiery trial to which they are now subjected!

I have the firmest faith that these eyes and these hearts will not be disappointed. I have the strongest belief that the visions and phantoms of disunion which now appall us will soon be remembered only like the clouds of some April morning, or "the dissolving views" of some evening spectacle.

I have the fullest conviction that this glorious republic is destined to outlast all, all, at either end of the Union, who may be plotting against its peace, or predicting its downfall.