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April 14, 1909. THE PRESBYTERIA
concern themselves for the protection of one man or for
the help of another, many of the Chinese soldiers took
aim not at the marines who defended the walls, but at
the spirits that were hovering above, and fired their bullets
into the air, where they could harm no one at all.
This continued for days.
Did the Chinese use no special devices to drive this
little band out of their defences? Yes, they tried to
use fire. Just to the north of the British legation, where
the refugees were gathered, was the famous Han-lin
library, the richest collection of literature in the world.
In it was a cyclopedia of 360,000,000 words that far
excels anything in Christian lands. The library was
simply a priceless treasure. But these hated foreigners
must be destroyed; and when the wind blew a gale
from the north the Chinese set fire to their own precious
library in order to roast out the foreigners. It was
indeed a most serious moment. The heat was intense
and growing more intense. All the able-bodied among
the besieged turned out to fight the flames; the others
betook themselves to prayer. Their prayer was answered.
Soon the wind changed from north to south,
and blew the flames over upon the Chinese houses. And
no longer did the windows of the library remain as a
_ 1 _ - ?
piacc wnere enemies might hide and shoot down the
defenders.
But how about the native Chinese? Were they not
a burden? Nay, they were among the most useful of
the defenders. For the soldiers were too few to guard
the walls and also to build the barricades of sandbags.
But the native Christians filled the bags and bravely
put them in their places, thus giving a most valuable
help.
Was the air nlled with groanings on account of the
privations of the siege? Nay. We have read of utterances
of thankfulness which fell from the lips of those
who were in such discomfort. With the thermometer
<n ninety-nine and the windows stuffed with sandbags,
with perhaps forty people sleeping and eating in one
room, and with only a limited amount of horseflesh to
eat. yet as family after family sat down to eat, the
voice of thankfulness to God was heard with a tenderness
which is beyond expression.
Finally the last of the horseflesh was gone. Unknown
to the besieged the enemy had been hard at
work digging a mine under the main building of the
British legation. The mine was completed, and the
kegs of powder were in place, when the cannon of the
troops that had marched up from Tien Tsin to relieve
the ambassadors were heard thundering ae the gates of
Pekin. Those who had been trying to destroy the
Christians hastened, of course, to the defence of their
city walls, onlv to meet with
^ v.vivui. i iic v^nnstians
were delivered.
* It was not without sufferinrg. Sixty of the marines
were killed and 140 were wounded. But the ambassadors
and the Christians were delivered. And a lesson
was given to the Chinese which will serve for the protection
of Christians in that land for generations. Since
that day the work of the Gospel has been greatly promoted.
T. E. C.
\
lN OF THE SOUTH. II
Devotional and Selections
% DO NOT FRET..
Let us not live fretful lives. God will never stretch
the line of our duty beyond the measure of our strength.
We ought to live with the grace of flowers, with
the joy of birds, with the freedom of wind and wave.
Without question this is God's ideal of human life. We
are expected to do no more than we can do with the
time granted us, with the tools, the materials, nnrl
opportunity at our disposal. We serve no Egyptian
taskmaster who watches to double the tale of bricks,
but a generous Lord who waits to make our duty our
delight.
"If our love were but more simple,
We should take Him at His word,
And our lives would be all sunshine
In the sweetness of the Lord."
?William L. Watkinson.
A PRAYING CHURCH.
A prosperous church is a church which prays. It is
written, "My house shall be called a house of prayer."
We must never lose faith in prayer. We rmi?t
abandon prayer. We must never lose the spirit of
prayer. A church can get on for a considerable time
without singing, and can go on indefinitely with indifferent
singing. A church may do well with poor
preaching, and even without preaching of any kind.
But a church without prayer is no church at all. We
might as well expect a man to live without breathing
as to expect a church to live without praying. Pray
for the minister. Pray for the sick and afflicted. Pray
for the children. Pray for the lost. Pray for the community.
Pray for one another. Pray ye the Lord of
the harvest that he may send forth laborer* intr*
harvest. Pray without ceasing. Pray everywhere. Let
the church be characterized by prayer, filled with the
atmosphere of prayer, and crowded with the trophies
of prayer.
THE GETHSEMANE OF LIFE.
For every one of us, 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 wellnigh despair for sins that we will not, but which
we say can not be overcome. Well, my brethren, in
that Gethsemane?aye, even in that Gethsemane of sin
?no angel merely, but Christ Himself, who bore the
burdens of our sins, will, if we seek Him, come to com
tort us. He will, if, being in agony, we pray. He can
be touched, lie is touched, with the feeling of our infirmities.
He, too, has trodden the winepress of agony
alone; he, too, has lain face downward 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 of hope, the faith,
the sustaining arm, the healing anodyne of prayer.?
Dean Farrar.