Newspaper Page Text
6 ( 844) a a.
<
Our Boys
?
|f NOW I LAY ME DOWN TO SLEEP.
Day was done, and I was sitting
Dreaming in the fading light
When I heard a soft voice tell me:
"Mamma, me is tired to-night;
Me is tired of all day playin'?
Put my soldiers all away;
Tell the pussy 'at me's sleepy
But to-morrow me will play."
id
On my lap he climbed and nestled,
Lay his head upon my breast,
Said he loved his small, gray pussy
But he loved his mamma best.
Then I sang a bylo-baby,
Gave him to the Angels' keep
And he went to dreamland saying,
"Now I lay me down to sleep."
I "Now I lay me down to sleep,"
Said the baby on my knee;
"Pray the Lord my soul to keep,"
He repeated after me;
"Should I die before I wake,"
Little eyes were closing fast,
"Pray the Lord my soul to take,"
Said the little boy at last.
Just a week and I was kneeling,
Stricken, in the fading light
When I heard a faint voice whisper:
"Mamma, me is tired to-night;
Me is tired of all day sleepin'
An' me wants a little play;
Bring my soldiers an' the pussy?
Don't you let her run away."
]-:
On the bed I lined the soldiers,
Pussy marching at their head,
But?"Tate 'em down until to-morrow,
Me's too tired to-night," he said.
Then I clasped my one loved darling,
Watched the shadows slowly creep,
And I felt the hot tears blind me
As he laid him down to sleep.
"Now I lay me down to sleep,"
Said the baby on my breast;
"Pray the Lord my soul to keep,"
As he slowly sank to rest;
"Should I die before I wake,"
Little eyes were closing fast,
"Pray the Lord my soul to take,"
Faltered little lips at last.
On the hearth through many years,
Staunch and steadfast for my sake,
Soldiers still await the morning
When their captain shall awake.
Pussy, old and blind and lame,
Sits beside me while I weep
For the little boy who said:
"Now I lay me down to sleep."
?Kathren Dangerfield, in Our Dumb Animals.
Many secular and half-religious organizations
make it a part of their stock in trade to disparage
the church and ita work, but it is noticeable
that they always call on the church to help them
push their enterprises or reforms. Movements
are invented to "get a move on" the church,
and then the church is appealed to to "get
under" the movement! The process sometimes
grows very tiresome to tihe people of the church.
9 ^
prebbyteeian of IEE ft <
c*nd Girls
i i
i >
BERNICE'S BUSINESS.
J
HOPE DARING.
"My! hut I'm hungry? Anything I can do
to help you, Bernice?"
"Yes, you can fill the water pitcher, and
bring a can of peach pfckles that you will
find on the cellar table. I am hurrying dinner
as fast as I can."
Kenneth Merdith laughed. "Now don't get
cross, sister. I wonder if your eagerness to
get the dinner yourself wasn't prompted by
a desire to escape Cousin 'Manda's tongue.
We all try to do that, but it's hard on the
little mother."
Bernice frowned as Kenneth turned away
to fill the water pitcher. The Merdiths had
returned home from church an hour before, accompanied
by a distant widowed relative who
was known as " Cousin'Manda." Bernice had
insisted on preparing the dinner alone, thus
leaving her mother to entertain the guest.
The girl carried in to the sideboard the dessert
of canned peaches and cream to be served
with sponge cake. As she stepped back, noting
the pretty effect of the yellow fruit and
cake against the low-growing asparagus fern,
from the adjoining sitting room came Cousin
'Manda's strident voice:
"A business course! For land sakes! You
don't mean to tell me, Jennie Merdith, that you
air goin' to let Bernice, your only girl, go to
the citv and fool 'wav that three hundred dol
lars her aunt give her fur her name, a-tryin'
to do business!"
"You do not understand, 'Manda," Mrs.
Merdith said, gently. "Bernice hopes to fit
herself for office work by taking a business?"
"Wall, I understand 'nough 'bout it. If
Bernice would look right out of this here window,
she'd see her business plain as day afore
her face. Who's to do it if she don'tt I declare,
Jennie "
"0 Bernice! Something's burning!" Kenneth
called from the kitchen, and the girl ran
out, just in time to save the chicken that was
frying, from destruction
Ten minutes later they were at the table.
There were three Merdith boys?James, who
had just attained bis majority and entered
the grist mill where his father was carrying
on the business of his own father and grandfather,
and Kenneth and Guy, who were younger
than their sister, and still in the village
school. Bernice had graduated from this school
the summer before. During the dinner hour
Cousin 'Manda proceeded to put James and his
father through a long list of questions con
cerning the mill. When all her questions had
been answered or skillfully evaded, the widow
shook her head.
"You'll land in the poorhouse, Cousin Thomas.
I've always said that new-fangled machinery
was a clean flyin' in the face of Providence.
Them ol' mill-stones as done duty in
your grandpa's day wasn't nigh wore ont, I
know."
Cousin 'Manda lingered until evening. She
insisted on wiping the dinner dishes, and,
while doing it, asked the price of the Haviland
cups and saucers. She asked Bernice to
play for her, and, when her request was granted,
declared that "the music of now is jest
jingle and rattle."
After the departure of the guest it chanced
that Bcrnice was alone in the sitting-room.
30TH [July 17, 1912
She stood at the great south window, looking
out. The Merdith house, a big, square, red
brick, surrounded by spacious grounds, stood
at the summit of a slight hilL The land
sloped down to the river, and on its bank stood
the brown, steep-roofed mill. On the other
side of the river lay the village. It was small,
but a railroad connected it with a city thirty
miles away, thus affording the Merdith mill excellent
shipping facilities. From where she
stood Bernice could see, in the failing light,
the schoolhouse where she had received her
education and the church she had always attended.
Further back stretched wide, mapleshaded
streets, where frost had already colored
the leaves with red and gold.
"What did Cousin 'Manda mean by saying
I could see mv business from this winrlnwrt"
Bernice asked herself. "I can see everything
I have ever had to do with. ' There's things
enough to do over in the village, but it's not
ray business to do them. It's a poky place,
and yet mother is beginning to worry about
Kenneth and Guy wanting to spend their
evenings there. I?I don't like that. When
T get to earning good wages I mean to see that
the boys have all the new books they want."
All the next day Bernice was unusually
quiet. It had been arranged that on Thursday
Mr. Merdith and his daughter should go
to the city to complete the arrangements for
Bernice's attendance at the business college.
Years before, the aunt for whom the girl had
been named had left her three hundred dollars.
This she was to use as she pleased, at
any ume arrer ner eighteenth birthday, and
she had elected to use it to fit herself for
office work. It was not until Tuesday afternoon,
when mother and daughter were at work
together in the kitchen getting supper, that
Bernice asked:
"Mother, how do you feel about this business
course 1 I do not mean what you are willing
I should do, but just how it looks to you."
"I shall be very lonely without yo*. The
boys will miss you, and the place you have
filled in the home will be empty. Then, when
you get to work, you may be filling the place
of some girl who needs to work for her bread."
"But, mother, a girl does not want to let her
life slip along, accomplishing nothing. She
wants "
"What Cousin 'Manda and men call business,"
and Mrs. Merdith smiled. "To learn
to keep house and to sew, to read and study
music, to be a good daughter and sister, to
help and inspire one's associates?all that may
not be business, but, dear, it is loving service."
No more was said on the subject. When
supper was over Bernice said:
"I am going to hurry with the dishes. Then
we will have one of our old-fashioned concerts.
James, you get your violin tuned while I am
at work."
"And I'll help with the dishes," Kenneth
cried, gayly.
Bernice played the piano, James the violin,
Kenneth the cornet, and Guy the flute. For an
hour they played vigorously. When they stopped
to rest, Bernice asked:
"James, why do you not give Rosalind Hubbard
lessons? You are the best violin player
in the village, and she is crazy to learn. Her
people cannot afford to pay for her lessons and
pay her car-fare to the city."
"Why, I never thought of it!" was James'
reply.
"She could come here one evening of each
week. Her brother Fred could come with her.
To play with us would help them both."
"But, if you go away, how are we to keep
on wUh these jolly evenings? Guy demanded.