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Woman's Work. T. L. MITCHELL, Publisher. Vol. 17—No. 9. For Woman’s Wonk i.’M) TOE MIMW KW6 ®F LDSHT. • . * mighty King of Light that sets ‘ 11 Tall minarets aflame, And fringes with a thousand jets ~..• . ’Wk. * Cloud-castles none can name, ’ .. Still stoops to paint the lily white, ’«&■ • *» Give buttercups their gold, And the forget me-nots delight nP* s%gjEF' --W® .. With hues in heaven unrolled. ‘ ’Mia Hung on the sky in loops of fire ♦ His pictures grandly gleam— a.. I'x Are nature’s heirlooms hour by hour, ~' \ TO w"*'’ ‘ On mount, and sea, and stream. The poor who have no lamp to burn Can glory in Sol’s rays; X. ■ -- He of dim vision still discern ' "TO.. ' ' ' '* K >ta£^' Its light, and give God praise. Vi-> - »-i>' .-. ? ''to""~' / The sun, the mighty King of Light, A *-’*L«<f* * ’<' '' '" ?V. ' That guides the flocks afield, ■r- ■ *That makes the morning grand! v bright, <♦ And earth its treasures yield! . .. '■ \ ' . The downcast and the lowly raise to i '«• '■»' " r . ■ •’. Their grateful eyes above, For gift,through all life’s changing days, Proof of our Father’s love! TO' TO' ■ George Bancroft Griffith. F<t Woman s Work. A MODERN ST. ©EeiLIA. UTT ISS CECILE CAYWOOD put on A VIA her wide-brimmed hat and trip ped through the fields in the soft sum mer afternoon until she reached the tiny vine-covered church where she was organist. She had a key to the church and would go there alone many evenings to prac tice new hymns. To-day, after her customary practice, she wished to try one of the Oratorios from “The Messiah.” She laid aside her hat and gloves and began to play. Soon she finished the hymns and started the Oratorio. Sweet ly solemn sounded forth the music; she seemed to speak out her heart in the organ tones. The western sun shot slanting rays through the window to fall over her. Her dress was of some soft white fabric, the sleeves falling loosely back from her beautifully modeled wrists and hands. Around her neck, suspend ed by a slender chain, she wore a jew eled cross, and with the sunlight falling like a halo upon her auburn hair she looked like a fair saint as she sat there playing. The music, sounding through the open windows, roused from slumber a man who had been lying under the shade of the chestnut trees in the churchyard. For a few minutes he lay and listened, blinking sleepily up at the sunbeams stealing through the leafy canopy over head. “Wonder if I was dreaming of music and the sun woke me up!” he muttered. “No, that’s real; someone must be playing in the church.” He arose, stretching himself languid ly. He was of a rather unprepossessing appearance, his clothes being soiled and much the worse for wear. His hat, worn low down over his disheveled hair, looked as if it might have seen better days; his face, which was reasonably clean, wore a hard, half desperate look, and his whole bearing was one of reck less defiance. For an instant he stood listening, then, with a muttered, “Guess I’ll see who ’tis,” slouched over to one of the open THERE ARE CHAINS OF RESPONSIBILITY THAT ARE STRONGER THAN WE KNOW. ATHENS, GEORGIA, SEPTEMBER, 1904- windows and, resting his elbows on the sill, looked in. Miss Cecile did not see him— could not, in fact, without partially turning— but he had a good view of her. As he gazed at the girl a wavering ray fell aslant the diamond cross she wore and quivered there, a line of flashing light. The man started at the sight of the gleaming stones and, with a low excla mation, started to draw himself up into the window, a' dark look in his eyes — then hesitated, with a furtive glance around. When he looked back the va grant sunbeam was straying across the organ keys, and the cross looked dull and heavy. “Guess I’ll wait till she gets through playing,” he said to him self, but with his eyes still fixed on the cross that hung around the young girl’s neck. It glittered again in the light, as its wearer moved, and again the dangerous light came into the man’s eyes as he watchedit. “She doesn’t need it,” he murmured between his set teeth. “She has enough and to spare, while I have nothing—nothing. ’ ’ A cloud passed over the sun, sudden ly darkening the place. The man started and looked nervously around. “Pshaw, no one is coming here,” he said to himself, “I needn’t be getting nervous over a shadow!” Miss Cecile had finished her selec tion long ago, but her fingers strayed on at their own sweet will over the ivory keys. The music flowed soft and sweet, with a strange, pleading note running through the lovely melody; now high, now low, but always that pleading strain. The man shivered slightly, “What’s the matter with me?” bethought, angri ly. “Why should I think of my moth er’s songs? Goodness knows I didn’t hear many; she died when I was so young that I can hardly remember her at all. But perhaps I might have been different if she had lived!” He shrugged his shoulders and tried to shake off the feeling that had seized him, then turned again to the window — but the music seemed to have cast a spell over him. He listened idly, won dering why he did so. Now it flowed along so smoothly. Why, he wondered, did it make him think of the shadowed stream where he had fished long years ago when he was a boy. Now it was no longer the calm sweep of the river, but a little brook rippling over its rocky bed. He bent his head upon his hands as the memory came back to him. How clearlv he could recall it —the little sparkling stream upon whose banks he had lain one summer’s day with the bit terness of defeat upon him. He had lain there that morning and thought over his rigorous childhood fol lowed by his first year of freedom, his first year at college, then, the gradual breaking away from the bond that had held him. He had thought of the reck less life he had led, of the disapproval of his stern old father, of the final sunder ing of the ties that had held him to his home. He had thought of the short time since then —how bis friends had one by one disappeared, and how he had at last lost his situation and found him self homeless and friendless. How sweet the music sounded! Ah yes, it was the voice of a blue-eyed child who had found him there and pitied him when his heart was black with de spair: he had said in answer to her ques tions, that he was sad because no one cared for him. “God cares for you,” she had an swered. He had asked her why, and she had smiled on him and said that she had learned in her last Sunday’s lesson the verse that, “God is Love.” How the organ seemed to catch the words and send a burst of triumph through the church —“God is Love, is Love, is Love.” Now’ the music grows sad and low: does it wish to take him back over the weary years of misery and degradation? True, for a short time the memory of the pure faced child had kept him straight, but the old habits were hard to break; he had fallen, nor tried to save himself. For a time he had bad unusually good luck; then he had lost steadily, until he was now a gambler, a drunkard and a tramp —a wretched outcast for whom life held nothing. How the music sounded in his ears, sweet and low and pure! He bent his head still lower in his hands. To what a depth he had fallen! To think he would have robbed the girl who sat there playing! Thank Heaven for the shadow that made him turn and so save the last shred of honor left. Ay, but had it? He had thought to do the deed. He was black through and through! He shuddered and almost groaned aloud under the awful darkness he felt pressing upon him. KATE GARLAND, Editress. Price 10 cts- $1 per Year. Hark! the organ was repeating the child’s words: “God is Love, is Love, is Love!” Was it true? Was there anv hope for him who had sunk so low? He had been taught from the Bible, yes, but taught to believe in a stern and rigid creed, and so he had deliberately and uncompromisingly lost himself. That was a pretty belief for those immacu late ones who had not strayed aside! But listen! How the rolling notes swelled forth in a triumphant song of Love Infinite! He could almost believe the organ had spoken! “Like as a father pitieth his chil dren!” Was it the girl singing, or a for gotten chord awakened in his memory? He ceased all mental effort, and allowed the music to bear him as it would. Thoughts and verses long forgotten came crowding back upon his mind, but in a new light and with a new signifi cance, and ever the music seemed to call him up and on. A sudden flood of light illumined his darkened under standing He lifted his head, the old defiant look was gone forever. “I will arise and go unto my father!” he murmured softly, and his face wore a softened, humbled expression. Like a paean of victory over a soul redeemed pealed out the music higher and higher. The man bared his head at the sound: “I may look at her—and at the cross— now,” he said to himself with a smile, though his eyes w’ere dim as he looked, > The last rays of the setting sun fell on Cecile’s hair like a golden halo, and lit 1 up her upturned face with an almost . heavenly light as she played the final great notes of triumph. “St. Cecilia,” murmured themanout -1 side the window, “she looks just like • the pictuie I have seen so many times: ; only the angels are lacking. Ah well, she has brought a human soul to heaven. . Some day I shall return and thank her, till then —fare you well, sweet lady.” He turned and walked rapidly away, the music still ringing in his ears. When he reached the road he took a battered quarter from his pocket and looked at it thoughtfully. “Not much ’ to travel five hundred miles on,” he said half humorously, “but I can walk, and there may be work I can get as I go along.” He replaced the coin, and, turning his face homeward, started forward on his journey just as Miss Cecile, warned by the growing shadows,tookher music and, ; locking the church, ran lightly across the field and up the hill to her home. Spencer Fielding Calnes.