Chapter 84

So that the annual loss to South Africa in its inhabitants was 500,000.—Edward Gilliatt, “Heroes of Modern Crusades.”

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Slavery Abolished—SeeFreedom, Gratitude for.

SLAVERY ENDED

In 1834 the children of the Jamaica slaves were freed, but at midnight of July 31, 1838, a general proclamation of emancipation went into effect and every adult slave in Jamaica became a free man. In anticipation of this event, William Knibb, the evangelist, gathered together the ten thousand slaves on that island for a prayer and praise meeting, and when the first stroke of the midnight bell pealed out, William Knibb shouted, “The monster is dying!” When the second stroke came, he said “dying”—after the third stroke he again said “dying,” and when the twelfth stroke struck he said “The monster is dead—let us bury him.” They had ready an immense coffin, into which they cast the whips, the branding-irons, the handcuffs and fetters, the slave garments and all the memorials of their slavery—and screwed down the lid. They let the coffin down into a twelve-foot deep grave, and, covering it over, they buried out of sight all the memorials of their past life of bondage.

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SLAVES NOT HEROES

When Louis XIV, in order to check what he perceived to be the growing supremacy of England upon the seas, determined to establish a navy, he sent for his great minister Colbert, and said to him, “I wish a navy—how can I create it?” Colbert replied, “Make as many galley-slaves as you can.” Thereupon every Huguenot who refused to doff his bonnet on the street as the King passed by, every boy of seventeen who could give no account of himself, every vagrant without an occupation, was seized, convicted and sent to the galleys. Could a navy of heroes be made of galley-slaves? The history of the Anglo-Saxon race says “No.”—Hampton L. Carson.

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SLAVES OF PLEASURE

Philanthropists in prison cells, missionaries to the Fiji Islanders, people doing rescue work in the worst sections of great cities, Livingstone in Africa, all these, through zeal, can work till midnight to save lost men, but the votary of pleasure will toil on up and down a waxed floor till daylight, until the head reels and the whole heart issick. In his “Confessions” Tolstoi says that for ten years he went from banquet to banquet, drinking rich wines, feasting, following his tailor, concocting flatteries, lies, sleeping by day and dissipating at night, and he adds, “My observation is that no galley-slave or apostle like Paul has to toil as hard as a society man and a society woman,” and both have lost their beauty, their happiness and their health before the life course is half run. So pleasure makes its disciples become galley-slaves. But pleasure promised a velvet path, air heavy with roses, the wine and nectar of Venus and Bacchus. Pleasure promised perfumed bowers, days of happiness, nights of laughter and song. But pleasure is a deceiver. (Text.)—N. D. Hillis.

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Sleeping in Church—SeeSelf-blame.

SLOWNESS

“A snail’s pace,” hitherto a remarkably indefinite phrase, has at last been exactly defined, thanks to the experimental philosophers of the Terre Haute Polytechnic. After putting half a dozen of them through their paces, and making all necessary differentiations, it was ascertained that a snail can travel exactly a mile in fourteen days. Hence, it will be seen that it is about nip and tuck between the snail and the boy when you send the latter to a grocery past a vacant lot where the other boys are engaged in a game of baseball.—CincinnatiEnquirer.

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SMALL ANNOYANCES

James Drummond, in “Parables and Pictures,” says:

We have heard of a battle against cannibals gained by the use of tacks. They had taken possession of a whaling vessel and bound the man who was left in care of it. The crew, on returning, saw the situation, and scattered tacks upon the deck of the vessel, which penetrated the bare feet of the savages, and sent them howling into the sea. They were ready to meet lance and sword, but they could not overcome the tacks on the floor. We brace ourselves up against great calamities. The little tacks of life, scattered along our way, are hard to bear.

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SMALL BEGINNINGS

“Despise not the day of small things.” “Great oaks from little acorns grow.”

A boy used to crush flowers to get their color, and painted the white side of his father’s cottage in Tyrol with all sorts of pictures, which the mountaineer gazed at as wonderful. He was the great artist, Titian.An old painter watched a little fellow who amused himself making drawing of his pots and brushes, easel and tools, and said, “That boy will beat me some day.” So he did, for he was Michelangelo.

An old painter watched a little fellow who amused himself making drawing of his pots and brushes, easel and tools, and said, “That boy will beat me some day.” So he did, for he was Michelangelo.

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Small Duties—SeeHelpfulness.

SMALL EVILS HARDEST TO BEAR

Gerald Gould expresses in verse a sentiment that many will indorse:

It is the slow and softly dropping tearsThat bring the furrows to man’s face; the years,Falling and fall’n vain,That turn the gold to gray upon his head;And the dull days to disappointment wed,And pain that follows painThat make life bitter in the mouth, and strewThe dead with roses, but the quick with yew.Better a wide and windy world, and scopeFor rise and downfall of a mighty hope,Than many little ills;Better the sudden horror, the swift wrong,Than doubts and cares that die not, and the longMonotony that kills:The empty dawns, pale stars, and narrow skies,Mean hopes, mean fears, mean sorrows, and mean sighs. (Text.)—The Spectator.

It is the slow and softly dropping tears

That bring the furrows to man’s face; the years,

Falling and fall’n vain,

That turn the gold to gray upon his head;

And the dull days to disappointment wed,

And pain that follows pain

That make life bitter in the mouth, and strew

The dead with roses, but the quick with yew.

Better a wide and windy world, and scopeFor rise and downfall of a mighty hope,Than many little ills;Better the sudden horror, the swift wrong,Than doubts and cares that die not, and the longMonotony that kills:The empty dawns, pale stars, and narrow skies,Mean hopes, mean fears, mean sorrows, and mean sighs. (Text.)—The Spectator.

Better a wide and windy world, and scope

For rise and downfall of a mighty hope,

Than many little ills;

Better the sudden horror, the swift wrong,

Than doubts and cares that die not, and the long

Monotony that kills:

The empty dawns, pale stars, and narrow skies,

Mean hopes, mean fears, mean sorrows, and mean sighs. (Text.)

—The Spectator.

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Smallness and Bigness Compared—SeeDestructiveness.

Smiles—SeeLove’s Carefulness;Trouble.

SMILES AND FROWNS

We would all be willing to help in the pleasant task described in these verses:

If I knew the box where the smiles are kept,No matter how large the keyOr strong the bolt, I would try so hard,’Twould open I know for me.Then over the land and sea broadcastI’d scatter smiles to play,That the children’s faces might hold them fast>For many and many a day.If I knew a box that was large enoughTo hold all the frowns I meet,I would try to gather them, every one,From nursery, school, and street.Then, folding and holding, I’d pack them in,And turn the monster key;I’d hire a giant to drop the boxTo the depths of the deep, deep sea.

If I knew the box where the smiles are kept,No matter how large the keyOr strong the bolt, I would try so hard,’Twould open I know for me.

If I knew the box where the smiles are kept,

No matter how large the key

Or strong the bolt, I would try so hard,

’Twould open I know for me.

Then over the land and sea broadcastI’d scatter smiles to play,That the children’s faces might hold them fast>For many and many a day.

Then over the land and sea broadcast

I’d scatter smiles to play,

That the children’s faces might hold them fast>

For many and many a day.

If I knew a box that was large enoughTo hold all the frowns I meet,I would try to gather them, every one,From nursery, school, and street.

If I knew a box that was large enough

To hold all the frowns I meet,

I would try to gather them, every one,

From nursery, school, and street.

Then, folding and holding, I’d pack them in,And turn the monster key;I’d hire a giant to drop the boxTo the depths of the deep, deep sea.

Then, folding and holding, I’d pack them in,

And turn the monster key;

I’d hire a giant to drop the box

To the depths of the deep, deep sea.

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SMILING

In Brooklyn, two young women undertook to band together a smile club. In this club’s membership may be included every one, everywhere, who is willing to pledge as many smiles as possible to make life generally happier. Here are some of the things required of members: “Radiate! Smile! Shine like a little sun! Begin each day anew, and begin it by smiling until you are in a good humor. Think only of the things you wish to possess or of what you desire to become, for thoughts are things. Have faith and your wishes will come true. Smile! And keep on smiling, and you will find that the happiness you have always been seeking is within yourself. Express this happiness.” Surely no objection can be offered to the organizing of clubs of this sort, tho we need not necessarily join one to acquire and practise the smiling habit. It may be said of smile clubs and smiles, the more the merrier. As a popular post-card puts it: “Smile a while, and while you smile another smiles, and soon there are miles and miles of smiles because you smile.” Grouches could not exist if every one was smiling. It’s worth trying for a few days anyhow, just to see how well it works.

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Snob versus Gentleman—SeeGentility, False Standard of.

SNOBBERY

A countryman had been to the city and went home brimful of news. “You ’member the Smiths?” he asked his wife, “the Silver Crik Smiths, them as got rich on the’r gran’feyther’s money.” Yes, she remembered them. “I seen ’em. They’re way up; live in a gran’ house on a street they call a thavenoo. They ride in a double kerridge, and have no end of money.” She said she s’posed as much. “But, ’Mandy, you wouldn’t want ter change places with her; I see her a minnit, and I didn’t hev the heart to speak t’her. She’s bin humbled right down to the dust. She’s as blind as a bat.” Blind! She guessed not. “But she is. Fust, she didn’t know me, me that’s rid down hill and played tag with her when she warn’t knee-high to a turkey. Then, ’Mandy, tho her eyes was wide open, she went right along the streets, all drest up in her fine clothes, and a leetle mite of a dog was leading her along. He was tied to a streeng, and she had hold of t’other end of the streeng. Now, ’Mandy, how’d you like to be her?”—DetroitFree Press.

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SNOBBERY REBUKED

Social standing is not always a sign of moral worth, as the following story suggests:

“The late Francis Murphy,” said a Pittsburg man, “perhaps the greatest temperance reformer our country has ever seen, hated snobbishness hardly less than drunkenness. At a dinner in Pittsburg I once heard him rebuke, with a little anecdote, a snobbish millionaire.“He said there was a rich and snobbish English woman living in the country. Her husband put himself up for a political place, and in order to help his campaign along the woman gave a garden party to which every voter for miles around was invited.“Among the humble guests was a very independent grocer. The grocer made himself quite at home. No duke’s manner could have been easier and freer. Indeed, the man’s total lack of subservience angered his hostess extremely, so that in the end, thinking to take him down a peg, she said to him significantly:“‘You know, Mr. Greens, in London, shopkeepers don’t go into the best society.’“The grocer looked at her, and nodded and smiled.“They don’t here, either, ma’am,’ he said.” (Text.)

“He said there was a rich and snobbish English woman living in the country. Her husband put himself up for a political place, and in order to help his campaign along the woman gave a garden party to which every voter for miles around was invited.

“Among the humble guests was a very independent grocer. The grocer made himself quite at home. No duke’s manner could have been easier and freer. Indeed, the man’s total lack of subservience angered his hostess extremely, so that in the end, thinking to take him down a peg, she said to him significantly:

“‘You know, Mr. Greens, in London, shopkeepers don’t go into the best society.’

“The grocer looked at her, and nodded and smiled.

“They don’t here, either, ma’am,’ he said.” (Text.)

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SOCIAL CHRISTIANITY

In other days when people did not have matches they were sometimes obliged to go to the neighbors for fire, if their own blaze went out. Usually a bunch of large knots were laid on the coals at night and then covered over with ashes until morning. But if the knots failed to burn, then the oldest child was usually sent to the neighbors with an iron kettle to borrow fire. Happy to be of use, the child soon returned with a kettleful of bright coals and a blazing knot on top.No man can live at his best who leads asolitary life. Without the fellowship of others, like an isolated coal he soon ceases to glow and burn. Very few can remain for a long time in a white heat of enthusiasm. The flames die down, the warmth disappears unless the fires are kept replenished. Brainard’s prayer was “O that I could be a flame of fire in the service of my God.” (Text.)

No man can live at his best who leads asolitary life. Without the fellowship of others, like an isolated coal he soon ceases to glow and burn. Very few can remain for a long time in a white heat of enthusiasm. The flames die down, the warmth disappears unless the fires are kept replenished. Brainard’s prayer was “O that I could be a flame of fire in the service of my God.” (Text.)

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SeeChristianity, Social.

Social Faults—SeeDifficulties, Social.

SOCIAL INSTINCTS IN BIRDS

On one occasion Mr. Leander Keyser’s several cages of birds were moved from one porch to another on the other side of the house. The jay’s cage, being too big for the new quarters, was left behind, when at once the bird began to express his dissatisfaction and loneliness. All day he rushed about his cage, calling in the most pitiful way. The next morning he was no more reconciled, and showed so plainly by every look and motion his unhappiness that a place was made for him near the others. The moment he saw them he gave a cry of delight, his calls ceased, he chirped and twittered, and was his happy self again.—Olive Thorne Miller, “The Bird Our Brother.”

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SOCIAL INTERDEPENDENCE

There was once a rich man who lived in a certain village. The people were pleased to have this man of influence among them. The only fault that they found with him was that he was selfish. It did not trouble him if his neighbors were poor or sick or out of work or in trouble. What was that to him? It only added to his position of superiority. He could import his edibles. He could hire foreign labor. But one day a family was stricken with a contagious disease induced by their poverty and poor food. The village was quarantined. He went to a gardener for vegetables but the cut worms had made the garden fail. He went to the poultry-dealer for eggs, but his hens were not laying well. He went to the farmer for fruit, but the drought had injured his vines. Then the rich man began to realize the relation between himself and his fellow man. If trouble came to his neighbor, he could not escape its blight. It was then that he became truly humble and began to love his neighbor as himself.It is as true in our moral and spiritual life as it is in our physical life. The sin that blasts our neighbor’s character will sooner or later cast its shadow upon us, live we ever so blameless. No one can live his life apart from his neighbors. (Text.)

It is as true in our moral and spiritual life as it is in our physical life. The sin that blasts our neighbor’s character will sooner or later cast its shadow upon us, live we ever so blameless. No one can live his life apart from his neighbors. (Text.)

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SOCIAL PROGRESS

“The farmers’ telephone was a boon during heavy and unprecedented snows,” saysThe Electrical World and Engineer, “and many interesting uses are reported in New York State in places where many roads were blocked with drifts over ten feet deep. Hemmed in so that they could not see a neighbor for weeks, farmers have been able to converse with their friends and thus keep in touch with the world.” (Text.)

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SeeEconomic Motives.

SOCIAL RELIGION

Only the selfish man could wish to go to heaven alone. The door of life is always closed to the man who is not helping some other man on his journey.

A priest had a striking dream. He dreamed he had ascended the ladder that reached from earth to heaven. Expectantly he knocked upon the door. Some one responded, and demanded, “Who is there?” Proudly the priest called his name. “Who is with you?” came the reply. “No one,” answered the priest; “I am alone.” “Sorry,” said the angel, “but we are instructed never to open these gates for a single individual.” And, crestfallen and disappointed, he descended to earth.

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SOCIAL STRENGTH

A constant struggle is going on in nature, and those animals best adapted to their conditions will be the ones to survive and transmit their superior characteristics to subsequent generations. This is natural selection. This same law governed man in his early history, and in almost the same way as it governs the brute kingdom. From the time that the tribal relation is established among men the struggle for existence ceases to be one of individuals and becomes one of tribes. It little profits an individual to be strong if he belongs to a weak tribe; it little profits a tribe to be composed of strong individuals if they fail to work in harmony with each other. Natural selection will still preserve the strongest, but it will be the strongest tribe. It is mutual trust, fidelity, honesty, concert in action, patriotism, disregardof death, that form the sinews of the nation, personal strength becoming a subordinate factor. Wolves hunt in companies, and together fearlessly attack animals which would easily master them separately. Insects live in communities and tho individually they are weak, by concert of action they make themselves formidable to the strongest of animals. But the central feature of the teaching of Christ was the law of love. It constantly appears in His words—now clothed in one parable now in another. The new command given to man was to love his enemy, to do good to them that hated him, to help the weak, to pardon the erring, to resist evil, and to give to him that asked. Henceforth it was to be the peacemaker who should be blest, and he who wished to be greatest was to be servant of all.—H. W. Conn,Methodist Review.

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SeeUnity, Strength in.

SOCIAL TRAITS IN CHILDREN

Pedagogs tell us that the plays of children under seven or eight are noncompetitive and noncooperative. Kindergarten children play side by side or in pairs, rarely spontaneously in groups. They are gregarious rather than social. The plays between the ages of seven and twelve are social, cooperative and competitive games, but each child usually plays for himself. After twelve group games with opposing sides are more popular, and finally tend to crowd out all others.

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SOCIAL VANITY

I read in a Paris paper an interesting account of a reception that some of our distinguished friends passing the season in Newport gave to a chimpanzee. Of course, it was mortifying to an American to have it known by Europeans that my compatriots were prepared to confess in that practical way to their belief in the evolution theory, and to have it understood in the cultivated centers of English and Continental life that over here people of advertised refinement could drop into such close relations of social reciprocity without either the Newport gentlemen and ladies or the chimpanzee feeling themselves insulted by the contact. But that first feeling, which of course was one of loathing, not for the chimpanzee, but for his companions, soon gave place to one which I am sure was more just and wholesome, this, namely, a pathetic realization of the horrid sense of emptiness which people must be suffering under to be willing to fill up the vacuum with material of such an abominably unhuman type; like a man so agonizingly hungry that he had rather fill himself with carrion than go to bed supperless, and not only that, but reduced to such an extreme point of inanition as even to acquire an appetite for carrion.—Charles H. Parkhurst.

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SOCIETY IS MAN’S PLACE

The man of the city closes his house, forgets his office and goes away. He has a suit of store clothes on him and two linen collars in his handbag, but for the rest he carries the garb of the vagabond, and getting into this as quick as he can he buries his face in the pine-needles and lets the wind and rain beat down on his uncovered head and untrimmed beard. And the weeks pass; and then happens the stranger thing. Through the music of the forest and the harmonies of the falling waters, he hears, at first, far away and hardly audible, then ever nearer and clearer, the voice of the city he deserted, and to his manhood’s spirit that voice speaks with a charm which overcomes the woodland’s spell and in another day he is back again, back in the old street, to the old work, to the ever dear old city. And once more keeping step with the vast army of toilers, he knows that not in solitude, but in society, is character made, and more, that not nature, but human nature, is God’s best handiwork.—T. C. McClelland.

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Soil—SeeFruit and Soil.

SOLACE OF THE SEA

The following paragraph is the conclusion of James G. Blaine’s eulogy of President Garfield, and forms one of the finest passages of English prose:

Gently, silently, the love of a great people bore the pale sufferer to the longed-for healing of the sea, to live or to die, as God should will. Within sight of its heaving billows, within sound of its manifold voices, with wan, fevered face tenderly lifted to the cooling breeze, he looked out wistfully upon the ocean’s changing wonders, on its far sails whitening in the morning light, on its restless waves rolling shoreward to break and die beneath the noonday sun, on the red clouds of evening arching low to the horizon, on the serene and shining pathway of the stars. Let us think that his dying eyes read a mystic meaning, which only the rapt and parting soul may know. Let us believe that,in the silence of the receding world, he heard the great wave breaking on a farther shore, and felt already upon his wasted brow the breath of the eternal morning.

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Solar Energy—SeeEnergy;Utilization.

SOLDIER, A TRUE

In the midst of a hot engagement, Napoleon asked one of his aides about the battle. “Sire,” said he, “this battle is lost, but,” pointing with his sword to the sun still an hour high, “there is still time enough to win another.”

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Soldier’s Dying Sentiments—SeeEssentials.

SOLIDARITY

Smith’s family in Brooklyn went on short allowance, the oldest son was taken out of college, the two daughters gave up their music-teacher, there was no summer vacation. They explained that Smith had lost thirty-six thousand dollars on R. & P. stock. Smith knew that he had lost this money because he was ten minutes late in getting a receipt from the directors.On a certain day there were twenty-four directors in the head office. They waited vainly for the twenty-fifth. Their half-hour delay was costly to Smith and many others.Mr. Brown, the twenty-fifth director, was late because his clerk had not brought a certain mail package due on the one-o’clock express. The clerk came at last with the package; the one-o’clock express had arrived late.Fifty more plans went wrong because the express was late. Men rang up the general manager’s office to complain of the annoyance. The manager sent for the conductor. The conductor explained that the fault was a “hot box.” Inquiry at Rochester traced the hot-box to the inspector and oiler. He had come late to his work and was only in time to go over half the wheels of the express. The oiler, being questioned, admitted that he was late owing to a sick baby, for whom he had been obliged to go for a doctor. So, in a way, an oiler’s sick baby, two hundred miles away, upset Smith and his family, delayed boards of directors, changed Wall Street fortunes. Victor Hugo said that at Waterloo “the universe changed front.” But it changes front every time we act. If one member suffers, all the members suffer with it.

On a certain day there were twenty-four directors in the head office. They waited vainly for the twenty-fifth. Their half-hour delay was costly to Smith and many others.

Mr. Brown, the twenty-fifth director, was late because his clerk had not brought a certain mail package due on the one-o’clock express. The clerk came at last with the package; the one-o’clock express had arrived late.

Fifty more plans went wrong because the express was late. Men rang up the general manager’s office to complain of the annoyance. The manager sent for the conductor. The conductor explained that the fault was a “hot box.” Inquiry at Rochester traced the hot-box to the inspector and oiler. He had come late to his work and was only in time to go over half the wheels of the express. The oiler, being questioned, admitted that he was late owing to a sick baby, for whom he had been obliged to go for a doctor. So, in a way, an oiler’s sick baby, two hundred miles away, upset Smith and his family, delayed boards of directors, changed Wall Street fortunes. Victor Hugo said that at Waterloo “the universe changed front.” But it changes front every time we act. If one member suffers, all the members suffer with it.

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The people of the world have a community of interests. Sickness in the slums of a great city, for instance, breeds disease in the whole community:

A man in the city of Chicago was asked why he did not do more to better the condition of the working people in the poorer sections of the city. “What are they to me?” he heartlessly answered. A few weeks later his daughter died of typhoid-fever brought to her in clothing made in the sweat-shops which her father thought it was not his business to try to do away with. (Text.)

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SeeSensitiveness.

SOLIDITY OF OLD TRUTHS

The fine-grained old truths of religion have been deposited by the world’s best life. Its age is theirs; but, altho so many epochs and races went to make them, we use them now without a thought of their age or of the gravity of getting them well-grown; like the beautiful ivory mammoth tusk, sticking six or seven feet out of the frozen ground in Alaska, which the Indians have used for generations as a hitching-post. Tribes come and go, and generations succeed each other; but we all hitch up to the solid truths which offer their convenience, embedded in the past. (Text.)—John Weiss.

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SOLITUDE, LESSON OF

My safety (from madness) lay, as I found, in compressing my thoughts to the smallest compass of mental existence, and no sooner did worldly visions or memories intrude themselves, as they necessarily would, than I immediately and resolutely shut them out as one draws the blind to exclude the light. But this exclusion of the world created a dark background which served only to intensify the light that shone upon me from realms unseen of mortal eyes. Lonely I was, yet I was never alone. (Text.)—Mrs.Maybrick, “My Fifteen Lost Years.”

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SOLITUDE, TRAINING IN

A writer tells of a little bird which would not learn to sing the song its master would have it sing while its cage was full of light. It listened and learned a snatch of this, a trill of that, a polyglot of all the songs of the grove, but never a separate and entire melody of its own. Then the master covered its cage and made it dark; and then it listenedand listened to the one song it was to sing, and tried, and tried, and tried again, until at last its heart was full of it. Then, when it had caught the melody, the cage was uncovered, and it sang the song sweetly ever after in the light. (Text.)

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Solving Worry—SeeContentment.

Son Conquered—SeeWorshiper, A Mother.

Song—SeePraise.

SONG AND HUMANITY

The teacher of music should bear in mind that his subject is related to life in a profound and many-sided fashion. The songs of home and friendship, of religion and patriotism, have no small place in the higher life of humanity. To cite one example: I have been present at a Phi Beta Kappa dinner at Harvard when, at the close, the company of scholars joined hands and sang together Burns’ song of “Auld Lang Syne.” I have heard the same song at a company of ministers at a theological seminary reunion. After the battle of Manila Bay, where the British and American marines fraternized, as the British men-of-war left the harbor, the marines of both nations sang the same song. It was the music of the plowman-poet that best fitted as a parting-song of friendship for the scholar, the theologian, and the marines of two great modern nations. Read the tributes to music of noted men of letters like Carlyle and Newman. See how they have been imprest by this art, which opens into the world of the ear or sound—a word which has its artists and poets, its historians and dramatists, its architects and builders, as the world of letters or of space.—W. Scott, “Journal of the National Educational Association,” 1905.

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SONG AND SUFFERING

It is said of Charlotte Elliott, the author of the “Invalid’s Hymn-book,” that tho she lived to enter her eighty-second year, she never knew a well day. Her sweet hymns, such as “Just as I am without one plea,” were the outpouring of a heart that knew what it was to suffer. Like so many other bards, she “learned in suffering what she taught in song.” (Text.)

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SONG AS A WELCOME HOME

In the mountains of Tyrol it is the custom of the women and children to come out when it is the close of day and sing. Their husbands, fathers and brothers answer them from the hills on their way homeward. On the shores of the Adriatic such a custom prevails. There the wives of the fishermen come down about sunset and sing a melody, listen for a while for an answering melody from off the water, telling that the loved one is almost home. How sweet to the weary fisherman, as the shadows gather around them, must be the songs of the loved ones at home that sing to cheer them, and how they must strengthen and tighten the links that bind together these dwellers of the sea.

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SONG, EFFECTIVE

An African heathen chief from an inland district was passing a mission school in Livingstonia. He heard the children singing their simple parting hymn. He sat down and waited till they came out. Then he asked the teacher “What were these children doing?”“Singing a hymn,” she replied.“What is a hymn?” asked the chief; “it has touched my heart. I should like the children of my village taught some hymns.”There has since been a school established in that chief’s village, and the gospel is reaching the people through the simple messages carried by the children in song and story.

“Singing a hymn,” she replied.

“What is a hymn?” asked the chief; “it has touched my heart. I should like the children of my village taught some hymns.”

There has since been a school established in that chief’s village, and the gospel is reaching the people through the simple messages carried by the children in song and story.

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Thirty men, red-eyed and disheveled, lined up before a judge of the San Francisco police court, says TheYouth’s Companion. It was the regular morning company of “drunks and disorderlies.” Some were old and hardened, others hung their heads in shame. Just as the momentary disorder attending the bringing in of the prisoners quieted down, a strange thing happened. A strong, clear voice from below began singing:

“Last night I lay a-sleeping,There came a dream so fair.”

“Last night I lay a-sleeping,

There came a dream so fair.”

Last night! It had been for them all a nightmare or a drunken stupor. The song was such a contrast to the horrible fact that no one could fail of the sudden shock at the thought the song suggested.

“I stood in old Jerusalem,Beside the temple there.”

“I stood in old Jerusalem,

Beside the temple there.”

The song went on. The judge had paused. He made a quiet inquiry. A former member of a famous opera company, known all overthe country, was awaiting trial for forgery. It was he who was singing in his cell.Meantime the song went on, and every man in the line showed emotion. One or two dropt on their knees. One boy at the end of the line, after a desperate effort at self-control, leaned against the wall, buried his face in his folded arms, and sobbed, “O mother, mother.”The sobs cut the very heart of the men who heard, and the song, still welling its way through the court-room, blended in the hush. At length one man protested:“Judge,” said he, “have we got to submit to this? We’re here to take our punishment, but this—” He, too, began to sob.It was impossible to proceed with the business of the court, yet the judge gave no order to stop the song. The police sergeant, after a surprized effort to keep the men in line, stept back and waited with the rest. The song moved on to its climax:

Meantime the song went on, and every man in the line showed emotion. One or two dropt on their knees. One boy at the end of the line, after a desperate effort at self-control, leaned against the wall, buried his face in his folded arms, and sobbed, “O mother, mother.”

The sobs cut the very heart of the men who heard, and the song, still welling its way through the court-room, blended in the hush. At length one man protested:

“Judge,” said he, “have we got to submit to this? We’re here to take our punishment, but this—” He, too, began to sob.

It was impossible to proceed with the business of the court, yet the judge gave no order to stop the song. The police sergeant, after a surprized effort to keep the men in line, stept back and waited with the rest. The song moved on to its climax:

“Jerusalem, Jerusalem! Sing for the night is o’er!Hosanna in the highest! hosanna for ever-more!”

“Jerusalem, Jerusalem! Sing for the night is o’er!

Hosanna in the highest! hosanna for ever-more!”

In an ecstasy of melody the last words rang out, and then there was a silence.The judge looked into the faces of the men before him. There was not one who was not touched by the song; not one in whom some better impulse was not stirred. He did not call the cases singly—a kind word of advice, and he dismissed them all. No man was fined or sentenced to the workhouse that morning. The song had done more good than punishment could have accomplished.

In an ecstasy of melody the last words rang out, and then there was a silence.

The judge looked into the faces of the men before him. There was not one who was not touched by the song; not one in whom some better impulse was not stirred. He did not call the cases singly—a kind word of advice, and he dismissed them all. No man was fined or sentenced to the workhouse that morning. The song had done more good than punishment could have accomplished.

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SONG IN THE NIGHT

Years ago, when theOcean Monarchwas wrecked in the English Channel, a steamer was cruising along in the darkness, and the captain heard a song, a sweet song, coming over the waters, and bearing down in the direction of the voice, he found it was a Christian woman on a plank of the wrecked steamer singing:

“Jesus, lover of my soul,Let me to thy bosom fly,While the nearer waters roll,While the tempest still is high.” (Text.)

“Jesus, lover of my soul,

Let me to thy bosom fly,

While the nearer waters roll,

While the tempest still is high.” (Text.)

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Song of Cheer—SeeCheer, Good.

Song, Power of—SeeLife-line, Hymn.

SONG, THE GOSPEL IN

The ministry of song in modern times has been of incalculable value in spreading the truths of the Word. Speaking of a city-wide revival in Boston, a current news item says:

The city is ringing with revival melodies. Everywhere Mr. Alexander’s songs are being hummed and whistled and sung. A number of revival hymns have been published in the newspapers, and a few days ago two drummers were seated in a train going out of Boston, holding a newspaper before them and singing from it lustily, “Don’t Stop Praying.” A gentleman who happened to be in the same car, which was filled with people, said that he finally approached them and asked them if they were ministers. “Oh, no,” was the reply, “we are just drummers.” In one of the hotels some theatrical women were singing, “He Will Hold Me Fast,” instead of their own songs. These are simply indications of the way in which the gospel songs have permeated the entire city. (Text.)

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Songs Born in Trouble—SeeNeglect of Genius.

SONGS THAT ENDURE

George Sylvester Viereck, in “Prisoners of Song,” has these suggestive lines on the immortality of the song:

With rumbling thunder and discordance hideousThe gods and stars shall tumble from the sky,But beauty’s curve enmarbled lives in Phidias,And Homer’s numbers can not die.And when the land is perished, yea,When life forsakes us and the rustHas eaten bard and roundelay,Still from the silence of the dustShall rise the song of yesterday!

With rumbling thunder and discordance hideousThe gods and stars shall tumble from the sky,But beauty’s curve enmarbled lives in Phidias,And Homer’s numbers can not die.

With rumbling thunder and discordance hideous

The gods and stars shall tumble from the sky,

But beauty’s curve enmarbled lives in Phidias,

And Homer’s numbers can not die.

And when the land is perished, yea,When life forsakes us and the rustHas eaten bard and roundelay,Still from the silence of the dustShall rise the song of yesterday!

And when the land is perished, yea,

When life forsakes us and the rust

Has eaten bard and roundelay,

Still from the silence of the dust

Shall rise the song of yesterday!

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SOOT

The Chicago public laboratories recently made tests to determine the amount of soot and dust deposited from the air in that city. The acreage deposit, as estimated from samples collected at eight different heights during a period of four weeks, was, approximately, at the rate of 8.5 tons per acre per year. On the Board of Trade Building, 110 feet above the street level, the estimated annualdeposit was 10.5 tons. On the county building, 160 feet above street level, the amount was 7.8 tons, and on the Reaper Block, 120 feet above street level, 12.6 tons. The situation in Chicago is different only in degree from that prevailing in every large city. It would be interesting (and no doubt appalling) to know how many tons of soot enter the lungs of the inhabitants of our large cities.—Good Health.

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Sorrow—SeeSuffering Transformed.

SORROW FOR A LOST CAUSE

In reminiscences of her husband, General George E. Pickett, of the Confederate Army, his widow has this to say in regard to the sadness that filled the Southern heart at the close of the unsuccessful war:

He (General Pickett) gave his staff a farewell breakfast at our home. They did not once refer to the past, but each wore a blue strip tied like a sash around his waist. It was the old headquarters flag, which they had saved from the surrender and torn into strips, that each might keep one in sad memory. After breakfast he went to the door, and from a white rose-bush which his mother had planted, he cut a bud for each. He put one in my hair and pinned one to the coat of each of his officers. Then for the first time the tears came, and the men who had been closer than brothers for four fearful years clasped hands in silence and parted. (Text.)

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SOUL A UNITY

The Christian soul is not a department store. It does not advertise songs for Sunday, sharp bargains for Monday, doubts for Tuesday, worldliness for Wednesday, dishonesty for Thursday, compunction for Friday, repentance for Saturday, and then songs again for Sunday. No! The Christian soul is not a fractional mechanism, but an organism. It is fed by the divine sap that flows into it from the true vine. Thus does the glow of its life splendor every service it renders. The rich hues of its godliness vein the whole of its life as a spiritual mosaic.—F. F. Shannon.

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SOUL AND NATURE

The daisy brightening in the shadow of the hedgerow, or strewing the fields as with golden flakes; the trees spreading their whispering roof of tremulous foliage, or holding against the blast their rugged arms, inlocked with a trunk deep-set and rooted; brooks, lapsing or leaping from their summit springs; the ocean, which takes these to itself, without an added ripple on its bays, or an increase of its tides; all sounds, of mirth, or suffering, or fear; the drowsy hum of multitudinous insects; the arrowy song of birds, swifter than wings, aspiring to the skies; all forms and tones of human life; the immeasurable azure which is over us everywhere, brilliant with stars, or flecked with clouds, or made the blue and boundless realm of the victorious sun—all these, and all the visible system which these but partly represent, the soul perceives. It goes out to them, in its observant, inspecting glance. It meets and hears them, if they are vocal, with its attent sense. It apprehends them all, arranges them in their natural and obvious order, assigns to each its place and service, and lives amid them as in a home reared for it and furnitured at the commencement of its being.—Richard S. Storrs.

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SOUL FLIGHT

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