CHAPTER II.
“It is not the will of your Father which is in heaven that one of these little ones should perish.”
W
WITH her mind full of concern and kind thoughts for the poor little strangers, Mrs. Morley rose early the next morning, and hastily dressing, went down before rousing her own children, to see whether they were still sleeping. To her great astonishment, on opening the door of the shop, and unfastening the shutters, they were nowhere to be found. In the corner lay the blanket she had so carefully wrapped round them the night before, but no trace of the children could be seen. On examining the bolt of the front door, she saw that it had been slipped back, and that they must evidently have gone out before it was light, probably fearing to encounter the cross words, or even blows,which had hitherto repulsed them from door after door where they had sought shelter.
Good Mrs. Morley blamed herself greatly for not having carried them upstairs to the attic; and both she and her husband were sorely grieved to think of the poor children wandering perhaps without food, shelter, or friend. “We’ll leave the door unlatched again to-night, and maybe they’ll come back to the place where they once found shelter and warmth. Poor things! it’s a wonder they didn’t take the blanket, with only those few thin rags scarcely covering them. I had been looking out some of our Lily’s things for them: it cost me something to go to that drawer this morning, and take them out one by one; but a verse came into my mind, which helped me to give them up: ‘Neither will I offer unto the Lord my God of that which doth cost me nothing;’ and then it seemed quite easy to take my darling’sthings and give them to Him who has said, ‘Inasmuch as ye have done it unto one of the least of these, ye have done it unto Me.’ And so now, whether these little ones come again to us or not, my mind is made up, and Lily’s things shall be given to some of the needy ones whom the Good Shepherd is going out to seek in the wilderness, and bring back to His heavenly fold.”
When breakfast was over, Mr. Morley called his children; and after reading a chapter with them as usual, and asking for a heavenly blessing on each, before they set off for school or work, he told them of the little wanderers who had found a shelter under their roof the night before, and asked them to pray each night and morning that God their Father would fetch home these poor children to His blessed fold on earth, and give them a place in His heavenly kingdom.
The children all listened with muchinterest to their father’s account. Susie, the eldest girl, was a pupil-teacher in the school where her younger sister and brother went, and on Sunday afternoons took a class in a ragged school not far distant; and she had learned to feel a tender love for the poor little ones for whom the Lord Jesus died, but who, until they came to the school, had heard but little of a Saviour’s love.
Elsie, the second girl, had left school, and helped her mother at home and in the shop; Alice and Johnny went every day to school under Susie’s care; and Daisy, the third girl, was an invalid. Crippled in body by a fall when quite young, but not in mind nor heart nor understanding, Daisy, whose weak and feeble frame had long since ceased to grow, grew in grace and heavenly wisdom year by year. In her quiet corner by the fireside, or oftener lying on the little couch, to which she was sometimes kept for weeks together, hersweet and peaceful face was a constant lesson to the busy ones around her, and all who knew her, old and young, would tell how the heavenly-minded child had often helped and cheered them on their way. Daisy would knit socks and comforters for Susie’s ragged children; and though she could not go out to teach them of the loving Saviour, as her sister did, she could speak to Him for them, and many a silent prayer went up for them from Daisy’s heart into the ears of Him who so tenderly listens to the voices of little children:
“For He loves His little children,And He pleadeth for them there,Asking the great God of heavenThat their sins may be forgiven;And He hears the prayer.”
“For He loves His little children,And He pleadeth for them there,Asking the great God of heavenThat their sins may be forgiven;And He hears the prayer.”
“For He loves His little children,
And He pleadeth for them there,
Asking the great God of heaven
That their sins may be forgiven;
And He hears the prayer.”
When Susan came home from her class on Sunday afternoons, Daisy was always full of eager questions about the children, and would lie with her large eyes fixedon her sister, as she told of the poor little ones whom she was trying to teach about Jesus.
Susie had gentle ways, and loved her little sister dearly, and devoted much of her spare time to her; while Daisy in return unconsciously taught her elder sister many a lesson of patient submission and quiet trust. For never can the life of anyone, however young, feeble, and apparently helpless, that is really united to Jesus Christ by living faith, be spent in vain. “The fruit of the righteous is a tree of life;” and whether that fruit be manifested in active service or in patient suffering, it shall not be in vain in the Lord. After all, it is not so much our work as our will that God asks and desires of us—the offering up of ourselves as a reasonable, holy, and lively sacrifice; and the little child that day by day looks up to heaven, and tries from love to Jesus to be gentle, loving, and obedient, or tobear with quiet patience the weary pain which keeps it still and lonely when other children are at their merry pastimes, does not live in vain, but is bringing forth the fruit of righteousness, to the praise and glory of God.
Weeks and months went by; but no more was seen or heard of the little strangers, though night after night the Morleys’ door was left unlatched, in the hope of their return; and every day when the children gathered round the hearth the father ended his petitions with an earnest prayer that the little lost ones might one day be found, either on earth or in heaven.
Daisy’s confidence that God would hear, and that some day they would be brought back, was unshaken, though day after day passed by without bringing anything further to light about them. “Our prayer-children,” she would call them; and perhaps few little beggar children ever had so many lovingthoughts bestowed on them, so many sweet prayers breathed upwards into the ears of the Lord of heaven and earth, prayers that were not spoken in vain, but which were even now preparing a harvest of blessing.
Two girls hanging up their hats