1879 



GLEANINGS LN BEE CULTUKE. 



501 



places before the morrow would be treated 

 as new comers, and all new coiners, hereaft- 

 er, must subscribe to those rules. If they 

 would go back to-day, the matter should be 

 dropped. They assented that I had never 

 been severe, and that I had almost never 

 dismissed a hand, even for the worst behav- 

 ior, yet they decided to leave, and, as they 

 wended their way out of the factory, I went 

 up into the deserted rooms, and prayed for 

 them as I seldom pray. I prayed that God 

 would, for their own sakes, show them their 

 error and touch their hearts, since I was 

 powerless. I felt satisfied and comforted, 

 and, lo ! while I prayed I heard footsteps on 

 the stairway. I arose and looked out of the 

 window, and the current had changed, and 

 they were thronging back. Was I dreaming? 



" Mr. Root, if you will forgive me this 

 time, I will go to work without any more 

 foolishness," said one of my best hands, and 

 one whom I had felt pained about almost 

 more than about any of the rest. 



I can not begin to tell you how I thanked 

 God, and how good it seemed to have the 

 busy hum of business commence again. 

 Even now, when I look at them all over the 

 rooms, and see the work going on, I think 

 of that morning when I had not a trained 

 hand left, as it seemed. Did God answer 

 that prayer by a miracle V It was a miracle 

 to me, but it all came about through human 

 agencies, as I will explain. 



Perhaps a half-hour before, my former 

 partner came to her work, and, seeing the 

 state of affairs, came to me and asked if I 

 would waive those rules if the hands would 

 all consent to come up-stairs to a service of 

 singing, Bible-reading, and prayer, for ten 

 minutes every noon. 



" Why, I have waived the rules already ; 

 and should I mention Bible-reading and 

 prayer, they would object more vehemently 

 than they have yet ! " 



" They will come if I ask them ; " and, as 

 she went off with her pencil and paper, I 

 had so little faith in such a crazy idea, that I 

 absolutely forgot all about it. I could not 

 see God"s hand in it then, but I see it all 

 now. She who, above all others, had reason 

 to feel persecuted, was just the one to change 

 the current of affairs. How could the most 

 defiant of them refuse her request ? and 

 such an unheard-of request ! She was not 

 a professor, any more than the greater part 

 of them, and the idea was fallen in with, al- 

 most without exception. I had tried in vain 

 to get them to come to the Bible-class Sun- 

 day mornings. Of the whole eighty, I had 

 seldom more than a dozen. At noon they all 

 came up, from the engineer to the smallest 

 boy, and there was I, through no planning 

 of my own, desired to read and pray with 

 them. I felt myself a child in God's hands, 

 and it seemed as if he had chosen these boys 

 and girls to point out to me my path, when 

 I had been trying to point out to them their 

 path. 



I presume we all felt that God was leading 

 us ; and when some one suggested the little 

 hymn below, with one accord nearly every 

 one joined in. 



"Sweet hour < f prayer! sweet hour of prayer! 

 That calU me from a world of care, 



And bids me at my Father's throne 

 Make all r,y wants and wishes known : 

 In seasons of distress and grief, 

 My soul has often found relief ; 

 And oft escaped ihe tempter's snare. 

 By thy return, sweet hour of prayer!" 



Was ever anything so appropriate ? If the 

 the family, gathered then and there, did not 

 know what "a world of care" meant, who 

 did? "In seasons of distress and grief", 

 put in misunderstanding, and it was our case 

 exactly. "Relief V" if it was not a blessed 

 relief to more than one heart just then, I 

 don't know anything about it. 



If I remember rightly, I read the xxin 

 Psalm, and then I tried to pray. When I 

 thought of praying for them it seemed more 

 as if I ought to pray for myself; and when I 

 had asked God to help me to be more worthy 

 of the place he h id given me, and to give 

 more wisdom to safely guide so many, I 

 broke down and cried, and I can't tell how 

 many of the rest cried, for I dared not look 

 up. The engraver came up and took my 

 hand, and said he had been terribly troubled 

 about the position I was taking, but he had 

 got all over being troubled now, for he was 

 sure I was on the right track, and he would 

 stand by me as long as I wanted him. 



"Uncle Nat", an old gray-headed man, 

 came up and said he feared God was not 

 with me before, but that he had no doubt of 

 it now at all ; and the rest looked as happy, 

 as they wiped away their tears, as you might 

 expect a large family of brothers and sisters 

 to do, after coming out of a shipwreck and 

 finding every one of them was saved. It 

 was a shipwreck, truly, but it was one that 

 will bind us together, perhaps more securely 

 than anything else that could have possibly 

 happened. 



For a time, the hour of exercises was at my 

 own expense; but somebody figured up that 

 the ten minutes was costing me a dollar each 

 day, and then without my having anything 

 to do with it, the hands offered a resolution 

 that each one should bear his own share of 

 it, and the hands should give their time. 

 This was passed, and also a resolution that 

 the hands should all try to conform to my 

 rules and regulations as far as they could, 

 even if they did not sign them. Now, my 

 hearers, you are just in a position to compre- 

 hend the wonderful beauty and power of the 

 little text I have so often quoted of late, just 

 look ! 



"IT IS NOT BY MIGHT, NOR BY 

 POWER, BUT BY MY SPIRIT, SAITH 

 THE LORD OF HOSTS." 



This was not all, either. We sometimes 

 had trouble in our singing; especially when 

 we tried unfamiliar pieces. As all wanted 

 to sing, and many felt the need of something 

 to pitch our tunes, and something we could 

 rally round, as it were, a project was started 

 among the hands to purchase an organ for 

 our noonday devotions ; and belore I hardly 

 knew it each hand was going to give one 

 day's work for the organ. This idea, too, 

 was suggested by one not a professor, if I 

 am correct, and one who had been rather the 

 leader in the "strike". One of the hands 

 wrote to inquire about organs, and when the 

 manufacturers knew something of the cir- 

 cumstances, they agreed to take more than 



