278 



GLEANINGS IN JJ1«:K CULTUllE. 



APli. 



much. That little girl you see by her side 

 was one of her favorites. ' She always hunt- 

 ed up tlie poor children, sir, and linally she 

 was so kind and good to them that tlie peo- 

 ple lielpeil her build that asylum you see." 

 And as he spoke he pointed to tiie bricl< 

 building I have mentioned before. Sure 

 enough, tliere it stood right near the piece 

 of statuary ; and across it. in letters dim 

 with time, were words something like these: 

 •■ Asylum for orphan cjjildren." 



"I tell you sir," lie went on. '• you just 

 ought to have seen these streets here at the 

 time the statue was unveiled. There were 

 so many people crowding to get even a sigiit 

 of it that you could not find a place to stand 

 nor sit down on any of these buildings or in 

 any of the streets. " When she died, the peo- 

 ple of New Orleans felt awful bad.'' 



I learned from him further, that every- 

 body called her just simply Margaret, and 

 nothing more. 1 presumed from Avhat he 

 said, that she was not a married woman. 

 Her whole life seemed to have been given to 

 liomeless orphan children ; and in living for 

 tliem she was living for the Savior. I gath- 

 ered from his talk that she was a Christian, 

 and 1 can readily imagine that when she 

 went iiome to the Master, her welcome must 

 have been in words something like these : 



Come, yc blessc-d of my Father, inherit the king- 

 dom prepared for you from the foundation of the 

 world: for I was a hungered, and ye gave me meat: 

 1 was thirsty, and ye gave me drink: I was a stran- 

 ger, and ye took me in: naked, and ye clothed me: 

 I was sick, and ye visited me: I was in prison, and 

 ye came unto me.— Matt. 25: 34, 3o, .36. 



A'ery likely her reply would have been the 

 following: 



Lord, when saw we thee a hungered, and fed theeV 

 or thirsty, and gave thee drink? When saw we thee 

 a stranger, and took thee in? or naked, and clothed 

 thee? Or when saw we thee sick, or in prison, and 

 came unto thee? 



For I am sure, from taking a look at that 

 land motherly face, she never thought, 

 Willie doing all this little work in building 

 up this asylum for these little ones, that she 

 was doing more than her duty ; but I think 

 I may be sure the dear Savior replied to her 

 something like the answer which we see in 

 this fortieth verse. 



N'erily I say unto you. Inasmuch as ye have done it 

 unto one of the least of these my brethren, ye have 

 done it unto me. 



I stepped out of the chair, thinking of this, 

 and rejoicing that I had found traces of the 

 Savior and a Savior's love, right liere in the 

 heart of the great city of New Orleans. I 

 told my young friend (yes, by this time he 

 was not only a neighbor but a friend, and I 

 should be glad to see him and grasp his hon- 

 est hand at any time), that I had got my 

 cloths muddy some, and I wished to get him 

 to brush me up nice, so I should not be 

 ashamed of myself when I rose ^^\^ to talk to 

 the bee-friends. 



•' Tt) be sure, sir," he replied. • 1 always do 

 that.'' And after he had done his work to 

 my full satisfacticm T asked what was to 

 pay. You know, the peoi>le of Xew Orleans 

 have been accused of charging exorbitantlv 

 for every thing. Well, I was a little sur- 

 prised when he said a nickel. lie, like 

 Johnny Stout, whom I told you of a while 

 ago, rejoiced in giving humanity •' full 



value '' for all he received. No wonder he 

 had two chairs. Before we took the street- 

 car I glanced again at the beautiful picture 

 in white maible, illumined now bv the rising 

 sun, and 1 thought of Christ's words as he 

 si)oke of that other woman, •' She hath done 

 what she could." 



j BLASTED HOPES. 



i MANV ItKES AND FEW HIVES, OR MANY HIVES AND 

 FEW BEES— WHICH? 



0XE evening last spring Bro. Fhillii)S tame ov( r 

 to ask me if it was not about time for the 

 bees to swarm. I told him that it was time, 

 but that I did not want any more bees, and I 

 was going to run mine without increase, a k/ 

 Heddon, as much as possible. 



"Well," said he, "I want mine to swaim; it seems 



to me that bees do better if they swarm early, and I 



have a hive down there that is just booming, and I 



j am looking for them to come out every day. Don't 



I you think it would be a good plan to i)ile straw on 



I the hives and sweat them out?" 



I " Now, Brother Phillips," said I, " we don't look at 

 bee-keeping from the same standpoint. I run my 

 I bees for honey; you run youi-s for hrex; you are 

 ; anxious to have your yard dotted over with little 

 I bo.\cs with a few bees in them, while I would have 

 j all of mine in one hive if possible, so wo must each 



go our own gate." 

 I In a few days he came up again, and this time he 

 had a smile spread all over his lace; his bees had 

 I swarmed— swarmed gloriouslj-— three swarms from 

 j the same hive, and he rubbed his hands together 

 I and chuckled. This was right in the \\ hiteclover 

 I honey harvest, and my bees were rolling and tum- 

 bling over each other to get into the hives with 

 I their loads of nectar. 



i It might have been ten days before I saw Uro. 

 I Phillips again, when he said that his bees were do- 

 j ing well; he had nine new swarms, and every 

 j thing was humming. 



" And how many pounds of honey have you sold?" 

 I asked. 



"OhI not an.\," he said. " I am not raising hop.ey : 

 I am raising ?.('(s; and when I get 1 rt s enoujih, I'll 

 put them to raising honey." 

 j Well, he increased his fi*om si.v to nineteen (I 

 think); then the honey season was over, and it was 

 j all the bees could do to live the rest of the time. 

 Last week Sister Phillii>s was over, and she said 

 their bees were all dead, with plenty of bees and 

 honey in the hives. 



This morning as I was driving through town a 

 woman carrying a sleeping baby in her arms stop- 

 ' ped me to ask about the bees; hers were all dead 

 j but two colonics; had si.v in the fall; then when I 

 i drove up to the grocery, a man hailed me to know 

 how the bees were doing; and he said the bee- 

 keepers along Spoon Hiver that had three and four 

 hundred hives of bees had lost all of them. My 

 ' friend Ladd, of Ipava, who bought bees of me two 

 years ago, lost all of his, some six or eight colonies 

 (I forget which), and he ought to have lost them, 

 for he never put even so nnich as a chaff cushion on 

 them, but left them to die. Then when I drove 

 around by the factory, two more men told me of 

 their bee losses. Friend Hart, of Vermont, 111., is a 

 scientific beekeeper. He has his hives in his door- 

 yard, and they arc painted green and purple and 



