1889 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



101 



0iir pejiEg. 



How amiable are thy tabernacles, O Lord of hosts ! 

 My soul longetb, yea, even fainteth for the courts 

 of the Lord : my heart and my flesh crieth out for 

 the living God.— Ps. 84:1, 2. 



TTp NOTHER joyous and peaceful Sabbath 

 9|1| (Dec. 9) is past. One of the happiest 



0tf memories of my visit to California 

 '^ t will be the pleasant meetings with 

 Christian people. Saturday afternoon 

 I found I had accepted all invitations ex- 

 cept one, and my friends informed me thead- 

 dress was left by a young man who came on 

 a bicycle, and who was quite deaf. He lived 

 at Long Beach. I wanted to get off on my 

 homeward trip, and I found two trains left 

 at about the same time— one for Long Beach 

 and the other for San Francisco. Which 

 should it be V As I stood before the ticket- 

 office I prayed for guidance. In a moment 

 I decided. I found my friend building a 

 new house, and not very well fixed to keep 

 company over Sunday, and so I decided to 

 go to the hotel ; but he soon told me, with 

 some hesitation, that, if I could put up with 

 his quarters, it would save expense, and 

 that I should be quite welcome. His 

 " quarters " were a barn close by his new 

 house, his wife being with friends until the 

 new house should be finished. Now, it is a 

 very common thing here to live in barns, 

 and some of them very scanty ones at that ; 

 and I quite enjoyed the idea, especially as it 

 seemed to promise an opportunity for me to 

 discover what message it was the Master's 

 wish I should deliver to this afflicted broth- 

 er. After our supper at a restaurant, we 

 sought our lodging-place. As it is remote 

 from any house, I could talk as loud as I 

 pleased, without being overheard. Deaf 

 people often get very lonesome— did you 

 know it ? I was soon rejoiced to find my 

 companion a sincere and devoted Christian, 

 but he had met some perplexities, or, per- 

 haps, conflicting advice, that he longed to 

 submit to the author of " Our Homes," for 

 he has taken and read Gleanings since it 

 was a 25-cent quarterly. One of his troubles 

 was that he had never been baptized, except 

 in infancy, and somebody had told him 

 such baptism was "no good." They had 

 even loaned him a book to read, and he had 

 compared the texts with the Bible, and they 

 all " squared " exactly. 1 assured him there 

 were multitudes of books that proved their 

 teachings in this very way, and advised him 

 to let the baptism rest right where it was, 

 but to bestow his care and pains toward 

 "doing justly, loving mercy, and walking 

 humbly before God." 



" But, Mr. Root, there isn't a word in the 

 Bible about infant baptism." 



" Neither is there a word about Sunday- 

 schools, yet you and I are going to the very 

 first one in the morning we can find." 



He had actually been thinking of uniting 

 with another church, just because his de- 

 voted and faithful parents had baptized him 

 when he was too small to know any thing 

 about it His pastor did, it is true, consent 

 to another baptism, but rather advised as I 

 did, to let it remain as it was, and turn his 



attention to things that were doing real 

 harm. 



" But, Mr. Root, one minister advises one 

 way and another different. How can both 

 be right ? " 



I told him it would be perfectly right for 

 each one to follow the advice of his own pas- 

 tor, in such matters. 



"But, Mr. Root, I believe in taking the 

 Bible exactly as it reads, without regard to 

 any minister's advice ; " but as he had his 

 well-read Bible open on the top of his tool- 

 chest, he pretty soon found a passage where 

 it described an army " as the sands of the 

 seashore," in numbers, and he was com- 

 pelled to admit it was not to be taken liter- 

 ally, as it read. 



"Well, Mr. Root, I think one ought to 

 even black his shoes on Saturday night, to 

 avoid working on Sunday." 



"All right; that is a good and safe prac- 

 tical religion ; bring your brush, and we will 

 put it into practice at once." 



" But, you don't need to black yours, ac- 

 cording to your teaching, for you may not 

 feel about it as I do." 



"But I do think as you do to-night, 

 any way ; but if we get the blacking off in 

 chasing after the horse in the morning, I 

 should brush them up again, rather than to 

 go to church with untidy shoes." 



After we got to bed he questioned me as 

 an eager child would ; and when I got too 

 sleepy to answer loud enough, he jokingly 

 suggested I needn't be afraid of waking up 

 the " people up stairs." At this 1 talked so 

 loud a lot of geese the other side of the 

 boards to the barn set up a cackle, and then 

 we had a big laugh. 



The joke about the upstairs was because 

 the principal occupants were the stars of 

 heaven. 



" Mr. Root," said he, " were you ever 

 tempted, when all alone by yourself?" 



I told him that some of the hardest bat- 

 tles I had ever fought were in this very line, 

 and his question took hold of me instantly. 



" Well," he resumed, " did you ever try, 

 at such times, singing a hymn?" 



I told him I had never thought of it ; but 

 when he asked me if I would not sing one 

 verse of some familiar hymn of my own, I 

 felt it a privilege. Of course, I should have 

 to sing quite loud to make him hear. It 

 could not disturb any thing but the geese, 

 and I had just had such a hearty laugh at 

 the cackling that I was in very good trim to 

 sing with energy. I sang, as well as I could, 



" Guide me, O thou great Jehovah!" 



At the close I asked him to sing some- 

 thing that had helped him when tempted ; 

 whereupon my poor deaf brother sang one 

 of the most touching hymns I ever heard in 

 my life. He commenced with a somewhat 

 timid voice, but finally the beautiful senti- 

 ments seemed to give him inspiration ; and 

 I did not wonder at its close that such a 

 hymn had power to banish evil spirits and 

 evil suggestions. If he will write out the 

 words I will at some future time give it to 

 the readers of Gleanings. 



When I was half asleep again, he pulled 

 me by the shoulder, and suggested, " Yo\\ 

 forgot to wind your Waterbury," 



