JL'XE J, ll'lJ 



8«d 



Our Homes 



A. I. ROOT 



A soft answer turneth away wrath; but grievous 

 words stir up anger. — Prov. 15:1. 



But I say unto you, that ye resist not evil; but 

 whosoever shall smite thee on the right cheek, turn 

 to him the other also. — Matt. 5:39. 



Think not that I am come to send peace on earth: 

 I came not to send peace, but a sword. — Matt. 10: 

 34. 



It is now springtime, and everybody is 

 making garden more or less. I do not know 

 but I might say likewise that almost every- 

 body is keeping chickens " more or less." 

 Well, the chickens are all right and the gar- 

 dening is all right. Both are commendable. 

 But they do not work well together. If the 

 mother hen is penned up and the little 

 chicks are allowed to run through the gar- 

 den, they will, at least for a time, do good 

 and not harm; but if you do not look out, 

 the first you know, even small chicks will 

 get into the seed-beds and not only dig 

 them up but make things look sadly untidy. 

 I have sometimes thought that plants be- 

 come discouraged and give up, just as hu- 

 man beings do. After a chicken has snip- 

 ped off the foliage and scratched the dirt 

 off from some of the tiny rootlets, the plant 

 will of a sudden lose its vigor and energy. 

 Well, what I have in mind tins morning, 

 while we are getting a gentle May shower, 

 is the matter of having one neighbor have 

 a choice garden and the adjoining neighbor 

 some chickens, and trouble comes. Not all 

 of (he chicken folks and garden folks are 

 professing Christians; and some of them 

 that are seem to forget their religion when 

 tlie chickens get across the boundary line 

 and dig up the plants. I believe it is get- 

 ting to be more and more the fashion to dis- 

 pense with fences; and I always rejoice to 

 see this. We of the United States, espe- 

 cially the Christian people, have no money 

 to waste on needless fences any more than 

 the gTeat powers of the earth have millions 

 to waste on needless " men-of-war." May 

 God hasten the day when men shall beat 

 their swords into plowshares and their 

 spears into pruning-hooks. Of course the 

 chicken man (or chicken woman) must have 

 fences. But the neat tidy fences made of 

 poultry-netting are not at all offensive nor 

 out of harmony with beautiful surround- 

 ings. In towns where neighbors ai'e close 

 bv on all sides, I would recommend fowls 

 that do not fly over fences, or having 

 coarse cheap netting overhead also. Let us 

 remember what my old friend Aunt Mar- 

 garet said when her chickens had a habit of 

 getting into our front yard. She said in 

 substance, if not in exact words, " If chick- 

 ens make my neighbors to offend, I will 



keep no chickens while the world standeth," 

 And she offered then and there to sell me 

 all the chickens if I wanted them. As I did 

 not want them, she disposed of them soon 

 after. In looking back at the transaction 

 ] feel sorry I did not show my Christianity 

 by offering her a poultry-netting fence, and 

 telling her to keep her chickens, for she was 

 a poor woman and they were conducive to 

 her health in getting outdoors as well as 

 earning a scanty liveliliood. Oh dear me! 

 I am afraid I have many times in the past 

 forgotten my religion and forgotten that 

 cloak of humility that we who are followers 

 of the Lamb should wear day and night. 

 I keep thinking of my talk about the boys 

 and the automobile in last issue. I once 

 thanked a good Methodist brother for his 

 excellent sermon, and told him it had done 

 n^.e a lot of good already. He surprised me 

 by replying something like this: " Mr. Root, 

 that sermon has done me good too; and I 

 firmly believe that it always does every one 

 good who preaches in his own way the 

 gospel of Christ Jesus." 



There is a little more I did not tell about 

 that automobile transaction. After the boys 

 had blocked my way in going to the pray- 

 er-meeting, on my return home I went to 

 the postoffice to get my evening mail. Well, 

 those boys I have spoken of have a fashion 

 of hanging around the postoffice. I wonder 

 if that is true of your postoffice, say in the 

 evening, between eight and nine o'clock. 

 AVhile 1 was in getting the mail out of the 

 drawer I heard an automobile making an 

 awful racket as if it were going to tear 

 itself to pieces. I rushed out; and both 

 levers of my machine were turned up to the 

 highest speed, and flie engine was going 

 like a young tornado. As quickly as possi- 

 ble I threw the levers back. Two men stood 

 close by, talking as indifferently as if that 

 were the way automobiles always do. I 

 asked if they could tell me who started my 

 machine in that way. One of them said a 

 boy ran up and pulled the levers, and then 

 ran back in the darkness. Then the men 

 went on talking. I had been sorely vexed 

 an hour before, and now my patience and 

 Christian spirit were most severely tried. 

 I was not only vexed with the boys who 

 took such a liberty, but with the two men 

 who seemed so indifferent. In fact, I was 

 a good deal stirred up, and I do not know 

 but I almost felt " ugly " toward everybody. 

 I thought the two men might have stopped 

 the boy who pushed the levers back when 

 they saw how the engine was *' racing." 



