1452 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Nov. 15 



not even write his own name, our daughter 

 Carrie, who had been several years a teach- 

 er, especially in the mission fields, volunteer- 

 ed to give him some instruction. Ransom, 

 however, did not make very much progress. 

 He explained his lack of education by saying 

 he had a fall when he was a child, and in- 

 jured his head. There was a doctor who 

 said there was no use in sending him to school 

 — he was not like other boys, etc. Carrie ad- 

 mitted that he seemed to be rather peculiar, 

 and said it was a hard matter for him to con- 

 centrate his mind. She succeeded, however, 

 in getting him to read so he read that one 

 verse in the Sunday-school lesson that 1 told 

 you in that story long ago. Well, now, here 

 is the letter that Ransom wrote to his old 

 friend and teacher: 



Mv dear friend, Miss Boot:— As I have not heard 

 from you in over a year I thought I would write and 

 see if you were still in good health. I should like to 

 hear from you and your folks, as I am longing to 

 hear from my Ohio friends with whom I used to have 

 so much pleasure. I am many miles away from them 

 all, but I have not forgotten them. Since I left there 

 I have seen lots of the country and some of the wild 

 and woolly West. I spent the last part of last sum- 

 mer in South Dakota. It was about 30 miles between 

 houses. I spent the last nine months in Nebraska 

 and Colorado. I spent three months in Denver. I am 

 at present working in Havelock, in the C. B. and Q. 

 shops. Havelock is seven miles from Lincoln and 

 thirty-two from Omaha. The wor < is all piecework, 

 I am making all the way from two to three dollars a 

 day. I am working as a boiler-maker helper. 



As it is about church time I shall have to close. 

 Please write and let me know all the news from the 

 shop and from all the rest of you. 



Hoping to hear from you soon I remain 



Yours truly. R. G. Murray. 



Havelock, Neb., Aug. 25. 



Now, the above letter was quite well writ- 

 ten for a boy of eighteen or nineteen; but 

 what surprised me most was that there was 

 not a badly .«'pelled word in the whole letter; 

 and it really was one of my "happy sur- 

 prises." Ransom does not tell us very much 

 about how he is holding on to his religion; 

 but he does say, "It is about church time." 

 I might think that he did this because he 

 thought it would please us, and that, may be, 

 he is not attending church very much after 

 all. But this thing is certainly true: The boy 

 who could not write nor read well enough 

 to sign his own name now writes a very fair 

 letter; and the letter gives evidence all the 

 way through that he nas been growing in 

 wisdom and in grace. May the Lord be 

 praised that this little bit of casting our bread 

 on the waters brought such a crop. Come 

 to think of it, more is due to Carrie Bell than 

 to myself, for 1 think she spent much more 

 time with him than I did. When I found 

 Ransom there in jail he had commenced al- 

 ready at the age of seventeen to steal rides 

 on the cars and going about with a circus or 

 show, and was in a fair way to turn out a 

 tramp and perhaps a criminal. Just a little 

 effort on our part started him in the better 

 way. « 



Once more, this little letter helps to bring 

 out the wonderful beauty and encouragement 

 and inspiration there is in the words of our 

 first text: "He which converteth the sinner 

 from the error of his way shall save a soul 



from death, and shall hide a multitude of 

 sins." Who knows, or who can compute the 

 trouble and expense to our nation that is 

 saved by turning just one boy away from 

 bad habits and vicious ways? 



Before closing I wish to say just a word 

 about that statement from the doctor that 

 Ransom could not study because his head 

 was injured. There is quite a little of that 

 sort of talk going on. A certain boy thinks 

 he can not get an education because he is not 

 "built that way"— that some boys are born 

 to be scholars, and some are not. My friend, 

 do not believe a word of it. Jt is a sugges- 

 tion of Satan. Along the same line a young 

 man tells you he inherits an appetite for 

 drink and tobacco, and it is the fault of his 

 parents and not his own. Such suggestions 

 come from the prince of darkness — from Sa- 

 tan himself. If it is true that some of us ar*? 

 handicapped in some respects compared with 

 others, God has given all a chance. When I 

 was at school 1 learned very easily. I loved 

 books, and could master them without very 

 much hard work. Now, the truest friend I 

 have in this whole wide world was unlike 

 me in that respect. It was hard for her to 

 get her girlish ideas pinned down to her stud- 

 ies; andshe says she did not make as good 

 use of her time as she might have done when 

 her parents labored hard to keep her in school ; 

 but when she had some boys and girls of her 

 own she began to appreciate what she had 

 missed; and her determination that her boys 

 and girls should go to school and improve 

 their time was almost a fierce one. She was 

 so set in giving the children an education 

 that she went over their lessons with them 

 and followed it up for years, and in this way 

 made up for what she neglected before she 

 was married. For a good many years I be- 

 gan to think myself greatly her superior in 

 point of education; but after our five children 

 had grown up and been piloted through their 

 lessons (even when they went away to school) 

 their indefatigable mother had got to be 

 ahead of myself in many points of education 

 — especially a good common-school education 

 — and she began to straighten me up, not 

 only in my talk, but in my writings here in 

 these pages. Mrs. Root has always been a 

 worker; and although she is now toward sev- 

 enty years of age she is a worker still; and 

 with the multitude of periodicals we have 

 now in such plenty she keeps abreast with 

 pretty much all that is going on in this world 

 of ours. 



Now a word more about people who are 

 prevented from getting an education by her- 

 edity or some physical trouble or something 

 of that sort. When I last visited my sister 

 in Manistee, Mich., she gave me a little tract 

 that said on the outside of the cover, "Di- 

 rections for Beginners in Practical Christian- 

 ity, with Six Days' Course of Treatment." 

 I wish to give you the " treatment " for just 

 one day: 



MONDAY. 



[Deny]— I deny the belief that I am a child of the 

 flesh and must suffer the sins of my forefathers " even 

 unto the third and fourth generation." Perish all 

 such ignorant claims. 



