346 



GLEANINGS IN BEE CULTURE. 



Oct. 



I would not ask anybody to sign with me ; i 

 but Saturday night came, and the boys and 

 girls came for their pay, as usual, never 

 dreaming that the money would not be 

 forthcoming, as it always had been. I rea- 

 soned with myself, that they had no business 

 to expect their wages always so promptly ; 

 that other establishments were sometimes a 

 little behind, and why should not I be? A 

 few looked disappointed, and when I learned 

 of one who went without the needful things 

 of life, because I had not been as prompt as 

 I had led them to expect me to be, my heart 

 smote me. Perhaps, he had just such a soft 

 blue eyed baby at home as mine, and it might 

 be that I had been the means of depriving 

 this little one of comforts, because the fath- 

 er could not have his small earnings on 

 Satu.rday night. As I went home, in the 

 darkness of the night, I bowed my head to 

 tlie ground, in the" damp grass, under the 

 api)le trees, where I had gone many times 

 before, and asked Ilim who never refuses to 

 go our ''security.'- when we are in the right 

 track, to show me wherein I liad erred, and 

 to tell me whit to do. Yf hen Jesus healed 

 the blind man, he told him to go and wash ; 

 wlien he healed the sick man, he told him 

 to take up liis bed and walk ; and when he 

 fed the multitude, they were first required 

 to sit down on the grass in iifties. Sec; now, 

 I do not know that a prayer of mine was 

 ever answered, unless I went right to v/ork. 

 But. we often hear asked, could you not go 

 right to work just as well without praying? 

 To be sure I could, but would I go to work 

 in the same way':* I leave you to judge. As 

 a natural consequence of being refused mon- 

 ey at the bank, I imagined tliat the people 

 at the bank treated me with a sort of lofty 

 indilference ; and my first inijjulse was to 

 declare that I would have nothing n)ore to 

 do with them, but that I would deposit my 

 money elsev.iiere, &c. After kneeling in 

 the grass, hov/ever, my work was very 

 plainly shown to be, to root out all those 

 feelings, to bear •■snubbing," if such came, 

 with patience, and to take a far liumbler 

 place than I had been holding. Instead of 

 getting mad at the cashier of the bank, and 

 declaring that I would never have anything 

 more to do with him, I went and stated 

 plainly to him my exact circumstances, and 

 asked Iiis advice. This put both him and 

 myself in quite a different light, and he was 

 tlie same good friend he had always been. 

 Tiie truth of it was, he had never been in 

 the least imfriendly. Do you know what a 

 hard thing it is to do, to refuse to trust an 

 intimate friend and acquaintance? If the 

 casiiier of a national bank could not do this, 

 he would be totally unfit for his position, 

 and would most certainly lose it. I know of 

 nothing but i)rayer, that takes '-kinks" out 

 of a body, and shows them just where they 

 belcmg. ' 



"If you object to asking anybody to sign 

 with you,'" said he, ''give your signers a 

 mortgage, and thus secure them from run- 

 ning any risk.'' 



What a sensible piece of advice, and yet it 

 had not occurred to me before. Further- 

 more, he volunteered to lay my case before 

 the liMiik dhv'tors. ;iiid -'"h if an arrange- 



ment could not be made, whereby I might 

 have credit for all money taken in, and be 

 charged interest for only what I used, and 

 no more. If I were to borrow money for a 

 year or more, I could easily get it for 8 per 

 cent, but then I should be obliged to keep a 

 considerable sum lying idle in the bank, 

 just to have it ready as needed. The ar- 

 rangement spoken of was made, and all 

 that was necessary was to get the two names 

 of considerable land holders. A relative by 

 marriage said las father would sign with 

 me willingly, but that his mother must not 

 be told of it. In my way of thinking, man 

 and wife are one, and I made my request to 

 both. The old gentleman seemed (luite wil- 

 ling to accommodate me, but his wife, whom I 

 knew well, having got acquainted with her 

 ill my mission work, strongly objected. 

 Said she : 



"As long as you are alive, Mv. Root, I 

 have no fear; but should you die, and the 

 property be sold under the hammer, it might 

 not bring even :?2.000. We are old people, 

 and it would be a sore trial to us to be wor- 

 ried with such business. We worked hard 

 for our fevf acres, when it Avas all woods 

 a.bout here, we have lived humbly and care- 

 fully, and we wish to end our days quietly, 

 in the same way." 



What a wicked thing it would have been, 

 to have secured her husband's name to any 

 paper without lier knowledge, and to have 

 worried her in her old age, even if she had 

 been extreme in her ideas. God forbid that 

 I should ever get out of troubles in that way. 

 Saturday night was coming again ami not 

 enough to pay tlie hands, and yet I shrank 

 from asking anyone else to be responsible 

 for my business sjieculations. I stated the 

 matter to a member of our church, who 

 owns considerable property, and althougli 

 he did not refuse, I saw pla'inly that he pre- 

 ferred not to do it. He very kindly told me, 

 that people were talking about the proba- 

 bility that I would get "swamped," in trying 

 to do things on so large a scale, because my 

 business was something that few could un- 

 derstand; if I wanted to buy a farm, or go 

 into a store, or start a lumber yard or black- 

 smitli sho)). it would be readily understood ; 

 but the idea of employing half a hundred 

 hands, in a business that even I myself can 

 hardly give a name to, is, to average persons, 

 a mystery. Said he: 



" Mr. Root, your whole work is out of the 

 common track; it is, as it were, a constant 

 experiment. Your mission Sabbath schools 

 and Bible class, your bees and your bee jour- 

 nal, have all elicited wonder and surprise ; 

 but everybody, almost, thinks them tran- 

 sient things, and we have looked to see them 

 go down long before this time. We rejoice 

 to see you looking to God for help and guid- 

 ance, and our faitli in you is constantly in- 

 creasing." 



I knew that what he said was the truth, 

 yet the old pride kept coming up as I re- 

 plied : 



'• I could have built a wooden building and 

 had it all paid for; or I could have built 

 sma.ller, at the risk of having to build again 

 in a year or two ; or I could have purchased 

 a smaller engine, and printing press; but 



