By Milon's side he laid him down; They mount in haste, and onward speed, It is the spot, and yet I ween At the strange sight Sir Milon spoke : The king before the castle stood Sir Heimon he did ride in truth, And from the place some ten yards' space The archbishop was the next to come, And next came Kaims, Bavaria's duke; He brought a mighty pole and strong: "Behold, I in the forest took This weapon stout and wondrous long! Earl Richard joined the rest on foot, The Count Garin was seen from far, Cried Karl: "He brings the shield, the star, "The shield, O sire! but the gem of fire From out it had been taken." Sir Milon came, the last of all, When, as they neared the castle gate, The king he turns his wondering gaze Turned Milon: "Boy, what hast thou there? Sir stripling, who hath given thee this?" "Now grant me pardon, father dear, And, prithee, take it not amiss, CHILDREN AS THEY ARE IN CAIRO. Y first inquiry has been as to the condition of the children in this Moslem land. For the most part they are in complete ignorance, save what is picked up in the streets, or in their contact with the world. True, there are a few Arabic schools. There is a noble American mission, where a few are taught Arabic, French, and English; an estimable English lady has a small mission, where a few score more are annually instructed. But what are these among 80 many? Here is a population of four hundred thousand. In only two of these schools is there any religious instruction. The masses of the children, where are they? Go with me to a great canal the Viceroy is digging, and you will find thousands of little boys and girls, up to their knees in mud, scooping up the earth and putting it into baskets on their heads, and carrying it away. The taskmasters, as of old, stand over them with long reeds, which they lay upon their naked backs at the least provocation. This is an Egyptian Sabbath-school, for this work goes on seven days in the week. Oh that I were an artist! I would sketch your readers such a picture as would make their hearts bleed. Walking out for a little exercise last Sabbath, and thinking of my own dear children, and other children whom I love as these, in their pleasant Sabbath-schools, I came upon a company of children, most of them little girls. They were busy, but not with their Bible lessons. They were singing, but not those sweet melodies which belong to the Sabbath-school. It was a wild, sad, bitter wail. There were tears in their voices. What were they doing? do you ask? They were at work removing the earth from a street the Viceroy is paving. The loam is loosened with a clumsy pick, when it is taken up with little bare, bleeding hands, and put in baskets on the naked head, and borne away. This was another Egyptian Sabbath-school. I watched the painful process with real grief. The Viceroy seems to own the children. They are hardly more than his slaves. When I see his beautiful palaces and visit his luxuriant gardens, I remember these poor children, and all their attractions vanish from my mind, and their sumptuous rooms seem filled with wailings. Now, what makes the children of Chicago and Boston so much better cared for than the children of Caire! Why are there dear Christian homes, where woman is loved and respected in one, and the harem, and abused women, and poor, degraded, crushed children in the other? There is one sufficient answer-the religion of the Lord Jesus Christ. It is the blessed gospel so faithfully and widely taught in our dear Sabbath-schools. The sights I have seen here will make me love my own land and institutions better. Especially will t deepen my love for the Sabbath-school, and give me a new conception of its value. Save the children, and you redeem the world. Neglect the children, and we slide backwards into barbarism.-Rev. S. R. Denner, in "National Sunday-School Teacher" (American). A THE SOFT ANSWER. LITTLE girl whom I knew well came to her aunt one day and inquired earnestly, "Aunt, is every word in the Bible true?" "Yes, my dear," her aunt replied; “but why do you ask?" Because," the child replied, "it says, 'A soft answer turneth away wrath'-Prov. xv. 1. Now Anne [her cousin] was angry with me to-day, and I gave her a soft answer, but it did not turn away her wrath. She continued to scold as angrily as before, and I was obliged to come away." I do not know whether her aunt was able at the time to give the orphan the right explanation of her difficulty, for I was not present at the interview; but having had time to consider the case, and having often thought of it since I heard it, I think I can give my readers the right solution of the difficulty now. You have perhaps tried to remove a stone that obstructed the road; you put forth all your strength, but it did not move. You were obliged to leave it lying there, although you feared as you were going away lest it should make some poor traveller stumble in the dark. At another time and place you saw a stone on the path, and desired to remove it; you took it up in your hands, and though it was heavy and required great exertion, yet you were able to raise it up, and throw it to a side. In the first case perhaps you made more exertion, and yet were not successful. The reason of your failure was the great weight of the stone, or the depth to which it was embedded in the ground. You did what you could You did your duty. Now, if a companion is angry, and you give a soft answer in the hope of turning away wrath, and the wrath still continue, that is the fault of the other. You have done what you could. In all cases do what you can, whether you be successful or not. In most cases you will succeed. You will gain your brother or sister. And even in cases where, on account of the hardness of an offender's heart, it does not melt even under the influence of a soft answer at the moment, the I soft answer will return to the offender's memory when he is alone and you are far away. Perhaps he will melt under what you have said, although you do not see it. And more still. Whether yon gain your brother's love or not, the soft answer that you give is a blessing to yourself. Remember the words of the Lord Jesus, how he said, "It is more blessed to give than to receive." You who gave the loving word have enjoyed all the blessedness of giving; and in this difficult world there is hardly anything that is easier to give, or more precious to the giver, than the soft answer to turn away wrath. It costs nothing, and it gains much. The soft answer is the power that turns away wrath ; although, in some cases, the wrath is so hard and heary that it takes more than one or two of the loving answers to take it away. EDITOR YEAR has passed away since all that | Constantino's well-worn volume. But another light, without which these would have been useless, has illumined the sacred page for Fray Fernando, even "the candle of the Lord," which is his Spirit. The result of all may be briefly told :—at the year's end his faith differed widely from the recognized creed of that Church with which he still remained in outward communion. was mortal of Melchior del Salto found a quiet resting-place beneath the shadow of the new church of Callao. To Fray Fernando it has been "the beginning of years," the first year of a new life. Its days and nights have been filled to overflowing with thought and action. Inward change and progress have kept pace with outward activity; "great searchings of heart" with valiant work of head and hand. And yet the Fray Fernando who raises his eyes from his book, with a pleasant smile of greeting for José as he enters, looks a healthier, happier, and even a younger man than The who brought the dying galley-slave to his home twelve months ago. Nay more, Fray Fernando looks younger now than he did when he bought the best blessing of his life, some fifteen years since, from Don Ramon de Virves with the tooth of St. Joseph. No man who thinks profoundly and feels keenly can change his ancestral faith for another without many a fear and misgiving and many a pang. In deep soil, the roots strike deepest: even to lay the branches low the tempest must put forth the fierceness of its strength; what then if the roots be torn away? Surely the soil will come up with them-the heart itself be convulsed to its depths. Yet Fray Fernando, who had suffered so much already, suffered less than might have been expected during the progress of this momentous The book he is reading, his favourite, almost change. It was well for him that he had grasped his only study, is still the Vulgate. From its truth with a firm hand before he felt the call to pages he has learned much. Important side abandon error. Moreover, action was with him lights have been thrown upon their teaching by not only the companion of thought, but its prenumerous conversations with Walter Grey (now cursor. The cumbrous armour of superstition once more at Callao, after a long coasting expe- was not torn from him by violence so much as dition) by the simple faith that upheld Mel- laid down voluntarily piece by piece, when he chior del Salto in the hour of death-by Fray | found that instead of helping it hindered him in his daily conflict with sin and ignorance. His experience taught him that the truths his own soul lived upon were life and peace to the sick and dying to whom he ministered continually to the crowd of negroes, Creoles, and mariners to whom he preached on the shore every Sunday and holiday. But whatever was not found in the Vulgate seemed not good for them any more than for himself. Yet once again he had José-José, the most appreciative of scholars, the most sympathetic of friends" answering him like silver bells lightly touched." Everything he learned was imparted almost immediately to José, and the joy it gave was more than doubled by the process. José himself would have originated nothing in this line. He would have been content, to the end of his days, to eat the heavenly manna as his fathers ate their maize, simply as they got it, without the aid of the stones that bruise or the fan that winnows. He would have gone on, happy and contented, loving his King, living for Him, and willing at need to die for Him, but never suspecting the mode of worship he had learned at Cerro Blanco to be not altogether well pleasing and acceptable in His sight. If anything he had been taught had ever chanced to perplex him, as appearing contrary to some other thing that his heart held dear, he would have told himself, "It is a mystery of the faith," and have rested satisfied. What Fray Fernando taught him, however, he understood thoroughly, and felt profoundly. It need scarcely be added that he was the safest confidant the monk could have chosen. No one ever knew better how to keep his mouth and his tongue, and thereby to keep his soul from troubles. Already he was the guardian of scores of deadly secrets about his own people. He was just as likely to betray Maricancha or Rimac to the Viceroy, as he was to compromise Fray Fernando with the Inquisition. His own life at this time was quite as busy, and probably quite as useful, as that of his patron. The surviving members of the Inca family had lately been banished from Cuzco and its neighbourhood by a cruel and tyrannical decree. Most of them were forced to take up their residence at Lima, where, severed from the associations dear to their hearts, and exposed to the influences of an unhealthy climate, they withered away like trees transplanted into ungenial soil.* Every hour that José could spare from attendance on the patre he devoted to the task of comforting and ministering to his brethren. It is true that the common wants of the body, such as food and clothing, he seldom had to supply. Impoverished though the Incas were, they still had treasures at command in the love and reverence with which every Indian heart regarded them. "We were wrong, indeed," said the baptized Indians, when taunted by the Spaniards with having worshipped their ancient kings-" we were wrong; for now we know they were not gods, but men. having received so much good from them, we cannot think them less than of divine race; and if you show us such men now, needs must that we pay them the same veneration." Yet Yet much remained that José could do for his friends. His familiarity with the white man's language, learning, and habits enabled him to perform many important services for them. But best of all was his power to comfort them with strange sweet words spoken in the tongue of their fathers, and linked in a thousand ways to all their cherished thoughts and traditions, yet strong with a strength and wise with a wisdom that was not theirs. Earnestly did he labour to inspire the hearts of his brethren with his own passionate love and reverence for the King, the great Inca of the East, upon whom all his hopes were resting. But to return to that particular evening, just one year after the death of Melchior del Salto. José came in, hot and tired, from a walk to Lima, undertaken as escort and guide to a Dominican friar, newly arrived from the West Indies. The monk had spent the preceding day and night with Fray Fernando, being ill from the effects of a long and uncomfortable voyage. He was not too ill, however, for much conversation, or rather controversy, with his kind-hearted host. "Well, José, did you deliver up your charge in safety?" Fray Fernando asked with a smile. José's face wore a rather curious expression as he answered, "I did. Two years ago, patre, I should have been pleased to see a Spaniard treat Out of thirty-six persons who were thus banished at one time, no less than thirty-five died within the space of two years. his own countrymen as Spaniards everywhere | he said, "without telling them also—Oh, my son, treat Indians." "I had hoped, José," said Fray Fernando a little sadly, "that those old thoughts of bitterness were of the past." "The old bitterness, yes; the old thoughtsnever [" José was silent a moment, then resumed in a different tone. "This good friar seems to imagine that we of Callao are all fast asleep, and that he has come to wake us. He thinks we are poor, silly, ignorant folk, understanding nothing; just as the Spaniards think of my people. All the time it is they who cannot understand. How can they, when they despise us? We know secrets that are sealed from them for ever." "Did you follow our long argument to-day, José ?” Fray Fernando asked somewhat anxiously. "I followed you," said José, “and I went before you, and all round you, and away from and back again to you, twenty times at least, while you were talking." you, "Ah, José! I shall never get the slightest idea of logic into your head. How could you possibly think out a chain of reasoning after that fashion?" "I do not think my thoughts, patre, in chains, with one link holding on to another. My thoughts grow up like flowers-here, there, anywhere they list." "Then read this, and tell me what thoughts 'grow up' in your mind about it." And Fray Fernando handed him a letter, a fair, well-written document, with a mitre on its seal. It was in Latin, but that was now no impediment to José. He laid it down again with a look of satisfaction. Evidently "the words of the wise had been heard in quiet;" the fame of the patre's simple yet fervid eloquence had reached at last the dignitaries of his Church, and induced them to pay him a high, but well-merited compliment. "My heart is glad," said José. "You will make the walls of that great cathedral echo to grand, glorious words of truth. And on Easter-day, too! You will tell them Christ is risen!" But Fray Fernando's face did not reflect the joy that beamed from the dusky countenance of José. On the contrary, it wore an expression of anxious thought. "How can I tell them Christ is risen," do you not perceive the strait I am in?" José understood him; and the gladness faded from his face. But he placed his hand on Fray Constantino's book. "Have you not told me that he preached for years in the cathedral of Seville, and no man even suspected him of believing as you do?" "Not quite as I do. That last terrible mystery" -his eyes sought the little silver casket, rarely used of late "having dared to let that go, José-" "We keep Christ, the King. He will guide us," José said reverently. "Perhaps it were best to accept this call, and, once for all, tell out all the truth in the face of the great congregation!" José shuddered inwardly. He knew the Holy Inquisition as a vague, dark shadow, nothing more. Neither Walter Grey, nor Melchior del Salto, nor Fray Fernando himself, would ever talk of it. Presently he drew close to the patre, laid his hand, as a son might do, on his shoulder, and began to speak-eagerly, fluently-in low, soft, pleading words that fell from his lips like ripe fruit "dropped in a silent autumn night.” Tears glistened in Fray Fernando's eyes. "My son," he answered tenderly, "it must be God's will even before yours. If He has given me back— after all those years of anguish-light, joy, hope, liberty,-is it too much that I should bring Him a thank-offering?" "Many thank-offerings you will bring Him, patre; such as the soul of that poor man who died yester-even calling upon Christ the Saviour." "It may be He has other work for me. But I know not. Rest content, José; I will go nowhere, I will do nothing, save as He leads my footsteps." "I ought to rest content with that, patre. The King will lead you, and by the right way." There was a pause, which Fray Fernando broke at last. "José, do you remember-long ago, on our journey from Cerro Blanco to Cuzco-that moment when, suddenly emerging from the darkness of the rock-hewn passage, we came in sight of the deep ravine of the Apurimac, spanned by the bridge of sogas?" |