Then to my lifted eyes, a bow The bow that spanned my brightened sky For his step was firm and steady, And is there one before me now Oh! listen to a friendly voice, Do it quickly while your heart is warm; Come, take our pledge, and proudly wear Then with hand that's firm and steady, A bit of ribbon blue May little seem to you, But oh! how much it meant to me, HAL OLD CHRISTMAS. "ALLO! Here's "Old Christmas" with jovial face! Come, bring the bright holly our loved homes to grace; The goose and the sirloin, the turkey, the fowl, Let north winds blow keenly, let snow fall in flakes, We fear not the winds, we delight in the snow, We heed not the sleet, as it beats on our brow; The Childless Mothers. 39 When frosts are right keen, we glide o'er the lakes; We'll call round our hearthstone relations and friends, THE CHILDLESS MOTHERS. YE mothers of little children! Ye who are toil-worn and weary, Think of the mothers to-night Whose homes are childless and dreary: No whisper of childish prattle, And no noisy footfall is boun ling; But silence and sa iness reigneth And the knell of the churchyard is sounding. Ye mothers, with hands so la len With tasks, and duties, and care, That ye have no time for resting, But of work have more than a share, The heart-broken mothers to-night, Whose hands are no longer busy, Whose homes are no longer bright. Ye mothers whose hearts are burdened Who would gladly your burden bear. God pity the mothers to-night Whose little ones lie 'neath the sod; Their life is a weary way Who have thus passed under the rod; And pray that all joyful mothers, HOPE IN WORK. EDWARD HAYTON. ALL work Well done, must tell sometime for goodNor faithless Jew, nor savage Turk, Is fairly proof against the might Of steady and unswerving right. Oh! ask No splendid opportunity, But just the simple daily task— The chance that comes in little things, The chance that any duty brings. If these Are lost, the best-ay, all is lost! For man grows strong by slow degrees; 'Tis inch by inch if 'tis at all, The great lies somewhere in the small. The hand, That shapes to-day a work of art, Toil on! Resolv'd to reach the unattain'd, As each man'must who would be known More noble than the beasts he drives, And who would live in other lives. DEACON BROWN..A Moderate Drinker and Smoker of the approved type. MRS. ELIZA BROWN.. His wife, a good mother and an earnest abstainer. TOM (about 15 years of age)....... .Their son, a schoolboy. CLARA (about 21 years of age) ..Their daughter, one who takes after her mother. ......... Servant to the Browns. EMMA... REV. WM. WORKWELL........Their Pastor, an energetic Teetotaler and MR. JOHN GOODHEART.. Non-Smoker. Friends of the Browns and earnest [SCENE-BROWN's Sitting Room. Table, Easy Chairs, &c. Enter BROWN, he seats himself in an easy chair by the table. Takes out a cigar and looks at it.] DEACON BROWN. Now then for a little indulgence. (Pauses.) I had better not smoke here, for my wife will find it out when she returns, and then I shall have a lecture. (Puts cigar back into his pocket. He rings. Enter EMMA in servant's attire.) EMMA. Please, sir, do you want anything? D. BROWN. Find me "The Christian Standard" for this week. (Exit EMMA, who returns with a paper, and lays it on the table beside BROWN.) DEACON BROWN. Thank you, Emma. Where is Mrs. Brown? EMMA. Please, sir, she went out for a walk with Miss Brown this afternoon. I expect them back every minute. Anything else wanted, please, sir? (EMMA retires. BROWN When ! What have D. BROWN. No, not just now. opens his paper and appears to read). we here? (He reads aloud). "To the Editor of the Christian Standard.' Dear sir,-Can nothing be done to arouse the conscience of this professedly Christian nation against the evils of drink and tobacco? I think it is quite time for all Christian men who have any regard for the highest good of those by whom they are surrounded to have done with these two powerful agencies of evil. If we are to do any good with the degraded classes we must have clean hands ourselves. We must first set them the example of perfectly sober lives. The pot and the pipe, which have done so much to degrade and destroy them, must have no place in our regard.-Hoping these few lines may be the means of awakening some of your readers to a sense of their duty. I remain yours truly,-A Christian Worker." Dear me, I wonder what we are coming to! Strange that one cannot have a quiet smoke or a harmless glass of wine without one's Christianity being called in question in this fashion? These teetotalers and anti-smokers understand the art of making themselves very disagreeable. They are always poking their facts or their notions under a body's nose. Really things are getting too bad, and I think I will just let some of these gentlemen know a bit of my mind. I'll write to the editor of the "Christian Standard." These fellows get too much of their own way. (Enter Mrs. Brown). MRS. BROWN. Now, now, Edmund, do not get excited, dear. DEACON BROWN. Excited! It would excite a Quaker to be persecuted as I am, just because I indulge myself occasionally in a quiet smoke or a glass of port. Look here. (Hands her paper and points out the place he has read). Read that, please. I'll write to the editor of the "Christian Standard." MRS. BROWN (sits and reads.) But I don't see why you should take offence at this letter. There is nothing personal or offensive in it, and if you will persist in questionable practices yourself, dear, you need not set yourself up as the champion of a course of conduct which you must know to be indefensible. D. BROWN. Questionable practice! Indefensible course of conduct! Indeed! and from my own wife too. It seems to me that I must have heard those phrases before. (Pauses). Ah, I recollect! They are just the phrases which our minister is forever dinning into one's ears. By-the-by, how is it that he has taken to visiting here so much lately? Surely he does not think that we stand in any special need of his spiritual ministrations? MRS. BROWN. I should think you ought to be shrewd enough to guess pretty accurately yourself. Have you forgotten how persistently you visited my father's house at a certain interesting period of our history? D. BROWN (angrily). Indeed! and so it is our Clara he is after, is it? Confound his impudence! Eliza, I am astonished |