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Helen knew in just what a hearty, cheerful way he said it.

"'Not very many, dear,' she said; but I didn't feel like bothering her
about anything then, and decided it would do just as well to bring Al home
the following Saturday night and keep him over Sunday."

Will looked dubious.

"But it didn't do," he continued. "Having nothing to keep him busy that
holiday, Al went off with a crowd he had always before refused to join--a
pretty gay set, I am afraid. The man who had half promised him the position
he had been slaving for during the past year happened to see him with those
people, and the very next day he informed Al very curtly that, after due
consideration, he found he had no place for him. Alson guessed why, and now
he feels reckless, and says he might as well have the game as the name,
might as well be really bad since he has to suffer anyway. He talked in a
desperate sort of way this morning when he told me about it. Somehow I feel
responsible for the whole thing, because I hesitated about asking mother."

Will looked thoughtfully across at the girls, whose faces expressed real
sympathy. Suddenly Helen exclaimed:--

"The night before Washington's birthday, you say?"

"Yes."

"Mother was nearly crying alone in her room?"

"Yes."

"About seven o'clock?"

"Yes. Is this a cross-examination?"

"Then," said Helen, sitting upright and paying no attention to her
brother's question, "it's all my fault."

"How?"

"Bridget was out that evening, and I had to stay home from the lecture to
put away the dinner things and I said I did not see why I always had to do
such disagreeable things. I did not see why all our relations were rich,
and why we had to be always scrimping and missing everything. Of course I
repented in a little while and apologized. It made mother feel pretty bad,
I knew, but I did not think she minded it as much as that, though."

"It was a pretty serious mix-up all around, wasn't it, sister?" Will spoke
consolingly, but he looked worried.

"Well," came Mary's soothing tones, "you must not take all the blame, for
probably there were a great many more 'little nothings' that had something
to do with it. Al must take his share, too."

"Yes, perhaps," said Will; "but we have to take the blame that belongs to
us."

Helen was aghast at the enormous result of her few minutes' irritability.
Such outbursts were not common with her. There was a catch in her voice as
she said, "Poor Al!"

Mary went directly to the heart of the matter. "It is done," she said. "It
is somebody's fault, of course, but what is to be done first to rectify
it?"

"I don't know, I am sure," Helen answered, musingly. "I have not had a
thought of anything but the garden picnic for the last two days, and I
don't seem to have any idea but picnic in my head."

"O, good!" ejaculated Mary. The joy of the discoverer shone in her eyes.
"The picnic! That is just the thing. Ask him, of course."

Alson Jarvis had hidden the hurts of his schoolmates' recent slights under
a nonchalant manner. Each one, while it cut deeply, seemed to aggravate him
to greater wilfulness. Well bred as he was, took no real pleasure in the
sports of the company of which he had made a part since the loss of the
position he so desired, and for which he had worked so faithfully. He felt
himself disgraced and barred from the old associates; so, from pure
discouragement, he continued with the new.

Helen Fairmont's note of invitation came as a surprise. It ran:--

"DEAR ALSON: I am inviting, for Aunt Sue, a number of my friends to meet
Miss Mary Sutton, my guest from Amosville. We are to have a garden picnic
Thursday evening. I think you will enjoy meeting Miss Sutton, as she has
the same love for golf you have, and I have already told her of the scores
you made last summer. Yours sincerely,

"HELEN FAIRMONT."

He read it with pleasure. Then the accumulated unkindnesses of his old
friends came before him. A spirit of resentment took hold of him. No, they
had shown how little they cared for him. Why should he go among them again?
There was plenty of other company he could enter. But why had she asked him
if she did not want him? O, well, they were all alike anyway! Even if she
had not already done so, Helen would pass him by sooner or later, like so
many of the others. But Will Fairmont had stuck to him. Maybe he had got
his sister to pity him. Al winced at the thought. "I am getting
contemptible. Will Fairmont would not do that. O, well, I might as well be
done with them all right now!" His eyes flashed defiantly. Then he caught
sight of the little note.

"Friendly enough," he said. "Sounds as honest and sincere as her brother."
Then he added: "I might give her the benefit of the doubt, I suppose. Yes,
I will go, if for no other reason than that she is Will's sister."

He went. And he enjoyed himself thoroughly thanks partially to Mrs.
Armour's knowledge of human nature. Where others saw only weakness, she
found smarting hurts. She felt that he was on dangerous ground, that he was
ashamed of himself, and that his self-pride and self-respect needed
propping, and she immediately proceeded to prop them.

Helen's grief over her own unsuspected part in his career resulted in an
especial effort to make the picnic a pleasure and success for him. With
that kindly compliance which is more common in those about us than we
sometimes think, the other young people accepted the idea of Alson's being
one of them again, and he found himself, before the termination of the
evening, on almost his old footing with them.

"Wasn't it a success all round?" said Mary that night. "I congratulate you,
Helen, on your ability to extend real hospitality. It was just lovely."

"They did seem to have a good time, didn't they? Al Jarvis was on my
conscience all the evening. Do you think he enjoyed himself?"

"Yes, I do, Helen."

"After what I did it was such a little return to make."

Simultaneously the girls laughed.

"Trifles again! They keep bobbing up, don't they? I suppose this is one of
those of little consequence."

"'Time will tell,'" sententiously quoted Mary.

Time did tell. Years afterward two successful lawyers sat in an office, one
congratulating the other on his brilliant speech of the day.

"It might never have been, Will," said Alson Jarvis, "if your aunt hadn't
somehow, without a single definite word on the subject, shown me the broken
road down which I had about decided to travel through It was at a party she
had in her grounds one night long ago for your sister and Mary Sutton. Do
you remember it?"

Did he? Will's heart glowed with pleasure and gratitude as he thought of
the great result of Mary's little suggestion about inviting Al. How unlike
this was the outcome of that miserable trifle which had played so important
a part in the lawyer's experience.--_Elisabeth Golden, in the Wellspring_.

Finish Thy Work

No other hand thy special task can do,
Though trivial it may seem to thee.
Thou canst not shirk
God-given work
And still be blest of Heaven, from sin be free.
O idler in life's ripened harvest-field,
Perform thy task, that rich thy work may yield!

Ah, sweet the thought that comes at set of sun,
If finished is the work of that one day.
But O the joy
Without alloy,
Awaiting him who at life's close can say,
"I'm ready, Father, to go home to thee;
The work is finished which thou gavest me."

MRS. M A LOPER.

A SECOND TRIAL

A College Scene

It was commencement day at college. The people were pouring into the church
as I entered. Finding the choice seats already taken, I pressed onward,
looking to the right and the left for a vacancy, and on the very front row
I found one. Here a little girl moved along to make room for me, looking
into my face with large gray eyes, whose brightness was softened by very
long lashes. Her face was open and fresh as a newly blown rose. Again and
again I found my eyes turning to the rose-like face, and each time the gray
eyes moved, half-smiling, to meet mine. Evidently the child was ready to
make friends with me. And when, with a bright smile, she returned my
dropped handkerchief, we seemed fairly introduced.

"There is going to be a great crowd," she said to me.

"Yes," I replied; "people always like to see how schoolboys are made into
men."

Her face beamed with pleasure and pride as she said: "My brother is going
to graduate; he's going to speak. I have brought these flowers to throw at
him."

They were not greenhouse favorites, but just old-fashioned domestic
flowers, such as we associate with the dear grandmothers. "But," I thought,
"they will seem sweet and beautiful to him, for his little sister's sake."

"That is my brother," she went on, pointing with her nosegay.

"The one with the light hair?" I asked.

"O, no;" she said, smiling and shaking her head in innocent reproof; "not
that homely one with red hair; that handsome one with brown, wavy hair. His
eyes look brown, too; but they are not, they are dark blue. There! he's got
his hand up to his head now. You see him, don't you?"

In an eager way she looked from him to me, as if some important fate
depended on my identifying her brother.

"I see him," I said. "He is a very good-looking brother."

"Yes, he is beautiful," she said, with artless delight, "and he's good, and
he studies so hard. He has taken care of me ever since mama died. Here is
his name on the program. He is not the valedictorian, but he has an honor
for all that."

I saw in the little creature's familiarity with these technical college
terms that she had closely identified herself with her brother's studies,
hopes, and successes.

"He thought at first," she continued, "that he would write on 'The Romance
of Monastic Life.'"

What a strange sound these long words had, whispered from her childish
lips! Her interest in her brother's work had stamped them on the child's
memory, and to her they were ordinary things.

"But then," she went on, "he decided that he would write on 'Historical
Parallels,' and he has a real good oration, and says it beautifully. He has
said it to me a great many times. I almost know it by heart. O, it begins
so pretty and so grand! This is the way it begins," she added, encouraged
by the interest she must have seen in my face: "'Amid the combinations of
actors and forces that make up the great kaleidoscope of history, we often
find a turn of Destiny's hand.'"

"Why, bless the baby!" I thought, looking down into her proud face. I
cannot describe how very odd and elfish it did seem to have those sonorous
words rolling out of the smiling mouth. The band striking up put an end to
the quotation and to the confidences. As the exercises progressed and
approached nearer and nearer the effort on which all her interest was
concentrated, my little friend became excited and restless. Her eyes grew
larger and brighter; two deep red spots glowed on her cheek. She touched up
the flowers, manifestly making the offering ready for the shrine.

"Now it's his turn," she said, turning to me a face in which pride and
delight and anxiety seemed equally mingled. But when the overture was
played through, and his name was called, the child seemed, in her
eagerness, to forget me and all the earth except him. She rose to her feet
and leaned forward for a better view of her beloved as he mounted to the
speaker's stand. I knew by her deep breathing that her heart was throbbing
in her throat. I knew, too, by the way her brother came to the front, that
he was trembling. The hands hung limp: his face was pallid, and the lips
blue, as with cold. I felt anxious. The child, too, seemed to discern that
things were not well with him. Something like fear showed in her face.

He made an automatic bow. Then a bewildered, struggling look came into his
face, then a helpless look, and he stood staring vacantly, like a
somnambulist, at the waiting audience. The moments of painful suspense went
by, and he still stood as if struck down. I saw how it was; he had been
seized with stage fright.

Alas, little sister! She turned her large, dismayed eves on me. "He's
forgotten it," she said. Then a swift change came over her face, a strong,
determined look; and on the funeral-like silence of the room broke the
sweet child voice:--

"'Amid the combinations of actors and forces that make up the great
kaleidoscope of history, we often find that a turn of Destiny's hand--'"

Everybody about us turned and looked. The breathless silence, the sweet,
childish voice, the childish face, the long, unchildlike words, produced a
weird effect.

But the help had come too late; the unhappy brother was already staggering
in humiliation from the stage. The band quickly struck up, and waves of
lively music were rolled out to cover the defeat.

I gave the sister a glance in which I meant to show the intense sympathy
which I felt, but she did not see. Her eyes, swimming with tears, were on
her brother's face. I put my arm around her. She was too absorbed to feel
the caress, and before I could appreciate her purpose she was on her way to
the shame-stricken young man, sitting with a face like a statue's. When he
saw her by his side, the set face relaxed, and a quick mist came into his
eyes. The young men got closer together to make room for her. She sat down
beside him, laid her flowers upon his knee, and slipped her hand into his.
I could not keep my eyes from her sweet, pitying face. I saw her whisper to
him, he bending a little to catch her word. Later, I found out that she was
asking him if he knew his "piece" now, and that he answered yes.

When the young man next on the list had spoken, and the band was playing,
the child, to the brother's great surprise, made her way up the platform
steps, and pressed through the throng of professors, trustees, and
distinguished visitors, to the president.

"If you please, sir," she said, with a little courtesy, "will you and the
trustees let my brother try again? He knows his 'piece' now."

For a moment, the president stared at her through his gold-bowed
spectacles, and then, appreciating the child's petition, he smiled on her,
and went down and spoke to the young man who had failed.

So it happened that when the band had again ceased playing, it was briefly
announced that Mr. Duane would now deliver his oration, "Historic
Parallels."

"'Amid the combinations of actors and forces that----'" This the little
sister whispered to him as he arose to answer the summons.

A ripple of heightened and expectant interest passed over the audience, and
then all sat stone-still as if fearing to breathe lest the speaker might
again take fright. No danger. The hero in the youth was aroused. He went at
his "piece" with a set purpose to conquer, to redeem himself, and to bring
back the smile into the child's tear-stained face. I watched the face
during the speaking. The wide eyes, the parted lips, the whole rapt being,
said the breathless audience was forgotten, that her spirit was moving with
his.

And when the address was ended, with the ardent abandon of one who catches
enthusiasm, in the realization that he is fighting down a wrong judgment
and conquering a sympathy, the effect was really thrilling. That dignified
audience broke into rapturous applause; bouquets intended for the
valedictorian rained like a tempest. And the child who had helped save the
day, that one beaming little face, in its pride and gladness, is something
to be forever remembered.--_Our Dumb Animals_.

THE SIN OF EXTRAVAGANCE

"It may be a folly, but you would not think of calling extravagance a sin?"
asked a young man of his minister.

"I do not care to offend you by harsh terms, but if we agree that it is a
folly, that is reason enough for wishing to be wiser."

"But it is very easy to spend money when one is with others, and one does
not like to be called 'tight.'"

"John," said the minister, "I do not propose to argue with you, but I want
to tell you two stories, both of them true, recent, and out of my own
experience. They will illustrate the reason why, knowing you as well as I
do, having baptized you and received you into the church, I cannot view
without concern your growing extravagance, and the company into which it
leads you, and the interests from which it tends to separate you.

"A few months ago a young man came to this city, and spent his first days
here under my own roof. I have known his father for many years, an earnest,
faithful man, who has denied himself for that boy, and prayed for him, and
done everything that a father ought.

"I chance to remember a word which his father spoke to me a number of years
ago, when the boy was a young lad, and was recovering from a sickness that
made it seem possible he would need a change of climate. I happen to
remember meeting his father, who told me of this, and how he was arranging
in his own mind to change his business, to make any sacrifice, to move to
the ends of the earth, if necessary, for that boy's sake.

"The boy is not a bad boy. But he had not been in my home an hour before he
asked me for the address of a tailor, and when his new suit came,--a suit
which I thought he might very well have waited to earn,--it was silk-lined
throughout. I do not believe the suit which his father wears as he passes
the plate in church every Sunday is silk-lined.

"I knew what the boy was to earn, and could estimate what he could afford,
and I knew that he could not buy that suit out of his own earnings.

"I had a letter from his father a few days ago. Shall I read it to you? It
is very short. It reads as follows:--

"'MY DEAR FRIEND: I hope you will never know how hard it is for me to write
to you to say that you must not under any circumstances lend money to my
dear boy.'

"And those last three words make it the more pathetic.

"The second story, too, is recent. Another boy, from another State, came to
this city, and for the first few Sundays attended our church. We tried to
interest him in good things; we liked him, and did our best for him. I saw
little in him to disturb me, except that he was spending more money than I
could think he earned. Recently I received a letter from his father. It is
longer, and I will not read it, but will tell you the substance of it. He
wrote saying that his son was employed in a business where, with economy,
he ought to be able to make a living from the start, and with hope for
advancement, but that from the first week he had written home for money.
Not only so, but the father had all too good reason to believe that the boy
was still leaving bills unpaid. The father wrote to ask me whether he could
not arrange with some one connected with the church to receive the boy's
money from home week by week, and see that it was applied to the uses for
which it was sent. He added that he would be glad to consider himself a
contributor to the church during the period of this arrangement.

"I had little hope that any arrangement of this kind would help matters,
but I took it as indicating that the boy needed looking after, and I sent
at once to look him up. Where do you think we found him?--In jail.

"These are not imaginary stories, nor are they of a remote past. And I see
other young men for whom I am anxious. Wear the coat a little longer, but
pay for it out of your own money. Be considered 'tight' if necessary, but
live within your means. It is good sense; more than that, it is good
religion.

"And now I will answer your question, or rather, you may answer it: Is
extravagance merely a folly, or is it also a sin? What do you
think?"--_Youth's Companion._

A LITTLE CHILD'S WORK

Near one of the tiny schoolhouses of the West is a carefully tended mound,
the object of the tenderest interest on the part of a man known far and
wide as "Preacher Jim," a rough, unministerial-looking person, who yet has
reached the hearts and lives of many of the men and women in that region,
and has led them to know the Master whom he serves in his humble fashion.

Twenty years ago Preacher Jim was a different man. Rough and untaught, his
only skill was shown by the dexterity with which he manipulated the cards
that secured to him his livelihood. Then, as now, he was widely known, but
in those days his title was "Gambler Jim."

It was during a long, tiresome trip across the Rockies that a clergyman and
his wife, having undressed their little boy and tucked him snugly into his
berth, repaired to the observation-car in order to watch the November
heavens.

An hour passed swiftly; then suddenly a rough-looking fellow made his way
toward the group of which the clergyman was one.

"Anybody here got a kid what's dressed in a red nightgown and sings like a
bird?" he demanded, awkwardly.

The father and mother sprang excitedly to their feet, gasping in fear. The
man nodded reassuringly.

"The' ain't nothing the matter of him," he said, with yet deeper
embarrassment. "The matter's with--_us_. You're a parson, ain't you? The
kid, he's been singin' to us--an' talkin'. If you don't mind, we'd take it
mighty good of you to come with me. Not you, ma'am. The kid's all safe, an'
the parson'll bring him back in a little while."

With a word to his wife, the minister followed his guide toward the front
of the train, and on through car after car until thirteen of them had been
traversed. As the two men opened the door of the smoking compartment, they
stopped to look and listen.

Up on one of the tables stood the tiny boy, his face flushed, his voice
shrill and sweet.

"_Is_ you ready?" he cried, insistently. "My papa says the Bridegroom is
Jesus, an' he wants everybody to be ready when he comes, just 'cause he
loves you." Then, with a childish sweetness, came the song which had
evidently made the deepest impression upon the child's mind: "Are you ready
for the Bridegroom when he comes?"

"He's sung it over 'n' over," whispered the clergyman's companion, "'nd I
couldn't stan' no more. He said you'd pray, parson."

As the two approached, the boy lifted his sweet, serious eyes to his
father's.

"They want to get ready," he said, simply. And, his boy snuggled childishly
in his arms, the minister prayed, as he never had prayed before, for the
men gathered about the child.

It was only a few moments before the clergyman bore the child back to the
sleeping-car, where the mother anxiously awaited his coming. Then he
returned to talk with the men, four of whom that night decided to "get
ready," and among them was, of course, the man who sought out the father of
the child, Gambler Jim.

To this day it remains a mystery how the child succeeded in reaching the
smoking-car unnoticed and unhindered.

As for the little fellow himself, his work was early done, for a few weeks
later, upon the return trip through the mountains, he was suddenly stricken
with a swift and terrible disease, and the parents tenderly laid the little
form under the sod near the schoolhouse where Preacher Jim now tells so
often the story, which never grows old.--_Youth's Companion_.

Christ Is Coming

Little children, Christ is coming,
Coming through the flaming sky,
To convey his trusting children
To their glorious home on high

Do you love the Lord's appearing?
Are you waiting for the day
When with all his shining angels
He will come in grand array?

All who keep the ten commandments
Will rejoice his face to see;
But the wicked, filled with anguish,
From his presence then will flee

Now while yet probation lingers,
Now while mercy's voice is heard,
Haste to give your heart to Jesus,
Seek to understand his Word

Quickly help to spread the message,
You to Christ some soul may turn.
Though the multitudes his goodness
And his tender love may spurn.

Little children, Christ is coming,
Even God's beloved Son;
When in glory he descendeth,
Will he say to you, "Well done"?

DORA BRORSEN.

THE HANDY BOX

"Grandmother, do you know where I can find a little bit of wire?" asked
Marjorie, running from the shed, where an amateur circus was in
preparation.

Grandmother went to a little closet in the room and disappeared a moment,
coming out presently with the wire.

"O, yes! and Fred wanted me to ask if you had a large safety-pin." Marjorie
looked a little wistful, as if she did not quite like to bother
grandmother.

There was another trip made to the closet, and the safety-pin was in
Marjorie's hand.

"You are a pretty nice grandma," she said, over her shoulder, as she ran
out.

Not very long after, Marjorie came into the kitchen again. This time she
stood beside the sink, where grandmother was washing dishes, and twisted
her little toes in her sandals, but seemed afraid to speak.

"Fred wants to know"--began grandmother, laughing.

"Yes'm," said Marjorie, blushing.

"If I can't find him a piece of strong string?" finished grandmother.

"O, no--it's a little brass tack!" declared Marjorie, soberly.

She was a patient, loving grandmother, and she went to the little closet
again. Marjorie could hardly believe her eyes when she saw the tacks, for
there were three!

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