A laboring man had come up from the country for a holiday in
London. He seemed strong and active, tho his hair was gray; and
standing in the Roman Gallery, he looked wonderingly at the long
line of statues and busts of the Roman emperors. As I pointed
out one and another to a friend with me, he stept forward and
said, “Have they got Julius Cæsar here?” I at once told him that
the bust stood at the end of the gallery and he walked toward
it, but soon came back again, evidently not quite satisfied. I
asked him if he had found it.
“No,” he said, “I couldn’t see him.” So I took the old man back
to where it stood, and pointed it out.
“You are interested in these things?” I inquired.
“Yes,” he replied, “and now I can tell folks when I go home
that I’ve seen him. Which is the one that was alive when Jesus
Christ was crucified?” I soon showed him Tiberius Cæsar, and
then Augustus, telling him how God had through his means set
the whole Roman world in motion, in order that according to
prophecy Christ might be born in Bethlehem. And then I asked him
if he knew the Lord Jesus Christ. With a bright, satisfied look
lighting up his fine old face, he said, “Ah, yes! one gets to
know summat of Him in a lifetime.”
There were many things to be seen in London, but evidently the
British Museum stood first and foremost in his estimation,
because he could there see portraits of those about whom he read
in the Bible.--ADA R. HABERSHON, “The Bible and the
British Museum.”
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