CHILDREN MADE HAPPY.
“We are willing, we are ready;
We would learn, if you would teach,
We have hearts that yearn to duty;
We have minds alive to beauty,
Souls that any height can reach.”
MARY HOWITT.
Most grateful was the quiet repose of Mrs. Rivers’s pretty home after
the long wearisome ride in the cars, most pleasant was it to be kindly
welcomed by old friends in their new homes. The village seemed full of
purpose and aspiration, springing up in an oak opening on the shore of
Lake Michigan, and clustering round the two literary institutions that
have called it into existence. The familiar faces gathered around Mrs.
Rivers’s tea-table recalled many dear and cherished associations, and
brought back pleasant pictures of the past.
Norman’s pleasures were in the present. He was soon off to the lake with
George Rivers, wandering a while on its pebbly shore, and then sitting
on the pier fishing. They dropped their lines in the water, and sat
waiting for a bite. Long and patiently they sat, the sun burning their
faces, but their patience was not rewarded with success, for they got no
fish. Norman found more companions in the little Randolphs and Henrys,
who were fishing at the same time. They lived a few doors from George
Rivers, and they came to see Norman, and invited him to dinner and to
tea. He had many pleasant talks, and many games with his new friends,
who were very kind to him.
Sunday morning came; the weather doubtful, uncertain, showery. Mrs.
Lester heard with great pleasure a lecture from her former pastor, and a
sermon from an old friend. The Sunday school was invited to visit the
Biblical Institute that afternoon, to see some idols that had just
arrived from China, and to hear Profesor L. lecture upon them. The
children were on tip-toe with expectation; but the superintendent, after
consultation with the teachers, decided that it would not be prudent to
go; the clouds were threatening, and the grass was wet with the recent
rain. With his pleasant face and his kindly voice, he told the children
of this decision, and then asked all who were in favor of going to the
Biblical Institute the next afternoon, at four o’clock, to raise their
hands. Every hand was raised, but there was a new difficulty. A
professor in the Institute said that it would be better to defer the
visit till the next Sabbath, as it would interfere with the students’
recitations on Monday afternoon.
“Not the next Sabbath,” said another gentleman; “there will be a general
class-meeting here then, which we all wish to attend.”
“All, then,” said the superintendent, “who are in favor of visiting the
Institute this day fortnight, will signify it by holding up their
hands.”
Not an uplifted hand was seen; the expression of opinion was very
decided. The children did not believe in a pleasure so long delayed. The
professor, with great good-humor, then said that they were disposed to
gratify the children, and that they would so arrange their recitations
as to give them a cordial welcome.
“My text is at the Institute,” said Professor L., as he rose to speak to
the children, “and my audience here;” but he contrived to talk to them
without a text so agreeably, that the children voted that he should be
invited to address them the next afternoon, which he partly consented to
do.
It was a very pleasant looking Sunday school, teachers and children all
in their places, notwithstanding the wet walks and the dark clouds. The
children looked bright and happy, interested in their lessons, attentive
to their teachers, and they sang sweet hymns with great spirit and
earnestness.
Monday was bright and beautiful, and many little hearts beat high with
the thoughts of the afternoon’s pleasure. How glad they were that it had
not been put off for a fortnight. It was a pretty sight to see the
procession of children winding through the grove of grand old trees on
the high bank of the lake, whose blue waters sparkled in the sunlight.
The white sails of schooners were seen in the distant horizon, and the
lake looked so peaceful that it was difficult to imagine it roughened by
the tempest, uttering its loud roar as its great waves dashed against
the bank, tearing it away, and prostrating the lofty trees that adorned
it.
The children walked into the Institute, and entering the room on the
right, saw the walls covered with pictures of hideous Chinese idols. One
of the great idols they had come to see was a gigantic figure, dressed
in flowing robes of white muslin, with a ghastly face, rolling eyes,
grinning mouth, and a crown on his head. He was attended by his servant,
who had a horrible black face, and long flowing black garments. Such
figures as these are carried through the streets in China to receive the
worship of the people; and thus religion, which should elevate, only
debases them; and fear is the ruling motive instead of love.
Norman thought of that scene in the idol temple in Rangoon: the room
lined with images of Boodh, in a sitting posture, with folded hands,
bearing lamps to give light to a Christian prayer-meeting; Havelock,
with his Bible in his hand, surrounded by a hundred Christian soldiers,
praying to the God of heaven, and singing praises to the Lord Christ in
this famous idol temple. Well, the day will come when all the idols will
be cast to the moles and the bats, and when from every hill-top and
valley, from the broad prairie and the green savannah, the incense of
praise shall ascend to the one living and true God.
After the children had passed around the rooms, and looked at the idols,
they went up stairs and seated themselves in the chapel to hear
Professor L. The fresh breeze blew in the window, and the lake spread
its broad bosom beneath the eye; stripes of green and blue gave variety
to its surface; little sail-boats sailed rapidly by; and a large steamer
went proudly on its way. It was pleasant to look out upon this noble
view, and listen at the same time to Professor L.’s narration of what he
had seen during his three years in China.
He gave an interesting account of Miss Aldersey, a noble English woman,
who, while in her pretty English home, in the midst of kind friends, and
social joys, and religious privileges, felt her heart so moved by the
spiritual destitution of the Chinese, that she left home and friends,
and all pleasant, familiar things, and went over the seas to China.
Freely she had received; freely she gave fortune, time, and toil to the
great work to which she had consecrated her life. She opened a school,
and gathered in the poor neglected children. Female children are
despised in China, and many of these poor little things, who had no one
to love them, found a home beneath Miss Aldersey’s roof. Day after day
she sat teaching these ignorant little girls, and telling them of Jesus
and the home he has gone to prepare for his people. They listened to the
new and wonderful story, and their hearts were opened to receive these
heavenly truths.
One of them, after the custom of the country, had been bethrothed when
she was four years old, to a boy several years older, and the time
approached when she was called upon to be married. Part of the marriage
ceremony consists of bowing down before ancestral tablets, containing
images of their ancestors, and burning incense to them. This the young
Christian Chinese girl refused to do. She loved Jesus, she worshiped
God, and she would not bow down before any idol.
In vain her parents expostulated and entreated. In vain they offered her
reward, and threatened punishment. She was firm in her refusal to break
the law of God. They beat her and tortured her, but her steadfast heart,
stayed upon God, knew no fear. Faithful to her Christian profession,
this brave girl continued in the path of Christian duty, unmoved by
tribulation and wrath and all the devices of wicked men.
The children then sang the noble missionary hymn,
“From Greenland’s icy mountains,
From India’s coral strand,”
and were dismissed for a little recreation in the grove, where there was
a swing, and cool shade, and grassy turf. Just before sunset the
children were called together, and again in regular order walked
homeward, with faces glowing with enjoyment, and minds and hearts filled
with happy thoughts and memories.
Wednesday morning Norman went with his mother to the lake, just after
breakfast. The waves were gently kissing the shore, and hours passed
swiftly away as they listened to the soothing sound and gathered curious
pebbles. They found some small fossils, with the remains of shells and
animals in them, and Norman was greatly delighted with one that his
mother picked up, that looked as if it had on it a single pearl set in
gold. They felt sorry to leave the pleasant beach; but the morning had
already gone, and it was time to go to Mr. Henry’s to dinner. On their
return they found a kind invitation from Mrs. Harris to take tea at the
Institute. There were about forty students at the tea-table, and after
tea they had prayers. Instead of the reading of the Scripture, verses
were repeated, thus enabling all who wished to participate in the
devotional exercises; and noble and comforting promises, and precious
truths, were uttered in varying tones. That company of young men were
girding on their armor, that they might fight as good soldiers under the
Captain of their salvation. They were preparing themselves for their
life-work; some of them to sow the “precious seed” over the broad
prairies of Illinois, by the rocky bluffs and wood-crowned hills of
Wisconsin, and the blue waters of Minnesota; while others were looking
to the lands of the East—to Bulgaria, and India, and China. It was
pleasant to exchange a few brief words with these young men who, by the
eye of faith, could see more abundant harvests than those which reward
the Western husbandmen. They had asked the Lord of the harvest to send
them as reapers into these fields of promise, looking forward to that
blessed time when they shall “return with joy bringing their sheaves
with them.”
Mrs. Lester afterward looked upon the portrait of the Christian woman to
whose liberality this institution owes its existence. That portrait
ought to hang on its walls. There is a queenly look about the fine
figure, and the way the head is set on the shoulders, and blended
goodness and intelligence in the countenance. In the evening of the same
day Mrs. Lester was in the room where Mrs. Garrett died, and she thought
of the blissful visions that may have floated about that dying pillow
glimpses of refreshing and perennial streams to make the wilderness
rejoice and blossom as the rose. Her life was not spent in vain on the
earth. Regular and consistent in her daily walks of duty and piety, she
has, by the judicious bestowment of ample means, prolonged her
usefulness on the earth, linked herself to holy activities through
coming time, and set in motion trains of influence, the mighty results
of which may only be known in the morning of the resurrection. She made
to herself friends of the mammon of unrighteousness, that when she
failed they might receive her into everlasting habitations.