Father and Son

Review and Herald Publishing Association · Washington, D.C. · Apr 5, 1906

“I MUST look to the sheep of the field, See that the cattle are fed and warm; So, Jack, tell your mother to wrap you well, You may go with me over the farm. Though the snow is deep and the weather cold, You’re not a baby—you’re six years old.”

Two feet of snow on the hillside lay, But the sky was blue as June, And father and son came laughing home When dinner was ready at noon— Knocking the snow from their weary feet, Rosy and hungry, and ready to eat.

“The snow was so deep,” the farmer said, “That I feared I would scarcely get through.”

The mother turned with a pleasant smile— “Then what could a little boy do?” “I trod in my father’s steps,” said Jack; “Wherever he went, I kept his track.”

The mother looked in the father’s face, And a solemn thought was there; The words had gone like a lightning-flash To the seat of a noble care; “If he treads in my steps, then, day by day, How carefully I must choose my way!

“For the child will do as the father does, And the track that I leave behind, It will be firm, and clear, and straight, The feet of my son will find; He will tread in his father’s steps, and say: ‘I’m right, for this is my father’s way.’”

O fathers, treading life’s hard road, Be sure of the steps you take; Then the sons you love, when gray-haired men, Will tread in them still for your sake; When gray-haired men, their sons will say, “We tread in our fathers’ steps to-day.”

—Plank and Platform.