Your ShelfYour Projects

A MISSIONARY MOTHER

2%

Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Feb 27, 1901

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 27, No. 9.

Read the full edition

A MISSIONARY MOTHER.

By Lida F. Scott

MRS. GERRY, large of size, weak of heart, and panting, called, in a neighborly way, upon Mrs. Royce. As Mrs. Royce entered the parlor, the visitor peered into her young, anxious face, already accumulating wrinkles, and framed in with hair fast turning white.
Then, after a few introductory remarks, she plunged into the subject uppermost in her mind.
“What do you know about our new neighbors over at 44?”
“Nothing at all,” replied the hostess somewhat curtly. “I am too busy, you know, with my three children.”
“Well, you’re just the one who ought to make the acquaintance of Mrs. Palmer, then,” with an unbecoming wink of one of her eyes. “You ought to hear her ideas about bringing up children. The old, reliable methods of grandmother and mother, using persuasive measures in the form of sugar-plums, switches, and the slipper, are ruled out of date, it seems.”
“Yes?” replied Mrs. Royce, with a weary look in her eyes.
“She’s a crank on the training of children, and hygiene in general. Thinks nothing in life equals the importance of training those twins of hers. I never heard anything so absurd. She feels more like whipping herself than the children when they are naughty. Isn’t that a queer notion?”
“I’m not sure of that,” replied her hostess with awakening interest; “perhaps there is some truth in it. What are the children like, did you say?”
“Beautiful, I must admit. Never saw such a child as Grace, and she’s got a will of her own, too; yet her mother seems to have her in perfect control, and speaks in so gentle yet firm a way that anybody could see there is no use attempting to resist. The dog understands it—obeys a whisper.”
“She must be a wonderful woman.” Then she mentally continues: “I am going to call on her at once. I know she can help me. This must be an answer to my prayer.”
The following day, as Mrs. Gerry sat in her bay-window, with her neighborly eye on all that concerns Madison Street, out came Mrs. Royce, dressed for a call. She made haste, as tho pursued by an enemy, and as she darted from the front door, the neighbor was shocked to hear her three children send up a simultaneous wail, and one of them succeeded in grappling her dress, seriously wrinkling the flounce of her fresh new lawn.
When Mrs. Royce reached No. 44, her agitation was soon soothed, and she was refreshed by the heartfelt cordiality of the greeting given her by the new neighbor.
They had not much more than begun exchanging the usual remarks leading to an understanding of one another, when there floated down the stairs the flute-like tones of a child’s voice:—
“Mama, where’s ’oo? Where is ’oo, mama? Up in the attic?”
“No, dear, mama is in the parlor.” There was not a shadow of annoyance in face or voice. And the little feet came pattering, pattering down the uncarpeted stairs, and the dearest little voice, unspoiled by shrill crying and fierce displays of temper, repeated, as if to herself: “Where is ’oo, mama? I don’t see ’oo any place.”
On catching sight of the guest, she shrank into reserve, and hesitated at the foot of the steps. “But, O,” thought Mrs. Royce, “such a perfect child, and such a winning smile!” The rosy mouth all dimpled, fresh pink cheeks, and gleams of sunshine softly hovering over a mass of disheveled golden curls, the blue eyes shyly sparkling, and such a wonderful physique for a child so young! Mrs. Royce could not take her eyes off the picture, but said, smiling, and half to herself:—
“What is your recipe? I think I must try it.”
“Recipe? for what?”
“Well, to tell the truth, I see you know how to bring up children. How do you do it? My three! indeed, the problem’s beyond me. They are sickly and most trying. How do you find out these things, and I remain ignorant?”
Mrs. Palmer looked thoughtful.
“That is simple enough. Anybody can get the wisdom necessary—the simplest of methods.”
“I don’t see how anybody can tell which way is right. As I read, one excellent authority says one thing; another, who stands as high, declares with equal assurance just the opposite; so I get discouraged, and just jog along in my old, haphazard way. But you seem to be settled in your mind, which must be restful, to say the least. How do you acquire a firm basis upon which to build? My foundations have been swept away more than once because they were full of holes.”
In a dash of boldness the little thing ran to her mother, and climbed upon her lap. She had in her hand a remnant of cloth, which she gave to her mother.
“This is for ’oo, mama. ’Oo may have it if ’oo want to. I’ll give it to ’oo,” in a tone of one who gave up something of great value.
“Thank you, dear. How sweet of my little girl to think of mama!” kissing her forehead.
“Welcome,” replied Grace, whose unforced politeness surprised the visitor. “I brought it down for mama, didn’t I?” And with a happy, proud face she marched away. She returned in a moment with a number of treasured, broken toys, which she deposited, one by one, on the caller’s lap.
“O, thank you, my dear!” said she.
“Welcome,” said Grace with promptness.
Then, without further ceremony, she ran off upstairs, crying, “Yes, I’m coming pitty soon,” in reply to the appealing tones of her twin sister in the hall above.
“Isn’t she dear? And what a fine chest she has! With many children of her size the stomach is most prominent, but she holds out her chest like a proud bird. Let me see, how old is she?”
“Three and a half, nearly.”
“I should say she was nearer five—such a fine, large child! But how did you accomplish such things in your child? You started to tell me.”
“Well, Mrs. Royce, frankly, by prayer. Now, if the Bible is anything to me, it is the Word of God, and the instruction given is very practical, to be followed without question, without hesitation. There has never been a day since my two children were born that I haven’t felt my inability, ignorance, the force of that text, ‘Without Me ye can do nothing.’ In my utter helplessness I always go to the Source of all truth, and say, Thou hast said, ‘If any of you lack wisdom, let him ask of God, that giveth to all men liberally, and upbraideth not’; and I believe that what He has promised He is abundantly able to perform. That is the whole secret in a nutshell; and He is no respecter of persons.”
“That may be true; but I don’t see how you can tell truth from error in the confusion of writings.”
“God is not the author of confusion. There is but one truth, and to the willing, open mind He gives discernment between the true and the false. ‘My sheep know My voice.’”
“Positively,” exclaimed Mrs. Royce with flushed cheeks, “I never heard anything so interesting. Do you really believe that?—Yes, I see you do. It never occurred to me to take the Bible like that. It is beautiful if you can. While I have always thought I was a Christian, I never made my religion real as you do. How lovely to have such faith! But I fear I never could have it.”
“Well, I am not in a private conservatory receiving special attention. I am out in the open, thank God,where all of His children have an equal chance of receiving all He has to offer. The sun shines for all. It remains for us to open our eyes and behold His goodness, recognize Him, recognize His power, appropriate His promises, believe, believe what He says; only ‘believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved.’ You know Abraham believed God, and, altho he had sinned and did sin, it was accounted to him for righteousness. Is it simply to believe mentally that Christ existed 1,900 years ago?—No; it is to believe that when He says a thing is so, it is so because He says it is, tho all the world may think you mad for believing it, as Festus did Paul. It is to believe that when He says He will do a thing, He will, tho it take all heaven to perform the task. With God all things are possible. We are all like sheep gone astray. If we followed Jesus, and Him only, we would be in an even path, and our feet would not slide.”
“Do you really think so?”
“The Scripture says so, and I believe it, since God can not lie.”
Mrs. Royce opened her eyes wider, her lips parted; she drank in the words like a thirsty soul. Then she heaved a little sigh, and said wistfully:—
“It must be true if it is in the Bible, but I—I used to think I knew a little something of my Bible; but I confess I am woefully ignorant. Well, I must go; the children will need me; but I am deeply interested in this subject. It is entirely new to me. You have opened new lines of thought, which both I and my children will profit by, I am sure.”
There were tears in her eyes, and she could not trust herself to say more until she reached the door.
“This must not be the last. I am coming again soon if you will allow me, for I must hear more.”
“You will find yourself welcome at any time that is convenient for you, and I shall take the liberty to run in, too. May I?”
“How glad I should be!”
And Mrs. Gerry, who, quite weary with waiting, had brought her work down to the lower piazza to be sure not to miss the end of the call, was growing fidgety as the smell of something burning wended its way to her nostrils from her kitchen stove; but, tho it grew more and more obtrusive, she was not willing to be defeated in her purpose by leaving her post as watcher. She had been trying to make herself and neighbors believe she was a Christian Scientist, so she rocked very hard, asserting to herself: “If I only think it isn’t so, it isn’t so. Lord, help my unbelief. If there’s no such thing as matter, then it’s no matter about my dinner burning.” But afterwards she could never get around the cold facts that her dinner was ruined, and that all the family, strangely enough, thought the same thing at the same time.
“What a long call she’s making, and for the first one, too! There she comes now—wiping her eyes, I do declare! She can’t be crying; it must be a cold. She needs cod-liver oil this spring; she’s running down.”
In her heart, she knew not why, she felt a little envious of Mrs. Royce, vaguely divining a want of some superior quality in herself which would have bridged over a chasm between her and Mrs. Palmer. While she respected this new neighbor at 44, she was ill at ease in her company, and glad to get out of the reach of her calm, beautiful spirit, which set hers quivering like a compass in the presence of a magnet. Somehow she knew that Mrs. Royce would fit in there, and it annoyed her, because she knew that she herself was a misfit, and that the fault was her own. They had no common ground. When she attempted to gossip, she felt like panting for air, as tho in a rarefied atmosphere. There was nothing there for a gossipy spirit to live on, and it flickered and went out. Then the familiarity and unassuming ease with which she spoke of “the Lord,” as she would of an intimate friend, so purified the atmosphere that it frightened her almost as much as it would if she had been suddenly transplanted into heaven. It seemed, for once, as tho her tongue had been effectually tied. So she had ended her visit as soon as possible, her pride terribly mortified, and feeling as tho she wanted to run, and run, and run, blocks away.
But she remained in Madison Street fascinated, her appetite for the uncommon, after all, rather whetted.
LIDA F. SCOTT.
Springfield, Mass.
(Concluded next week.)