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HIDE ME FROM PAPA

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Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Jul 21, 1898

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 24, No. 29.

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HIDE ME FROM PAPA.

“Please take me home with you and hide me so papa can’t find me.”
The speaker of the above touching words was a little child just two years of age. She was endowed with unusual sprightliness and loveliness, both of person and disposition.
CALIFORNIA SCENERY, No. 20.—Sacramento, the now capital of California, situated in the midst of a wonderfully fertile valley, is about fifty miles northeast of San Francisco, on the Sacramento River. It is noted for its early connection with the gold discoveries of the State. Sutter's Fort, where the city now stands, was the interior point from which the northern mines were reached, being accessible to San Francisco by boat. It was laid out as a town in 1848 for General Sutter, by Lieutenant William H. Warner. Where the main part of the city now stands was then a swamp. Our illustration is a view of the “town” in 1849.
CALIFORNIA SCENERY, No. 20.—Sacramento, the now capital of California, situated in the midst of a wonderfully fertile valley, is about fifty miles northeast of San Francisco, on the Sacramento River. It is noted for its early connection with the gold discoveries of the State. Sutter's Fort, where the city now stands, was the interior point from which the northern mines were reached, being accessible to San Francisco by boat. It was laid out as a town in 1848 for General Sutter, by Lieutenant William H. Warner. Where the main part of the city now stands was then a swamp. Our illustration is a view of the “town” in 1849.
We had been visiting her mother, and on leaving had taken the dear little one to ride a short distance.
We said, “Now, Mary, kiss us good-by; it is too cold to take you any further.” The little darling looked up with the most piteous expression, and, clinging to me, said in her baby words, “O Lenny, p’ease take me home with you, and hide me so papa can’t find me!”
O darling, precious Mary, how my heart ached for you as I pressed you to my bosom! What visions of sorrow and cruelty your words called up! How terrible it seemed that one so young and innocent should know so much of fear!
As I rode homeward, the thought would again and again recur to me: O, that all who have helped in any way to make her father a drunkard could have heard that piteous appeal, could have seen those baby hands raised in entreaty, and her lips quivering with suppressed emotion! Surely the heart of the most hardened whisky dealer would have been reached, and his slumbering conscience would have been awakened to a true sense of the terrible amount of wretchedness caused by the use of ardent spirits. O, think of it, barkeepers and whisky sellers of every grade! Think of your sad, sad work.
Here was a man who, when sober, was a kind and devoted parent, yet from the use of this curse of our land, had become so cruel and unkind as to inspire abject fear in his only child.
May all who read these lines, and have encouraged the use of ardent spirits in any way, be warned in time, lest in the last day many women and little children shall say to them, “To you we owe the untold wretchedness and agony of our lives; our blood be upon your skirts.”—Richmond Advocate.