Your ShelfYour Projects

THE WIDOW'S COW

5%

Pacific Press Publishing Company · OAKLAND, CALIFORNIA · Feb 22, 1899

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 25, No. 8.

Read the full edition

THE WIDOW'S COW.

By A. E. C. Maskell

"I HAVE been over to Widow Dilman's this afternoon and brought home that cow," said Farmer Merrion as he sat down to supper.
"Why, papa!" exclaimed Daisy, "what will the poor widow do now?"
"I had never thought of that," laughed the farmer.
"Well, I call that real mean," spoke up Joe. "We've got a whole barn-yard full of cows, while that poor woman has but just one."
"The widow has been buying provisions of me all along. The bargain was that as soon as it amounted to thirty dollars, if she had not the money to pay me, I was to have the cow. So, you see, the cow is bought and paid for."
"O papa, it's a shame, because she's half their living! Poor Mrs. Dilman has been sick so long, you know, and now that she is getting about again, I know she must feel almost lost without poor old Whitey." And there were tears in Eva's eyes.
At last, pushing back her food untasted, she sprang up and went around to her father and pleaded with him to take back the cow.
"I would, father," said his wife. "You know what the Bible says about being good to the poor."
"Tut, tut!" said the farmer. "You can all be very free with other people's money. How many of you, I wonder, would give anything out of your own pockets."
"Papa, dear, you shall have my bank and every dollar in it," said Eva.
"And you needn't buy me a new overcoat this winter, father. I'll wear my old one," said Joe.
"Please, papa, can't I sell my pet pig to help pay for the cow?" asked Daisy.
"Well, I declare," laughed the farmer. "Tell me where you all learn so much generosity."
"I have tried to instil it into them, my dear," said Mrs. Merrion, "as Jesus has taught it to us through His Word. 'He that hath pity on the poor,' you know, 'lendeth to the Lord; and that which he hath given will He pay him again.' God's Word is sure."
The result was that the next morning the farmer sold the cow to his children; and what fun they had driving her home!
As they drew near the cottage, they became so boisterous that the widow and one of her sons came out to the gate, and there stood old Whitey patiently by the fence with the children around her.
"Good-morning, Mrs. Dilman; we've brought your cow back," cried Joe.
"For the land's sake!" cried she, holding up both hands. "Don't you want her?"
"You want her worse," said Joe; "and so papa sold her to us children, and we've brought her back a present to you."
"You blessed children! God be praised!" exclaimed the widow, bursting into tears; and little Mark threw both arms around the cow's neck.
Farmer Merrion's children declared, as they were returning home, "that they never felt so happy in their lives." They had learned that it is indeed "more blessed to give than to receive."—A. E. C. Maskell, in Our Young Folks.