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THE TRAMP'S PRAYER

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Pacific Press Publishing Company · Oakland, California · Aug 9, 1899

FromSigns of the Times, Vol. 25, No. 32.

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THE TRAMP'S PRAYER.

By The Missionary

THERE had been a railroad wreck, two passengers were killed and five or six injured, and among the latter was a professional tramp who had been stealing a ride. To the doctor who examined his injuries he said, smiling feebly, and with that manner peculiar to his class: "Well, pard, what's the verdict of the jury?"
"You are very badly hurt," was the reply.
"Are my legs off?"
"No; you are fatally injured, however."
"That means I'm a gorner. My pard was on the car ahead. Is he hurt?"
"No, here he is."
At that moment a ragged, unkempt, and typical vagabond came forward, and, bending over the victim, said: "Well, Jim, they say you have to go. How are your feeling over it?"
"Sorter! No use to kick, Tom."
"Kin I do anything for you?"
The dying man gazed at him a moment in silence, and then whispered: "Tom, you are the only pardner I ever had as knowed the Lord's Prayer. Just say it over to me."
The old tramp pulled off his cap and knelt down, and, as the bystanders uncovered and bowed their heads, he repeated the prayer word for word, and with such feeling as astonished everybody. When he had finished, he rose up and said: "That's it, Jim; and kin I do anything more?"
"Nothing more for him," answered the doctor, as he looked down upon the pale face. "Your partner is dead."
Who will say, after reading this incident, that there is no hope for the tramp, and that it is useless to work for him? Why, the very tramps themselves would put us to shame if we did—as in this instance.
For our part, we would rather be the ragged wretch kneeling by the side of his dying partner, and holding just before him the faintest rushlight of a hope to illumine the darkness that was settling down upon him, than to stand in the pulpit of a near-by church and to preach a gospel of good taste to a congregation of a hundred and fifty pious souls, who had made their calling and election sure.—The Missionary.