Pine Needles

by Hildegard G. Frey

  CHAPTER XXI.

  "That is one of your very prettiest stories, Ditto," cried Maggie whenhe stopped.

  "Yes," said Flora, "I think so."

  "It must be a good story that can be listened to here," said Mr.Murray,--"and I have been listening with great attention. I have beenthinking, while I was looking out over all this beauty and receiving somuch by my ears of another kind of beauty,--I have been thinking andrejoicing to myself over the fact, how good our God is. 'Mountains, andall hills; fruitful trees, and all cedars; young men and maidens; oldmen and children: let them praise the name of the Lord.'"

  "Uncle Eden," said Maggie meditatively, "how _can_ hills praise theLord?--or trees?"

  "Don't they?"

  "How, Uncle Eden?"

  "_Don't_ they, I ask?"

  "But they could not hear anybody tell them to praise."

  "You are a literalist. How can 'the trees of the field clap theirhands'?"

  "Does the Bible say they do?"

  "It says they will. And it says 'Let the floods clap their hands; letthe hills be joyful together before the Lord; for He cometh!'--"

  "But that is very strange too," said Flora. "'He cometh to judge theearth;' I know the chant; but it seems solemn and dreadful, and it issung in the minor key."

  "I know," said Mr. Murray. "The composer did not understand therejoicing either."

  "But how can any one, Mr. Murray?"

  "Those 'that love His appearing,' Miss Flora?"

  "I suppose I am very bad, Mr. Murray; but I tell you just how I feel.That seems to me the most awful of times, and nothing but awful."

  "Perfectly correct, Miss Flora, and just as it is described in theBible. When the kings and the great men and the rich men will say to themountains and to the rocks, 'Fall on us, and hide us!'--"

  "But you talk of being glad?" said Flora, looking a good deal troubled.

  "Ay, but I was thinking of the other party," said Mr. Murraygravely,--"from whom will go up a very different cry, a shout ofgladness--'Lo, this is our God! we have waited for Him, and He will saveus.'"

  "Save them from what?"

  "From all the oppressions and miseries inflicted upon them by the rulersof this world; and more, from all the evils under which humanity hasbeen groaning ever since the fall. Then will strike the hour of theworld's freedom. That will be the time when the bridegroom cometh, andthey that are ready will go in with him to the marriage. Don't you thinkthey will be glad, who have been waiting in darkness and weariness forso long? Then comes the marriage supper, and the everlasting unionbetween Christ and His Church. Should not the Church be glad!"

  "You said, 'they that are ready.'"

  "Yes."

  "Who are they?"

  "Do you remember the parable of the marriage supper? Don't yourecollect, one man had not on a wedding garment?"

  "But what _is_ the wedding-garment?" said Flora, who looked as if shehad some difficulty to keep her composure.

  "Shall I answer you in the words of one of old time?--'I will greatlyrejoice in the Lord, my soul shall be joyful in my God; for He hathclothed me with the garments of salvation, He hath covered me with therobe of righteousness, as a bridegroom decketh himself with ornaments,and as a bride adorneth herself with her jewels.'"

  "Then it is something given," said Flora slowly.

  "Given, by the King to the guests; a free gift, Miss Flora, to all whoaccept the King's invitation."

  Flora asked no more, but lay still on her couch of pine branches,looking out on the calm and glorified hills. Nobody else broke thesilence; I think Fenton was gone to sleep; and the others were quiet.

  "The shadows are going the wrong way," said Flora at last. "I wish thisday would last longer!"

  "'A thing of beauty is a joy for ever,'" said Meredith.

  "Don't quote such a dreadfully hackneyed sentiment!" said his sister."How comes it, Mr. Murray, that beautiful things in nature never growhackneyed?"

  "They are always fresh. No two days in one's experience are just likeeach other."

  "There never was a day in my experience like this one," said Flora."Ditto, aren't you going to read some more?"

  "It will be a variety, if I do."

  "We are made to like variety--as Mr. Murray has just reminded you."

  Meredith guessed that his sister cared more about putting off the hourof departure than about the reading in the abstract; and he opened hisbook again, for nobody else made any objection to Flora's proposal.

  "I shall read you," said he, "the story of a pastor and a farmer."

  "Those are the people your stories are generally about," said Flora. "Ihope the variety will lie in the treatment. Go on. I don't care what youread."

  "'In a certain country, that I am not going to name, there is a parishvillage. In the parsonage lives a pastor; it is not I, however. Thispastor faithfully serves our beloved church with the Word of God, whichhe preaches in truth, and with the holy sacraments, which he administersas he ought. And wherever this is done, the fruit will not be wanting;for God has promised it, and He keeps His word still, although amongmen there is little truth or faith any longer to be found.

  "'With temporal goods, however, this pastor is not specially wellprovided; and were it not that he has a living God in the heavens, hemust many a time grow anxious and dispirited; which in truth he does notalways escape, as he himself humbly confesses. For if you have a smallbenefice, a large family, and a couple of children at school to boot,sometimes that gives even a believer the headache; though indeed thereis no need for that, were faith but strong and prayer simple enough. Nowthere are cultivated fields belonging to the living; but as the pastorcannot drive the plough spiritual and the plough agricultural both atonce, he hires out his ground; that he may give himself the morediligently to the cultivation of hearts. From these hired-out acrescomes not a small part of his scanty means, and therefore it becomes avery desirable thing that he should dispose of his ground suitably. Withmost of his fields, indeed, this is not difficult, for they are fruitfuland favourably situated and easy to get a good tenant for them. But oneof his pieces of ground, and a pretty large one, lies on the slope of ahill which is wooded at the top; this field nobody will take, because ingreat rains loose earth and stones come rolling down over the slope fromthe hill above, and in this way the whole crop may easily be destroyed.It comes to my mind that the fault probably lies at the door of thebeloved Enclosings. In the course of them it might well happen that toomuch wood has been cleared from the hill and sold. By that means thesoil has been laid bare and the rain floods can wash it off anywherethey come. At any rate, nobody wants the field; and it always gives thepastor a stab in the heart when he comes past it; and he does notcontent himself with thinking, but he prays too, and promises that hewill give to the Lord Jesus, for the mission, a portion of the hire ofthe field, if only a tenant may be found for it.

  "'And He in the heavens has heard the pastor's prayer. Not long after,there comes a man of the parish, who is not in possession of groundenough to make his farming suffice for the wants of his family, and whotherefore would willingly hire some more acres. He offers to take theneglected field off the pastor's hands. The upright pastor does not hidefrom him the reason why the field has hitherto found no tenant. But thisman, who loves the Lord Jesus, and who therefore is a hearty friend ofhis pastor, declares that he has already quietly considered all that;and he has thought among other things that it must be very important tothe pastor to let out this field, for to be sure the boys cost money;and it is very desirable for himself to hire a field, since he also hasa great many mouths to feed. So both of them would be the better off.The Lord must have the care of the thing, and that He is well able for;he himself also would pray the Lord faithfully to this end, and he wouldmake it the one stipulation with his beloved pastor, that he would standby him and help him in faithful prayer. The two men gave each other thehand upon that. The man hiring the ground had also told the Lord that hewould give Him a portion of the produce of the
field for the conversionof the heathen, and that all the same whether the produce were much orlittle. But the man had said nothing about this to his pastor, and heagain on the other side had said nothing to the man about his owncontract with the Lord; so that each of them had thus kept in his hearta secret for himself, which was known to the Lord alone. But surely Iknow that the Lord thereupon looked kindly on both the men.

  "'Now in the autumn the farmer sets himself vigorously to work to getthe field in order; and the Lord gives His blessing upon it; up comesthe seed merrily, and the winter does it no hurt; the Lord hasgraciously sheltered it. With a wet summer the corn really shoots up,and stands so fine that it is magnificent to see. Both pastor and farmerare heartily glad at the sight, and both at the same time have a secretrecollection of their vow, and are still more glad. But many of thepeasants, who are not lovers of the Lord, and therefore also not loversof their good pastor, and of the good farmer as little, feel nopleasure, but a regular hateful grudge in their hearts; for indeed thereis everywhere a plenty of envy and spite to be found among unbelievers,because they make their god out of what is earthly, and that is all theycare about. However they comfort themselves with the thought that whenthe thunder-showers once come with their violent rain-pours, then surelythere will be stones and soil enough rolling down upon the field fromoff the hill in the end to destroy all that is standing upon it. Verilythat is not a godly sort of satisfaction, but a true Satanic delight,for Satan rejoices when any evil happens to people.

  "'And at last, the wish of the peasants seems to be fulfilled. Therecomes up an uncommonly violent thunder-storm; the rain pours down fromheaven in streams, as if the clouds had burst; so that regular brooksare flowing down the village streets. Then the envious people triumph;there is no mistake about it, the field lying so exposed on the slope ofthe hill must be thoroughly laid waste. Those two men, it may well be,tremble too, for the storm is too frightful; but lose heart they do not;on the contrary, the need drives them to more ardent prayer: "Lord,help, and do not let the field be spoiled. Thou art the strong, almightyGod of Sabaoth, and Thy hand is not shortened, but Thine arm isstretched out still." So they prayed; and when the storm was past theywent confidently up to the field, a good many accompanying them; and asthey were going, and while the many who went along could hardly hidetheir delight, they were singing in their hearts the hymn--

  "Was mein Gott will gescheh allzeit, Sein Wille ist der beste; Zu helfen ist Er dem bereit, Der an Ihn glauebet feste."'"

  "Ditto, we don't understand that."

  "It means about this. 'The will of my God be done always. His will isthe best. He is always ready to help them who rest on Him in firmfaith.'"

  "'With that they are able to look up cheerfully and they are of goodcourage. And when they arrive at the field, what do they see? The entirefield is unharmed. The stalks of grain lift their heads up bravely, asif they too would give thanks for the beautiful rain which has sorefreshed them. But on both sides of the field a whole stream has poureddown from the hill, and nothing is to be seen but a wild mass of rocksand stones. Whose is the strong hand which seized the rain flood, andparted it just before it came to the field, and so gently led it down onboth sides of the field? Moved to the depth of their hearts, our twofriends were constrained to cry out--"The Lord, He is the God! The Lord,He is the God! Give our God the glory." And it is to be hoped that manyof the unbelievers, if not aloud, yet quietly joined in the prayer withthem.

  "'And now, when the harvest was finished, and the farmer brought to thepastor what he had promised to give the Lord of the produce of thefield, and then also the pastor's vow was made known to the farmer, thetwo fell upon their knees again and thanked the Lord for His goodness,because His mercy endureth for ever. Must not such gifts to the heathengo with God's special blessing resting upon them?'"

  "Is that all?" said Maggie.

  "That is all," said Meredith smiling.

  "I do not know what to make of that story," said Flora.

  "Why?"

  "Storms come from natural causes."

  "Oh, do they?" said Meredith. "You do not believe then what the psalmsays--'He commandeth and raiseth the stormy wind'"----

  "But that is poetry."

  "So is this," said Mr. Murray,--"'Who hath divided a watercourse for theoverflowing of waters; or a way for the lightning of thunder; to causeit to rain on the earth, where no man is; on the wilderness, wherein isno man; to satisfy the desolate and waste ground; and to cause the budof the tender herb to spring forth?'"

  "Well," said Flora a little abashed, "isn't it poetry?"

  "I do think, Flo," said her brother, "you have forgotten all our talksaround the breakfast table in Florida and elsewhere."

  "Here again," said Mr. Murray,--"'He saith to the snow, Be thou on theearth; likewise to the small rain, and to the great rain of Hisstrength.' It won't do, Miss Flora, to resist the fact. And I wouldremark, that the highest poetry is the highest truth also."

  "But do you think, Mr. Murray, if it is so, that God will change Hisarrangements just for men's asking Him."

  "I don't _think_, I know it, Miss Flora. It is precisely the Lord's way.But we cannot stop to talk about that now. My friends, do you see wherethe sun is?"

  "Oh, must we go?" cried they all.

  "It is a pity, isn't it? But this would hardly do for a night'slodgings; and if we are to sleep at home, we must take the necessarysteps."

  Slowly they gathered themselves up from their pine bushes, and shookthemselves; literally and figuratively, I might say.

  "What are you going to do with your oyster shells, Fenton?" his uncledemanded.

  "I don't want to do anything with them," said the boy.

  "You always want to be a gentleman."

  "What has that to do with it?"

  "A gentleman never needlessly annoys anybody."

  "Nobody comes here," said Fenton grumblingly. But they all laughed so athim that he pocketed his ill-humour and took his share in carrying thewrecks of the feast down to the creek side.

  Then with the tide they swept up the river. I can never tell you howpretty it was. The day had kept its character of clear quiet beautywithout change; and now as the sun began to get lower in the westernsky, and shadows stretched along under the shore on the river and fellin lengthening patches or lines from hill-tops and trees, it did notgrow cold. Quiet and sweet the air was, even on the water; and therowers dipped and raised their oars in steady time, and in silence.Nobody wanted to talk. They passed the island or promontory a littleabove Fort Montgomery, passed on and on, keeping the mid-stream now,passed Gee's Point, saw the boat-house looming up before them,--and wereat home.

  The very next day it rained.

  THE END.

  PRINTED BY BALLANTYNE, HANSON AND CO.

  EDINBURGH AND LONDON