1897.] June 3 —What a delightful day it has been. Marion has been so kind and charming I really think the dear girl does love me. I wonder if she knows how I love her—and yet I wonder how she cannot know it. I feel reminiscent to-night. I wonder if she re members the time I broke her doll and she became so angry ? It seems but as yesterday, and yet it is nearly a dozen years agoT How time does fly. That little mixture of blue glass, blonde hair and painted cheeks is very vivid in my mind. And poor little Marion—how she did cry. Sometimes I think that incident was a sort of index of her whole future character. Much as I hate to admit it, yet I must say that it sometimes seemed to me as though my darling were preeminently selfish and that she will not be crossed. Perhaps it is my all-pervading love for her which magnifies all her actions—both good and bad. I wish she would take more interest in my church work but that will come in time, I suppose, and my love will teach me with God’s grace to lead her into right paths, let us hope by pleasant waters. How I love her, too, in spite of her faults. Oh, my darling, if you could know the sacrifices I made for you. If you but knew why I rejected old Dr. Stevens’ request to become his assistant, with the prospect of becoming his successor, to come to this little mission church here. If you knew, dear, that I gave up what is almost a young minister’s ideal—a wealthy city congregation— to preach to fallen women and drunken men, just so I might be near you. But happily you don’t know, and pray God you never will. June s—God help me; what a wretch I’ve been. It has all struck me to-night with tremendous force. I have been thinking only of myself and of my own interests. Tittle did I think when I went to Mr. M ’s missionary service that I should come out a different man. His words burned into my soul and I seemed to hear my mother’s oft-repeated prayer, “ Oh, that my boy were a David Livingston.” My path stands but clear before me. My duty is plain, and with the Master’s help I’ll do it. “ Can we to men benighted the lamp.of life deny?” No! a thousand times no. The cry 1 ' Come over into Macedonia and help us ’’ is ring ing in my ears. Much as I love my work here, yet I will give it up for a wider field. And Marion—l dare not think of her. Pray God she will accompany me. Fragments, FRAGMENTS.
Significant historical Pennsylvania newspapers