The Ashland union. [volume] (Ashland, Ashland County, Ohio) 1854-1868, 1854-08-02
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30.

SMa0ag 9Ra01llg
(From the Boston TrayeIer.)
THE BLIND GIRL AND HER BIBLE.
MANY years ago, said the Rev. Mon
sieur V-9,when a student in the uni
versity at Geneva, Twas accustomed to
spend the long summer vocations, travel
ing from village to village in my native
France, preaching in the open squares
the kingdom of God, distributing His
holy word to those who would accept it,
and teaching from house to house. On
such an excursion in the summer of l83-,
I entered a little v~ine-hung cabin in the
kitchen, I saw a middle-aged woman,
busily ironing, a boy yet too young for
labor, and a girl some seventeen or eigh-
teen years, of a sweet, serious aspect,
plating straw. She did not raise her
eyes as I entered, and on a nearer ap-
proach I perceived that she was blind.
Saying that I was one sent to bring
glad tidings of good things, l began to
tell them the story of Christ, his love,
sufferings, his death. They listened at
tentively. It was indeed tidings, new
and wonderful to them, like others of
the simple peasantry of France. The
next day and the next, 1 visited the
widows poor cottage.
Poor sightless Marie how was she
affected when I told her of Him who
opened the eyes of the blind, and read
to her how blind Bartimeus sat by the
way-side begging, when he cried unto
Jesus of Nazareth passing by, and re-
ceived sight. Then an irrepressible long
ing, such as she had never known be-
fore, a longing for Gods blessed gift of
vision, seized upon the poor blind girl ;
not that she sighed to behold the blue
heaven, or the golden light, or to look
upon her mothers smile, or gaze in her
young brothers laughing eyes. No, not
these; but she longed to read the bless
ed words of Jesus, how he said, "Come
unto me, and 1 will give you rest"
There dwelt then in Dion, a man of
God, who had gathered around him a few
blind, whom he had taught to read and
work. I sought him out, and told him
of Marie, interested him in her, arranged
that she should come an hour every
morning to learn to read, and procured
for her a Bible with raised letters for the
blind.
You should have seen her delight as
she started off next morning. warm,
bright August morning, one hand locked
in her little brothers, the other fondly
clasping the precious Bible, to take her
first lesson. s4ata5--a-s IS
Alas, poor Marie it requires a de-
licate touch to distinguish the slightly
letters, and her fingers are hard and
callous with the continued plating of
straw. Again and again was the effort
made, but to no purpose. But one day,
as she sat alone, sorrowfully chipping
with her little knife the rough edges Of
the straw, a happy thought occurred to
her. Could she not cut away the thick
hard skin from her thick fingers, and
then it would grow anew, smooth and
soft, like the rosy fingers of a child p
And so she whitfield the skin from her
poor fingers, needing not the pain was
it not hat she might read the word OF
God? But the straw work could not
cease; it bought bread, and the wounded
fingers were slow to heal. When the
reading lesson was tried again, warm
drops trickled from the bleeding fingers
along the sacred line. 1t was al in vain.
After the first bitterness of her disap-
pointment, Marie strove hard to be cheer
full. "God had opened the eyes of her
SOUL" she said I" and ought she not to
praise Him And the new Bible
All, surely she must carry it back; some
happier blind girl might pluck the fruit
from this tree of life, and find healing
in its blessed leaves. And holding the
volume near to the beating of her heart,
she knelt by her cot to pray, and touch
ed the open Bible with her lips. o joy
To the soft lips, the soft indentations OF
the raised surface are clearly perceptible;
they trace the sharp outlines of the let
tiers, with unerring accuracy. With a low
cry of Joy, she passes line after line across
her eager lip she turns the leaf, the lips
lose not their power. 1t is all clear, all
easy now. The lips could do what the
toil-hardened fingers could not-they
could read.
A twelve-month after, I visited Dion.
The low kitchen wore its old look but
what a beaming happy face was Marie's,
as she sat in her rude chair, her basket
of straw at her feet reading her beloved
Bible. Blind, it was full of light
{" Nest il pas h~eureux," she murmured
in her rich musical tones; "n'est il pas
heureux de baiser, ainsi, les douees paro-
! les pendant que je les LISP" Is it not
blessed to kiss the sweet words as I read ?
Dear, eloquent lips, which the cold
clay kisses now, told me this little tale,
and I listened with starting tears, think
ing how the poor blind girl would rise
up in the Judgment to. condemn the
many, who /" having eyes, see not"
SUNDAY IN PARIS.