The Arkansaw traveler., 1884-09-27
A CRY IN THE NIGHT.

m the ceSnu1ng.
 A husband riding home from the newly covered grave of his wife, while the rain beats al the carriage windows, and little giri leans her head against his arm and sobs because of the gloom and grief about her-this IS the picture that arrests the vision as it goes back into the bitter ness of the years
 The wind bloweth where it lisieth-.1
 He hears again the earnes, tones that fell upon him from the rude country pulpit.
 And thou heares, the sound there. of--
 What, Edith 2"
 Is 1t really night, papa:'
 Nearly, not quite"
 And mamma!
 He holds himself from breaking, by the dogged will that forces the emotion out of his voice and back to his inmos, heart. He even strokes her hair gently, as he says: Mamma is with the angels, above the storm, and away from the dark ness and the night, that cannot reach her.
 Nor the cold!"
 .' Nor the cold
 And we shall see her when the flowers grow again! Did no, the preacher say we should, papa.'
 He leaned against the cushions and closed his eyes. God! Could the tor tures of any hell be worse than this? There was something in his soul just then that most men who me, him out in the world could never have measured or understood. He had heard the sermon. the hymn and the przyer-full enough of consolation to such as could une erstand, but barren to him. He had said to the child: "She is beyond the sky '-but vas she?
 Was she anywhere, and would he be again given in some other life what time could hold for him no more forever This, after all. had been to him the bitter est portion of her death. He could be strong to bear and brave to wait if he only knew that the present courage could mean something in the future, and the present patience bring a recompense after he should have followed her in the night.
 But to come straight upon the question he had resolutely put from him. To hope in a helpless, despairing way, and no: believe. To think tha, her life, the sweetest and purest thing he had ever desolate waste blown out as lamp goes down in the windy gusts of night
 No man can tell for himself what he feels or tears in an hour like this, and if he could, all the gold in the world would not purchase his recital. Much less then can one tell it for another. l can say that the day vas dark and cold: that the rain beat about the carriage and drench- cd the driver through and through that the child fell asleep upon her fathers heart. And l amt glad to say that he held her there not only because she was the only link that held him to the one who was gone, but because he loved her in every nerve and fibre of his being, and that his sad heart had now her life alone to comfort it.
 These can be recorded, but in no words can be framed the bitterness that had been poured into his heart and the de- spair that crushed and ground him down.
 Home, sir 7" and the dripping coach man stood by the carriage door.
 Yes, home direct, and the faster the better" It was the sleeping child he was thinking of now.
 Later that night, when the dear o.e with the golden hair and the tired eyes had been laid away in her nest, and when her prayer for the lost mother had been followed close by the dream that came of the land to which she had gone, the father went down to his study with a tread as slow and heavy as men carry when passing amid the shadows of three score and ten. He sat down in the tig arm chair she had 90 often shared win him, he looked into the fire where hes dear face shone m every jet of flame, he heard the dash of the rain and knew that afar off it was falling upon her grave.
 There was a harsh tone in The door bell this time. It went through him like a knife, and rudely touched every raw and sensitive nerve of his being. Could not the world leave him alone for this one night9
 The christian minister, to weld the souls of men to his faith through personal love and sympathy, would be one who has suffered, and still better one who has sinned- If no devils have been cas; out of his heart, he can know nothing of the hell they are making in the soul where they have a habitaton. If no touch of doubt has fallen upon him. how can he lay finger of healing on the torn and bruised faith of another! fine has never suffered, how can he offer te another sympathy that is not cold, and barren as the desest sands.
 There never was missionary from the days of Paul to the present, whs went forth % impressed with the duty oi his mission and yes 90 against the inclination of his nature, as did the Rev. Thomas Cursiss on that night. But duty won, 6 it usually did in these early days of his ministry, and he braved the storm, and made his visit ofconsolafion to the neigh bor who had ben ssnisten by the way. He was young man, and realous; and his life had run in such smooth channels