Connecticut western news., 1890-10-01
CANAAN, CONN, WEDNESDAY, OCTOBER 1890.

O11O otttu OOuy LII O11lo Oc11C1dCUlCSS, and brought specimens of her kind needlework and said, "Dorcas made this," "Dorcas sewed that" 'Dorcas cut and fitted this" "Dorcas helnmed that.'
 According to Lightfoot, the com mentator, they laid her out in state in a public room, and the poor wrung their hands and cried and sent for Pe ter, who performed miracle by which the good woman came back to life and resumed her benefactions. An especial resurrection day for one woman! She was the model by which many women of our day have fashioned their lives, and at the first blast of the horn of wintry tempest there appear ten thou Decreases of New York, Dorcases of London, Dorcases of all the neighbor- hoods and towns and cities of Christen- dom-just as good as the Dorcas of Joppa which visited Thank God for the ever increasing skill and sharpness and speed and generosity of Dorcas' needle.
 CARRYING HIS BED.
 "What is that man doing9" I said to the dragoman in the streets of Joppa "Oh, he is carrying his bed" Multi tudes of people sleep out of doors, and that is the way so many in those lands become blind. It is from the dew of the night falling on the eyelds. As result of this, in Egypt every twentieth person is totally blind. In Oriental lands the bed is made of thin small mattress, 8 blanket and pillow, and when the man rises in the morning he just ties up the three into bundle and shoulders it and takes it away. It was to that the Saviour referred when he said to the sick man, ''Take up thy bed and walk" An American couch or an English couch would require at least four men to carry it, but one Oriental can easily manage his slumber equip ment
 THE TANNERIES OF JOPPA.
 But inhale some of the odors of the large tanneries around Joppa. It is there to this day, prosperous busi- ness, this tanning of hides. And that reminds me of Simon, the tanner, who lived at Joppa and was the host of Peter, the apostle. suppose the ol- factories of Peter were as easily in suited by the odors of tannery as others. But the Bible says, ''He lodged with one Simon, the tanner" People who go out to do reformatory and mis- sionary and Christian work must not be too sensitive Simon no doubt brought to his homestead every night the mal- odors of the calfskins and OK hides in his tannery, but Peter lodged in that home, not only because he may not have been invited to the houses of merchant princes surrounded by redo lent gardens, but to teach all men and women engaged in trying to make the world better that they must not be ] squeamish and fastidious and finical and over particular in doing the work of the world.
 The church of God is dying of fas- tidiousness. We cry over the suffer ings of the world in hundred dollar pocket handkerchiefs. and then put a cent in the poor box. There are many willing to do Christian work among the cleanly, and the refined, and the ele- gant, and the educated, but excuse them from taking a loaf of bread down dirty alley, excuse them from teach ing mission school among the un- combed and the unwashed, excuse them from touching the hand of one whose finger nails are in mourning for departed soap. Such religious pre- cisionists can tol in atmospheres laden with honeysuckle and rosemary, but not in air floating up from the nal- odorous vats. No, no, no! Excuse them from lodging with one Simon, the 1 tanner.
 During the last war there were in Virginia some sixty or seventy wound 1 ed soldiers in a barn, on the second floor, so near the roof that the heat of the August sun was almost insupport- able. The men were dying from sheer exhaustion and suffocation. A dis tinguished member of the Christian commission said to the nurse who stood there, "Wash the faces and feet of these men and it will revive them" ''No," said the nurse, 'T didn't come into the army to wash anybody's feet. "Weu," said the distinguished member of the commission, bring me water and a towel; I will be very glad to wash their feet.' One was the spirit of the devil, the other the spirit of Christ.
 THE HOUSE TOPS OF JoPPA.
 But reference to Peter reminds me that we must go to the housetop in Joppa where he was taught the de- mocracy of reGaion. That was about the qsseerest thing that ever happened. On our way up to that housetop we passed an old well where the great stones were worn deep with the ropes of the buckets and it must be well many centuries old, and I think Peter drank out of it. Four or five goat or calfskins filled with water lay about the yard. We soon got up the steps and on the housetSp. It was in such a place in Joppa that Peter one noon while he was waiting for dinner had a hungry fit and tainted away, and had a vision or dream or trance. I said to my family and friends on that house. top, "Listen while read about what happened here" And opening the Bible we had the whole story.
 1 It seems that Peter on the housetop dreamed that great blanket was let down out of heaven, and in it were sheep and goats and cattle and mules 1 and pipeOnS and hI1ZzardS and snakes and all manner of creatures that fly the air, or walk the field, or crawl the earth, and in the dream a voice told him as