Connecticut western news., 1890-12-31
NATIVITY OF CHRIST.

NATIVITY OF CHRIST.
 DR. TALMAGE BREACHES A CHRIST
 MAS SERMON. --@ Jesus Was Born in the Wiatsr, and Will
 Be . Help in Time of Troubls-The Wise Men of tho East and the West
 Bow to Him.
 BROOKLYN, Dec. 28.-Dr. Talmage's sermon today was appropriate to the season. Its subject was the Christmas jubilee. A crowd which filled the Academy of Music in every part list ened to it in the morning, and another enormous audience thronged the New York Academy of Music to hear it in the evening, when the doctor preached under the auspices of The Christian Herald. His text was Luke II, Is: Let us now go even unto Bethlehem. "
 Amid a thousand mercies we give each other holiday congratulations By long established custom we ex- hort each other to healthtul merrf ment. By gift, by Christmas trees which blossom and fruit in one night, by early morning surprise, by clusters of lighted candles, by children's proces- sion, by sound of instruments some times more blatant than musical, we wake up the night and prolong the day. I wish you all in the grandest, noblest and best sense merry Christmas. The event commemorated is the gladdest of the centuries. Christ's cradle was as wonderful as his cross. Persuade me of the first and am not surprised at the Last. The door by which he en- tered was as tremendous as the door by which he went out.
 was last winter at the house where Jesus lived while he was in Africa. It was in Cairo, Egypt, the terminus of that terrible journey which he took when Joseph and Mary fled with him from Bethlehem to Egypt to escape the massacre of Herod. All tradition, as well as all history, points out this house in Cairo as the one in which these .. fugitives lived while in Af- rica The room is nine steps down from the level of the street. meas ured the room and found it twenty feet long and seven and half feet high. There are three shelvings of rock, one of which think was the cradle of our Lord. There is no win dow, and all the light must have come from lantern or candle. The three ar ! rived here from Bethlehem, having crossed the awful desert.
 A TERRIBLE JOURNEY.
 On the Mediterranean steamer going from Athens to Alexandria met the eminent scholar and theologian, Dr. Lansing, who for thirty-f1ve years has been a resident of Cairo, and he told mo that he had been all over the road that the three fugitives took from Beth lehem to Egypt. He says it is a desert way, and that the forced journey of the infant Christ must have been terrible journey. Going up from Egypt, Dr.. Lansing met people from Bethlehem, their tongues swollen and hanging out from the inflammation of thirst, and although his party had but one goat skin of water left, and that was i'm portant for themselves, he was so moved with the spectacle of thirst in these poor pilgrims that, though it ex- cited the indignation of his fellow tray elers, he gave water to the strangers. Over this dreadful route Joseph and 1 Mary started for this land of Egypt. No time to make much preparation. | Herod was after them, and what were these peasants before an enraged king | Joseph, the husband and father, one night jumped up from his mattress in great alarm, the beads of sweat on his forehead and his whole body quak. ing. He had dreamed of massacres ot his wife and babe. They must be off, that night, right away. Mary put up a few things hastily, and Joseph brought to the door the beast of bur den, and helped his wife and child to mount. Why, those loaves of bread are not enough; those bottles of water will not last for such a long way. But there is no time to get anything more. Out and on. Good-by to the dea, home they expect never again to see. Their hearts break. It does not need that ours be a big house in order to make us sorry to leave it.
 Over the hills and down through the deep gorge they urge their way. By Hebron, by Gaza. through burning sand
 under hot sun, the babe crying the mother faint, the father wearied
 How slowly the days and weeks pass
 Will tho weary three ever reach tho banks of the Nileq Will they ever see Cahoi VIII the desert ever end
 When at last they cross the line beyond
 which old Herod has no right to pur
 sue, their joy is unbounded. Free al
 lAstl Let them dismount and rest
 Now they resume their way with les.
 anxiety. They will find place some
 where for shelter and the earning O.
 their bread. Here they are at Cairo
 Egypt.
 FROM A BARN TO A CELLAR.
 They wind through the crooked
 streets, which are about ten feet wide
 and enter the humble house where
 have been today. But the terminus O
 the journey of these three fugitives wa!
 not as humble as their starting point a
 Bethlehem. If that journey across thu
 desert ended in a cellar it started iron
 8 barn. Everything humble around
 that barn, but everything gloriou
 overhead. Christ's advent was in th'
 hostelry called the house of Chim Ham
 the night with diamond finger point
 Ing down to the place the door of heavel