The Princeton union. [volume] (Princeton, Minn.) 1876-1976, 1895-04-11

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''The Young Man Strolled Slowly"
ned the great white lily on her breast.
Just as they entered the doorway Ned
threw one arm around her and cap
tured the kiss-a powdery, grease
PANTY kiss it was-but the lily was
brushed off and fell unregarded to the
sidewalk. "
The emblem Of purity lay there wait
ing for some chance passer-by to
tread it under foot. =.
One Lily Went Where Sorrow Is.
LET us learn from these flowers"
said the Rev. DR.. Goodman, touching
gently with his taper fingers, the lilies
that decked the pulpit that Easter
morning, lessons Of humility and pa
thence. They are born and they die,
but not before they have spread their
fragrance OF meek, pure, beautiful
lives. Let us who are of His house
hold, carry into the world the frag-
rance Of lives as pure and beautiful.
AS you know, my brethren, it is our
custom to send the flowers which have
graced the altar on this natal day to
the hospitals, that their beauty may
charm away q few moments of p&in
and suffering. Let us remember it
was for this, too, we have been made
whitehall we may carry succor to
suffering humanity and bear light and
hope to those who go in darkness"
Softly the great organ droned like
FAR away bag-pipes; then gathering
strength it burst into a stormy anthem
of hallelujahs and praise. The peo-
pie filed decently out Of church. Only
few remained. They stripped the
altar and pulpit Of the flowers. Bas-
ketfuls were sent to the different hos
pitfalls. On the top Of one basket,
among tufts of moss, violets and roses.
Lay the great, white lily, which had
pointed the preachers moral. 1t was
languid listless, neurotic. This bas-
ket was carried to hospital in Forty
second street. It is a Manufactured,
red building, with two bullying half
towers. The little newsboy at the cor
ner has a notion, vague and not very
valid, that it is grim, red monster,
fed on the crippled wretches he sees
enter there. For they never come out.
Year after year there has been this
unhappy procession of manned and
crippled children, passing through the
iron gates into the great building. The
small newsboy wonders what becomes
Of them. He never sees them come
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merry, red-cheeked things who come
dancing out the little wretches who
hobbled in wailing? Or those driven
darby away in the small, black
boxes?
Sad? Even listless lily, oppressed
with nostalgia for dwarf roses, could
hardly find it sad on Easter morning.
The morning sun beating through the
broad windows, stirred the little de-
formed children into a grig-like mer-
riment. They capered in their jang-
ling irons and danced in the leather
harness that held in place their crook
ed limbs. The eighty we'll, lame girls
woke altogether in their cots; sat up
altogether; chartered altogether like
the gamin sparrows out in the street.
For it's Easter morning and here's
state of things!
The White Rabbit has ridden in on
moonbeam and played his old prank
1sh games. Eggs under the pillows;
eggs in jolly little folds Of the sheet;
eggs under the cots; eggs in pinafores;
eggs In shoes and stockings; hello
eggs on the window-sill; eggs up the
chimney; eggs on the mantel-piece.
Wonderful old fellow, the White Rab-
bit Eggs of all colors-red, white,
blue, green yellow, notified, speckled
and silver; eggs with chicks peeping
out OF them; eggs that fall apart and
spill candy. Very wonderful fellow,
the White Rabbit. Young white rab-
bits chockful Of sweetmeats, every
where; lilies and myrtles everywhere
else. And eighty small girls jubilant.
Eighty all but one She stands by
the window. She does not laugh with
her little crippled mates.
1--WE call her our little sentinel,~ said
the nurse .....
A pitiful little sentinel, with warned
and wasted body and pain-drawn face
keeping ward over her last Easter
day. The doctors can do nothing for
her; the nurses cannot keep her: the
lonely, rueful little sentinel stands by
the window, waiting for deaths re-
lief. The other children try to tempt
her into their songs and games, She
does not care for these things.
They are singing the carols of Das-
ter, the old new songs of the risen
Christ They sing very sweetly with
young, quivering voices.
"See, little sentinel" the nurse says.
here is a lily" t
1t is the fairest one Of all, white and
stately, but she lets it fall unregarded
at her feet. Lilies of Daster and the
Easter Christ-she knew this long ago.
She is waiting, waiting, and he does
not come.
Patience, little sentinel.
There are only few weeks more
1t may be before the tall lilies have
failed.