The Maryville times. (Maryville, Tenn.) 1884-1944, 1898-02-26

other hand against the pulseless breast
and God laid him softly down or
Mount Nebo, and then the lawgiver
lifted in the Almighty's arms, was car
ried to the opening of cave and placed
in crypt, and one stroke of the divine
hand smoothed the features into an
everlasting calm, and rock was rolled
to the door, and the only obsequies, al
which God did all the offices of priest
and undertaken, and gravedigger, and
mourner, were ended.
Miriam was the eldest of the family
Moses and Aaron, her brothers, were
younger. Oh the power of the elder
sister to help decide the brothers char
actor for usefulness and for Heaven
She can keep off from her brother
more evils than Miriam could have
driven back waterfowl or crocodile
from the ark of bullrushes. The older
sister decides the direction in which
the cradle boat shall sail. By gentle
ness, by good sense, by Christian prin-
ciple she can turn it toward the palace,
not of wicked Pharaoh, but of holy
God; and brighter princess than
Thermutis should lift him out
of peril, even religion whose
ways are ways of pleasantness and all
her paths are peace. The older sister,
how much the world owes her! Born
while yet the family was in limited
circumstances, she had to hold and
take care of her younger brothers.
And if there is anything that excites
my sympathy, it is little girl Juggling
around a great fat child and
getting her. ears boxed because
she can not keep him quiet? BY
the time she gets to young woman
hood she is pale and worn out, and
her attractiveness has been sacrificed
on the altar of sisterly fidelity, and
she is consigned to celibacy, and socie-
ty calls her by an unfair name; but in
Heaven they call her Miriam. In most
families the two most undesirable
places in the record of births are the
first and the last; the first because she
is worn out with the cares of home
that can not afford to hire help, and
the last because she is spoiled as pet.
Among the grandest equipages that
sweep through the streets of Heaven
will be those occupied by sisters who
sacrificed themselves for brothers.
They will have the finest of the Apoca,
lyptic white horses, and many who on
earth looked down upon them will
have to turn out to let them pass, the
charioteer crying: "Clear the way! A
queen is coming!"
Let sisters not begrudge the time
and care bestowed on brother. 1t is
hard to believe chat any boy you know
so well as your brother can ever turn
out anything very useful. Well, he
may not be another Moses. There is
only one of that kind needed for 5000
years. But l tell your brother will
be-either a blessing or curse tc
society, and candidate for happiness
or wretchedness. He will, like Moses
have the choice between rubies and
living Goals, and your influence will
have much to do with his decision. HI
may not, like Moses, be the deliverel
of a nation, but he may, after YOU
father and mother are gone, bt
the deliverer of a household. What
thousands of homes to-day are pilotet
by brothers.! There are properties now
well invested and yielding income for
the support of sisters and younger
brothers because the older brother ROSE
to the leadership from the day the
father lay down to die. Whatever YOU
do for your brothers will come back tt
you again. If you set him an lima
tured, censorious, unaccommodatine
example, it will recoil upon you from
his own irritated and despoiled nature
If you, by patience with his intirmitie'
and by his nobility Of character, dwell
with him, in the few years of YOU
companionship, you will have you
counsels reflected back upon you some
day by his splendor of behavior in some
crisis where he would have failed but
for you.
Don't snub him. Don't depreciate
his ability. Don't talk discouragingly
about his future. Don't let Miriam gel
down off the bank of the Nile ant
wade out and upset the ark of the bull
rushes. Don't tease him. Brothers
and sisters do not consider it any harm
to tease. That spirit abroad in the
family is one of the meanest and mos
devilish. There is a teasing that i,
pleasurable, and is only another form
of innocent raillery; but that which
provokes and irritates and makes the
eye flash with anger is to be repre-
hended. Itwould be less blameworthy
to take bunch of thorns ant
draw them across your sister,
cheek, or to take knife and draw
its sharp edge across your broth
er's hand till the blood spurts, for thai
would damage only the body; but teas
ing is the thorn and the knife scratch
ing and lacerating the disposition ant
the soul. 1t is the curse of innumbera
BILE households that the brothers teas,
the sisters, and the sisters the brothers
Sometimes it is the color of the hair, o.
the shape of the features, or an affair
of the heart. Sometimes it is by re
vealing secret or by suggestive look
or a guffaw, or an "Ahem!" Tease
Tease Tease! For mercy's sake, qui
it. Christ says: 'He that hateth hi
brother is a murderer. Now, whel
you, by teasing, make your brother o.
sister hate you, you turn him or her in
to a murderer or murderess.
Don't let jealousy ever touch sister
soul, as it so often does, because he
brother gets more honor or more means
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