Part 5

With bleeding feet he climbed the rocks to peer out into the distance, looking for his companions. No one can know what it feels like to be lost, except those who have had that dreadful experience. Lost in the wilderness, with no grub, no companion, nothing but what seemed a pitiless heaven above and a heartless nature all around, he shouted into an unheeding air, and only heard the sound of his own voice.

After hours of weary pain, he saw tracks which proved to be traces of his companions who had also left camp to hunt for grub. Following them in the hope of reaching camp, he was looking away over the horizon when he saw something dark. "Was it man or beast, dead or alive?" Soon he saw it move, and raise itself, and to his horror he saw it was a man, who turned out to be one of his own companions who had fallen exhausted and been left to die on the lonely trail.

What was he to do?

He could not leave him to perish; he could not stay long, for death was staring him in the face. To leave meant dark inhumanity; to help meant fearful suffering! But he was a hero, and took but a few moments to make his choice. He would stay with him and help him through, or perish in the effort.

The exhausted man said, "Leave me; we will both die if you stay." "No," said the brave hero, "I'll help you. Ah! I know how. My back is still left."

It took a lot of persuading, but at last, bending low, with all his wretchedness and hunger, with his bleeding feet and staggering body, he pulled the man upon his back and started to trudge over that awful road.

Miles he travelled until the very flesh peeled off his feet--but he never stopped until the tracks led him back to camp, where he laid tenderly down his burden and fell in exhaustion that nearly proved his end.

It was all told me in the plainest and most simple way, with no boasts--just the quiet eloquence of a story of a deed done, because there was nothing else to do.

As I heard it I fancied I could hear the Indians up the hill in the little mission chapel singing, and this is what they seemed to sing:

"Then scatter seeds of kindness For the reaping by-and-by."

For he who scatters help and service may suffer, but the glory of the crowning will more than make up for all the pains of heroism.

*XXIII*

*"ONE BY ONE"*

The first thing we all do is to learn to count one by one.

At school when I began as a very little boy, they had an object called an "abacus." I hardly know where they got the name, but it was made of wires with beads strung on them, and it is found away back in the time of Greece and Rome.

These beads could be moved along the wires and so we learned to count, moving one bead after the other, one by one. I suppose girls and boys are not taught that way now, but we still have to learn to count one by one.

You can't multiply or divide or do any other of those lessons you all so dearly love in arithmetic until you can count.

All girls and boys love to count and add--stamps and pennies, birthdays and holidays; and nearly every little child loves to look at a calendar and number off the days. You just watch a boy with a bag of marbles or a purse of pennies, and see how often he counts them.

The love of a home is a love one by one. Your parents count their children that way. They never mix people up.

I read in some book lately the story of a man in New York State taking the census; that is, making a list of the people who live in the country. "How many children have you?" he asked. "Well, let me see," she answered, "there's Tom and Bessie and Billy and Jean and----" "Oh!" he said, impatiently, "just give me the number." "Number!" the woman said with indignation. "We've not got to numbering yet. Do you think we have run out of names?"

The dear mother knew her girls and boys one by one, name by name. One will not do for another. Each one is loved, no matter how many there are.

It is always one by one. _You_ count for something at home. You would be missed, even if there were a crowd. You have your place. The only thing is, are you filling it?

Often I have been visiting in a home where at a sick bed a mother has said, "It does not matter how many you have. You could not care to give up any one."

The names given to people nowadays are only tags, to keep them apart so we can distinguish them. They do not always really tell what a child is like. Bible names were supposed to do so. To-day, because a girl is called "Dora," which means a gift, she may not always act as though she were a precious gift to her parents. She may act like a boss instead. But the idea of a name at first was to let that child stand by himself alone.

They are not like policemen or even car conductors, marked by a number, but are known by name.

It is each by each and one by one. So all the work of the world is done.

"One thing at a time, and that done well, Is a very good rule, as many can tell."

If you let the one thing at your hand go, you will not get very far ahead.

"One step and then another, And the longest walk is ended; One stitch and then another, And the longest rent is mended; One brick upon another, And the highest wall is made; One flake upon another, And the deepest snow is laid.

"Then do not look disheartened At the work you have to do, And say that such a mighty task You never can get through; But just endeavour, day by day, Another point to gain, And soon the mountain which you feared Will prove to be a plain."

When I first went to college and looked over the four years' work I was nearly paralyzed. And when I began my ministry and thought of all the years of making two and three new talks every week, and going to scores and hundreds of homes every year, I almost got into a panic until a sensible thought came into my head, and I said, "Now, old boy, do not be silly. Just read one book at a time and go to one lecture at a time, and pass one year at a time, and make one sermon at a time, and visit one home at a time,"--and I have done that ever since, and the years have just gone by with the speed of a streak of lightning.

Girls and boys often look far ahead and picture what wonderful things they will do when they grow up, and they wish they were women and men to do a great world's work.

Well, the way it all comes is one at a time. Each day's task and each day's duty brings you to the next, and so it goes, and life moves on grandly and surely--one by one.

"Would'st shape a noble life? What each day needs that shalt thou ask. Each day will set its proper task."

And finally, God's love is a love for each of us--one by one. He says not a sparrow can fall without His will and the very hairs of your head are numbered.

Do you not love the little hymn which says:

"God sees the little sparrow fall, It meets His tender view; If God so loves the little birds, I know He loves me too.

"He paints the lily of the field, Perfumes each lily bell; If He so loves the little flowers, I know He loves me well."

The same great power that makes the sun and planets roll round on their path also controls a little child's toy.

The smallest atom is as much under God's rule as the mightiest world in the universe.

God knows you by name--just _you_. You, out of all the world!

The telescope shows us one hundred million stars, and telescope photographs add millions more. And when we say millions, it is hard to just grasp it all. But every single one is the object of God's eternal care and is not lost in the many. Neither are you nor I.

Some child story-teller has a beautiful message of an African chief who had a lot of oxen. Some one said, "How many have you?" "I do not know," was his answer. You see he could not count.

"How, then, do you know if one is missing?" he was asked, and with a shining eye he replied, "By the faces I would miss."

Is that not beautiful? The old chief knew the face and probably had a name for every animal.

Dear girls and boys, God knows you and cares for you, and has you all down by name and will miss your face if you are not near Him!

That is a wonderful love, and being a love for each of us one by one, we may well pray:

"Lord, for to-morrow and its needs, I do not pray; Keep me, my God, from stain of sin, Just for to-day."

*XXIV*

*WHAT MAKES A GOOD SOLDIER?*

Please note the word "good." There are soldiers and soldiers, but the best kind is the good kind who never brings shame to his regiment.

A story is told of a "parson in arms" who enlisted as a private because he loved the boys. He lived a fine clean-cut life of inspiration, became a captain and went over the top.

When the roll call took place after the battle there was no answer to his name, but later he was found with his forehead pierced by a bullet. Just before the charge he said, "Boys, we are about to charge. Commit yourselves to your Saviour. If you die it will be well; if you live it will be well."

He hated war, but did his duty, and told the men "there is no fitter place for a man to die than when he dies for men."

He was a good soldier and a good man.

First. He remembers the honour of the regiment is in his care. Some people call that "esprit de corps," which is the French way of describing the spirit that enters into and fills a body of men.

It is that spirit that makes the character of any collection of people. In your home, in your school, in your church, in your club, in your class, in your country, there is a hidden spirit, just as your soul is hidden in your body.

To keep that spirit strong and noble is the ambition of every loyal person, and to do anything that spoils it hurts the school or the club or the home.

Now, a good soldier wants to keep the spirit of his company high. His question should be what kind of a company will this be if everybody was like me? And after all, it is what all are like that makes the real character of the whole.

Then second: A good soldier listens to the commands.

There are three leading commands.

(_a_) "Attention." That means keep yourself ready; put your heart and head into your work. It is the same thought that is often written on the corner of the streets where the cars cross. "Stop, look, listen." Get your mind on the job, and make it thorough!

(_b_) "Eyes front." Why does the soldier keep his eyes looking straight forward? Simply because side glances spoil attention. To keep looking around distracts, a word that means "draws apart." Instead of looking at one place, the eyes look everywhere and see nothing distinctly.

(_c_) "Obedience." Just think of a company with no discipline, where every man does as he pleases, and where orders may be followed or may not. Do you suppose the glorious Canadian army could have followed the barrage at Vimy if they had not been trained to obey orders?

The good soldier is under orders and

"Theirs not to make reply, Theirs not to reason why."

They are to take the order and carry it out and the objective is won.

Then third: After all the training, the good soldier adopts four attitudes.

(_a_) Ready for inspection. How the boys used to hate polishing buttons and smoothing puttees and brushing up, but it was all good and necessary. It made the soldier who could pass muster and who showed care for himself and the appearance of his regiment.

Are you ready for inspection? It takes place. Would you like to think that the Great Inspector of life is looking at you, and if He does, could you stand that look? What about your thoughts? If the full light were turned on, would you like them to shine out just as they are? A good soldier is never afraid of being looked at.

(_b_) "Semper paratus." When you get to the high school you will learn that that means "always ready."

When I was a little boy I used to love to watch the parade of the Tenth Royal Grenadiers, and when I hear yet the band play "The Grenadiers' March," I can still feel the thrill of that wonderful regiment. Their motto on their crests and on their flags is, "Semper paratus." Whatever comes or goes; whatever orders are given; whatever work is to be done; we are ready.

(_c_) "Carry on." That means, push the job through. In rain or shine, in camp or trench, in defeat or victory, keep a-going. The war is not yours. It belongs to your country, and winning it depends on no one giving in.

(_d_) "Over the top." That is the end of it all. All the drill, all the discipline, all the training, all the marching, all the weapons; even all the rest times are to issue in the final charge.

The war is not for fun. It is desperately in earnest. It is meant to attack the enemy and wrest victory from him.

We all have sometime or other to come out into the open; out of the dugouts and trenches into the front firing line, and then over no man's land into the lines of the enemy.

Girls and boys, your battle is ahead of you. Now is the time to get ready. You are in the training camp. Home and school, and even street, are part of it. Would you not like to be ready for it all? Do you not think the end is worth all the toil?

Enrol to-day; listen to the orders; undergo the hard toil; be a good soldier; take the oath and live for it!

Many years ago every youth in ancient Athens, as soon as he was old enough, took a great oath. Here it is:

"I will not dishonour my sacred arms. I will not desert my fellow-soldier, by whose side I may be set. I will leave my country greater and not less than when she is committed to me. I will reverently obey the laws which have been established, and in time to come, shall be established by the judges. I will not forsake the temples where my fathers worshipped. Of these things the gods are my witnesses."

That is a fine oath for such early times, and filled with the modern Christian spirit. If you will take it, it will make of you a good soldier.

*XXV*

*THE SOLDIER'S OUTFIT--SHOES*

Some one says an army moves on its stomach, and I guess it does, for an empty stomach makes a poor traveller.

But it also marches on its shoes.

A poor fellow came to my church office one day to see if I could get him a pair of strong shoes. He was getting a job and his boots would not stand the strain.

In the army the boots are most necessary, because of long marches, and wet roads and soaking trenches.

One of the worst of all crimes was to make and issue bad boots to our fighting men.

There was an army rule that demanded care of the feet. Every man had to watch that part of his body, and the medical men were always seeing to it that that rule was kept.

Many a soldier had to leave his post because he had trench feet.

Donald Hankey, who wrote "A Student in Arms" and who was later killed on the Somme, gives a very tender tribute to the beloved Captain. He tells how careful he was of his men, how thoughtful and wise, how his smile encouraged them, how he bucked them up when tired, and always played the game and tried to make every man do the same. Among other things he says, "When we started route marches, and our feet were blistered and sore, as often they were at first, you would have thought that they were his own feet from the trouble he took. After a march there was always inspection of feet. If any one had a sore foot he would kneel down on the floor and look at it carefully as if he had been a doctor."

It was all because he knew the feet were so important, and you can be sure he was greatly interested in the shoes the men wore.

Now, at home, boots are also important. Sometimes it is a problem to know just how to get enough of them; but every parent likes to see his girls and boys with feet well shod and comfortable.

If they are bad, they develop corns and sores, and they go to pieces, and then what use are they?

One day I was playing in a football team, and I guess the shoemaker did not put his best into his job, for my right boot cracked and the sole fell in pieces, and if I had not borrowed one from another chap I would have been out of the game.

We all feel sorry for a poor fellow who has no good shoes. Somehow or other, even if the rest of your garments are threadbare, one does not look quite so badly off if the feet are well shod.

There is an interesting Bible story in Joshua of some of the people in Palestine who heard of the great deeds at Jericho and got afraid of Joshua and his army; and so they fixed themselves up like far-off strangers and took old sacks and old bound-up Eastern wine bottles and old garments and musty bread, and put old shoes on their feet.

The whole show worked on Joshua's heart, and he made a covenant with them, and when the surrounding people were conquered, these sly ones with the bad shoes were spared because Joshua, like the rest of us, felt sorry for people who looked so worn out.

What a splendid service is rendered by a good shoemaker, a real consecrated cobbler; and what a social wretch he is that makes boots just for pay, and passes out the kind that look all right, but are no use, and spoil the feet.

"If I were a cobbler, 'twould be my pride The best of all cobblers to be. If I were a tinker, no tinker beside Should mend an old kettle like me."

Now, sometimes shoes are worn out without any good cause, like the copper toes a boy uses up, just by kicking, or the soles that go because he slides or slips along without lifting his feet square off the ground when he walks.

Parents get impatient at having to buy so many boots for children who wear them out so easily, and often can't show anything done.

But when a shoe is worn out by hard service, that old boot is quite an honourable object.

The worn-out shoes of the dear boys who fought over no man's land, or marched through the enemy's barrage, or stood for us in the blood and water stained trenches, are relics of honour.

A Spanish lullaby sings about the angels so busy that they wore out their shoes, but when the little tattered angels got to the doorway of heaven they were given new ones.

"Little shoes are sold at the doorway of heaven, And to all the tattered little angels are given. Slumber, my darling baby."

That is the strange lullaby sung by some Spanish mothers to put their babies to sleep.

There was a man named Bunyan, who once had a wonderful dream. It was about a sinner who became a Christian and who travelled from earth to heaven. He was shown many wonderful places and saw wonderful things, and had wonderful experiences.

Among the places he visited was the House Beautiful, and in it he was shown a great many things, and among them his guides showed him, "all manner of furniture which their Lord had provided for pilgrims, as sword, shield, helmet, breastplate, all-prayer, and _shoes that would not wear out_."

Was that not a wonderful thing to have? How pleased your dad would be if he could buy you everlasting shoes. Well, there are such, and I will tell you what they are.

(1) An old legend tells of a maiden whose footsteps left flowers blooming. Wherever she went, things were a little brighter because she went there.

I knew a little girl who was called Little Sunshine, because she was like a ray of light. She tripped around like a dancing sunbeam.

To clothe one's feet in merry sunshine is to get a covering that can't fade. There is no wear to sunshine. It is always fresh and bright and welcome. That is the kind of shoes your mother wears!

"She sings a snatch of a merry song As she toils in her home from morn till night. Her work is hard and the hours are long But the little woman's heart is light."

No one ever has sore feet who wears shoes of sunshine.

(2) The Bible says it is a good thing to wear shoes that are called "the preparation of the gospel of peace."

I wonder what that means? It is not easy to say, but I fancy it means we should be always ready to preach the love gospel of Jesus.

"What!" you say. "I preach!"--Why sure! a preacher is not only a man in a pulpit on Sunday. He is one who delivers a message, and he does not have to always use his voice. Deeds talk too!

A young fellow was converted, so he said, by his mother's preaching--but she never said anything. She just lived so that when people saw her they thought of Jesus. He called it his mother's "translation of the Bible."

Our Bibles are changed from Greek and Hebrew into English. He said hers was changed from print into practice.

And those shoes that cover the feet with a Christ love message will never wear out.

There is a beautiful hymn we all love to sing. You can hear it on a victrola from a trained quartette and it sounds wonderful: