playing bridge or whist, or wasting all the golden day in some absurd and useless way. When I was young I seldom saw a sporty pa or giddy ma; the children of that elder day had parents tutored to obey; the mothers seldom left their tubs to fool around at euchre clubs, and fathers, when the day was dead, took off their rags and went to bed. Ah, seldom then were children seen, with furrowed brow and sombre mien, distraught by galivanting dads, or mas who played the cards for scads! O children, to yourselves be true! Round up the galivanting crew of parents who are trotting fast, before it is too everlast—ing late to give the bunch a chance; come forth, O children, from your trance! [Pg 118] [Pg 118] Dad Dad is growing old and weary and there's silver in his hair, and his eyes are always solemn, he has seen so much of care; he has seen so much of sorrow, he has known so much of tears, he has borne the heat and burden of so many bitter years! Dad's already in the twilight of life's little fleeting day, and perhaps we'll often ponder, when his load is laid away, on the steps we might have saved him when his feet and hands were sore, on the joy we might have given to the heart that beats no more. We'll recall a hundred errands that we might have gladly run, and a hundred kindly actions that we might have gaily done; we'll remember how he labored, while the boys were all at play, when the darkness hides him from us at the closing of the day. [Pg 119] [Pg 119] John Bunyan The village Marshal, watchful wight, was bound to hold his job down right. He saw John Bunyan running loose, and put him in the calaboose. Now John, the tinker, had renown for jarring up the little town, and all the local sages said that he would never die in bed. But when he found himself in soak, he said: "The sporting life's no joke; here's where I cut it out and strive to show the world that I'm alive." And in that dark and dismal den he sat, with paper, ink and pen, and wrote the book that people hold as being worth its weight in gold. The job was hard; in cells beneath, they heard the grinding of his teeth; whene'er he wrote a sentence wise, he had to stop and swat the flies; the grub was poor, the water foul, the jailer sombre as an owl; the jail was full of dirt and dust, the chains he wore were brown with rust. Yet through it all, by hook or crook, he toiled and wrote his matchless book! O, authors of the present day, whose books are dry
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