-bells' jingle one
moonlight night woke us to welcome the baby. She had travelled fifty
miles in the shaky bullock-cart, and she was only a few days old; but
she seemed healthy, and we had no fears. "Ah, the Lord our God gave her
to me, or never could I have got her! Her mother had determined to give
her to the Temple; and when I went to persuade her, she hid the baby in
an earthen vessel lest my eyes should see her. But earthen pots cannot
hide from the eyes of the Lord. And here she is!" The details, fished
out of Devai by dint of many questions, made it clear that in very
truth the Lord, to whom all souls belong, had worked on behalf of this
little one; moving even Hindu hearts, as His brave old servant pleaded,
making it possible to break through caste and custom, those prison walls
of most cruel convention, till even the Hindus said: "Let the Christian
have the babe!" We do not know why she was taken. She never seemed to
sicken, but just left us; perhaps she was needed somewhere else, and
Dohnavur was the way there.

The other meant even more to us, for she was our first from Benares, the
heart of this great Hinduism; and her very presence seemed such a
splendid pledge of ultimate victory.

This little one was saved through a friend, a Wesleyan missionary, who
had interested her Indian workers in the children. The baby's mother was
a pilgrim from Benares, and her baby had been born in the South. A
Temple woman had seen it and was eager to get it, for it was a child of
promise. Our friend's worker heard of this, and interposed. The mother
consented to give her baby to us. It was not a case in which we dare
have persuaded her to keep it; for such babies are greatly coveted, and
the mother was already predisposed to give her child to the gods.

When we heard of this little one, old Devai was with us. She had only
just arrived after a journey of two days with a little girl, but she
knew the perils of delay too well to risk them now. "Let me go! I will
have some coffee, and immediately start!" So off she went for five more
days of wearisome bullock-cart and train. But her face beamed when she
returned and laid a six-weeks-old baby in our arms--a baby fair to look
upon. We gathered round her at once, and she lay and smiled at us all.
Hardly ever have we had so sweet a babe. But the smiling little mouth
was too pale a pink, and the beautiful eyes were too bright. She had
only been with us a month when we were startled b