d
believe this work on their behalf is something God intends should be
done, "pray as if on that alone hung the issue of the day." More than we
know depends upon our holding on in prayer.

All through those months there was prayer for that child in India and in
England. The matter was so urgent that we made it widely known, and some
at least of those who heard gave themselves up to prayer; not to the
mere easy prayer which costs little and does less, but to that waiting
upon God which does not rest till it knows it has obtained access,
knows that it has the petition that it desires of Him. This sort of
prayer costs.

But to us down in the thick of the battle, it was strength to think of
that prayer. We were very weary with hope deferred; for it was as if all
the human hope in us were torn out of us, and tossed and buffeted every
way till there was nothing left of it but an aching place where it had
been. God works by means, as we all admit; and so every fresh
development in a Court case in which the child was involved, every turn
of affairs, where her relatives were concerned (and these turns were
frequent), every little movement which seemed to promise something, was
eagerly watched in the expectation that in it lay the interposition for
which we waited. But it seemed as if our hopes were raised only to be
dashed lower than ever, till we were cast upon the bare word of our God.
It was given to us then as perhaps never before to penetrate to the
innermost spring of consolation contained in those very old words: "I
should utterly have fainted, but that I believe verily to see the
goodness of the Lord in the land of the living. Oh, tarry thou the
Lord's leisure: be strong, and He shall comfort thine heart; and put
thou thy trust in the Lord."

This Divine Interposition has been very inspiring. We feel afresh the
force of the question: "Is anything too hard for the Lord?" And we ask
those whose hearts are with us to pray for more such manifestations of
the Power that has not passed with the ages. Lord, teach us to pray!

For it has never been with us, "Come, see, and conquer," as if victory
were an easy thing and a common. We have known what it is to toil for
the salvation of some little life, and we have known the bitterness of
defeat. We have had to stand on the shore of a dark and boundless sea,
and watch that little white life swept off as by a great black wave. We
have watched it drift further and further out on t