thy person
comes forward to take charge of him, sentence upon the prisoner will be
suspended."

Robert came back to his father holding the boy by the hand, and together
they made their way from the crowded room.

"I'm so glad! I'm so glad!" said the old man brokenly.

"We often have to do this. We try to save them from the first contact
with the prison and all that it means. There is no reformatory for black
boys here, and they may not go to the institutions for the white; so for
the slightest offence they are sent to jail, where they are placed with
the most hardened criminals. When released they are branded forever, and
their course is usually downward."

He spoke in a low voice, that what he said might not reach the ears of
the little ragamuffin who trudged by his side.

Abram looked down on the child with a sympathetic heart.

"What made you steal dem cakes?" he asked kindly.

"I was hongry," was the simple reply.

The old man said no more until he had reached the parsonage, and then
when he saw how the little fellow ate and how tenderly his son
ministered to him, he murmured to himself, "Feed my lambs"; and then
turning to his son, he said, "Robbie, dey's some'p'n in 'dis, dey's
some'p'n in it, I tell you."

That night there was a boy's class in the lower room of Robert Dixon's
little church. Boys of all sorts and conditions were there, and Abram
listened as his son told them the old, sweet stories in the simplest
possible manner and talked to them in his cheery, practical way. The old
preacher looked into the eyes of the street gamins about him, and he
began to wonder. Some of them were fierce, unruly-looking youngsters,
inclined to meanness and rowdyism, but one and all, they seemed under
the spell of their leader's voice. At last Robert said, "Boys, this is
my father. He's a preacher, too. I want you to come up and shake hands
with him." Then they crowded round the old man readily and heartily, and
when they were outside the church, he heard them pause for a moment, and
then three rousing cheers rang out with the vociferated explanation,
"Fo' de minister's pap!"

Abram held his son's hand long that night, and looked with tear-dimmed
eyes at the boy.

"I didn't understan'," he said. "I didn't understan'."

"You'll preach for me Sunday, father?"

"I wouldn't daih, honey. I wouldn't daih."

"Oh, yes, you will, pap."

He had not used the word for a long time, and at sound of it his father
yielded