e chap had done. I tell you,
boys, when I saw it there was something blurred my eyes, so's I
couldn't read it at first. The little man had tried to keep the lines
straight, and evidently thought that capitals would make it look better
and bigger, for nearly every letter was a capital. I copied it, and
here it is; but you want to see it on the stone to appreciate it:

MY MOTHER
SHEE DIED LAST WEAK
SHEE WAS ALL I HAD. SHEE
SED SHEAD BEE WAITING FUR--

and here the boy's lettering stopped. After awhile I went back to the
man in charge and asked him what further he knew of the little fellow
who brought the stone. "Not much," he said; "not much. Didn't you
notice a fresh little grave near the one with the stone? Well, that's
where he is. He came here every afternoon for some time working away
at that stone, and one day I missed him, and then for several days.
Then the man came out from the church that had buried the mother and
ordered the grave dug by her side. I asked if it was for the little
chap. He said it was. The boy had sold all his papers one day, and
was hurrying along the street out this way. There was a runaway team
just above the crossing, and--well--he was run over, and lived but a
day or two." He had in his hand when he was picked up an old file
sharpened down to a point, that he did all the lettering with. They
said he seemed to be thinking only of that until he died, for he kept
saying, "I didn't get it done, but she'll know I meant to finish it,
won't she? I'll tell her so, for she'll be waiting for me," and he
died with those words on his lips. When the men in the cutter's yard
heard the story of the boy the next day, they clubbed together, got a
good stone, inscribed upon it the name of the newsboy, which they
succeeded in getting from the superintendent of the Sunday school which
the little fellow attended, and underneath it the touching words: "He
loved his mother."

God pity the mother with such an influence as this if she is leading in
the wrong direction!

It is necessary also to say just a word about the father. There are
many pictures of fathers in the Bible. Jacob gives us one when he
cries, "Me ye have bereft of my children."

David gives another when he cries, "O Absalom, my son." The father of
the Prodigal adds a new touch of beauty to the picture when he calls
for the best robe to be put upon his boy. I allow no one to go beyond
me in paying tribute to a m