ealized. There was absolutely no place
that I could go to be alone! The best that I could do was to go home
to the mission station, into the house, up to my room, and close the
door. Even then, who knew how soon someone would call me?

Then, in a flash, a little story I had read in a magazine long before
came to my mind. A friend dropped in to visit a busy mother. The
family was large and poor, and they lived in only one room. It seemed
to the visitor that the one room was swarming with children. The
mother met her with a beaming face.

"But how can you be so happy," asked the visitor, "when you can never
get a minute to be alone? How can you find quiet even to pray?"

"It used to trouble me," was the quick reply, "until I found out the
secret. When things get too much for me, I just throw my apron up over
my head, and I am all alone with the Lord."

Dear Lord, forgive me! I thought. What about _that_ poor mother? And
what about the Lord Jesus? He wanted solitude just as we do, and He
went with His disciples across the lake to an out-of-the-way spot to
be quiet. The multitudes heard where He was going and followed by
land. When He stepped from the boat, there were thousands upon
thousands waiting for Him. How did _He_ react? Was there anger in His
heart, or resentment, at never being allowed to be alone? No; for it
says that when He saw the multitudes, He welcomed them (Luke 9:11).
Dear Lord, give me that same heart of love for the multitudes!

* * * * *

Privacy and solitude are good things, no doubt--in moderation. Most
missionaries get less of them than they would desire. There are
probably few missionaries who have not been irritated at one time or
another when their houses and their persons were subjected to amazed,
or delighted, or even half-contemptuous scrutiny by the curious.
_Can't they have the decency to keep out of what is my own private
business?_ the missionary thinks. Yet if we belong to the day, if we
are children of light, why should any act of ours, or anything
belonging to us, need to be hidden in the dark? This is not to
recommend a needless parading of things that normal people prefer to
be reserved about. Let us remember, however, that people must come to
know us before they can accept our message, or before our testimony
has any value to them. Why should I desire to keep hidden _anything_
that has to do with myself--_if the sharing of that thing might help
to