' God 'ud sen' a jedgment on me--s'p'osin'
He'd take our little Jim?"

"Sh, sh, honey," said Jim, with a man's inadequacy in such a moment.
"'Tain't yo' fault; you nevah wished huh any ha'm."

"No; but I said it, I said it!"

"Po' Ike," said Jim absently; "po' fellah!"

"Won't you go thaih," she asked, "an' see what you kin do fu' him?"

"He don't speak to me."

"You mus' speak to him; you got to do it, Jim; you got to."

"What kin I say? 'Tildy's daid."

She reached up and put her arms around her husband's brawny neck. "Go
bring that po' little lamb hyeah," she said. "I kin save it, an' 'ten'
to two. It'll be a sort of consolation fu' him to keep his chile."

"Kin you do that, Marthy?" he said. "Kin you do that?"

"I know I kin." A great load seemed to lift itself from Jim's heart as
he burst out of the house. He opened Ike's door without knocking. The
man sat by the empty fireplace with his head bowed over the ashes.

"Ike," he said, and then stopped.

Ike raised his head and glanced at him with a look of dull despair.
"She's gone," he replied; "'Tildy's gone." There was no touch of anger
in his tone. It was as if he took the visit for granted. All petty
emotions had passed away before this great feeling which touched both
earth and the beyond.

"I come fu' the baby," said Jim. "Marthy, she'll take keer of it."

He reached down and found the other's hand, and the two hard palms
closed together in a strong grip. "Ike," he went on, "I'm goin' to
drop the 'Junior' an' the 'ham,' an' the two little ones'll jes' grow
up togethah, one o' them lak the othah."

The bereaved husband made no response. He only gripped the hand
tighter. A little while later Jim came hastily from the house with
something small wrapped closely in a shawl.

THE FAITH CURE MAN

Hope is tenacious. It goes on living and working when science has
dealt it what should be its deathblow.

In the close room at the top of the old tenement house little Lucy lay
wasting away with a relentless disease. The doctor had said at the
beginning of the winter that she could not live. Now he said that he
could do no more for her except to ease the few days that remained for
the child.

But Martha Benson would not believe him. She was confident that
doctors were not infallible. Anyhow, this one wasn't, for she saw life
and health ahead for her little one.

Did not the preacher at the Mission Home say: "Ask, and ye shall
receive?" and had