MIDNIGHT IN CITIES. DR. TALMAGE PREACHES ON THOSE WHO ARE AWAKE AT NIGHT. Few Indeed Are They Who Need Be Out Till Midnight, but Criminal and Vi-

cious Find That Their Hour--Practical Christian Work Needed. BROOKLYN, April 9.--Rev. Dr. Talmage chose for his sermon today a theme of universal interest--the dark side of social life in our great cities. The text chosen as the basis of a most graphic discourse was Genesis i, 5, "And the dark-

ness he called night."

Two grand divisions of time. The one of sunlight, the other of shadow; the one for work, the other for rest; the one a type everything glad and beautiful, the other used in all languages as a type of sadness and affliction and sin. These two divisions were made by the Lord himself. Other divisions of time may have nomenclature of human invention, but the darkness held up its dusky brow to the Lord, and he baptised it, the dew dripping from his fingers as he gave it name, "And the darkness he called night." My subject is midnight in town. The thunder of the city has rolled out of the air. The slightest sounds cut the night with such distinctness as to attract your attention. The tinkling of the bell of the street car in the distance and the baying of the dog. The stamp of a horse in the next street. The slamming of a saloon door. The hiccough of the drunkard. The shrieks of the steam whistle five miles away. Oh, how suggestive, my friends—midnight in town!

ANGELS OF THE NIGHT.

There are honest men passing up and down the street. Here is a city missionary who has been carrying a scuttle of coal to that poor family in that dark place. Here is an undertaker going up the steps of a building from which there comes a bitter cry which indicates that the destroying angel has smitten the firstborn. Here is a minister of religion

who has been giving the sacrament to a dying Christian. Here is a physician

passing along in great haste, the mes-

senger a few steps ahead hurrying on to the household. Nearly all the lights have gone out in the dwellings. That

light in the window is the light of the watcher, for the medicines must be ad-

ministered, and the fever must be

watched, and the restless tossing off of

the coverlid must be resisted, and the ice must be kept on the hot temples, and the perpetual prayer must go up from hearts soon to be broken. Oh, the midnight in town! What a stupendous thought--a whole city at rest! Weary arm preparing for tomorrow's toil. Hot brain being cooled off. Rigid muscles relaxed. Excited nerves soothed. The white hair of the octogenarian in thin drifts across the pillow, fresh fall of flakes on snow already fallen. Childhood with its dimpled hands thrown out on the pillow, and with every breath taking in a new store of fun and frolic. God's slumberless eye will look. Let one great wave of refreshing slumber roll over the heart of the great town, submerging care and anxiety and worriment and pain. Let the city sleep; but, my friends, be not deceived. There will be thousands tonight who will not sleep at all. Go up

that dark alley and be cautious where

you tread lest you fall over the prostrate form of a drunkard lying on his own doorstep. Look about you lest you feel the garroter's hug. Look through the broken window pane and see what you can see. You say, "Nothing." Then listen. What is it? "God help us!" No foot lights, but tragedy ghastlier and mightier than Ristori or Edwin Booth ever enacted. No light, no fire, no bread, no hope. Shivering in the cold, they

have had no food for 24 hours. You

say, "Why don't they beg?" They do, but they get nothing. You say, "Why don't they deliver themselves over to

the almshouse?" Ah, you would not ask

that if you ever heard the bitter cry of a man or a child when told he must go to the almshouse. THE HONEST POOR. "Oh," you say, "they are the vicious poor, and therefore they do not demand

our sympathy." Are they vicious? So much more need they your pity. The

Christian poor. God helps them. Through

their night there twinkles the round, merry star of hope, and through the broken window pane they see the crystals of heaven, but the vicious poor, they are more to be pitied. Their last light has gone out. You excuse yourself from

helping them by saying they are so bad

they brought this trouble on themselves.

I reply, where I give 10 prayers for the innocent who are suffering I will give 20 prayers for the guilty who are suffering. The fisherman, when he sees a vessel dashing into the breakers, comes out from his hut and wraps the warmest flannels around those who are most chilled and most bruised and most battered in the wreck. And I want you to

know that these vicious poor have had

two shipwrecks--shipwreck of the body, shipwreck of the soul--shipwreck for time, shipwreck for eternity. Pity, by

all means, the innocent who are suffer-

ing, but pity more the guilty. Pass on through the alley. Open the door. "Oh," you say, "it is locked." No, it is not locked; it has never been locked. No burglar would be tempted to go in there to steal anything. The door is never locked. Only a broken chair stands against the door. Shove it back. Go in. Strike a match. Now look. Beastliness and rags. See those glaring eyeballs. Be careful now what

you say. Do not utter any insult, do not

utter any suspicion, if you value your life. What is that red mark on the wall? It is the mark of a murderer's hand! Look at those two eyes rising up out of the

darkness and out from the straw in the corner coming toward you, and as they

come near you your light goes out.

Strike another match. Ah! this is a

babe, not like the beautiful children of your household, or the beautiful children smiling around these altars on baptismal day. This little one never smiled; it never will smile. A flower flung on an awfully barren beach. O Heavenly

Shepherd, fold that little one in thy

arms! Wrap around you your shawl or coat tighter, for the cold night wind sweeps through. Strike another match. Ah! is it possible that the young woman's scarred and bruised face was ever looked into by maternal tenderness? Utter no scorn.

Utter no harsh word. No ray of hope

has dawned on that brow for many a year. No ray of hope ever will dawn on that brow... light has....

Do not strike another light. It would be mockery to kindle another light in such a place as that. Pass out and pass down the street. Our cities of Brooklyn and New York and all our great cities are full of such homes, and the worst time the midnight. THE CRIMINAL CLASSES. Do you know it is in the midnight that criminals do their worst work?

At half past 8 o'clock you will find

them in the drinking saloon, but toward

12 o'clock they go to their garrets, they get out their tools, then they start on the

street. Watching on either side for the police, they go to their work of darkness. This is a burglar, and the false

key will soon touch the store lock. This

is an incendiary, and before morning

there will be a light on the sky and cry

of "Fire! Fire!" This is an assassin, and tomorrow morning there will be a dead body in one of the vacant lots.

During the daytime these villains in our cities lounge about, some asleep and some awake, but when the third watch of the night arrives, their eye keen, their brain cool, their arm strong, their foot

fleet to fly or pursue, they are ready.

Many of these poor creatures were

brought up in that way. They were

born in a thieves' garret. Their childish toy was a burglar's dark lantern. The

first thing they remember was their mother bandaging the brow of their fa-

ther, struck by the police club. They began by robbing boys' pockets, and now

they have come to dig the underground

passage to the cellar of the bank and are preparing to blast the gold vault.

Just so long as there are neglected

children of the street, just so long we will have these desparadoes. Some one, wishing to make a good Christian point

and to quote a passage of Scripture, expecting to get a Scriptural passage in an-

swer, said to one of these poor lads, cast

out and wretched, "When your father

and your mother forsake you, who then

will take you up? and the boy said, "The perlice, the perlice."

In the midnight gambling does its

worst work. What though the hours be slipping away and though the wife be

waiting in the cheerless home? Stir up the fire. Bring on more drinks. Put up more stakes. That commercial house that only a little while ago just put out sign of copartnership will this season be wrecked on a gambler's table. There will be many a money till that will spring a leak. A member of congress gambled with a member elect and won $120,000. The old way of getting a living is so slow. The old way of getting a fortune is so stupid. Come, let us toss up and see who shall have it. And so the work goes on, from the wheezing wretches pitching pennies in a rum grocery up to the millionaire gambler in the stock market. GAMBLERS OF ALL CLASSES. In the midnight hour pass down the streets of our American cities, and you hear the click of the dice and the sharp, keen tap of the poolroom ticker. At these places merchant princes dismount,

and legislators, tired of making laws,

take a respite in breaking them. All classes of people are robbed by this crime, the importer of foreign silks and the dealer in Chatham street pocket handkerchiefs. The clerks of the store take a hand after the shutters are put up, and the officers of the court while away their time while the jury is out. In Baden-Baden, when that city was the greatest of all gambling places on earth, it was no unusual thing the next morning in the woods around that city to find the suspended bodies of suicides. Whatever be the splendor of the surroundings, there is no excuse for this crime. The thunders of eternal destruc-

tion roll in the deep rumble of that gam-

bling tenpin alley, and as men come out

to join the long procession of sin all the drums of woe beat the dead march of a

thousand souls. In one year in the city of New York there were $7,000,000 sacrificed at the gaming table. Perhaps some of your friends have been smitten of this sin. Perhaps some of you have been smitten by it. Perhaps

there may be a stranger in the house this

morning come from some of the hotels. Look out for those agents of iniquity who tarry around about hotels and ask you, "Would you like to see the city?" Yes. "Have you ever seen that splendid building up town?" No. Then the villain will undertake to show you what he calls the "lions" and the "elephants" and after a young man, through morbid curiosity or through badness of soul, has seen the "lions" and the "elephants," he will be on enchanted ground. Look out for these men who move around the hotels with sleek hats--always sleek hats --and patronizing air and unaccountable interest about your welfare and entertainment. You are a fool if you cannot see through it. They want your money. In Chestnut street, Philadelphia, while I was living in that city, an incident occurred which was familiar to us there. In Chestnut street, a young man went

into a gambling saloon, lost all his property, then blew his brains out, and before the blood was washed from the floor by the maid the comrades were shuffling

cards again. You see there is more mercy in the highwayman for the belated traveler on whose body he heaps the stones; there is more mercy in the frost for the flower that it kills; there is more mercy in the hurricane that shivers the steamer on the Long Island coast than

there is mercy in the heart of a gambler for his victim. DRINKING IN ALL RANKS. In the midnight hour also, drunkenness does its worst. The drinking will be respectable at 8 o'clock in the evening, a little flushed at 9, talkative and garrulous at 10, at 11 blasphemous, at 12 the hat falls off and the man falls to the floor asking for more drink. Strewn through the drinking saloons of the city--fathers, brothers, husbands, sons, as good as you are by nature, perhaps better. In the high circles of society it is hushed up. A merchant prince, if he gets noisy and uncontrollable, is taken by his fellow revelers, who try to get him to bed, or take him home, where he falls flat in the entry. Do not wake up the children. They have had disgrace enough. Do not let them know it. Hush it up. But sometimes it cannot be hushed up--when the rum touches the brain and the man becomes thoroughly frenzied. Oh, if the rum touches the brain, you cannot hush it up. You do not see the worst. In the midnight meetings a great multitude have been saved. We want a few hundred Christian men and women to come down from the highest circles of society to toil and amid these wandering and destitute ones and kindle up a light in the dark alley, even the gladness of heaven. Do not go from your well filled tables with the idea that pious talk is going to stop the gnawing of an empty stomach or to warm stockingless feet. Take bread, take raiment, take medicine as well as take prayer. There is a great deal of common sense in what the poor woman said to the city missionary when he was telling her how she ought to love God and serve him. "Oh!" said she, "if you were as poor and cold as I am, and as hungry, you could think of nothing else." A great deal of what is called Christian work goes for nothing for the simple reason it is not practical, as after the battle of Antietam a man got out of an ambulance with a bag of tracts, and he went distributing the tracts, and George Stuart, one of the best Christian

men in this country, said to him: "What

are you distributing tracts for now? There are 3,000 men bleeding to death. Bind up their wounds, and then distribute the tracts." PRACTICAL SENSE NEEDED.

We want more common sense in Chris-

tian work, taking the bread of this life in one hand, and the bread of the next life in the other hand. No such inapt work as that done by the Christian man who, during the war, went into a hos-

pital with tracts, and coming to the bed

of a man whose legs had been amputated, gave him a tract on the sin of dancing!

I rejoice before God that never are sympathetic words uttered, never a prayer offered, never a Christian almsgiving indulged in but it is blessed. There is a place in Switzerland, I have been told, where the utterance of one word will bring back a score of echoes, and I have to tell you this morning that a sympathetic word, a kind word, a generous word, a helpful word uttered in the dark places of the town will bring back ten thousand echoes from all the

thrones of heaven.

Are there in this assemblage this morning those who know by experience the tragedies of midnight in town? I am not here to thrust you back with one hard word. Take the bandage from your bruised soul and put on it the soothing salve of Christ's gospel and of God's compassion. Many have come. I see others coming to God this morning, tired of sinful life. Cry up the news to heaven. Set all the bells ringing. Spread

the banquet under the arches. Let the crowned heads come down and sit at the jubilee.

I tell you there is more delight in heaven over one man that gets reformed by the grace of God than over ninety

and nine that never got off the track. I could give you the history in a minute

of one of the best friends I ever had. Outside my own family I never had a better friend. He welcomed me to my home at the west. He was of splendid personal appearance, and he had an ardor of soul and a warmth of affection that made me love him like a brother. I saw men coming out of the saloons and gambling hells, and they surrounded my friend, and they took him at the weak point, his social nature, and I saw

him going down, and I had a fair talk

with him, for I never yet saw a man you

could not talk with on the subject of his

habits, if you talked with him in the right way. I said to him, "Why don't you give up your bad habits and become a Christian?" I remember now just how he looked, leaning over his counter, as he replied: "I wish I could. Oh, sir, I should like to be a Christian, but I have gone so far astray I can't get back." SICKNESS AND REPENTANCE. So the time went on. After awhile the day of sickness came. I was summoned to his sickbed. I hastened. It took me but a very few moments to get there. I was surprised as I went in. I saw him in ordinary clothes, fully dressed, lying on top of the bed. I gave him my hand, and he seized it convulsively and said: "Oh, how glad I am to see you! Sit down there." I sat down,

and he said: "Mr. Talmage, just where

you sit now my mother sat last night. She has been dead 20 years. Now, I don't want you to think I am out of my mind, or that I am superstitious; but, sir, she sat there last night just as certainly as you sit there now--the same cap, and apron and spectacles. It was my old mother--she sat there." Then he turned to his wife and said: "I wish you would take the strings off the bed. Somebody is wrapping strings

around me all the time. I wish you

would stop that annoyance." She said, "There is nothing here." Then I saw it was delirium. He said: "Just where you sit now my mother sat, and she said, 'Roswell, I wish you would do better--I wish you would do better.' I said,

'Mother, I wish I could do better. I try to do better, but I can't. Mother, you need to help me. Why can't you help me now?' And, sir, I got out of bed, for it was reality, and I went to her and

threw my arms around her neck, and I said: 'Mother, I will do better, but you must help. I can't do this alone!'" I knelt down and prayed. That night his soul went to the Lord that made it. Arrangements were made for the obsequies. The question was raised whether they should bring him to church. Somebody said, "You can't bring such a dissolute man as that into the church." I said: "You will bring him in the

church. He stood by me when he was

alive, and I will stand by him when he

is dead. Bring him." As I stood in the pulpit and saw them carrying the body up the aisle, I felt as if I could weep tears of blood. On one side of the pulpit sat his little child of 8 years, a sweet, beautiful little girl that I had seen him hug convulsively

in his better moments. He put on her all

jewels, all diamonds, and gave her all pictures and toys, and then he would go

away as if hounded by an evil spirit to his cups and house of shame, a fool to the correction of the stocks. She looked up wonderingly. She was not old enough to understand the sorrow of an orphan child. A TOO COMMON TRAGEDY. On the other side of the pulpit sat the men who had ruined him. They were the men who had poured wormwood into the orphan's cup; they were the men who had bound him hand and foot. I knew them. How did they seem to feel? Did they weep? No. Did they say, "What a pity that such a generous man should be destroyed?" No. Did they sigh repentingly over what they had done? No; they sat there, looking as vultures look at the carcass of the lamb

whose heart they have ripped out. So they sat and looked at the coffin lid, and I told them the judgment of God upon those who had destroyed their fellows. Did they reform? I was told they were in the places of iniquity that night after my friend was laid in Oakwood cemetery, and they blasphemed, and they drank. Oh, how merciless men are, especially after they have destroyed you. Do not look to men for comfort or help. Look to God. But there is a man who will not reform. He said, "I won't reform." Well, then, how many acts are there to a tragedy? I believe five. Act the First of the Tragedy--A young man starting off from home. Parents and sisters weeping to have him go. Wagon rising over the hill. Farewell kiss flung back. Ring the bell and let the curtain fall. Act the Second--The marriage altar. Full organ. Bright lights. Long white veil trailing through the aisle. Prayer and congratulation and exclamation of "How well she looks!" Act the Third--A woman waiting for staggering steps. Old garments stuck into the broken window pane. Marks of hardship on the face. The biting of the nails of bloodless fingers. Neglect and cruelty and despair. Ring the bell and let the curtain drop. Act the Fifth--A destroyed soul's eternity. No light. No music. No hope. Anguish coiling its serpents around the heart. Blackness of darkness forever.

But I cannot look any longer. Woe! Woe! I close my eyes to this last act of the tragedy. Quick! Quick! Ring the bell and let the curtain drop. "Rejoice, O young man, in thy youth and let thy heart rejoice in the days of thy youth, but know now that for all these things God will bring you into judgment. "There is a way that seemeth right to a man, but the end thereof is death." A Fireproof Electric Wire. A wire is being introduced which possesses such fire resisting qualities that the most extreme fire tests to which it has been subjected have failed to produce any visible effects upon it. At a recent demonstration several sample boards were prepared, each having arranged upon it samples of various well known electrical wires, one sample upon each board being the new wire. All the samples had the same sized conductor and were carefully wired together into a circuit, so as to allow of their being tested in comparison and under the same conditions. These sample boards represented 16 leading makes of insulated wires, several of them being claimed by their makers to be fireproof. A powerful electric current was then applied and maintained until the conductor was first brought to a red heat, then a white heat and in some cases melted. Under this intense heat every one of the samples except the new wire was entirely destroyed, in several instances setting fire to the board, but in no case did sufficient heat escape through the new wire to discolor the board beneath it.--New York Telegram. A Convict's Letter. In East Greenwich there is a woman jailkeeper, whose father and grandfather kept the jail before her. So insecure was the old place that some years ago it was no unusual thing for the prisoners to remark that they could escape, but they were treated so well they didn't care to. To one of the prisoners who spoke of the matter of escape Mrs. Smith

replied that she had asked for an appropriation, whereupon the prisoner called for pen and ink and wrote to the governor of the state a characteristic letter, which is kept among the archives. It is headed "East Greenwich Jail," and continues, "If you don't send some one down here pretty quick and patch up this place for Mrs. Smith as she wants it, I'll leave."--New York Sun. Removing Tumors Early. If it were generally known among intelligent people that great numbers of innocent tumors sooner or later become malignant, and that malignant tumors often simulate benign tumors and remain quiescent for a great while, the sufferers would unhesitatingly consent to the removal of these morbid growths in their inception, long before the possible advent of serious mischiefs, or when the cure might be effected by minor operations which would leave the smallest scars, especially in such parts as the face, neck, arms or hands.--J. W. S.

Gouley, M. D., in Popular Science Monthly. Helping Each Other. A gentleman who had traveled extensively through the south was one evening seated in one of those proverbial corner grocery stores in a small village talking to the people and commenting upon the unstinted hospitality of the people. A tall, cadaverous looking chap, who had listened to him intently, interrupted: "That's so, stranger. When a man comes among uns an does what's right, we uns ain't the people to see him

suffer when he's down on his back an can't help himself. We're just going to raise him up."

And they do "raise him up." If he is

sick, they till his ground, feed his cattle,

cut his wood and in various ways render him assistance. On the eastern shore of Maryland and Virginia this custom is universal, and many a sick man has silently made his grateful prayers for blessings on his neighbors for the great stacks of chips and split wood that have

been gathered about his yard, and for the hams and flour and other necessaries that have been placed in his smokehouse.--Philadelphia Times. Why We Are Slack In Speech. We do not demand careful speech of

our children because we do not know it ourselves. We rebuke them a dozen

times for some breach of etiquette with

a teaspoon or a dish, but we do not think to say, "Stop--decide first what you want to say, and then say it clearly and briefly." We do not think of it because we do not do it ourselves, and not doing it we do not notice it in others. But when we are sick talking tires us, and when we are not sick, but suffering from nervous exhaustion, this driveling speech becomes indeed a burden. The tired brain droops under the flood of superfluous words, climbs wearily over the gaps of words omitted and stumbling blocks of words misplaced, allows for known peculiarities, illumines by past

experience, winnows the words and picks

out the thought--only to find it some totally irrelevant statement, some mere overflow of a low banked brain, that need not have been said at all.--Char-lotte P. Stetson in Kate Field's Washington. THE SUNDAY SCHOOL. LESSON III, SECOND QUARTER, INTERNATIONAL SERIES, APRIL 16. Text of the Lesson, Job xxiii, 1-10--Mem-ory Verses, 8-10--Golden Text, John xiii, 7--Commentary by the Rev. D. M. Stearns. 1, 2. "Then Job answered and said, Even today is my complaint bitter; my stroke is

heavier than my groaning." This is the be-

ginning of Job's reply to the third address of Eliphaz. Each of the three--Eliphaz, Bildad and Zophar--had spoken twice, and Job had replied to each in turn. This is the beginning of the third round. In an interesting and instructive little pamphlet entitled "Job and His Friends," by C. H. M., the author thinks that these three stand for experience, tradition and legality--all well meaning, but unwise in their dealings with Job. The difficulties on each side are summed up in chapter xxxii, 1-8. They

condemned Job instead of leading him to

condemn himself, and he justified himself

rather than God. As to the beginning of this reply of Job, we may often feel that we, too, have great cause of complaint, as did Israel under their discomforts, but it is written, "When the people complained, it displeased the Lord" (Num. xi, 1). 3. "Oh, that I knew where I might find Him; that I might come even to His seat!" Eliphaz had said, "Acquaint now thyself

with Him and be at peace" (xxii, 21). Job

replies that his longing is to do so. According to the testimony of God Himself, Job was a perfect and upright man, fearing God and eschewing evil (1, 8, 11, 3), the word "perfect" meaning in this case simple or sincere. Before his friends came, even under overwhelming affliction, he was patient and did not sin nor charge God foolishly (i, 2, ii, 10), because he felt himself face to face with God and that God was dealing with him. But these men seem to have come between him and God, and he, in replying to them and dealing with them, loses sight of God and gropes in the darkness of his own wisdom.

4. "I would order my cause before Him

and fill my mouth with arguments." So it seemed to Job in his blindness, but it is evident that he lacks the broken and contrite spirit which only is acceptable to God. In the story of the two men who went up to the temple to pray (Luke xviii, 10-14) it was the man who would not lift up so much as his eyes unto heaven, but smote upon his breast, saying, "God be merciful to me, a sinner," who went down to his house justified rather than the other who thanked God that he was better than other men. It is only when our mouths are stopped as to our own righteousness that we can enjoy the free justification of the grace of God through His righteousness (Rom. iii, 19). 5. "I would know the words which he would answer me and understand what he would say unto me." He cannot understand these friends, and it is very clear that they do not understand him, but he thinks he could understand God, and he would like to know what God would say to him. No doubt there are many who think they can sympathize with Job in his being so misunderstood. Well, there is great comfort in looking unto Him who knew us thoroughly from the beginning and can never find out anything new about us. He never can or will misunderstand us. "O Lord, thou hast searched me and known me" (Ps. cxxxix, 1). 6. "Will He plead against me with His great power? No, but He would put

strength in me." A very little thing will

often bring the soul into such a place that everything will look distorted, as when one sees things in a fog or with blurred vision. Our eyes need constant anointing with heavenly eye salve (Rev. iii, 18) that we may

see clearly. The Holy Spirit can do this,

and inasmuch as we have Him in a sense that Job had him not we are more guilty than Job if we allow our vision to become so dim. God pleads not against the sinner, but against sin, which He hates. He who sought Adam and Eve and redeemed them and restored them to a measure of fellowship with promise of future glory is ever the same and is pleading with the sinner to come to Him, however sinful he may be, and with the erring to return to Him, however far off he may have wandered. See Isa. i, 18, iv, 6, 7; Jer. iii, 12-14; Hos. xiv, 1, 2. 7. "There the righteous might dispute with Him; so should I be delivered forever from my judge." Perhaps we cannot tell just what was in the mind of Job when he uttered these words, but this we do know--that there is only one righteous person whose righteousness can stand before God, and He also has been ordained to be the judge of quick and dead (II Cor. v, 21; Acts

xvii, 31). However sinful we may be, if only

we come with true penitence to Him who came into the world to save sinners, He will not only not cast us out (John vi, 37), but He will become our righteousness, wisdom, sanctification and redemption, and we shall have great cause to glory in Him (I Cor. 1, 30, 31). The Judge being our friend, our Redeemer, our substitute, who died in our stead, what boldness we may have in the day of judgment (I John iv, 17).

8. "Behold, I go forward, but He is not there, and backward, but I cannot perceive Him." He reminds us of the bride in the Song of Songs who, because she had been self occupied and had not promptly heeded the voice of her beloved, is compelled to seek Him very earnestly before she found Him again. She says, "I sought Him, but I could not find Him; I called Him, but He gave me no answer" (Song v, 6). Many a Christian is walking in darkness, out of fellowship with God, because of some thing or person which has been allowed to come nearer to them than the Lord Himself. He is not far off, nor hard to find, when we seek Him with the whole heart (Rom. x, 8, 9; Jer. xxix, 13), and if we would walk continually with him, esteeming His fellowship more than all else, we would never walk in dark-

ness. 9. "On the left hand, where He doth work, but I cannot behold Him. He hideth himself on the right hand that I cannot see Him." The remarks on the last verse are also applicable here, and yet there is another side of the truth. We may walk with Him in peace and quietness and yet not know why He doeth this or that. He may say to us as to Peter, "What I do thou knowest not now, but thou shalt know hereafter." And it will always be true until "the morning" that we know only in part but then shall we know even as also we are known (1 Cor. xiii, 9, 12). 10. "But He knoweth the way that I take." Here is our comfort, "He knoweth." Jeremiah's comfort was, "Thou, O Lord, knowest me" (Jer. xii, 3). The Lord Jesus taught us to find comfort in these words, "Your Heavenly Father knoweth" (Math. vi, 32). Therefore we can sing: So I go on not knowing; I would not if I might; I'd rather walk in the dark with God than walk alone in the light. "When He hath tried me, I shall come forth as gold." Therefore he could also say, "Though He slay me, yet will I trust in Him" (Job xiii, 13, 15), or with Isaiah, "Be-

hold, God is my salvation" (Deliverer); "I will trust and not be afraid" (xii, 2).

Let the world have whatever sports and recreations please them best, provided they be followed with discretion.--Burton. A traveling telephone, which can be taken to any room required in a large office building at a moment's notice, is a recent idea.

A train on the Great Northern rail-

road ran into a large herd of antelopes near Blackfoot, Mon., recently. Seven were killed, and the engine was disabled so that another had to be obtained to take the train on its journey.

DESIRABLE COTTAGES FOR SALE OR RENT. If you intend visiting the seashore the coming season, communicate with R. CURTIS ROBINSON, Real Estate and Insurance Agent, 744 ASBURY AVENUE, OCEAN CITY, N. J. who has on hand a number of desirable furnished and unfur-

nished cottages. Full information furnished on application.

Building lots for sale in every section of the city. I also have 150 lots near Thirty-eighth street, which I will offer to a syndicate, five lots to the share. Money to loan on Bond and Mortgage on improved property.

SCUDDER LUMBER CO., PLANING MILL, SASH FACTORY AND LUMBER YARDS

MANUFACTURERS OF Doors, Window Frames, Shutters, Sash, Moldings, Brackets

Hot Bed Sash, Scroll Work, Turning, &c.

ALSO DEALERS IN BUILDING LUMBER OF EVERY DESCRIPTION, OF WHICH A LARGE STOCK IS CONSTANTLY ON HAND, UNDER COVER, WELL SEASONED AND SOLD AT LOWEST MARKET PRICES.

FRONT AND FEDERAL STREETS, CAMDEN, N. J.

Y. CORSON, REAL ESTATE AGENT, AND LICENSED AUCTIONEER,

No. 721 Asbury Avenue, OCEAN CITY, N. J.

Properties for sale. Boarding Houses and Cottages for Rent in all parts of the city. Correspondence solicited. WM. LAKE, C. E., REAL ESTATE AGENT, Surveying, Conveyancing, Commissioner of Deeds, Notary Public, Master in Chancery. Sec'y Ocean City Building and Loan Association. Lots for Sale or Exchange. Houses to rent, furnished or unfurnished. Deeds, Bonds, Mortgages, Wills and Contracts carefully drawn. Abstracts of titles carefully prepared. Experience of more than twenty-five years. Office--Sixth Street and Asbury Avenue. P. O. Box 265. WM. LAKE. Honesty is the best policy.--B. Franklin. Therefore get the policies issued at the office of H. B. Adams & Co., by HONEST, Sound, Liberal, Solid and Successful Fire Insurance Companies. Your choice of 18 of the best American and English Companies. LOTS FOR SALE in all parts of the city. Hotels and Cottages for Sale or Rent. Money to loan on mortgages.

H. B. ADAMS & CO., Eighth Street, opposite W. J. R. R. Station, OCEAN CITY, N. J.

E. B. LAKE, SUPERINTENDENT OF OCEAN CITY ASSOCIATION From its Organization, and also REAL ESTATE AGENT. Having thousands of Building Lots for sale at various prices, Some very Cheap and located in all parts of Ocean City. Now is the time to purchase property before the second railroad comes, as then property will greatly advance.

I have a good many Inquiries for Property between 6th and 12th streets. Any one having property for sale might do well to give me their prices. All persons desiring to Buy, or Sell, or Exchange property, would do well before closing any transaction to call on or address

E. B. LAKE, Association Office, No. 601 Asbury Ave., Ocean City, N. J. F. L. ARCHAMBAULT. I am offering Diamonds, Watches, Jew-

elery, Silver Plated and Solid Silver Ware Handsome Table and Banquet Lamps during this month at the very lowest prices, and my success has been owing just to such special inducements.

I feel there is no excuse for one not to enjoy a good time-keeper, when prices are from $10 to $15 in coin silver cases. Have a Watch, be on time.

FRANK L. ARCHAMBAULT, JEWELER,

No. 106 Market Street, PHILADELPHIA, PA.