HOW THE LORD IS CONSTANTLY CARING FOR HIS TRUSTING POOR.

A city missionary recently found, in this city on the streets, a refined Englishwoman with her children, who had been turned out of her home for non-payment of rent.  With the aid of a few friends he installed her in a new domicile, and procured work for her.  From time to time he visited her, and rejoiced with her that God had sent him to her in the hour of extremity.  At length, pressure of business kept him away for some time, until, one evening, he started out to look up a few dollars owing him, in order to procure some delicacies for a sick wife.  One dollar was all he could procure, and with that in his pocket he was returning homeward, when he became so impressed with the idea that he should visit the Englishwoman that he turned aside and did so.  He found her in tears, and asking the cause, heard the sorrowful tale of no work, no food in the house for to-morrow, which was Sunday.  He was in doubt whether to give her the dollar and suffer his sick wife to go without something palatable, but in a moment, “Blessed is he that considereth the poor; the Lord will deliver him in time of trouble,” presented itself to his mind, and—­the dollar dried the widow’s tears.

Upon reaching his home he found a lady had called on his wife and brought with her three or four kinds of jellies, fruit, home-made biscuit, various relishing things; three times more than the dollar would have purchased.

The same gentleman, while calling on a poor family one day, discovered a little house in the rear, which he visited, finding a neat, cleanly room, occupied by an old lady, crippled with rheumatism.  He found she had no one in the world but a sister, a monthly nurse, to care for her.  When first setting out on his tour that morning, the missionary had fifty cents given him by a gentleman, who expressed the hope that “it might do some good during the day.”  Although a number of visits had been made, he had not felt called upon to bestow it until then, nor could he tell why he should want to put it in the old lady’s hand at parting, but he did so.

She was too much overcome by her emotions to speak, but she took his hand and led him to a little table, on which lay a Bible, opened at the passage, “Whatsoever ye shall ask the Father in my name, He will give it you.”  She said, “Please tell me if any one sent you here?” “No.”  “Did you ever hear that I lived here?” “I did not.”  “Then the Lord sent you in answer to my prayer this morning.  For the first time in my life, I am without food.  My sister was to have come home yesterday, but has not.  I was just asking the Lord to provide for me when you knocked at the door.”

Such scenes as these amply repay our missionaries for all the toils and weariness, all the anxieties and perplexities of the work.

A PRAYER FOR BREAD.