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 Banks, Louis Albert, 1855 
 
 1933. 
 Soul winning stories 
 
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SOUL WINNI 
 STORIES 
 
 '^ 
 
 -^0^ OF Pf^ 
 
 MAP -1 1926 
 
 >, 
 
 BY 
 
 ^. 
 
 Rev. LOUIS ALBERT BANKS, d.d. 
 
 Author of ''' Religious Life of 
 Famous Americans'^ 
 
 NEW S^W^ YORK 
 GEORGE H. DORAN COMPANY 
 
COPYRIGHT, 1902, 
 BY AMERICAN TRACT SOCIETY 
 
 SOUL WINNING STORIES 
 
 IC 
 
 PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA 
 
Just a Word with the Reader. 
 
 Personally I have found life to be the most 
 interesting thing in the world. Nothing has ever 
 helped me so much as a source of fresh impulse 
 and encouragement to increased endeavor as the 
 story of success on the part of some one else. 
 And surely that was the Master's way of encour- 
 aging his disciples for all time to come. The 
 stories which Jesus told, and the stories which 
 are related concerning the people w^hom he 
 healed and who were converted under his 
 ministry, are a constant source of power and 
 inspiration to Christian people to-day. We get 
 faith and courage to cast out devils from men 
 now because of the picture we have of that 
 redeemed man of Gadara whom Christ trans- 
 formed and sent forth to tell to his friends the 
 good news of salvation. 
 
 The stories in this book are my own. They 
 are culled here and there from a great storehouse 
 of such incidents with which God has blessed me 
 in the course of my ministry. It has been a joy 
 to write them, because the happiest memories I 
 have are connected with incidents such as are 
 narrated on these pages. I have written them, 
 and now give them to the printer, sincerely 
 hoping and praying that they may give impulse 
 to many another to know the joy of winning souls. 
 
 Louis Albert Banks. 
 New York City, 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 Preface 5 
 
 1. Preliminary Skirmishes 7 
 
 II. Cayuse and Saddle-bags 25 
 
 III. The Capture of the Street-car Man 39 
 
 IV. How THE Young Bartender Was Saved . . 55 
 
 V. The Winning of the Young Merchant 
 
 AND His Bride 69 
 
 VI. A Grocer's Clerk Who Became a Mighty 
 
 Archer for the Lord 81 
 
 VII. How AN Oregon Towi?? Was Captured 93 
 
 VIII. A Servant Girl's Quartet 109 
 
 IX. An International Incident 123 
 
 X. Won Through Friendship 137 
 
 XI. An Old Saint's Surprise 149 
 
 XII. The Boy in the Dry-goods Box 165 
 
 XIII. Wayside Conversions 177 
 
 XIV. The Railroad Revival 189 
 
 XV. On the Trail of a Soul 201 
 
 XVI. A Wayside Capture 213 
 
CHAPTER I 
 PRELIMINARY SKIRMISHES 
 
CHAPTER l: 
 
 IT was my providential fortune to 
 be born and brought up on the 
 extreme frontier in Oregon and 
 Washington. My father's log cabin stood 
 within hearing distance of the roar of the 
 breakers that beat against the Pacific 
 Coast line. It was there in a little coun- 
 try college that I received my education, 
 having been prepared by my mother, so 
 that I entered the classes with full-grown 
 men when but eleven years of age. At 
 sixteen I went with my family to Eastern 
 Washington, with all a college boy's 
 dreams and hopes; but deep down imder- 
 neath was a conscious undercurrent of 
 conviction that my life work was to be 
 found as a preacher of the Gospel and a 
 winner of souls. 
 
10 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 I had not reached my seventeenth 
 year when the church of which I was 
 then a member, the United Brethren, 
 licensed me to preach, and at a camp- 
 meeting on the httle Touchet River? 
 where the session of the annual Confer- 
 ence was being held, they set me to preach 
 my first sermon. It was a Monday after- 
 noon. The camp ground was in a beau- 
 tiful grove, and a large platform, roofed 
 over, with a board across the front, about 
 waist high to the preacher, served as a 
 pulpit. There was a large congregation, 
 and I was extraordinarily nervous. I 
 had written many essays and orations 
 in school, but had made no written 
 preparation for this sermon. Among 
 the circle of preachers with whom I was 
 acquainted in my boyhood written ser- 
 mons were the one unpardonable sin in 
 a minister. The result was that, though 
 I had carefully thought out my sermon, 
 I made a poor estimate of the length of 
 time it would take me to deliver it. My 
 
Preliminary Skirmishes. 11 
 
 text was, ^'For the wages of sin is death; 
 but the gift of God is eternal life through 
 Jesus Christ our Lord/' I went at it 
 with all the force I had, and delivered 
 my introduction, my firstly, secondly, 
 and thirdly, and then, as I once heard 
 Spurgeon say, I gave my ^^ moving ex- 
 hortations'^ and finished up. It was 
 done in exactly eight minutes. I then 
 quit, having said everything that I had 
 prepared to say on the subject. In later 
 years I have often congratulated myself 
 on the fact that I stopped when I got 
 done. 
 
 One amusing experience of that first 
 sermon I can never forget. There was 
 an old brother, with white beard and a 
 bald head, sitting right in front, almost 
 under the pulpit. He seemed greatly 
 pleased at seeing so youthful a specimen 
 in the pulpit. At that time I weighed 
 but eighty-five pounds and was only five 
 feet and a half high. My boyish appear- 
 ance stirred the old man's soul, and on 
 
12 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 the slightest provocation he burst forth 
 in hallelujahs and amens. He gave 
 them out with such an explosive force 
 that, nervously strung up as I was, he 
 made me start every time. But, poor 
 old fellow, he got his ^'come-up-ance,'' 
 as they used to say out there. There 
 was a big brass candlestick, with a good 
 chunk of candle left in it, standing on 
 the board in front of me. It had been 
 left over from the night before. Just as 
 I got well going in my sermon, one of 
 my gestures took that candlestick in its 
 sweep and over it went, striking the man 
 in the middle of an amen, and also in 
 the middle of his bald head. It was a 
 great dampener on the brother, and 
 the sermon was so short that he did not 
 recover himself in time to make any 
 further encouraging remarks. 
 
 Very soon after receiving my license 
 to preach I went off on an autumn 
 preaching tour with an old man who had 
 a license to exhort. We must have 
 
Preliminary Skirmishes. 13 
 
 made an interesting couple to lookers-on^ 
 He was as old as I was young. He had 
 a long white beard that reached below 
 his belt. He was not an educated man,^ 
 except as education may be had with 
 dealing with the hard experiences of 
 life; but he was a good man. He loved 
 God and he loved the souls of men. He 
 had a tremendous voice and could be 
 heard a long way, and his gift in prayer 
 was something phenomenal. He is one 
 of the few people I have known whose 
 prayers seemed to be inspired of the Holy 
 Ghost. We were together some three 
 months, traveling nearly all the time on 
 horseback, preaching almost every night, 
 and on Sundays two or three times. The 
 combination was one well calculated to 
 draw large audiences. My extreme youth 
 was a great attraction among the people, 
 the little country newspaper spoke kindly 
 about me, and the news spread every- 
 where, so that we usually spoke to large 
 numbers of people for a country region. 
 
14 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 The rapid tour, however, gave little 
 opportunity for serious evangelistic work, 
 upon which my heart was set, and on 
 our return home in the early winter I 
 was willing to disband, as the old man 
 had wearied, and begin work by myself. 
 
 The region being sparsely settled and 
 preachers scarce, their circuits covering 
 hundreds of miles, the demand for any 
 one who could preach the Gospel in sim- 
 plicity and from a loving heart was very 
 great. 
 
 After a week or two at home I decided 
 to go to a community about a half day^s 
 ride from where my father lived and hold 
 my first series of evangelistic meetings. 
 I rode into the community by noon, went 
 to the school-house, which was the only 
 place of meeting in the neighborhood, 
 saw the school-teacher, and announced 
 that I would preach there that night at 
 '^ early candle lighting.^' Then I rode 
 on around the outlying sections of the 
 conmiunity, visiting houses that would 
 
Preliminary Skirmishes. 15 
 
 not be likely to hear the word from the 
 school-house, telling them about the 
 meeting and inviting them to attend 
 that evening. This was the universal 
 custom, as there were no churches and 
 but few Christian people. The preacher 
 was literally a seeker after souls, a shep- 
 herd gathering up a scattered flock, most 
 of whom were as wild as the wolves. At 
 noon I had stopped and made friends 
 with a family who gladly gave me my 
 dinner, and in the evening had taken 
 my supper at the last house where I 
 called before dark. The people were 
 hospitable, the country was new, preach- 
 ers were not often seen, and the humblest 
 of them were always made welcome, 
 except at the most churlish firesides. 
 
 I went early to the school-house that 
 night and watched the people come in. 
 Only one man was earlier than I, and he 
 was building a wood fire in the stove. 
 He had brought with him one candle, 
 which he put in the neck of a bottle and 
 
16 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 stood it on the school-teacher's deskj" 
 which served for a pulpit. But soon the 
 people began to come, in wagons and 
 on horseback, and as nearly every family 
 brought a candle, they were soon throw- 
 ing out their light on the bare walls of 
 the school-house and on the live and 
 interesting faces of men, women and 
 children who filled the little room to 
 overflowing. 
 
 The school-teacher led the singing, 
 and we sang the old hymns which every- 
 body knew (and knows), for I do not 
 suppose there were more than two copies 
 of any one hymn-book in that whole 
 neighborhood. I read the Scriptures and 
 prayed and preached — all in less than half 
 an hour. It was many months after 
 that before I ever preached longer than 
 fifteen minutes. But I preached on 
 great themes: Death, Hell, Heaven, 
 the Judgment, the Atonement, Pardon,^ 
 Repentance, Salvation through Faith — 
 these were the themes, sharply defined,' 
 
J 
 
 Preliminary Skirmishes. 17 ] 
 
 presented without doubt and a boyish ; 
 
 love and enthusiasm, which, blessed by ; 
 
 the grace of God, often seemed to ' 
 bear everything before them. I never 
 
 preached in those days without inviting | 
 
 immediate confession of Christ. But i 
 though on that first evening the people 
 
 had heard the Word with attention, and | 
 
 some even with emotion, there was no j 
 
 response, and I was correspondingly ■ 
 
 discouraged. ; 
 
 I went home with one of the families 
 
 present, and remained over night, having i 
 
 announced a meeting for the next night. ; 
 
 The next day I spent riding still farther j 
 
 afield, spreading the news of the meeting j 
 and coming back to preach at night. A 
 
 still larger crowd was present. Indeed, j 
 every foot of standing room was taken, 
 
 and great interest and a deep spirit of i 
 
 conviction seemed to pervade the au- ] 
 dience; but not a move of any kind could 
 I secure. 
 
 I was at my wits' end, and almost 
 
18 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 ready to believe that my call to the 
 ministry had been revoked. That night, 
 however, I went home with a new family, 
 where the woman of the house was a 
 Christian. We were scarcely seated in 
 the house before she said, ^^Now, my boy, 
 you must not feel that it is your fault 
 that the meetings are not going better, 
 for I know exactly where the trouble 
 lies.^^ I was awake in a minute when 
 she said that. Then she told me that the 
 two wealthiest men in the community, 
 the men having the largest and best 
 stocked ranches and the most influence, 
 had been in a feud for a long time and 
 would not speak to one another. To 
 make it worse, one of these men was the 
 son-in-law of the other, and the family 
 quarrel had been very intense and bitter. 
 And what was still more serious, from my 
 standpoint, both families were professed 
 Christians. This bitter feud had been a 
 scandal and a shame to Christianity in 
 the neighborhood and lay like a giant 
 
Preliminary Skirmishes. 19 
 
 boulder across my path in trying to win 
 the people to Christ. If Christians were 
 going to act in that way, the rest of the 
 neighborhood did not want to be Chris- 
 tians. 
 
 This was an eye-opener. But, hard as 
 was the problem presented, it greatly 
 relieved my mind. The next morning, 
 after prayerful consideration, and pledg- 
 ing this good woman to pray for me, I 
 set out to heal that feud. 
 
 I have never seen a person more as- 
 tonished than was this old man when I 
 went to him and laid my plea before him. 
 I told him that he was standing in the 
 way of the Holy Spirit ^s winning souls 
 in that community; that, as he was the 
 older man, he could afford to be generous. 
 But he was proud and hard and would 
 not yield. 
 
 Then I went to the younger man and 
 put it to him that men and women were 
 living there without hope of heaven, and 
 he was making Christ seem ugly to them, 
 
20 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 and that, being the younger man, it was 
 the right thing for him, out of considera- 
 tion for his father-in-law's age, to go more 
 than half way toward a reconciliation. 
 
 The houses were only three-quarters of 
 a mile apart, and I kept the road hot all 
 day. Early in the day I found that the 
 mother and the daughter were very 
 tender toward each other, and that their 
 hearts were with me in my attempt to 
 make peace. I had supper with the 
 elder family, and, finally, as I was going 
 away to the evening service, the old man 
 agreed to announce a morning service at 
 eleven o'clock the next day at his house, 
 saying that if his son-in-law would come 
 to the service, he would forgive him and 
 make peace. 
 
 Of course this was a great start toward 
 victory, and I went before the crowd 
 in the school-house in triumphant spirit; 
 but there was still no response to my 
 passionately earnest appeal to them to 
 become Christians. But at the close of 
 
Preliminary Skirmishes. 21 
 
 the service, when I announced the morn- 
 ing service at the home of the old man, 
 there was great excitement. People 
 turned to each other with looks of great- 
 est interest. Everybody seemed to feel 
 that something was going to happen. So 
 great was this feeling that the next day, 
 though the service was at such an early 
 hour, work was dropped, and the big 
 living-room and dining-room and the 
 adjoining bedroom of the old-fashioned 
 farmhouse were crowded with people. 
 I had a hard time that morning, getting 
 the young man to give in sufficiently to 
 come ; but his wife helped me, and at last 
 he yielded. When he arrived, with his 
 family, just before the meeting began, 
 the excitement among the neighbors 
 present was up to fever heat. I have 
 preached to many an audience since, 
 sometimes when there were many thou- 
 sands of people listening, but I have 
 never more keenly felt the atmosphere 
 of an audience than I did that day. 
 
22 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 I preached a short, tender sermon, 
 about twelve minutes long, and then 
 announced that we would have a brief 
 testimony meeting, and that if there 
 were any present who would like to say 
 a few words about their own religious 
 experience, or express a purpose to serve 
 Christ more faithfully in the future, I 
 would be glad to hear from them. All 
 was silent for two or three minutes. It 
 seemed like ten minutes to me. The 
 old man and the young man were waiting 
 against each other; but, finally, the old 
 man rose to his feet. He was a fine 
 looking man, of venerable appearance. 
 As he stood and looked around on his 
 neighbors his lips trembled and his eyes 
 filled with tears. At last he said broken- 
 ly, ^^ Neighbors, I have not been doing 
 my duty to God. I have not lived in 
 my family as I ought to have lived, and 
 I fear my influence in the neighborhood 
 has been to make people doubt Christ. 
 My anger hid it from me until — '' and he 
 
Preliminary Skirmishes. 23 
 
 turned to me — ''God sent this young 
 man to show me my sin. But my anger 
 
 is all gone now, and if will forgive 
 
 me, we will have peace and do our duty/' 
 As the old man finished he turned toward 
 his son-in-law and stretched out his arms. 
 Everybody was crying. The young 
 man's heart was melted, and a moment 
 later he was in the old man's embrace. 
 The mother and daughter found each 
 other soon, and a spirit of reconciliation 
 and love filled the air. 
 
 You may well believe that that scene 
 cleared the atmosphere, and that night, 
 in the little school-house, seven people 
 responded to my invitation and tear- 
 fully sought and found hope in Jesus 
 Christ. In the days that followed the 
 revival influence swept through the entire 
 community, and in a large number of 
 families father and mother and all the 
 children were converted to Christ. 
 Under God, it was the healing of the feud 
 that did it. 
 
CHAPTER II 
 CAYUSE AND SADDLE-BAGS 
 
CHAPTER II. 
 
 THE minister who has never ridden 
 a Far Western circuit has lost 
 an interesting chapter from the 
 possibihties of his experience. My 
 first regular circuit riding was done as 
 an assistant pastor, or, rather, ^^ assistant 
 preacher-in-charge/^ for that was the 
 term used, to my uncle, who was 
 '^ preacher-in-chief/ ^ I was with him 
 the six winter months, for in the Willa- 
 mette Valley there are only two seasons, 
 the summer and the winter. The sum- 
 mer is comparatively dry and the winter 
 is nearly always very wet. Our circuit 
 reached from the city of Portland east- 
 ward as far as settlements had gone into 
 the Cascade Mountains, and from the 
 Columbia River on one side across two 
 
28 Soul-Winnins: Stories. 
 
 to 
 
 counties to the south. The country was 
 heavily timbered, for the most part flat, 
 and the roads muddy, and the lot of a 
 circuit-rider such as to try his soul and 
 develop in him many Christian graces- 
 I had no horse, and a benevolent 
 brother on the circuit offered to let me 
 have one for his keep. I think his 
 benevolence was mixed with a desire to 
 be rid of the horse for awhile and to 2:et 
 him broken. He was a wild, vicious 
 beast, with no sense, and led me a terrible 
 life. I remember one forenoon I had 
 a long ride to make to reach a log school- 
 house where I was to preach at eleven 
 o'clock. Rain had been pouring for 
 many days and nights, and the streams 
 were overflowing their banks every- 
 where. Ordinary brooks had become 
 small rivers. And to make it worse 
 the road was new to me, and I could 
 only plunge ahead and take things as I 
 found them. I came upon a stream 
 which usually was a little affair, but the 
 
Cayuse and Saddle-bags. 29 
 
 bridge had been washed away and the 
 water had spread out for a long distance 
 on either side. The water was dirty, 
 and there was no telling how deep it was 
 until you tried it. At the first lunge 
 of my horse his head went out of sight 
 and the water washed through my 
 saddle. Up he came,' gave a terrific 
 snort, and, leaping as far as he could, 
 went down again to the bottom. This 
 time the water struck imder my armpits. 
 Up again came the horse, snorting 
 wildly, and with another fearful lunge 
 he went onward and then down, again 
 hugging the bottom. This time the 
 water gurgled around my shirt collar, and 
 I held my chin up to keep it out of my 
 mouth. Luckily, we had reached the 
 lowest point, and two or three lunges 
 more brought us into wading depths 
 The horse had no idea of swimming. If 
 the stream had been wide enough he 
 would have drowned himself. As it was,' 
 he had given me a very uncomfortable 
 
30 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 preparation for a morning's discourse. 
 I could not stop; I had eight miles yet 
 to ride, and went on as fast as the horse 
 could gallop. When I reached the little 
 school-house in the big woods I found 
 that, notwithstanding the rain, it was 
 filled with people, some of them having 
 come on foot several miles over trails 
 in order not to miss the one chance they 
 had once a month of hearing the Gospel. 
 I went in and stood by the stove a 
 moment, and then with my wet clothes 
 steaming I conducted the services and 
 preached as best I could. I had some 
 dinner in a humble home near by and 
 rode eighteen miles farther that after- 
 noon to preach again that night. 
 
 As the winter deepened we began to 
 hold evangelistic meetings at the leading 
 points on the circuit. We were usually 
 alone in these meetings, the circuit being 
 so large that we followed each other 
 alternately around. We often began 
 a meeting on Saturday night and would 
 
Ca3ruse and Saddle-bags. 31 
 
 continue over until about Wednesday 
 of the next week. On more than one 
 occasion that winter a whole neighbor- 
 hood was tremendously shaken by these 
 simple straight-forward services. It was 
 in those country places that I learned 
 the secret which has been one of my 
 greatest sources of power ever since, and 
 that is, if you want to get at a man's 
 real heart and break down his defences 
 in your effort to win him to Christ, you 
 must get him alone by himself. It is a 
 great waste of time to talk to a man 
 personally about his own salvation in the 
 presence of other people, unless he has 
 already decided and needs your help, 
 and even then it is better to get him 
 alone. That winter I also learned that 
 if a man showed deep interest in the 
 meeting, and was almost persuaded to 
 be a Christian, it was not well to let the 
 next day go by without having a personal 
 conversation with him. If I could man- 
 age it I got an invitation to be at his 
 
32 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 home, and that night, in front of the big 
 fireplace, when all the rest of the house 
 were asleep, or the next morning out 
 among the stock or in the field or the 
 pasture, I found the opportunity to open 
 the gate straight into his heart, and many 
 a man was converted in those heart- 
 searching conversations and the tender 
 prayer that followed later. 
 
 At the close of the six months in this 
 field where I had been an assistant a 
 brother died who had been in charge 
 of a large circuit a hundred miles or 
 more south of us, and the presiding elder 
 put me in charge for the rest of the year. 
 I arrived on the scene in the early spring, 
 when the mud was deep and heavy, as it 
 is in a country full of swales about the 
 time it begins to dry up. I had received 
 only a hundred dollars of salary for 
 the last half year's work and was still 
 without a horse. A good brother came 
 to the front with a little pony. It was a 
 very gentle, nice pony, but its legs were 
 
Cayuse and Saddle-bags. 33 
 
 SO short that when we got into a very 
 bad mud hole it would stick, and I would 
 have to get off and walk. The months 
 on that circuit, however, were months 
 of great enjoyment. It was an old and 
 famous circuit, with a great many strong 
 Christians among both the men and 
 the women, who had rare spiritual graces, 
 and my association with them will never 
 be forgotten. The time of year for 
 evangelistic services had passed before 
 my coming to this circuit, as the farmers 
 were plowing and sowing, and it was 
 almost impossible to get them out to 
 service on a week evening. 
 
 Everything was looking forward 
 toward the camp-meeting. I heard 
 wonderful stories of the great times they 
 had known on the old camp-ground, and 
 the camp-meeting that year was no 
 exception. The people came from a 
 circuit of forty to fifty miles around. 
 There were no cottages or buildings 
 made of timber of any kind, but the 
 
34 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 people brought their canvas tents, and 
 by the middle of the week it looked like 
 a white city. Scores and scores of tents 
 went up in long rows on every side. 
 The whole grove and all the people in it 
 were given up to spiritual things. No- 
 body thought about entertainments or 
 amusements. They had come there to 
 worship God, and all day and part of 
 the night was given up to it. The first 
 thing that would be heard in the morning 
 would be the voice of some one singing 
 hymns, and then, as the people gathered 
 for morning prayers, the sound of singing 
 and prayer would rise from a hundred 
 tents. I have never seen anything else 
 like it on earth; but it was as beautiful 
 and glorious as it was unique. 
 
 A portion of ground immediately in 
 front of the ''preacher's stand,'' suffi- 
 cient to seat about one hundred and 
 fifty people, and fenced in by poles 
 nailed on to the sides of trees, was called 
 the altar. This, as well as the region 
 
Cayiise and Saddle-bags. 35 
 
 beyond it, was seated with rude benches 
 without backs. The ground was covered 
 with fresh straw to keep it from becoming 
 too dusty. At eight o'clock there was 
 a prayer and iSong and praise service. 
 At nine o'clock there was a sermon. 
 At eleven o'clock there was another 
 sermon. At about two-thirty there was 
 another sermon, and at four o'clock 
 there were what they called '^ brush 
 prayer meetings," where leading men 
 among the laymen would invite their 
 brethren and any that were seeking 
 Christ, and any others who were still 
 holding out against the Lord, to go with 
 them into the woods for a quiet prayer 
 meeting. The women held a meeting 
 of their own for women onty, with the 
 same purpose in view. I have known 
 these meetings to be a most powerful 
 agency in the winning of souls. Again 
 at night there was a sermon. Of course, 
 after every one of these sermons there 
 was an after service. The sermons were 
 
36 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 often informal and *^ scattering/' but 
 they were all earnest and Scriptural and 
 all devoted to the one great purpose of 
 winning men to Christ then and there. 
 Every sermon closed with a direct appeal 
 for the sinner then present to cease his 
 rebellion against God and surrender to 
 his Lord. 
 
 The exhorter came next. Those were 
 the days of exhorters. Whenever as 
 many as two preachers were together 
 at any evangelistic meeting during my 
 younger ministry, it was understood 
 that one would preach and the other 
 exhort. Multitudes of men in our great 
 pulpits whose ministry is not being 
 blessed by the conversion of souls would 
 become great soul-winners if they could 
 only have a year's training as exhorters. 
 At this great camp-meeting which I have 
 been describing the exhorters followed 
 every sermon all day long. It is quite 
 an art to get up after a man has ceased 
 preaching, catch the spirit of the meeting 
 
Cajruse and Saddle-bags. 37 
 
 where he has left it, and carry it right 
 on with well chosen words or striking 
 illustrations, intensifying it as you go, 
 until the time for action has come. The 
 invitations given were for immediate 
 decision for Christ. The front benches 
 were cleared, and the people who would 
 make a public confession of their purpose 
 to surrender to the Lord were invited to 
 come and kneel there. Then preachers 
 and laymen sought out their friends and 
 acquaintances through the audience 
 and with tears and entreaties persuaded 
 them to come to Christ. 
 
 I have seen many great revivals under 
 a great variety of circumstances; but I 
 have never seen any place where the 
 presence of Almighty God was more 
 apparent, where the conviction of sin 
 seemed to be a more real and terrible 
 thing, where the members of the church 
 were more passionately in earnest for 
 the salvation of men; nor have I ever 
 seen more marvelous surrenders of the 
 
38 Soul- Winning Stories, 
 
 human will to God, or clearer and brighter 
 instances of happy and joyous conver- 
 sions that issued into the steadfast and 
 holy Ufe, than I witnessed on the old 
 Brownsville camp-ground in Oregon. 
 
CHAPTER III 
 
 THE CAPTURE OF THE 
 STREET-CAR MAN 
 
CHAPTER III. 
 
 T was in the days when the horse- 
 car was in all its glory, shortly 
 before the electric trolley came 
 on the scene and sent the horses 
 back to the farms. It was my first 
 pastorate in an Eastern city, and 
 I had the care of a small church that was 
 situated in a populous suburb. The 
 general location was excellent, but one 
 thing greatly annoyed my congregation; 
 this w^as the existence of a great horse- 
 car stable just across the street from us, 
 where the cars were coming in and going 
 out constantly to make the changes of 
 horses and men. Whenever anything 
 nice was said about the church by one 
 of our people to another, or by any out- 
 sider to them, there was always that 
 
42 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 reservation, ''If only that old street-car 
 barn were out of the way.'' As Mordecai 
 to Haman when he wouldn't bow to him, 
 so that old bam took the edge off all our 
 joys. ^ 
 
 This old street-car barn was anno3dng 
 in many ways. In the first place, it did 
 not smell good; in the second place, it 
 was very noisy; and finally, and the 
 most important, there was always a 
 large group of from twenty to fifty horse- 
 car conductors and drivers off duty, who 
 were hanging around the doors of this 
 barn. They were an unusually wicked, 
 blasphemous lot of men, and they natu- 
 rally attracted other men of the same 
 ilk, and it became notorious as a place 
 that was noisy and vulgar, where women 
 were stared at and remarked upon. 
 Every decent woman took the other side 
 of the street and hurried past when she 
 had to go arovmd that corner. 
 
 After I had been pastor of the little 
 chm-ch for a few months, it was borne in 
 
The Capture of the Street-car Man. 43 
 
 upon me that something must be done 
 to change the condition at that car- 
 barn corner. After thinking it over and 
 praying about it a good deal, I called 
 my official board together one Sunday 
 morning, after the sermon, and told them 
 that I believed our church had a duty 
 in relation to that horse-car bam. I 
 said to them, ''You have tried to get 
 away from the place and you have tried 
 to get them to move away for a long 
 time, and nothing has ever come of it. 
 Now my judgment is that it is all provi- 
 dential. God has put us here to save 
 that crowd. This is the duty that is at 
 our door. I want you to back me up 
 in a series of revival meetings. We will 
 not tell people so, but the great object 
 of all will be the saving of the conductors 
 and drivers who have their headquarters 
 at that horse-car barn.'' 
 
 They were greatly astonished. Most 
 of them thought I was optimistic beyond 
 reason, and that we would never get any 
 
44 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 of them to come to the meetings. Two 
 or three, however, took fire at the ear- 
 nestness of my own heart, and after 
 talking it all over they all agreed that it 
 was worth trying, and we set to work. 
 For six weeks we held meetings day and 
 night. We had preaching every evening, 
 but I soon found that the best hour for 
 the horse-car men was about nine o^clock 
 in the morning when the morning rush 
 was over. More men were at leisure 
 between that and eleven than at any 
 other time. So I added another meeting, 
 especially for them at that hour. 
 
 Well, the Lord blessed our labors. 
 We parceled them out. I hunted the 
 church through to find out who in the 
 church had personal acquaintance or 
 influence with individual drivers and 
 conductors, and I set everybody praying 
 for their own acquaintances among these 
 men, and urged each one to try to answer 
 his own prayers by seeking them out and 
 bringing them to the meetings. It was 
 
The Capture of the Street-car Man. 45 
 
 not long before this work began to tell,' 
 and, one after another, they were being 
 converted. 
 
 From the very first I found that the 
 greatest obstacle to a successful work of 
 grace among the men at the bam was in 
 the person of the car-starter. He was a 
 man past middle age, and a man of great 
 force of character. He was sharp and 
 witty, and his keen tongue could always 
 raise a laugh or bring the blood, if, as 
 often, he chose to use it as a lash. With 
 ail this, he was a big-hearted man in 
 many ways, and very popular among 
 the drivers and conductors. But he 
 hated God, he hated the church, he hated 
 Christians, and above everything else 
 he hated Christian ministers. There was 
 nothing his sharp tongue could say that 
 was bitter enough and mean enough if it 
 could raise the laugh against a preacher 
 and show his contempt for him. I very 
 soon discovered that many of the men 
 were holding back for fear of running 
 
46 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 the gauntlet of his tongue. When I 
 found this out, I went straight to him 
 and told him so, thinking I might sober 
 him with a sense of responsibility in the 
 matter; but he contemptuously cursed 
 me and told me to mind my own business. 
 I quietly told him that I should pray 
 God to open his eyes to his wickedness, 
 and went away. 
 
 I told some of the people in the church 
 about it, and we covenanted together 
 to pray daily for the starter^s salvation. 
 Every day, now, I was about the barn, 
 inviting men to the meetings, encouraging 
 some who had already started, specially 
 working with others, and, incidentally, 
 coming in contact with the starter. 
 Every day there was some bitter, vulgar 
 sneer or wicked oath hurled at me, and 
 when assured that I was praying for 
 him he would almost grind his teeth in 
 rage. This matter went on for some 
 three weeks, when one night, just as I 
 was sitting down at the table for my 
 
The Capture of the Street-car Man. 47 
 
 supper, the door-bell rang, and, on 
 opening it, there stood the car-starter^s 
 wife. She was greatly excited. "Oh," 
 said she, "I wish you would come to 
 our house right away. My husband is 
 in a terrible condition.'' 
 
 " Why, what is the matter?'' I inquired. 
 I supposed there had been some accident 
 about the barn. 
 
 "Oh!" she replied, "he is in an awful 
 condition. I left him walking the floor, 
 and wringing his hands in a perfect agony. 
 He thinks he is going to be lost. He 
 says he has conmiitted the unpardon- 
 able sin and there is no hope for 
 him." 
 
 I shall never forget the thrill of joy 
 that ran through me as the woman told 
 me that story. Involuntarily I ex- 
 claimed, with great fervor, " Thank God ! " 
 
 She looked at me almost dazed, and 
 inquired, "What do you mean?" 
 
 "I mean," was my reply, '^that this is 
 the beginning of better times for your 
 
48 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 husband. If he is feeUng Uke that,' I 
 am sure I can do him good.'' 
 
 "Well/' she said, "if you can do him 
 good, he surely needs it, and that very 
 soon.'' 
 
 I forgot all about my supper, and 
 throwing on my hat and overcoat hurried 
 with her to her home. When we went 
 in, I found she had not overstated the 
 case as to the starter's feelings. He was 
 in the deepest anguish. Despair was 
 written on every line of his face. The 
 Holy Spirit had opened up before his 
 gaze the awful hell that was in his heart. 
 He seemed utterly without hope. As 
 soon as he saw me he cried, "There is 
 no hope for me! How wicked I have 
 been! And I knew better, too. But I 
 have hated God and I have hated you. 
 I have said every mean thing about you 
 that I could lay my tongue to. And I 
 have abused the members of the church; 
 I have picked flaws in them. I have 
 made fun of every man that has started 
 
The Capture of the Street-car Man. 49 
 
 to be a Christian. I have done all I 
 could to keep them back, and I fear 
 some of them will be lost because of 
 what I have said to them." 
 
 As soon as I could get a word in I 
 said to him, ^^ Remember, it is not your 
 sin, it is not your wickedness, that is in 
 the way of your salvation." 
 
 He looked at me astonished. ^'What 
 is in the way, then?" 
 
 I replied, ^^The only thing that is in 
 the way is your unwillingness to ask 
 Christ to forgive you, and to accept his 
 forgiveness." 
 
 That was a new idea to him. Then I 
 told him the old story of the thief on 
 the cross, and the other story of that 
 poor, demon-possessed man at Gadara. 
 I could see that the last one took hold of 
 him. He seemed to feel that the man 
 who had a whole legion of devils in him, 
 all of whom were cast out by the power 
 of Jesus, was a case that gave hope for 
 him. After we had talked perhaps ten 
 
50 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 minutes, we kneeled down to pray. I 
 never heard a man pray with such aban- 
 don for himself. I thought all the neigh- 
 bors on the street would hear. He cried 
 out to God. He did not mince matters 
 in telling the Lord about his sins. Final- 
 ly his heart broke. The tears came, and 
 in that flood of tears his faith caught 
 sight of the Christ who died for him. 
 His heavy burden rolled off like the load 
 from the shoulders of Bunyan^s pilgrim 
 at the cross. He rose up from his knees 
 with a new look in his face and a new 
 joy in his heart. 
 
 He said he must go at once to his work 
 at the barn, as he was due there in a few 
 minutes; but I was so anxious to thorough- 
 ly intrench him in his new life that I 
 took him across with me to the church, 
 where I knew a little prayer-meeting 
 was going on, and he went in with me, 
 and there gave his first testimony for 
 the Lord. 
 
 The car-starter's conversion created 
 
The Capture of the Street-car Man. 51 
 
 great excitement in the community. 
 People flocked to the meetings, and the 
 revival received a new impetus. Over 
 two hundred were hopefully converted, 
 and over a hundred and fifty were added 
 to my church. But that which pleased 
 me especially was that fifty of my new 
 church members were made up of twenty- 
 five street-car men and their wives. 
 
 From that day till this, now a good 
 many years, the car-starter has lived 
 a Christian life. His influence every- 
 where has been for Christ. He has led 
 many to the Lord through the purity of 
 his life, the sweetness of his spirit, and 
 the holy boldness with which he bears 
 his testimony to the power of Christ to 
 forgive sins. 
 
 One of the sweetest compensations 
 for the self-sacrifice which is often de- 
 manded of a Christian minister is found 
 in the love and devotion of the men and 
 women who are won to Christ through 
 his efforts. Some years after the car- 
 
52 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 starter's conversion, lecturing one night 
 in a far-distant State, I found him in my 
 audience. Nothing would do but that 
 I must go home with him for the night. 
 I had to take a train at half -past two in 
 the morning, but he assured me that he 
 could wake at any hour, and there would 
 be no danger of my getting left. When 
 he aroused me in the morning, and I 
 went down to find a cup of hot coffee 
 waiting for me, something in the car- 
 starter's face convinced me that he had 
 not slept. 
 
 ^'Look here,'' said I, ''you have been 
 sitting up all night. I can see by your 
 eyes that you have not been asleep. 
 You are too old a man to do a thing like 
 that." 
 
 I shall never forget the answer. His 
 lip quivered, his eyes filled with tears, 
 and as the great drops rolled over his 
 cheeks, he said, ''Ah, you do not know 
 what a joy it is for me to do something 
 for you. If I were to sit up all night,^ 
 
The Capture of the Street-car Man. 53 
 
 once a week, as long as I live, it would 
 be nothing compared to what you have * 
 done for me/' 
 
 I have seldom had anything touch 
 me more deeply than those words. I 
 thought of what Paul said to the Gala- 
 tians whom he had won to Christ, in 
 recognizing their love for him: ^^I bear 
 you record, that, if it had been possible, 
 ye would have plucked out your own 
 eyes, and have given them to me.'' 
 Many times since that night, when I 
 have been tempted to discouragement, 
 and wondered if the hard work was 
 worth while, I have recalled the car- 
 starter's tears, and his words of gratitude 
 and love, and, thrusting aside my de- 
 pression, I have thanked God and taken 
 courage. 
 
CHAPTER IV 
 
 HOW THE YOUNG 
 BARTENDER WAS SAVED 
 
CHAPTER W: 
 
 SOME years ago, in Boston, a 
 young man and his sister came to 
 see me one evening in great 
 trouble concerning their brother. The 
 story they told me was one of those heart- 
 breaking stories that come so often to 
 the ear of the minister of a large city 
 church. 
 
 These young people were from Nova 
 Scotia. The father had died some years 
 before, and the mother had been left with 
 a large family with only one of them old 
 enough to be of any help. This boy was 
 the 3^oung man who had come to see me. 
 He told how his mother had dreaded to 
 have him leave home, but there had to 
 be help from the outside or the family 
 would be broken up and scattered, and 
 
68 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 SO with a breaking heart she let him go 
 away to Boston to work. Tears ran 
 down his manly face as he told of the 
 last night at home, of the Bible his mother 
 gave him, and of her earnest pleading 
 with him to lead a Christian life in the 
 strange city. 
 
 Well, he came to Boston, found 
 work, joined the church, and had got 
 along well. He sent back all his wages 
 that he could spare to help the mother 
 and the children at home. After a while 
 the next one to him, a girl, became old 
 enough to come to Boston and enter 
 into domestic service, and now, for three 
 or four years, the two had been working 
 to make the burdens lighter for the old 
 mother in the far-off Canada home. 
 They were both earnest Christians and 
 honest, self-respecting young people. 
 And now they came to the burden of 
 their story, which had brought them to 
 me. They were not members of my 
 church, but as I had been very closely 
 
How the Young Bartender Was Saved. 59 
 
 identified with temperance work, they 
 had hoped I might be of value to them 
 in their great emergency. 
 
 This was their trouble: Two years 
 before, George, a younger brother, and 
 the very idol of his mother^s heart, had 
 also come to the city. He had had the 
 same careful training by his devout 
 Christian mother, but he had gotten 
 employment where he had been thrown 
 into evil associations and had been led 
 into the habit of drink. This had lost 
 him his place, and, in spite of all they 
 could do, he had taken a place as a bar- 
 tender some six months before their 
 coming to me. After this his downfall 
 had been rapid. He had drunk and 
 drunk until he was bloated, and 
 his beautiful features were becoming 
 coarse and revolting. They had come 
 to me hoping that I might be able to 
 advise them. They had not written 
 their mother about his condition, for 
 they feared it would kill her if she knew; 
 
60 Soul- Winning Stories. 
 
 and I have seldom in my life seen anybody 
 
 in sorer trouble than were that brother 
 
 and sister. 
 
 I must confess that it seemed like a 
 
 very hopeless case. We prayed together 
 about it, and I urged them to keep on 
 praying for him, and to use every influ- 
 ence they had to get him out of the busi- 
 ness, and, in the meantime, if any oppor- 
 tunity offered, to bring him to me, so 
 that I might talk with him. 
 
 About two weeks passed, when the 
 young woman came to see me alone, 
 saying that her brother had lost his 
 place as bartender because of his drunk- 
 enness, and she was hoping that now 
 there might be a chance to do something. 
 It so happened that, the day before her 
 visit, the proprietor of a newly estab- 
 lished sanitarium for the cure of drunk- 
 enness had met me on the street and 
 told me that if I would send them some- 
 one in whom I was particularly interested 
 they would treat the case free. I told 
 
How the Young Bartender Was Saved. 61 
 
 the young girl about this, and begged her 
 to bring her brother to me, and see if 
 we could not persuade him to go to this 
 sanitarium. She immediately caught at 
 this, for he had been sick for a few days 
 and was now thoroughly sober and 
 seemed to be more repentant and to have 
 more feeling concerning his condition 
 than he had shown for a long time. 
 
 The next morning she brought the 
 young man to my study. In spite of 
 the awful traces of dissipation he was a 
 handsome young fellow and bore in his 
 features and especially in his eyes the 
 unmistakable traces of real manhood. 
 Poor fellow, he had been caught in the 
 deviFs net by his genial heart, and his 
 feet had been tripped from under him, 
 as have the feet of ten thousands of 
 others, almost before he knew it. I saw 
 that he was now thoroughly ashamed 
 of himself, and that, while willing to do 
 anything, he was almost entirely hope- 
 less of any good coming of it« 
 
62 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 I had a long talk with him about it, 
 told him of several cases that had come 
 imder iny own observation of men who 
 had been greatly helped by medical 
 treatment in overcoming the drink habit, 
 and after I had gotten him thoroughly 
 interested and somewhat encouraged I 
 quietly urged upon him the greater cure 
 for all sinfulness that was to be found 
 in the Great Physician. I suggested to 
 him that all his troubles had come to 
 him because he had been tempted out 
 of the path in which he had been brought 
 up. That after coming to Boston none 
 of its wickedness would have affected 
 him if he had retained his habit of Bible 
 reading and prayer and church-going 
 which his mother had taught him — 
 putting himself in the care of the Saviour. 
 At the mention of his mother he was 
 deeply moved, and as I talked gently 
 and tenderly about her his pride seemed 
 to break down completely and he cried 
 like a child. 
 
How the Young Bartender Was Saved. 63 
 
 ''Oh! I know it! I know it!'' he said. 
 "She is praying for me! I have tried to 
 forget it for a year, but I know she is still 
 praying! It would kill her if she could 
 see me now.'' 
 
 Then I assured him that his mother's 
 God was also his God, and that if he 
 prayed to him, even now, in his sin and 
 sorrow, God would hear him and forgive 
 him. When I asked if he would like 
 to have me pray with him, he exclaimed 
 most eagerly, ''Oh, yes J do!" 
 
 It was borne in upon me by the Holy 
 Spirit hat it was the crisis hour of the 
 man's soul. We kneeled down together, 
 I on one side and his sister on the other. 
 I poured out my soul in prayer, and she 
 followed in supplication. I do not think 
 I ever heard such a prayer for another 
 as that sister poured out to God. I 
 doubt if she had ever heard her own 
 voice in prayer before. She was a timid 
 little body and I do not imagine that 
 she had ever prayed aloud in meeting 
 
64 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 in her life. But, oh, how she prayed 
 that morning! She told the whole story 
 over again to God. It was a new parable 
 of the Prodigal Son, except that it was 
 a mother waiting at home, and the poor 
 prodigal, with the smell of the swine 
 still on him, was just now coming to 
 himself. 
 
 When the sister had finished her 
 prayer, I urged him to pray for himself, 
 and he did so, in broken incoherent sen- 
 tences at first, but soon in a perfect flood- 
 tide of repentance. And then, suddenly 
 a great thing happened. I never could 
 tell just how it came; it reminded me at 
 the time of the words of Jesus to Nico- 
 demus, '^The wind bloweth where it 
 listeth, and thou hearest the sound 
 thereof, but canst not tell whence it 
 Cometh, and whither it goeth ; so is every- 
 one that is born of the Spirit.'' So it 
 was in this case. Suddenly the agonizing 
 man ceased to agonize. He stopped 
 praying right in the middle of a sentence, 
 
How the Young Bartender Was Saved. 65 
 
 and though his tears still flowed, and 
 great sobs shook his frame, both the 
 sister and myself felt that a great change 
 had come. 
 
 I turned to look at his face and found 
 him turning to look at me. His face was 
 wet with tears, but there was infinitely 
 joyous wonder shining in his eyes, and 
 I said: ^^ George, are you forgiven?^' 
 
 And he said, and with the very first 
 words his joy increased: ^^My burden 
 is gone! Yes! He forgives me!'' And 
 then we all sprang to our feet, and the 
 sister hugged him and kissed him, and 
 we all cried again, but this time they 
 were tears of joy. 
 
 Soon I began to speak about the 
 arrangements for his going out to the 
 sanitarium. Then he turned to me and 
 said, ''I do not believe I will go." 
 
 '^Why?" I inquired, astonished. 
 
 '^Well,'' he said, ^'I came intending 
 to go, because there seemed nothing 
 else to do. It was my only hope,' and I 
 
66 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 had not much faith in that. But now 
 it seems different. God has forgiven me. 
 I have Christ, my Saviour, to help me, and 
 I am going to trust him.'' 
 
 Of course I was greatly surprised, and 
 not entirely easy as to the outcome. 
 But there was something about it all so 
 strongly indicating the presence and 
 power of the Holy Spirit that I did not 
 try to change his purpose. After grate- 
 fully thanking me, they went away. I 
 kept track of them for many months, 
 and during all that time George lived a 
 strong and courageous Christian life, hav- 
 ing gained constant victory over all 
 temptation from the old appetite which 
 had so degraded and despoiled him. 
 
 There were several factors in the young 
 bartender's salvation. First of all, on 
 the human side, was that faithful mother 
 whose prayers and Christian fidelity he 
 could never forget. Second, there was 
 the loving faithfulness of that Christian 
 brother and sister; and, finally, there 
 
How the Young Bartender Was Saved. 67 
 
 came my opportunity, and the leading 
 of the Holy Spirit to impress me to seize 
 the critical moment when he could be 
 won to surrender himself to God. It 
 was one of the clearest cases of instan- 
 taneous conversion, which thoroughly 
 transformed the man, that I have ever 
 witnessed. 
 
CHAPTER V 
 
 THE WINNING OF THE YOUNG 
 MERCHANT AND HIS BRIDE 
 
CHAPTER V. 
 
 IT was my last Sunday in a far 
 Western town. My pastorate was 
 closing with the day, and the 
 morrow was to see me on my jour- 
 ney, two hundred miles by team and 
 three hundred more by rail, to my next 
 pastorate. Just after the sermon began 
 in the morning I noticed a young couple 
 come in and take a seat near the church 
 door. I did not take note of them 
 specially again, and did not note them 
 at the time, except that I made a mental 
 memorandum that they were strangers; 
 but having retired to the parsonage after 
 the morning service, on answering a 
 knock at the door, I found the same 
 couple on my door-step, and taking them 
 in at a glance said to myself, 'They 
 have come to get manied." 
 
72 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 The young man said they would like 
 to have a little private conversation with 
 me, if it were convenient. This deepened 
 my first impression, and I led them into 
 my study and closed the door. I offered 
 them seats, and the young lady sat down, 
 but the young man was under a nervous 
 tension, and remained standing. In a 
 straightforward manly way he said: 
 
 ^^We live in C , thirty miles away. 
 
 We were married this morning. We 
 have been engaged for a long time, but 
 this young lad}'', who is now my wife, 
 has been afraid to marry me for seme 
 months until to-day.^' 
 
 He scarcely seemed to know how to 
 go on, and to help him out I inquired, 
 '^What was the trouble?'' 
 
 ^' Well, you see,'' he replied, ^4t is this 
 way: I am a storekeeper. I keep a 
 general dry-goods and provision store, 
 and along with other things I always 
 keep a barrel of whisky on hand to sell 
 when people want it, as all the other 
 
The Winning of the Young Merchant. 73 
 
 storekeepers do. Well, I got to drinking 
 it myself, and I took too much several 
 times, and Mary was frightened, and 
 was afraid to marry me for fear I would 
 turn out a drunkard. This morning I 
 promised her that if she would marry 
 me we would drive up here to see you. 
 We have seen in the papers how earnestly 
 you are fighting the saloons and working 
 for temperance, and I told her I would 
 come here and ask you to write out a 
 pledge, and then I would sign it, and 
 never drink another drop while I lived. '^ 
 There was no mistaking the ring of 
 manly purpose in the young man's voice 
 and the flash of earnestness in his eyes 
 as he said these words, and instantlv I 
 thought of the day when the young man 
 stood before Jesus, and the Master, look- 
 ing on him, loved him. I felt that I was 
 standing in the Master's place, and that 
 I must be true to his soul. So I said: 
 "I like you. There's something about 
 you that goes right to my heart. But 
 
74 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 let me understand what it is you want 
 me to do/' 
 
 ^^Why, I want you to write out a 
 pledge not to drink any more, and I will 
 sign it." 
 
 "But you will go back home this after- 
 noon and sell the whisky to-morrow to 
 anybody who wants it, just the same?" 
 
 His face fell, but after a moment he 
 said, "Why, of course I could not keep 
 store in this country without selling 
 whisky. I would lose all my trade." 
 
 "Then this is what you mean," said I. 
 "You mean to sign this pledge not to 
 drink any more. But you will go back 
 to that town and you will sell whisky 
 to any other man who wants it. You 
 are going to keep your own self sober and 
 clean, but you will sell the stuff to others 
 that you know will ruin them, soul and 
 body. You are going to make your wife 
 feel safe. When you go down town in 
 the morning, you are going to have her 
 peaceful and at rest, never fearing that 
 
The Winning of the Young Merchant. 75 
 
 you will come back with a hellish smell 
 on your lips and with the stagger in your 
 limbs. But you are going to keep every 
 other woman in tovv^n trembling and 
 afraid.'^ 
 
 By this time I was ablaze with inten- 
 sity of feeling, and looking him straight 
 in the eye, I thundered, "No, sir; I will 
 not do it. I will not have any hand in it. 
 I will not soil my fingers with so mean a 
 thing as that. But I will tell 3^ou what 
 I will do. If you will let me write a 
 pledge that you will not only quit drink- 
 ing it, but that you will never sell it again, 
 or have anything more to do with it, I 
 will gladly ^vrite it. And that is the only 
 pledge you can keep. You think you 
 would keep the other, but I know you 
 would not. You have already got a 
 taste for it, and with that thirst in you 
 it would be impossible for you to sell it 
 long without coming to drink it again 
 yourself. Do something worthy of 
 yourself. Stop it altogether. Do that, 
 
76 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 and I will join you with all my 
 heart/' 
 
 It was an electric moment. Eye 
 flashed to eye, and I saw the decision 
 when it came in his eye, and he exclaimed, 
 not feebly, but with a volume of manly 
 purpose, "rildoitr^ 
 
 Then an inspiration came to me. 
 The glow of the sermon was yet on me, 
 and it flashed through my mind that 
 no other man would ever have such a 
 chance to win these two people to Christ 
 as I had just then. When once I felt 
 that inspiration I was compelled to go 
 on. I had shaken hands with him on his 
 decision, and still held him by the hand. 
 Gripping it anew, I said : " My brother, 
 do something better than that. This 
 is your wedding day. In all the years to 
 come there will never be another day like 
 this. To-day you are setting up your 
 home. Everything is possible to-day. 
 Why not stop all sin to-day? Why quit 
 just one sin? Why quit the drink alone? 
 
The Winning of the Young Merchant. 77 
 
 Why not join with your wife in dedicating 
 this new home of yours to the service 
 of God? Why not promise God here 
 and now that, by his help, you will not 
 only break off this one sin, but break 
 off every sin, and begin a life of prayer 
 and trust in God? Why not ask him 
 now, for Christ^s sake, to forgive your 
 sins and start you in this new life in a 
 new spirit?^ ^ 
 
 The Holy Spirit helped me. The 
 young wife had been weeping almost from 
 the first of my talk to him, and as my 
 heartfelt appeals followed one after the 
 other the t^ars came to my own eyes, 
 and the great tears welled up in his and 
 rolled down his cheeks. Again I saw 
 the light of decision come into his face. 
 He tightened his grip on my hand until 
 I felt a thrill of pain, as he almost 
 shouted: ^^God helping me, I'll do it!'^ 
 
 We knelt there together, the three of us, 
 on the study floor. I poured out my 
 heart to God in earnest prayer to send 
 
78 Soul- Winning Stories. 
 
 forgiveness and regeneration to these 
 young hearts. The young man prayed, 
 and then the young woman. And thus 
 we prayed and cried together until the 
 Hght of faith came into their hearts and 
 smiles of confidence illuminated their 
 faces. 
 
 It was a unique pledge that I wrote 
 out. I have often wished I had kopt a 
 copy of it. In it he promised not to 
 drink or sell liquor, and to live prayer- 
 fully the Christian life. He signed it, 
 his wife signed it, and I signed it. I 
 gave it to her, and they went away. 
 
 The next day I went on my journey. 
 After a brief pastorate in my new home 
 I came over three thousand miles east- 
 ward. Five years had gone before I 
 knew of the issue of that hour in my 
 study. Then a lady came to visit me 
 in Boston, who had been living in that 
 
 town of C at the time of the young 
 
 merchant's visit to my study, and this 
 was the story she told me: The young 
 
The Winning of the Young Merchant. 79 
 
 man and his bride returned that Sunday 
 evening to their home. Without waiting 
 imtil the next morning, he went and got 
 two or three of his friends, told them 
 of his pledge, and of his new purpose, 
 and took them with him to his store, 
 where they deliberately rolled his barrel 
 of whisky into the street, and with an 
 axe drove in the head of it and let the 
 liquor run into the gutter. Naturally, he 
 was made the butt of a good deal of ridi- 
 cule, and everything possible was done 
 to put temptation in his way. But all 
 to no avail. He never had a drop of 
 liquor about the store again, and while 
 it had been predicted that he would lose 
 his trade, and he himself had expected 
 to lose it, it had turned out otherwise, 
 and his business had prospered more than 
 ever. He set up a family altar in his 
 new home and let everybody know of 
 his new purpose to lead a Christian 
 life. A few weeks later a minister came 
 to the town and organized a little union 
 
80 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 church. Our young merchant and his 
 wife were on hand to become charter 
 members. A Sunday-school was organ- 
 ized, of which he was made the superin- 
 tendent, and at the time of the lady's 
 visit that young man and his wife were 
 the very pillars of religious influence 
 and power in that whole community. 
 
 I think that was the most joyous in- 
 formation that ever came to me. My 
 heart was filled with it and my soul 
 exulted. I do not think anything that 
 has occurred in my whole career has ever 
 given me a greater impulse to make the 
 winning of souls the chief end of my 
 ministry. God has many kinds of joy 
 for his children to compensate them for 
 all their self-denial on earth's pilgrimage, 
 but the sweetest joy and the most satis- 
 fying that I have ever known is the joy 
 of feeling that I have been instrumental 
 in his hands of winning others to Christ. 
 
CHAPTER VI 
 
 A GROCER'S CLERK WHO BECAME 
 
 A MIGHTY ARCHER FOR 
 
 THE LORD 
 
CHAPTER VI. 
 
 I DO not know if other ministers 
 have the same feeUng or not, but, 
 personally, I have always a great 
 timidity in going to a new church, 
 and never have much comfort or 
 feel at all sure of my standing ground 
 until I am rejoicing over some converts 
 in the Lord's name. When I came from 
 Cincinnati to South Boston, some years 
 ago, and took the pastorate of a large 
 church in the midst of a populous dis- 
 trict, I came from a year of wonderful 
 revival success; and yet I remember 
 the many anxious days and some almost 
 sleepless nights for fear my method of 
 preaching and work might not fit the new 
 parish to which I had come. It was, 
 therefore, with great joy that I got on the 
 track of my first man in the new field. 
 
84 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 He was a grocer^s clerk, and I met him 
 first at the parsonage door when he came 
 to see if he could get my trade. He was 
 a quick-eyed, ruddy-cheeked young fel- 
 low, short and round, but alive, every 
 inch of him. I was very much pleased 
 with him, and before he got away I 
 inquired : ^^ Where do you go to church?'' 
 
 "Well, to tell the truth, Dominie, I 
 don't go anywhere." 
 
 "Why not?'' 
 
 "Oh, I don't know. Got out of the 
 habit, I guess. I used to go to church 
 at home in Nova Scotia." 
 
 "Well, " I said, "you will have to come 
 and see me now, anyhow. Turn about 
 is fair play. If I buy your goods, you 
 will have to come and take some of my 
 goods." 
 
 That seemed to strike his fancy, and he 
 went away saying, "All right, I'll come 
 around next Sunday night." 
 
 To make sure he did come around 1 
 went to the store on purpose the next 
 
A Clerk Who Became a Mighty Archer, 85 ' 
 
 i 
 
 Saturday afternoon, and looked him up, j 
 
 and reminded him that I would be look- ^ 
 
 ing for him. ^ 
 
 It was my habit then, as now, to be at \ 
 
 the door of the church Sunday morning ! 
 
 and evening when the church is opened, ; 
 
 and shake hands with the people when * 
 
 they come in, till time for the service 
 
 to begin. So the next Sunday evening ; 
 
 I was on the lookout for my grocer's i 
 
 clerk. When he came I had a word with ' 
 
 him. I said to him,^^I have been think- i 
 
 ing about you and praying about you ever 
 
 since I talked to you the other morning 
 
 at my house.'' I told him that I had j 
 
 been homesick all the week because ! 
 
 there was not a man or a woman in the I 
 
 community whom I had won to Christ. i 
 
 "And now," said I, "I have been hoping 
 
 and praying that the Lord will give me ; 
 
 you to-night. I somehow feel that it j 
 
 was providential that you came to me | 
 
 the other day, and that if you will begin | 
 
 to be a Christian at once we shall begin \ 
 
86 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 OUT pastorate here together,' and you 
 and I together can do a great deal of 
 good with the blessing of God/' 
 
 He seemed very much touched. He 
 was a noble fellow, and the brotherly 
 way in which I approached him, and my 
 appeal to his better self to come to Christ 
 so that he could do good, seemed to get 
 hold. 
 
 The theme of the sermon that evening 
 was the stor}^ of the little boy who had 
 the loaves and fishes which, in the hands 
 of Christ, became sufficient to feed the 
 multitude. It gave me a great chance 
 to get at my young clerk, and I pressed 
 the Gospel home, with him in mind, with 
 all the power I had. The Holy Spirit 
 blessed the message. I could see by 
 his glistening eye and the rapt look on 
 his face that he was greatly interested. 
 
 At the close of the sermon I announced 
 that there would be an after-meeting in 
 the vestry, and urged Christians and all 
 others who were interested to remain 
 
A Clerk Who Became a Mighty Archer. 87 
 
 with us. To my great joy my grocer 
 clerk came in, and, on my giving an oppor- 
 tunity for any who would like to begin 
 the Christian life to manifest it by rising, 
 he was almost at once on his feet. He 
 was the only one who started that eve- 
 ning. When we knelt to pray, I asked 
 him to come and kneel with me at the 
 altar, so that I might talk and pray 
 with him. He came, and as he knelt 
 there the whole fountain of his nature 
 seemed to be broken up. He melted 
 down in complete surrender to God. 
 He had not knelt there five minutes 
 until his face was full of joy and gladness 
 and the peace that passes all understand- 
 ing filled his heart and illumined his 
 eyes. 
 
 When after a few moments we had a 
 little testimony meeting, he stood up 
 and in the manliest way told how I had 
 spoken to him, and how he had come 
 that night with no expectation of be- 
 coming a Christian at once, but that my 
 
88 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 words at the door had set him thinking 
 and that during the sermon a great 
 longing had taken hold of his heart to 
 make his life worth something to some- 
 body by giving it to Christ. He said 
 there wasn^t much of it, not any more 
 than there was of the little boy's loaves 
 and fisheS; but if the Lord could do any- 
 thing with it he should have every crumb 
 of it. 
 
 This was the second Sunday night of 
 my pastorate, and one of the happiest I 
 can remember. For the young clerk's 
 conversion was so bright and clear, 
 and his testimony so evidently sincere, 
 that it melted the entire church, and 
 started the year's work with a great 
 evangelistic uplift. I would have been 
 happier yet, if it were possible, if I had 
 known the full measure of what it meant 
 to win that young man. He at once set 
 himself to work. He made it the rule 
 of his life that he would never let any 
 Sunday go by without having at least 
 
A Clerk Who Became a Mighty Archer. 89 
 
 one new man, who had not been in the 
 habit of coming to church, with him at 
 the Sunday-school and at the church 
 service, and it was not uncommon for 
 him to have two or three. He hunted 
 these up while he was on his rounds, 
 taking orders for the grocery store, and 
 in any little wayside opportunity that 
 came to him. He brought these men to 
 the church and got them enrolled in the 
 men^s Bible class. Then he introduced 
 them to me and to some earnest Christian 
 men. Having got them there, he worked 
 for their immediate conversion. Many 
 a time I have had him come back to me 
 after going in with a man to the Sunday 
 night^s service. He would excuse him- 
 self for a moment, and slipping out he 
 would come to me at the door, where I 
 was shaking hands with the people, and 
 he would whisper to me as he got a chance 
 any information about the character or 
 the history of the man which he thought 
 would be valuable to me in making the 
 
90 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 sermon more effective in winning him 
 to Christ. Many a valuable point did 
 he give me in that way which I was able 
 to use with profit. 
 
 Then, when the after-meeting came, he 
 was always at the man's elbow to draw 
 him quietly in to this service, and as 
 he had come with him, having usually 
 met him by engagement for that purpose, 
 it was not easy for his companion to get 
 away without being rude, and it was 
 impossible to be rude to so good-humored 
 and kindly a fellow as our grocer's 
 clerk. And so in the after-meeting he 
 was ready to say a kind word or offer to 
 go with a man to the altar, or to motion 
 to me cautiously at the critical time to 
 add my invitation to his, which often 
 turned the scale and brought about a 
 permanent decision for Christ. 
 
 If one of his men started for the altar 
 he was with him, and he knelt beside 
 him, praying and crying for joy, watching 
 over him with a tender solicitude that 
 
A. Clerk Who Became a Mighty Archer. 91 
 
 was the wonder and joy of the whole 
 church; and when the hght broke into 
 the darkened mind, and the soul of his 
 companion lost its burden of guilt and 
 was able to testify that his sins were 
 pardoned, the next happiest man in that 
 room was the grocer's clerk. He could 
 hardly contain himself. He laughed and 
 cried, and often, when opportunity was 
 given to testify, he was too full for utter- 
 ance, and would, perhaps, only say a 
 sentence or two, such as, "Christ is the 
 best paymaster in the world''; or, "I 
 would rather have the joy of winning 
 a friend to Christ every week than have 
 the biggest store in town.'' But no 
 matter what he said, it was always some- 
 thing that just bubbled out of his heart, 
 something that touched the fountain of 
 tears in every heart in the room, and 
 lifted us all nearer to God. 
 
 In the first six months after my grocer's 
 clerk was converted he brought to the 
 church, by actual count, twenty-five men 
 
92 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 who were hopefully converted to God 
 and joined our church. He was influ- 
 ential and very helpful to many other 
 men, but these twenty-five were all his 
 own. He hunted them up on the outside, 
 and brought them to the church himself, 
 and after he got them there stayed with 
 them till they were happily converted. 
 And yet he was hard at work all the time, 
 working the long hours ol a grocer^s 
 clerk. 
 
 How quickly the world would be 
 brought to Christ if we could set all the 
 men and women of our churches as 
 earnestly at soul-winning as this man 
 gave himself. He is still at it. It is 
 now many years ago since this young 
 man was converted, but once in a while 
 I run across him, and I always see the 
 old light in his eyes, and loiow that, like 
 Uncle John Vassar, he is faithfully hold- 
 ing on at his work as "God/s shepherd 
 dog." 
 
CHAPTER VII 
 
 HOW AN OREGON TOWN WAS 
 CAPTURED 
 
CHAPTER VII. 
 
 IT was in my young days, when I 
 was yet a circuit-rider. I had 
 been sent to Southern Oregon 
 to carve out a circuit where no 
 preacher had ever wrought, except in 
 one httle valley, where there was already 
 a class established which met in a school- 
 house. Twenty miles away there was a 
 
 town on the railroad at D , which 
 
 gave the name for the circuit. It had 
 the reputation of being a very wicked 
 town, and it certainly lived up to its 
 reputation. I spent my first Sunday on 
 my new circuit with the lonely band of 
 Christians in the little valley hemmed in 
 bv the mountains, but I had written to 
 
 the postmaster of D that I would 
 
 preach there in the school-house on the 
 next Sunday. 
 
96 Soul-Winning Stories, 
 
 I arrived in D on Saturday night,' 
 
 and Sunday morning went over to the 
 school-house. It was a small affair of 
 only one room, barren and barn-like. 
 Just eleven people came to the services 
 that morning, nine women and two men 
 — one, a man from three or four miles 
 away, who in a mild way was a Christian, 
 and the other the man with whom I had 
 stayed all night. 
 
 Giving emphasis to the emallness of 
 our congregation, some two or three 
 hundred men were gathered together at 
 a horse-race in plain sight of the school- 
 house, out on a little level flat adjoining 
 the town. Their yelling was very annoy- 
 ing during the entire services. My host 
 had told me that the horse-race had been 
 arranged for that spot in special resent- 
 ment against the fact of a preacher having 
 been assigned to the region. 
 
 I preached as best I could, and then 
 told my few hearers that I had sent 
 notice for a service in another school- 
 
How an Oregon Town Was Captured. 97 
 
 house some ten miles away for that 
 evening, but that I would come back and 
 preach the next Sunday morning and 
 
 evening in D , and I wished them to 
 
 tell everybody they saw that week that 
 if they would come to church the next 
 Sunday they would find the school-house 
 full of people. They looked surprised 
 and amused, as though they thought I 
 was in for a big disappointment. But 
 when I saw that horse-race in the morn- 
 ing I felt that the battle was on, and that 
 I was either to be defeated or to win a 
 victory that would mean everything to 
 my success right there in that town. So 
 I determined on a bold measure. 
 
 I rode on and preached to a handful 
 of people in a little farm settlement on 
 Sunday night, and Monday came back 
 
 again to D and remained there for 
 
 the week. During that week I visited 
 every house where a human being lived 
 within several miles of the town. I went 
 into the saloons, and into the mills, into 
 
98 Soul- Winning Stories. 
 
 the logging camp, into every store and 
 private house. Everywhere I had the 
 same story to tell. I told them the 
 experience of the last Sunday, that there 
 V had only been eleven out to hear the 
 Word of God, while there were nearly 
 three hundred in the drinking, gambling 
 carousal at the horse-race. 
 
 "Come, now,'' I would say, "give the 
 )( Lord a fair chance. The devil has been 
 having a frse hand here for a long time, 
 and he has made a bad mess of it. Come 
 and give me a hearing. Let decent 
 things at least have turn about with the 
 devil.'' 
 
 That sort of talk aroused their atten- 
 tion and caught their fancy. By Thurs- 
 day of that week I was the one subject 
 of conversation for five miles around. 
 
 On Saturday something happened that 
 gave me great hope and courage. Every- 
 where I had gone I had asked, "Do you 
 s^ know of any Christian in the commu- 
 / nity?" and I had always received the 
 
How an Oregon Town Was Captured. 99 
 
 answer, ^^Yes, there is one/' and then 
 they would go on to tell me about a sick y 
 woman who lived up on a mountain 
 some miles from town. She had been 
 confined to her room for a number of 
 years, but everybody bore testimony 
 to the fact that she was a Christian, and 
 they usually ended up their remarks of 
 appreciation with this sentence: ^^If \ 
 ever there was a Christian, she is one/' 
 Saturday morning I went up to see 
 her. It was a lonely place, and I remem- 
 ber thinking what a terrible thing it 
 must be to live there year after year 
 chained to one's bed by sickness. But 
 when I was ushered into her room I for- 
 got all about this. I shall never forget y 
 the look on that woman's face as I came 
 in. The news had found its way up the 
 mountain, and she knew what was going 
 on. As I came into the room her face 
 was full of joy and expectancy. She v, 
 clapped her hands together, and, with 
 tear-wet eyes, exclaimed, "I thank God 
 
100 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 that my prayers are answered at 
 lastr' 
 
 Though every line in her face revealed 
 the traces of the pain she had suffered 
 and the long years of her confinement to 
 the house, yet it was a face of wonderful 
 peace. Her faith in God never wavered 
 and she had that spiritual insight which 
 miakes of pain a tutor to culture and to 
 ennoble the soul. 
 
 As I sat there by her bedside she told 
 me that several months before my coming 
 there had been some terrible results 
 from drunkenness in the community, 
 and she had begun to pray to God every 
 day that he would send a preacher to 
 the town who might be instrumental in 
 bringing about a revival of religion and 
 the conversion of the people, and that 
 when she heard that I was in the neigh- 
 borhood and was going about from 
 house to house she had felt an answer 
 of peace and now thoroughly believed 
 that God had answered her prayers and 
 
How an Oregon Town Was Captured. 101 
 
 that we were to have a great work of 
 grace. 
 
 You cannot easily imagine how much 
 comfort that was to me. I was very 
 young, but little more than a boy, and 
 the loneliness of this effort to get a hold 
 on that community, without any church 
 to back me up, was very hard, and this 
 good woman^s conversation, her praA^ers, 
 and her faith were a divine tonic to me. 
 
 I stayed for dinner in the house, and 
 prayed with her again in the afternoon, 
 and went away to the wicked little town 
 feeling that I had been in an "upper 
 room" like that where the disciples 
 waited for the power which made Pente- 
 cost possible. 
 
 The next day that school-house would 
 not hold half the people who came. Not 
 only every seat, but every bit of standing 
 room in it was taken, and, as the weather 
 was mild, the people crowded around the 
 windows and around the door. There 
 was not a great deal of preliminary 
 
102 Soul- Winning Stories. 
 
 service. I had a hymn-book, and the 
 man I have spoken of, who had belonged 
 to the church in other years, and who 
 had been present the Sunday before, 
 also had a hymn-book. I never could 
 sing much, and he carried a tune very 
 lamely, so that the singing was very 
 weak and lifeless. But I read the Scrip- 
 tures, and I poured out my heart to God 
 in prayer that the people before me might 
 have hearts to receive the Word of God, 
 might see their own sinfulness and be 
 willing to accept Christ as their Saviour. 
 Then I stood up to preach. I knew I 
 could not preach much, but I gave them 
 the Word of God. My text was, " Where- 
 fore do ye spend money for that which 
 is not bread? and your labor for that 
 which satisfieth not?'^ 
 
 As I had gone around during the week 
 ^^ I had gathered a great many incidents 
 of the awful havoc of sin, especially of 
 gambhng, drunkenness, quarreling and 
 fighting in that very community; 
 
How an Oregon Town Was Captured. \08 
 
 and now, with absolute fearlessness, I 
 went straight at them about their own 
 sins. I tried to show them that the 
 devil was a hard master, and that they 
 had been serving him and working for 
 him very hard, and had very poor satis- 
 faction for it. I only preached about 
 twenty-five minutes, but it was long 
 enough to make some of them fighting 
 mad, to melt others to tears, and to send 
 some others away looking very solemn. 
 At the close of the service I announced 
 that I would preach that night on "The 
 Sin and Doom of Drimkenness.'^ 
 
 As soon as I had pronounced the bene- 
 diction a stage-driver, who had the repu- 
 tation of being the most wicked man 
 in the community, and who was ruining 
 his family by drunkenness and gambling, 
 came up, swore a horrid oath, and said 
 
 I must find it lonesome, and he 
 
 pitied me, interlarding every sentence 
 with an oath. But he ended by asking 
 me to go home with him to dinner. I 
 
104 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 accepted, and as we walked along home 
 I became convinced that, in spite of all 
 his swearing and his bold manner, the 
 man was hard hit, and that God had used 
 the morning service to deeply convict him 
 of sin. I acted on this idea, and stuck 
 to him that whole afternoon like a leech, 
 and prodded at him in every way I 
 could. I charged him with ruining his 
 boys, and told him that unless he re- 
 pented now and turned over a new leaf 
 they would soon be so far gone he never 
 could bring them back. In spite of his 
 wickedness he was by nature a generous- 
 hearted man, and I urged upon him 
 the good he might do by boldly turning 
 his back on the devil and leading in a 
 surrender to Christ. 
 
 He made me no promises that after- 
 noon, and tried to make me believe that 
 he was indifferent. But I felt sure that 
 he was not. At night we had as big a 
 crowd as we had had in the morning. 
 The school-house was lighted with can- 
 
How an Oregon Town Was Captured. 105 
 
 dies hung up around the walls. I 
 preached that night on, ''Know ye not 
 that the unrighteous shall not inherit 
 the kingdom of God?^^ I read that 
 awful list that Paul gives, in which 
 drunkards are specially named, and with 
 all the power that was in me I uncovered 
 the horrors of drunkenness. I illustrated 
 it with incidents that I had gathered 
 during the week in their own neighbor- 
 hood, with which they were acquainted. 
 If I had done this in a hard way, no 
 doubt they would have mobbed me. 
 But I was dead in earnest, and I was 
 young, and so evidently tender and sin- 
 cere about it that the Holy Spirit made 
 them listen to it. I had not spoken 
 thirty minutes when tremendous con- 
 viction fell upon the congregation. Men 
 as well as women were sobbing and 
 crying. I asked the men to get up from 
 a bench in front of me, and then I pleaded 
 for those who would cease their sins and 
 turn to Christ to come to that bench 
 
106 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 and kneel down there. The first to 
 come was the stage-driver, and his wife 
 came with him. His prompt action 
 had great effect. Others crowded for- 
 ward, and every bit of room on both 
 sides of that bench was soon crowded 
 with those who were kneeling there. I 
 prayed awhile, then I talked awhile, 
 and then prayed again. There was no- 
 body to sing, and nobody else to pray, 
 imtil after half an hour or so the stage- 
 driver was happily converted, and then 
 he exhorted and prayed. The meeting 
 did not break up till nearly midnight. 
 Some ten men were hopefully converted 
 that night, and three or four women. 
 
 I announced that there would be a 
 meeting every night that week, and asked 
 them to bring any old hymn-books they 
 had, no matter what kind. I spent the 
 days of that week visiting among the 
 people, and talking and praying in their 
 homes, and preaching at night. We 
 begaa to have good singing. They 
 
How an Oregon Town Was Captured. 107 
 
 brought all sorts of books, but we sang 
 the old hymns that were in all of them, 
 and as the people were converted it was 
 wonderful how it aroused their musical 
 powers. Before the week was out we 
 had good congregational singing. 
 
 I could only stay ten days at that 
 time, as I had appointed a meeting in 
 another place, but I left a class of sixty- 
 five men and women. It became the 
 main point on my circuit. Before the 
 year was out we raised money for a 
 church, and had land and money given 
 to build an academy, and it has been 
 for years a church-going academy town. 
 But that revival was the way the trans- 
 formation was begun. 
 
CHAPTER VIII 
 
 A SERVANT GIRL'S QUARTET i 
 
 4-^ I 
 
CHAPTER VIII. 
 
 ONE can never tell how great a 
 victory has been won when a 
 man or a woman or a child has 
 been captured for Christ. There are al- 
 ways possibilities of values in the case 
 of which it is impossible for us to dream. 
 I suppose when Naaman captured the 
 little girl who afterward led to the cure 
 of his leprosy, it was considered a very 
 insignificant achievement, and yet the 
 capture of a major-general would have 
 been a small thing compared to that 
 victory. For it not only led to the heal- 
 ing of Naaman^s body, but it led to his 
 conversion to a happy and comforting 
 faith in God. The story is told that at 
 a certain revival meeting, which lasted 
 some weeks, only one little tow-headed 
 boy was converted, and that there was 
 
112 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 a feeling of great disappointment among 
 the people of that church. But that 
 tow-headed lad turned out to be Bishop 
 Matthew Simpson, who led multitudes 
 to Christ. 
 
 I have had many experiences illus- 
 trating this same thought, but I think 
 one of the most delightful of them was 
 the conversion of a little English girl 
 who came to South Boston, Mass., during 
 my pastorate there. She had just come 
 from the Old Country, and had taken 
 service as a cook in a home not far away 
 from my church when I first met her. 
 She was a little slip of a thing, and looked 
 altogether too young and inexperienced 
 to be away from home. I well remem- 
 ber the feeling of pity and the awakened 
 sympathy I had for her the first time 
 I met her at the church door and in 
 reply to my questionings she told me 
 that she was only a month from the Old 
 Country and that all her family were on 
 the other side of the ocean. She was 
 
A Servant Girl's Quartet. 113 
 
 not a Christian, but I saw that she was 
 in that first period of loneUness and 
 homesickness where a Uttle sympathy 
 and kindness would win her to the Lord, 
 and so I did everything that I could to 
 make her feel at home, and as she started 
 to go up the stairs I followed her to say : 
 ''There never could be a better time to 
 give your heart to the Lord than to-night. 
 He was lonely and homesick himself 
 sometimes, when he was here on earth, 
 and he knows how to be good and kind 
 to homesick folks. Give your heart to 
 the Lord now, and you won't be alone 
 any more, for there will be a whole 
 church full of people who will be your 
 brothers and sisters in Christ.'^ 
 
 The poor little girl was so utterly alone 
 that a kind word went straight to her 
 heart, and with tears in her eyes she went 
 on up the stairs, saying, "I will try." 
 
 Sure enough, in the after-meeting that 
 very night that little English servant 
 girl was converted. She was a quiet 
 
114 Soul- Winning Stories. 
 
 body, and did not make much show 
 about her emotions, but a very sweet 
 glow was on her face, and all the lonely 
 homesick shadows had gone out of it 
 as she went away from the church. 
 
 She went back to the place where she 
 was at work, and the next morning her 
 mistress was surprised when she came 
 into the kitchen and found Annie singing 
 over her work. The girPs loneliness 
 had touched the kind-hearted woman, 
 and she had been very sorry for her, 
 but when she came in Monday morning 
 all this was gone, and the girl seemed 
 so happy that she wonderingly inquired: 
 "What makes you so happy, Annie? 
 All your blues seem to have blown away/' 
 
 "Oh, Mrs. G , something wonder- 
 ful happened last night. I went down 
 to the church, feeling so lonesome and 
 sad that I almost wished I were dead. 
 And the minister was standing at the 
 door, shaking hands with the people, and 
 he shook hands with me, and asked who 
 
A Servant GirPs Quartet. 115 
 
 I was, and where I came from, and before 
 I knew it he had the whole story out of 
 me and knew all about me. I did not say 
 a word about being homesick, but he 
 knew it, somehow, and told me that the 
 best way to get rid of it was to give my 
 heart to Christ, who used to be so lone- 
 some and homesick, and who knew how 
 to comfort us. I never dreamed of 
 starting to be a Christian when I went in 
 at the church door, but by the time I 
 got to my seat I had almost made up 
 my mind that I would. And during 
 the sermon I said to myself, ^If he gives 
 me a chance to-night, I'll start.' And 
 so I went to the altar in the after-meet- 
 ing, and as I prayed to God all my lone- 
 liness and homesickness left me and I 
 felt that my sins were forgiven and that 
 God would take care of me and not let 
 anything bad happen to me over here 
 alone. And I came home happy last 
 night, and I went to sleep happy for the 
 first time since I left home. And this 
 
116 Soul-Winnins: Stories, 
 
 £> 
 
 morning I feel like singing all thb 
 time/' 
 
 Now Mrs. G was not only not a 
 
 Christian, but she was a woman whose 
 associations had led her very far from 
 Christ and the church. She had felt 
 very bitter and unbelieving about the 
 church and about Christians, and so 
 she watched this new convert very 
 narrowly. 
 
 But Annie^s religion would bear watch- 
 ing. It was just as natural and simple 
 as a child's trust in its parents. And 
 as her mistress noticed her good cheer 
 and happiness, a great hungering took 
 possession of her own heart. She had 
 recently had many things to trouble her 
 and her heart was very heavy and sad, 
 and through the night of her gloom 
 shone constantly the cheerful ray of the 
 happiness of Annie's new-found religion. 
 The girl never preached to her; she just 
 lived, cheerful, happy, and loving, but 
 somehow everybody in the house felt 
 
A Servant Girl's Quartet. ll*} 
 
 that this sweet happiness came from 
 Annie's reUgion. 
 
 Mrs. G stood it for two weeks, 
 
 and then to Annie's astonishment and 
 dehght she said to her on Sunday morn- 
 ing, '^ Annie, if you don't mind, I would 
 like to go with you to your church 
 to-night." She had never even been 
 inside the church door, though she had 
 lived in the community for years. Of 
 course Annie was greatly pleased, and 
 
 that evening she introduced Mrs. G 
 
 to me at the door of the church. 
 
 She had no opportunity to say any- 
 thing to me about her, and I knew noth- 
 ing more of it until the after-meeting. 
 There were several seekers at the altar 
 that night, and we had already had a 
 season of prayer, when, on rising to sing, 
 I noticed that Annie was talking to the 
 woman whom she had introduced to 
 me, and that this woman was crying as 
 if deeply affected. I at once reopened 
 the invitation for any others who would 
 
118 Sotil-Winning Stories. 
 
 like to seek Christ to come to the altar, 
 and a moment later the lady arose and 
 came with Annie to the mercy seat. She 
 was converted that night, and told me 
 that very evening the story I have 
 related. The cheerfulness and happiness 
 of the little cook's religion had appealed 
 to her until she had felt that she could 
 not live longer without it. 
 
 In less than a month after Mrs. G 's 
 
 conversion she, with Annie, came to the 
 altar one evening with the daughter 
 of the family, who was happily cou' 
 verted. 
 
 A Uttle later Annie told me one Sunday 
 afternoon that her brother, with his wife 
 and two children, had arrived from 
 England during the past week, and that 
 she was going to try to bring her brother 
 with her to church that night. He had 
 been a drinking man, and his family 
 had encouraged his coming to America, 
 hoping that if he got away from his old 
 associates he might break off his evil 
 
A Servant Girl's Quartet. 119 
 
 habits and live a new life. But Annie felt, 
 as I did, that the only real hope of his 
 reformation lay in his becoming a sin- 
 cere Christian, and so I agreed to unite 
 my prayers with hers and to make a 
 special effort that evening to reach him 
 with the Gospel. 
 
 Sure enough, he was on hand that 
 night, a ruddy-faced Englishman, with 
 the traces of dissipation written on his 
 countenance. I had been forewarned, 
 and I make it the rule of my life never 
 to disobey such warnings. If I know of 
 a special sin of a man in the congrega- 
 tion about whom somebody is greatly 
 interested at that moment, I never fail 
 to find some way to thrust my harpoon 
 there, and so I went directly for the 
 heart of Annie's brother that night. 
 God blessed the message. He came into 
 the after-meeting broken-hearted. She 
 came with him to the altar, and he knelt 
 there, crying like a child, sobbing and 
 calling aloud for mercy. He confessed 
 
120 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 his sins and went away with a new peace 
 in his heart. 
 
 I was not at all surprised the next 
 Sunday evening to see the whole family 
 at church. They came early — Annie, 
 with her brother and his wife, and the 
 two little children, one a baby and the 
 other scarcely more. That night it was 
 her brother^s wife she had on her heart. 
 She marshaled them well front in the 
 church, and I knew she was praying 
 every minute. It was not a remarkable 
 thing that the wife was at the altar that 
 night. It is the rarest thing in the 
 world where a wife does not readily 
 follow her husband when he sincerely 
 repents and gives himself to God. And so 
 I should have been disappointed indeed 
 if she had not yielded to the invitation. 
 The young man came with his wife to 
 the altar while Annie stayed with the 
 babies. 
 
 The sister-in-law did not readily come 
 into the light. There was some hesita- 
 
A Servant Girl's Quartet. 121 
 
 tion, perhaps some lack of clearness in 
 her mind about the simplicity of the 
 Gospel. Annie stood this delay as long 
 as she could, and then I saw her reach 
 over to a motherly old woman sitting 
 in front, and arrange with her to take 
 care of the babies, while she slipped away 
 to the altar where, throwing her arms 
 around her si3ter's neck, she talked with 
 her, meanwhile the tears running down 
 her own cheeks. But she successfully 
 pointed her to 'Hhe Lamb of God that 
 taketh away the sins of the world,'' 
 for not five minutes after she came, " the 
 light that never was on sea or land'' 
 shone in the face of the seeking woman. 
 And that was the way the little servant 
 girl won her quartet. 
 
CHAPTER IX 
 AN INTERNATIONAL INCIDENT 
 
CHAPTER IX. 
 
 ONE Sunday afternoon a fine- 
 looking girl, evidently of Irish 
 extraction, came to see me at the 
 parsonage in one of our large cities. She 
 had a very sad story. Her mother had 
 died some years before, leaving three 
 girls and the husband. One of the girls 
 was only a little baby at the time, and 
 the two older daughters had kept house 
 for the father and had managed to keep 
 the family together. But the father had 
 taken to drink, and it had grown steadily 
 worse, imtil now he was drunk a good 
 part of the time. At the time the young 
 woman came to see me her father was 
 just getting up from an attack of pneu- 
 monia, and had gone on a spree which 
 had come near being the last of him; 
 He was now laid up in bed, and the 
 
t26 Soul- Winning Stories. 
 
 doctor said he would certainly die very 
 soon unless he gave up drink. The girl 
 begged me to come and see if I could 
 do anything for them. 
 
 It seemed like a hopeless case, but I 
 comforted her all I could, and promised 
 to come before my evening service. Just 
 before she left — indeed, after she had 
 risen to go — I inquired if she was a 
 Christian, and found that she was not. 
 I asked her to sit down again, and for 
 half an hour, in the plainest, simplest 
 way I could, I preached the Gospel to 
 her. After the surprise of the attack, 
 her sore and w^ounded heart 3delded 
 readily to the offered comfort and help, 
 and we kneeled together in the parsonage 
 parlor, and as I prayed she consciously 
 accepted Clirist as her personal Saviour. 
 
 When I arrived at the Irishman's 
 home, for I found that though the chil- 
 dren had been born in this country the 
 father had come over as a young man 
 from the North of Ireland, he was still 
 
I 
 
 1 
 
 An International Incident. 127 ' 
 
 very much under the influence of drink.' 
 I had a hard time getting him aroused 
 enough so that he would appreciate 
 what I had to say. When I did, I talked 
 to him very straight, not only about the 
 sin of his drinking, but the meanness of 
 it with reference to his daughters, who 
 were trying to make him a comfortable 
 home. I never talked straighter to a 
 man in my life. I was perfectly willing 
 to make him mad, if only I could stir 
 him up and get him out of his lethargy. 
 I have often found it is far better to 
 make angry a man who is going on in 
 wicked ways, which his own conscience 
 disapproves, than it is to leave him 
 unmoved. It is not a far cry from anger 
 to other strong feelings, and if you can 
 get a man good and hot at your rebuke 
 you can often turn his anger toward 
 himself for deserving such talk. 
 
 I finally got him stirred up sufficiently 
 so that he began to tell me, as if that 
 would hide his own shame, that he came 
 
128 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 of a good old Irish family who were Chris- 
 tians, and that his brother was an honored 
 preacher in Ireland. As soon as he told 
 me this I went for him more strongly 
 than ever, and tried to make him feel 
 the shame of bringing such disgrace 
 on an honored name. Before I left I 
 prayed with him and his daughters and 
 promised to come again. 
 
 I went again the next day. He was 
 clear of the whisky now, but was very 
 hard and seemingly without any hope 
 of the possibility of becoming a Christian 
 or much changing his course of life. I 
 talked and talked, and though he let 
 me pray with him, I could get no hope- 
 ful word with him about himself. On 
 that day the second daughter was present 
 and she went with me into the hall to 
 let me out. At the front door I paused 
 and inquired if she was a Christian. 
 She said she was sorry to say she was 
 not. I told her that I was very glad 
 die was sorry^ for that showed that the 
 
An International Incident. 129 
 
 Lord had been speaking to her, and that 
 she was very near to the kingdom. I 
 found that her sister had been talking 
 with her, and that she was aheady under 
 conviction of sin, and very much wanted 
 to be a Christian. As we stood there 
 by the door, with my hand on the door- 
 knob, I told her how simple the terms 
 were, and we bowed our heads and I 
 prayed for her. When the prayer was 
 through the face that she lifted to me 
 was full of sweet content, and though 
 her eyes were tearful, there was in 
 them the glistening promise of a new hope. 
 I kept going every three or four days 
 to see my Irishman. The man strangely 
 interested me. He was a great, tall, 
 square-shouldered giant of a man, and 
 with a very strong face. I felt if I 
 could really capture him for the Lord, 
 and change him from the deviPs service 
 to that of Christ, it would be a great 
 victory. But the work went slowly, 
 and I think I never have seen a case, in 
 
130 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 which victory was finally won, quite so 
 discouraging as that proved to be, until 
 Providence threw into my hands a new 
 ally. 
 
 One morning, a few weeks after I 
 had first been called in, I received a 
 letter from Ireland. It was from the 
 brother of my man, who is a distinguished 
 and honored minister there. He wrote 
 to tell me how glad he was that I had 
 been to call on his only brother, and 
 to thank me for my interest in him. He 
 said drink had been the man's curse 
 all his life. He told me he had been 
 praying for this brother for many years, 
 and that his mother was still living, a 
 very old woman and very frail, but that 
 she prayed for her boy every day, and 
 did not feel that she could go home to 
 heaven until he was saved. 
 
 When I got that letter, and especially 
 when I read about the old mother's 
 prayers, I took hope. I somehow felt 
 that the Irishman had to come. I 
 
An International Incident. 131 ; 
 
 now, at least, had one new lever, and I j 
 
 determined to use it for all it was worth. I 
 
 That afternoon I took my letter and • 
 
 went down to see him. I told him I | 
 
 had a letter from his brother. He was ' 
 very much interested, and I could see 
 it moved him. I told him his brother 
 
 said he had been praying for him ever I 
 
 since he left home. Then I took the | 
 
 letter out of my pocket and read the ! 
 
 lines about his mother, about her in- I 
 
 firmity and age, and her great anxiety | 
 
 for his salvation, and how she was just ; 
 
 waiting on earth, praying every day ! 
 for her wandering boy. 
 
 That letter broke his heart. He had ; 
 
 not yet decided to be a Christian, but ; 
 
 he was full of anguish and remorse. i 
 
 The tears rolled down his cheeks and ^ 
 he seemed rather glad that day to have 
 me pray for him. Yet I could get no 
 decision out of him. 
 
 At the time of this last visit I had i 
 begun holding revival meetings and was 
 
132 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 preaching every night. I urged him 
 to come to the meeting that night, but he 
 would not promise. I felt that I could 
 not give up, for if I could not get him 
 that day, with the unusual influence 
 of the message concerning his mother, 
 which had so melted his heart, I never 
 would get him. So I kept at it. I must 
 have plead with him half an hour or 
 more, simply on the point of coming to 
 the meeting that night. At last, almost 
 in despair, he exclaimed, ^^Well, youVe 
 been so kind, and you're so persistent 
 about it, I will come.'' 
 
 I was sure he would keep his word. 
 He came, and came very early. I was 
 . out at the door, shaking hands with the 
 people as they came in. His youngest 
 daughter, a girl now thirteen years of 
 age, was with him. I stopped him, 
 and talked a little while in the vestibule, 
 urging him to make up his mind that 
 night and give himself to Christ; and 
 although he would not promise, I could 
 
An International Incident. IS'd 
 
 see that the conversation of the after- 
 noon had greatly moved him and that 
 he was in a hopeful condition. I walked 
 in with him and saw that he and the 
 little girl had seats immediately at the 
 front. I did not intend that anything 
 should interfere with the Gospel having 
 a fair chance at him that night. 
 
 I remained in the vestibule and shook 
 hands with the people through the song 
 service, not going in umtil it was time 
 for my sermon. When I went in they 
 were singing, and I could see that the 
 service was having the effect I expected 
 on my Irishman. He had been brought 
 up a Christian. The old hymns brought 
 sacred memories to him that touched 
 him to the heart's core. He had not 
 been to church now for several years, 
 and it all came back upon him with un- 
 wonted power that night. And when 
 the soloist sang a tender and touching 
 appeal to come to Christ, I saw a tear 
 rolling down over each cheek. I must 
 
134 Soul-V/inning Stories. 
 
 have preached the Gospel for all, that 
 night, for a number accepted Christ and 
 were converted in the after-service; but 
 my conscious appeal was to the Irish- 
 man. I felt as a lav/yer does when he 
 knows that one juryman is against him 
 and must be convinced, and so through- 
 out the sermon I sought to win the 
 verdict. A man who has not heard a 
 sermon for several years, but who was 
 brought up to give reverence to the 
 Gospel, finds it hard to withstand a 
 straightforward, simple presentation of 
 the divine appeal. The Irishman's heart 
 broke under it. The agony of his face 
 was something terrible. Finally he hung 
 his head and sobbed, and at last, when 
 the invitation was given for sinners to 
 come to the altar and throw themselves 
 on the mercy of God, he was the first 
 man there. The little girl came with 
 him. How he did pray! With tears 
 and cryings and groanings he repented 
 and laid hold upon the Christ who is 
 
An International Incident. 135 
 
 able to save unto the uttermost. The 
 little girl opened her heart to the Lord 
 as naturally as a morning-glory opens 
 its bell to meet the dawn, and the two 
 of them came into the church together. 
 
 And that is the way God pays. I 
 started in on a forlorn hope to save one 
 poor drunken man, and I came out, 
 through the mercy and blessing of God 
 and the prayers of that brother and dear 
 old mother, with a man saved and re- 
 deemed and three daughters all conse- 
 crated to the Christian life. 
 
 I have never had a happier task than 
 that of answering the letter of the brother 
 in Ireland, telHng him the whole story 
 and sending my love and congratulations 
 to the dear old mother, who through all 
 the years of disappointment and delay 
 had not failed to keep her tryst with 
 God and to daily send her prayers 
 heavenward for the salvation of her 
 boy. 
 
CHAPTER X 
 WON THROUGH FRIENDSHIP 
 
CHAPTER X. 
 
 I ONCE found in the neighborhood 
 of my church in a large city a 
 family which interested me great- 
 ly. It consisted of the husband and 
 wife and two children. I became 
 acquainted with them first through the 
 children, who were in the Sunday- 
 school. One day, speaking to one of 
 the Sunday-school teachers about the 
 bright little girl as she passed us, the 
 teacher said, ^' I suppose you know about 
 her father ?'' I replied that I did not 
 know the father, and asked what she 
 meant. Her reply was that the father 
 was one of the very best business men 
 in the community; that he belonged to 
 an old and honored family, and was 
 himself a refined and cultivated gentle- 
 man; but that he seemed to have an in- 
 
140 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 herited weakness for strong drink. This 
 manifested itself in a peculiar way. 
 He never went about liquor saloons 
 and was never known to drink in one of 
 them. Indeed, he would go months at 
 a time without drinking at all, and then 
 the spell would come on him, and an 
 awful thirst would take possession of 
 him. He would take liquor home with 
 him to his house, and there he would 
 drink imtil his stomach and throat 
 would be raw with it and he was on the 
 very verge of the grave. Then the 
 doctor would come in and patch him up, 
 and possibly it would be five or six 
 months before it would happen again. 
 The story moved me very deeply, 
 and I saw at once that here was a family 
 that needed help. As the children came 
 to the Sunday-school, it gave me a right 
 to call at the house, and I did so a few 
 days after I had heard the story, and 
 made a pleasant acquaintance with the 
 wife and mother. In response to my 
 
Won Through Friendship. 141 
 
 invitation she attended the church, and 
 I called also at the business place of the 
 husband and made his acquaintance. 
 I found him as he had been described 
 to me, a most delightful gentleman, a 
 man full of dignity, and 3^et of fine feel- 
 ings and genial, kindly nature. I de- 
 liberately set myself to cultivate the 
 friendship of the family, and I was met 
 half-way by all the parties. It was not 
 long before I felt that the time had 
 come to press for a decision in the case 
 of the wife. I sought her at her own 
 home, and urged not only her own obli- 
 gation to Christ, but also her duty to be 
 a Christian on account of her influence 
 upon her husband and children. She 
 responded readily to all these appeals 
 and definitely accepted Christ and came 
 into the church. And it was at this 
 time that she opened her heart to me 
 and told me the story of her husband's 
 weakness and of the haunting fear she 
 had that his awful habit would get 
 
142 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 worse and worse until it would; ere long, 
 carry him away. I promised her to 
 devote myself with all my soul to his 
 salvation, and told her that I had been 
 thinking it over and had made up my 
 mind that the only thing I could do was 
 to win his friendship; that I believed 
 if I could make him love me I could then 
 win him to Christ, for I had seen that 
 it was not easy to get back of that wall 
 of quiet dignity ana reserve where the 
 real man lived. 
 
 So I set myself to make a friend. It 
 was not hard work, for I liked the man 
 very much. We had many tastes in 
 common, and I made much of these. Of 
 all out-door recreations I am most fond 
 of fishing, and I soon found that he, too, 
 was an ardent fisherman, and so we 
 planned trips together. Sometimes we 
 went away for two or three days together 
 on fishing excursions; but no matter 
 what we fished for, or whether our luck 
 was good or bad, my hook was always 
 
Won Through Friendship. 143 
 
 baited for my friend^s soul. A year 
 and a half went by, nearly two years. 
 Three times during that period he had 
 come near to death in those times of 
 awful giving way to drink. The last 
 time my power over him as his friend 
 had become so strong that, as he was 
 getting better, but before he had gone 
 out to his store, he sent for me to come 
 in and see him. I went to see him, and 
 he opened his heart to me, and told me 
 what a terrible time he had had, and 
 how ashamed he was to so demean him- 
 self before his family and in the eyes of 
 his friends. This was my opportunity, 
 and I used it as far as my ability could 
 reach. I told him there was only one 
 hope, and that was in Jesus Christ. He 
 had been trying to save himself from 
 his besetting sin, and he had failed again 
 and again. But there was one hope 
 he had not tried, and that was Christ. 
 I talked with him a long time, and though 
 he heard me with great respect, and 
 
144 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 permitted me to pray with him, it 
 seemed impossible for him to beheve 
 that even Christ could give him power 
 over this sin which had so debased him. 
 A series of union evangelistic meetings 
 were being held in one of the churches 
 of the city at the time, and I asked him 
 if he would go with me that evening, and 
 he promised to do so. When we arrived 
 at the church it was packed to the door 
 and I took him around with me to the 
 side door, and up on the platform, where 
 seats were reserved for the ministers 
 and singers. My friend seemed almost 
 frightened to be in such a conspicuous 
 place, but it was the only way to get 
 into the house, and so he yielded. 
 The sermon was a plain, heart-searching 
 one that made everybody look at Christ 
 as the divine Saviour. Just as the 
 preacher was getting well started a mes- 
 senger came, and tapping me on the 
 shoulder said that my wife desired me 
 to come to the parsonage, nearly a quar- 
 
Won Through Friendship, 145 
 
 ter of a mile away. I feared very much 
 to leave my friend, and yet, not knowing 
 what was desired, I felt I must respond 
 to the call. Asking m}^ friend to wait 
 until my return, even if the meeting 
 should adjourn, I slipped back to the 
 rear of the platform and hurried home. 
 I found it was only a stray couple wait- 
 ing to get married, and, I never married 
 a couple more impatiently. I performed 
 the ceremony as quickly as possible, and 
 ran all the way back to the church, 
 hoping and praying that the minister 
 might preach a long sermon that night. 
 The sermon was not yet done. I slipped 
 in beside my friend, and I saw that his 
 interest and his hope seemed greatly 
 deepened. When the invitation was 
 given to go into the inquiry-room at the 
 close of the sermon, and I turned to him 
 and said, "Shall we go?'' he yielded 
 without any further urging, and when we 
 got down into the inquiry-room we went 
 away into a quiet corner by ourselves, 
 
146 Soul- Winning Stories. 
 
 and there on our knees, while I prayed, 
 he surrendered his whole heart and life 
 to Jesus Christ as his Lord and King. 
 The next Sunday I had the indescribable 
 joy of receiving him into the church. 
 
 Many times since then we have talked 
 the matter over together, and again and 
 again he has assured me that I never would 
 have won him to Christ if I had not first 
 won his friendship. He declares that 
 it was his love for me that led him finally 
 to have courage to hope that he might 
 love Christ as I did, and find in Christ's 
 love the help which I believed was there 
 for him. 
 
 We still go fishing together sometimes, 
 and I shall not forget, while memory- 
 remains, one summer afternoon sitting 
 in the boat on the lake as the sun was 
 dropping low in the west. We were 
 looking about at the green wall of the 
 mountains and speaking of its beauty. 
 Gradually the conversation drifted to 
 a more personal quarter and we spoke 
 
Won Through Friendship. 147 
 
 appreciatively and reminiscently of the 
 many good times we had had together 
 on such excursions. Suddenly turning 
 to me, his eyes filled with tears, and 
 with a glow of thanksgiving on his 
 usually pale cheek, he said in a trem- 
 bling, hushed voice, "All that I am I 
 owe to you/' I would not have ex- 
 changed that short sentence and the 
 look that came with it for any wealth or 
 honor that the world has power to give, 
 and I went home that night with a new 
 sense of appreciation of the blessedness 
 of the privilege of being a soul-winner. 
 
 / 
 
CHAPTER XI 
 
 AN OLD SAINT'S SURPRISE 
 
CHAPTER XI. 
 
 ONE of the most delightful scenes 
 I ever witnessed in the work 
 of saving souls — and altogether 
 the most delightful and gratifying 
 experiences I have ever known have been 
 in that work — was the intense surprise 
 and exquisite joy I once saw in the face 
 of a white-haired old man at the con- 
 version of his son. It occurred in the fol- 
 lowing way : I found in one of my pas- 
 torates in a large Eastern city an old man 
 who was pre-eminently the saint of the 
 church. He had been there for a long 
 time and his godly life, his spiritual tone, 
 and the graces of the Spirit manifested 
 in all his conduct marked him out as a 
 Christian of the noblest type. It was not 
 an imcommon thing to have people on 
 the outside of the church, men rough 
 
152 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 and coarse, who did not take much inter- 
 est in Christian things, say about him : 
 "Well, I will say, if ever there was a 
 
 Christian, Father T is one." The 
 
 old man had not much money to give to 
 the church; he was not specially gifted 
 in prayer or particularly eloquent in his 
 testimony; but he was a good man. He 
 had no enemies. Everybody loved him.' 
 And, as they say in Washington J "he 
 had the ear of the House " every time he 
 got up to speak. The old man had our 
 ears because he had our hearts. 
 
 About the time I came to the church 
 the old man's son, who had been away 
 from home a long time, came back from 
 his travels and work in the West and 
 settled down near his father and went 
 into business. The boy had been well 
 brought up in a Christian way, but he 
 had gone away from home very early 
 and had drifted entirely away from 
 religious things. He had been in the 
 mines and had associated with wicked 
 
An Old Saint's Surprise. 153 
 
 and reckless men and women until he 
 had simply become indifferent to religious 
 affairs. The old home teaching and 
 example of his father (his mother had 
 died young) had hedged him in, how- 
 ever, and kept him back from shameful 
 and outrageous sins. He did not drink 
 or gamble, and lived, so far as the world 
 could see, an orderly, moral, and upright 
 life. But his heart was hard toward 
 God, and he had been so long away from 
 the church, and had lived prayerless so 
 many years that, while he was polite and 
 good-humored about it, he let you have 
 no chance to get inside to the real citadel 
 of his heart in any attempt to win him 
 to Christ. 
 
 The attitude of the son was a great 
 sorrow to his father. He had been pray- 
 ing for hun all the years, and it was the 
 longing of his heart to see him a happy 
 and useful Christian. Happily the bond 
 between the father and the son was un- 
 usually strong and tender. The boy 
 
154 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 could not say too much concerning his 
 father's goodness. He had unbounded 
 faith in the sincerity and genuineness of 
 his father's religion. During the year 
 and more that I was trying to win him 
 to an open confession of Christ, the one 
 hopeful thing about the attempt was this 
 fact, that I knew he never doubted his 
 father's reUgion. The nearesx. I ever 
 got home to him in private conversation 
 was when I would turn to the subject 
 of his boyhood and get him to talk about 
 his boyish experiences. That was always 
 sure to bring out something about his 
 father's religious life, something about 
 the family worship, the Bible reading 
 and the prayers that were a part of every 
 day's life. Sometimes he would wind up 
 such a talk by saying : " I do not want 
 you to think that it is my father's fault 
 that I am not a Christian. If ever a man 
 lived right before his children it was my 
 father, and during all the years that I 
 have been away in the mines and in the 
 
An Old Saint^s Surprise. 155 
 
 mountains, among wicked men, going 
 months and months without ever seeing a 
 church or attending a religious service, 
 not knowing when Sunday had come 
 except that it was wash-day, I never 
 went to bed at night without thinking 
 of my father^s family prayers. And if 
 I had never seen another Christian, my 
 father has lived so honestly and so truly 
 a Christian life in my presence that I 
 should always know there was one 
 Christian/' 
 
 Now when a man would say a thing like 
 that, and say it so loyally and earnestly 
 that his cheeks would glow and his eyes 
 glisten with moisture, you would think 
 you had almost won him. So I thought, 
 only to be disappointed again and again. 
 
 You have seen an old snag of a tree 
 growing beside the road. It has been 
 struck by lightning, probably, and split 
 down through the center until most of 
 the top is gone. One side is dead en- 
 tirely. There is no sign of life anywhere 
 
156 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 about the main trunk to be discovered 
 from without. If you see it for the first 
 time in winter you think it is entirely 
 dead, and you are very much astonished 
 along in April to see one little branch up 
 near the top on which the buds begin 
 to swell out, and after a while the leaves 
 break forth, and you see that the heart of 
 the tree is still alive. It is alive in that 
 one spot; but for that one outcropping 
 of life, there would be no hope for the 
 gnarled and wounded tree. Well, it was 
 that way with my young business friend. 
 While he was still a young man in age, 
 he was past middle age in experience with 
 the kind of associations that had wounded 
 and seared his spiritual nature. There 
 was just one green spot of hfe left in him; 
 that was his love for his father and his 
 unshaken faith in his father's Chris- 
 tianity. 
 
 Time passed on, month after month. 
 Again and again I sought opportunities 
 for conversation with him. These were 
 
An Old Saint's Surprise. 157 
 
 never hard to obtain. He was a bright, 
 genial fellow, seemed to like me very 
 much, and always met me with a certain 
 kind of frankness when I broached the 
 subject of religion; but I soon discovered 
 that he always met me at the outside 
 gate, and kept the talk out there, and I 
 never got inside, where he really lived. 
 He was an enigma to me. He was so 
 friendly, both to me and to the church, 
 and yet toward God and Christ he was 
 as hard as a rock. I think of all the 
 men I have ever known of his type, a 
 man so good in many ways, he was the 
 most utterly indifferent to the claims 
 of God. 
 
 Every now and then his father would 
 speak to me about it, and beg me not 
 to forget him or cease to pray for his 
 conversion. A very powerful and suc- 
 cessful revival of religion passed by, but 
 without winning my young friend. He 
 came but little to the meetings, though 
 he always came on Sunday; but they 
 
158 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 seemed to have no effect whatever upon 
 him, and when the meetings closed, and 
 he was still outside, the aged father's 
 heart was very heavy. 
 
 Now Father T himself was a very 
 
 faithful soul-winner. While I doubt if 
 he ever passed a waking hour during 
 all that year that he did not have some 
 thought and prayer in his heart about 
 the conversion of his son, he did not, on 
 that account, neglect others. No man 
 in the church was more alert in looking 
 out for opportunities to say a good word 
 for his Master or to reach out a helping 
 hand to one in the dark, or to a weak 
 soul that was ready to faint. 
 
 So time passed on during the early 
 summer till we came to a wet Sunday 
 night. How well I remember it! I had 
 prepared, with unusual care, an appeal 
 to the unconverted, with special reference 
 to some people whom I hoped would 
 be present and in whom at the time I 
 was interested. But when, that after- 
 
An Old Saint's Surprise. 159 
 
 noon, it began to storm, and the night 
 was so rainy that we did not go up into 
 the main auditorium, but turned the 
 people who came into the Sunday-school 
 room, I was bitterly disappointed. I 
 do not know when I have been so dis- 
 appointed concerning a stormy Sunday 
 night, which I confess is always a great 
 trial to me, as on that night. During 
 the opening service it seemed to me that 
 the sermon I had prepared would be 
 entirely out of place, as I thought that 
 the few who had ventured out through 
 the unusual storm were all Christians. 
 But while they were singing the last 
 hymn the son of my old saint came in 
 and sat down in the back row of chairs 
 near the door. Suddenly there was a 
 flash of light through the black cloud 
 that had been overshadowing my sky. 
 I determined to direct my whole sermon 
 at that man. So far as I knew, he 
 was the only man in that small audi- 
 ence who was not a Christian, and I 
 
160 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 secretly purposed to concentrate all my 
 thought and hope on him, and preach 
 my sermon ta him as if we were the only 
 two in the audience. As Nehemiah 
 prayed to God for the right Y/ord when 
 he stood before the king in the palace at 
 Shushan, so I breathed out my heart 
 to God during the remaining verses of 
 that hymn that this might be the hour 
 for the capture of the man^s soul. God 
 greatly helped me in preaching. I de- 
 livered the discourse with unwonted 
 zest and earnestness. But toward the 
 chair near the center, in the rear of the 
 room, where that young merchant sat, 
 I directed my gaze. After a few minutes 
 he seemed restless under it and uneasy, 
 and then he gave himself up to it, and 
 we two men seemed looking into each 
 other's squIs. 
 
 At the close of the sermon I asked the 
 congregation to sing a hymn, and invited 
 any who would like to ask the prayers 
 of Christian people that their own sins 
 
An Old Saint's Surprise. 161 
 
 might be forgiven to rise, the congrega- 
 tion remaining seated. There were 
 four verses in the hymn, and three verses 
 were sung, and no one rose. My eyes 
 were on my young friend. His face was 
 white, and I could see that there was a 
 Ufe and death struggle going on in his 
 soul. There he sat, motionless as a 
 statue, as if he were glued to his seat. 
 To me the suspense and agony were 
 something terrible, for I somehow had 
 it borne in on me that if I could not win 
 him there and then I would never have 
 so good a chance again. When the 
 third verse was completed I raised my 
 hand to the pianist and began to speak. 
 Very quietly and very solemnly I went on 
 to say just what was in my heart — that 
 I believed some soul was making a life 
 and death struggle then and there, and 
 I greatly feared that if it grieved the 
 Holy Spirit at that time the struggle 
 would never be so hard for it again. It 
 would always find it easier to shut God 
 
162 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 out after that, and it would shut him 
 out at last, and thus shut itself out of 
 heaven. "Now,'' I continued, "we will 
 sing this last verse, and it is not only a 
 verse of song, it is an open gate into 
 heaven, and I am sure some one ought 
 to enter it." Scarcely the first line of 
 the hymn had been sung when my young 
 business friend leaped to his feet. 
 "Leaped" is the proper word, for he had 
 been holding himself so tense, and had 
 been so stiffening himself against such 
 conviction, that he simply had to leap 
 from it in order to conquer. Until he 
 stood up there had been no sign of emo- 
 tion about his face except its pallor; but 
 the moment he was on his feet, and had 
 really commiitted himself, the tears began 
 to run down his cheeks, and he threw him- 
 self upon his knees. With difficulty 
 mastering my own great emotion at this 
 sudden and glorious victory, I quietly 
 said that one young man had asked our 
 prayers and was praying for himself; 
 
An Old Saint's Surprise. 163 
 
 and urging all to unite their prayers 
 for hini; we knelt in prayer. 
 
 After several had led briefly in prayer, 
 on rising from our knees, I called for a 
 brief testimony meeting, and very soon 
 
 Father T was on his feet. During 
 
 the course of his remarks, which were 
 devoted almost entirely to his own ex- 
 perience, he finally spoke very tenderly 
 of his joy that ^Hhe young man'^ had 
 started that evening for heaven. It at 
 once became apparent to the audience, 
 most of whom were acquainted with 
 both the father and son, that the old 
 man, who had been sitting much further 
 front, did not know who it was that had 
 risen. Another old man, a few seats 
 away, was so overcome with this, that, 
 half rising out of his seat, he shouted: 
 
 "Why, Father T , don't you know? 
 
 It is Albert that started.'^ 
 
 I never saw such surprise and unutter- 
 able joy mingled in a human face as I 
 then saw on the face of that dear old 
 
164 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 man. He turned around, looking back- 
 ward toward where his son sat, his hands 
 upraised, and cried out in broken tones: 
 '^Oh, is it my boy? Is it my boy?'^ 
 y In the meantime the young man had 
 
 found the Lord, and he met his father's 
 looks with a joyous and reverent expres- 
 sion; and when his father sat down, 
 unable to speak further on account of 
 his emotion, the son rose to speak, and 
 I have never heard a sweeter tribute of 
 love and veneration paid by a son to his 
 father than that young man gave out 
 of the new Christian joy that had come 
 to his heart. It was a blessed hour. 
 We all thoroughly appreciated what it 
 must be to be in heaven where the angels 
 have "joy over one sinner that re- 
 penteth.'' 
 
CHAPTER XII 
 
 THE BOY IN THE DRY-GOODS BOX 
 
CHAPTER XII. 
 
 THERE once appeared in my Sun- 
 day-school a boy with the most 
 wonderful head and the most 
 captivating eyes that one could find 
 in a year of travel and search. He was 
 a little fellow, about ten years old, but 
 oh, what a head ! It would have been the 
 despair of an artist and at the same time 
 his joy. A wealth of curls, great, dark 
 eyes as gentle as a fawn's and with some- 
 thing so appealing in them that they 
 went straight to your heart. I turned 
 to look at him again and again as I 
 passed around through the Sunday- 
 school. He evidently came from a home 
 of moderate circumstances, for while 
 his clothing was neat and clean, it was 
 well patched. A few weeks passed by 
 and the little boy was very regular at the 
 
168 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 Sunday-school and won the hearts of 
 all who came in touch with him. 
 
 One Sunday he did not come. Both 
 the superintendent and myself missed 
 him. Then, when he did not come the 
 next Sunday, we went to look him up. 
 It was just before Christmas time, and 
 the weather was very cold. From his 
 address on the class record we found 
 that his home was on one of the very 
 poorest streets in the poorest section of 
 the city. Going to the place, a revelation 
 of poverty came to us that was heart- 
 rending. There was the mother and 
 father and five children, and they lived 
 in two Uttle rooms. One of these rooms 
 was a dark room, without a window in 
 it, and they rented this daytimes to a man 
 who worked nights. The family had 
 been in good circumstances up to within 
 a year of the time of our meeting. The 
 father had earned good wages, and they 
 had lived well. Then the firm for which 
 he labored had gone out of business, and 
 
The Boy in the Dry-goods Box. 169 
 
 it had thrown him out of employment. 
 They had come East, hoping to better 
 their condition, but had struck hard 
 times. The father had walked the 
 streets day after day hunting for work. 
 In the meantime they had pawned their 
 wedding presents, and one after another 
 had pawned or sold quite a library of nice 
 books, and then, as things grew worse, 
 all their better clothing had gone the 
 same way. Day after day the father 
 searched for work. The mother, who 
 was frail and in delicate health, did what 
 she could. Now and then the father 
 got a little job to do, but as his good 
 clothing went, and as he lost heart, it 
 became harder and harder to get any 
 employment at all. 
 
 And so it happened, as Christmas time 
 drew near, that they were on the very 
 verge of starvation. They had got down 
 to bread and tea, and not much of that. 
 To make matters woi*se the little boy 
 had fallen ill, and when the superintend- 
 
170 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 ent and myself hunted them out the 
 Uttle fellow was terribly sick with typhoid 
 fever and was lying on a little bed made 
 up in a dry-goods box. Without proper 
 medicine and care I have no doubt he 
 would have died within the next two or 
 three days. Of course we gave them 
 temporary relief at once, and saw to it 
 that they had proper food and that the 
 little boy had a chance to get well. I 
 immediately interested myself in finding 
 employment for the man, and was suc- 
 cessful. Both the man and his wife had 
 been Christians and members of the 
 church in their former home, and the 
 imexpected help which had come to them 
 from the church at a time when their 
 hearts were so broken and when they 
 seemed to be plunged into the very 
 depths of despair seemed to them to 
 come direct from God and proved to be the 
 cause of a spiritual quickening to which 
 their hearts responded, and they entered 
 with renewed joy upon the Christian life» 
 
The Boy in the Dry-goods Box. 171 
 
 None the less beautiful was its effect 
 upon the little boy. I think if an angel 
 from heaven had come down to that 
 tenement house and brought them help 
 in their time of need, it would not have 
 seemed to the little boy more really to 
 have come from God. He had been 
 brought up by a good true mother and 
 had always said his prayers and in a way 
 believed in God and the Bible; but now, 
 as the fever left him and he grew again 
 into health and strength, his whole heart 
 went out to the Lord in reverent love, 
 and he was one of the sweetest and most 
 charming of young Christians. 
 
 Not long after this the father was able 
 to secure permanent employment in a 
 suburban town some miles distant, and 
 I did not see them for a good while. Per- 
 haps a year and a half had passed when, 
 going to speak one afternoon at a meeting 
 three or four miles from the town where 
 they were living, at the close of the meet- 
 ing a yoimg lad leaped upon the plat- 
 
172 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 form, and though he seemed six inches 
 taller than when I had seen him last, 
 that beautiful face, that glorious curly 
 head and the fawn-like eyes could not 
 be forgotten, as he eagerly cried : " Mr. 
 Banks, do you know me? Do you know 
 me? " I was happy to tell him that I 
 knew him, and happier still to listen to 
 his happy story of the joyous home life 
 they were having together imder the 
 pleasant surroundings that had come to 
 them. 
 
 Five years passed away, and I heard 
 nothing further of my young friend. I 
 had myself removed to a distant city 
 where, as pastor of a large church, with 
 many outside engagements, I had enough 
 to occupy my mind; but ever and anon 
 I would think of my little boy in the 
 dry-goods box and wonder what the 
 future had in store for him. About this 
 time I had an engagement to lecture in 
 a Western town of several thousand 
 inhabitants. So far as I knew I was 
 
The Boy in the Dry-goods Box. 173 
 
 not personally acquainted with anyone 
 in the town. The arrangements for the 
 lecture had been made by a committee, 
 and my only personal interest in it was 
 to go and deliver my message and come 
 away. I arrived in town late in the 
 evening, my train being delayed, and 
 hurried directly from the station to the 
 hall. There was a large audience, and 
 at its close a number of people came up 
 to make themselves known to me and to 
 shake hands. They were all strangers, 
 and while I was shaking hands with them 
 I suddenly became interested in a very 
 peculiar circumstance. I can't remem- 
 ber just how it began, but all at once I 
 knew that a woman had one of my hands 
 in both of hers, and a man had 
 the other hand in both of his. The 
 man's eyes were full of tears, and tears 
 were freely raining down the woman's 
 face. Just then she lifted the hand she 
 held to her lips and kissed it reverently. 
 I was utterly dumbfounded, not knowing 
 
174 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 what it could mean, when suddenly 
 lifting my eyes from them I looked into 
 the eyes of a young fellow over six feet 
 tall. His eyes were shining with tears, 
 too, but his younger face was all aglow 
 with excited joy. In a moment the 
 meaning of it all flashed over me. It 
 was my boy of the dry-goods box. That 
 wonderful head of curling hair, that 
 gloriously chiseled face, those great dark 
 eyes — they never could belong to but 
 one person whom I had ever seen. As 
 the meaning of it all burned into my 
 brain my own heart broke with happy 
 tenderness and I furnished my part of 
 the tears. 
 
 I was to stay over night at the hotel, 
 and after a little talk with the father and 
 mother I took the yoimg fellow with 
 me to my room and talked with him 
 till past midnight. I found that the 
 family had gone back to their old home 
 surroimdings and were very comfortably 
 situated. The boy had managed to 
 
The Boy in the Dry-goods Box. 175 
 
 secure a very good education, and though 
 not yet seventeen, he was one of the 
 secretaries of the Young Men's Christian 
 Association in an important town, and it 
 was his hope and purpose to prepare 
 himself for the Christian ministry and 
 give his life to the winning of souls to 
 Christ. 
 
 The next morning, having a little 
 time on my hands, I took occasion to find 
 out how the boy was regarded in the 
 town, and from all quarters I learned, 
 what I was ready to believe from my 
 intercourse with him the night before, 
 that he was a young man of remarkable 
 influence for good, and in the church 
 which he attended, in his Bible class, 
 and among the men whom he met in the 
 Association work, he was everywhere 
 regarded as a noble example of conse- 
 crated Christian manhood. 
 
 As the train carried me awav toward 
 my home my heart was full of happy 
 thanksgiving to God. I said to myself 
 
176 Soul-Winning Stories. | 
 
 i 
 
 over and over again, "No one pays like •! 
 
 God." For where could there have been , 
 so small an investment that could have I 
 yielded back so large a return? Surely ^ 
 for either the minister or the layman I 
 there is no gold mine so rich in possi- 
 bilities as that of soul-winning. : 
 
CHAPTER XIII 
 WAYSIDE CONVERSIONS 
 
CHAPTER XIII. 
 
 THAT which adds romantic interest 
 to the hfe of every earnest 
 worker for Christ is the oppor- 
 tunity which ever and anon presents it- 
 self to win souls. Suddenly, without 
 any expectation or preparation, there 
 springs up from the roadside of hfe 
 one of the rarest privileges in all one's 
 experience. It was so in the life of 
 Jesus. He went walking by the seaside 
 and found the two young men mending 
 their nets. He had a little talk with 
 them, saw the time to win them, and 
 led them away after him forever. Going 
 down the street he sees a yoimg tax- 
 gatherer at his desk. He knows that 
 this young men is restless and uneasy, 
 and that now is the time to win him to 
 better things. Christ steps across the 
 
180 Soul-Winning Stories, 
 
 street, has a little talk with him, and 
 when it is over Matthew closes up his 
 business, and the next we hear of him 
 he is giving a dinner in honor of Jesus. 
 The life of Jesus was full of such ex- 
 periences. It was at the close of a weary 
 and dusty day that he was waiting out- 
 side of Samaria when the sinful woman 
 came with her water-pot, and through 
 the simple incident of asking for a drink 
 of water Christ got hold of her heart 
 and not only won her to himself, but also 
 won a great multitude in that town. 
 Now we are to be like our Lord. Our 
 lives mav be romantic and abound in 
 these unique and beautiful victories if, 
 like Jesus, we are ever on the alert to 
 seize hold of the passing opportunity. 
 I remember well one morning in a certain 
 city where I was pastor and was in the 
 midst of a great revival. Every day 
 I was preparing a sermon for delivery 
 the same evening, and God was greatly 
 blessing the work. Many people were 
 
'Wayside Conversions. 181 
 
 being converted. One morning while I 
 was in my study preparing the sermon 
 for that night^s meeting my wife came 
 to the study and told me that a messen- 
 ger had come from a family whose name 
 was entirely unknown to me, asking 
 if I could go to the house to see a yoimg 
 woman who was sick. I sent word that 
 I would go a little later in the morning, 
 and went back to my sermon. When 
 the sermon was completed I went to 
 make the visit. 
 
 Arriving at the home I found that none 
 of the family were members of any 
 church, and though some of them had 
 been to hear me preach I had up to this 
 time had no knowledge of them whatever. 
 The young woman who had sent for 
 me was about twent}^ years old and was 
 very ill with consumption. It was evi- 
 dent that she would never leave her 
 room again until she left it for the grave. 
 She had been shut in there, sick, for five 
 months, and though none of the rest of 
 
182 Soul-Wmning Stories. 
 
 the family were Christians, she had in 
 some way that I do not now remember 
 found the Lord. 
 
 I was met at the door by the mother 
 and ushered into a very pleasant room. 
 I sat for a while at the bedside of the 
 young lady and talked with her and the 
 mother, first about the bright day, about 
 the sunshine coming into the sick room, 
 and such commonplace matters, until, 
 incidentally, I turned to the mother and 
 asked her if she was a Christian. She 
 replied that she was not. I found, how- 
 ever, that she had been hopefully con- 
 verted when she was a young girl living 
 on a farm in Pennsylvania, but for some 
 reason she had not joined the church, 
 and as is very usual in cases where people 
 try to live a Christian Ufe outside of the 
 church, she had failed, and now for many 
 years had lived an entirely worldly life. 
 She said she had wholly given up the idea 
 that she would ever be a Christian; that 
 she had remarked only the other day to 
 
Wayside Conversions, 183 
 
 a friend that she was certain if she were 
 to die she would be lost, and that she 
 sometimes thought the day of grace had 
 passed for her. 
 
 You may well imagine that by this 
 time I was thoroughly aroused. It 
 seemed to me an awful thing to look 
 upon that sick yoimg woman who was 
 only waiting there for the angel of death 
 in the presence of a mother who could not 
 enter into any spiritual fellowship or 
 commimion with her; and so, with my 
 heart uplifted to God, I set myself de- 
 liberately to win the mother to Christ 
 then and there. I urged what God says 
 in his book — that he is married to the 
 backslider. I tried to make her see the 
 providential opportunity which was here 
 presented for her to renew her covenant 
 of grace with the Lord. 
 
 She was so unresponsive at first that, 
 after talking with her ten or fifteen 
 minutes, I came to the very edge of giving 
 up. How many times we fail that way 
 
184 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 when we are on the very verge of success. 
 I honestly beUeve that more preachers 
 fail of being successful evangelists and 
 soul-winners in their pastorates because 
 they give way too quick, both in the 
 following up a public appeal and in per- 
 sistently pursuing a private conversa- 
 tion, than for any other one reason. 
 But as I was just about to give up, the 
 thought suddenly possessed me that 
 perhaps this was the woman's last call 
 — if I could not win her there beside her 
 daughter's sick bed what hope was 
 there that any one could ever win her? 
 This thought gave me new energy, and I 
 pursued the conversation not only with 
 unabated but with increased resolution. 
 The result was that at the close of a half- 
 hour her heart was broken with deep 
 conviction, and, sobbing and crying 
 out to God for mercy, she knelt 
 with me beside her daughter's bed, 
 and while I prayed for her she 
 gave herself imreservedly up to God, 
 
Wayside Conversions. 185 
 
 and found forgiveness and peace in 
 Christ. 
 
 A few moments after we had risen 
 from our knees the mother went and 
 called in her sister, who was visiting her 
 from her old home in Pennsylvania, and 
 a younger daughter, thirteen years of 
 age. Then as the mother went away 
 from the room again for a moment, the 
 daughter looked into my face, and with 
 a radiance Uke that which shone in the 
 face of Saint Stephen when his murder- 
 ers bore testimony that it was as "the 
 face of an angel,'' she said, "Oh, isn't 
 this glorious! I have been lying here 
 praying for this, night and day, for so 
 many weeks." Thus I had a vision, a 
 revelation, and I knew it was in answer 
 to this daughter's prayers that salvation 
 was come to this house. 
 
 But the story is not yet complete. I 
 turned around from the bedside to see 
 standing there the aunt, whose face 
 was red with weeping, and I said to her, 
 
186 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 "Are you a Christian?^' And she an- 
 Bwered, "No." And then I entered upon 
 a new conversation. She frankly con- 
 fessed that she had long desired to be 
 a Christian, but there were so many 
 things in the way — idols, she said, that 
 she could never give up. But, making 
 little of these things, I began to tell her 
 the story of her sister's conversion before 
 she had come into the room, and while 
 I was telling her that story, and she 
 was listening with great astonishment 
 and evident emotion, the sister herself 
 re-entered the room and came up and 
 kissed her, and they sat and cried to- 
 gether. 
 
 Leaving the two women together for 
 a moment, feeUng sure the problem 
 would work itself out best that way, I 
 tmned my attention to the little girl, a 
 beautiful child of thirteen, and I saw 
 by her eyes that the battle was won there 
 before I began. Her heart opened to 
 the Saviour as naturally as a flower 
 
Wayside Conversions. 187 
 
 opens to the sun on a summer^s morning. 
 Then we had another season of prayer, 
 the aunt and the young girl praying for 
 themselves, and the mother and the sick 
 daughter and myself pleading with God 
 for them, until they came to trust the 
 Lord Jesus Christ and to rejoice in their 
 faith in him. 
 
 I was an hour and a quarter in that 
 house. I had never been in it before; 
 though two of them had heard me preach. 
 I had never even known their names or 
 had any personal conmiimication with 
 them whatever. In that hour and a 
 quarter, through God^s great grace and 
 mercy, three souls had turned away 
 from sin and had found peace in trusting 
 the Lord Jesus as their Saviour. What 
 a blessed wayside opportunity was that! 
 But to take advantage of such opportu- 
 nities we must live in the spirit of them. 
 If I had been in a cold and heavy mood, 
 and had gone to do my work in a spirit 
 of formality, I could have visited that 
 
188 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 sick girl and gone away and done noth- 
 ing else for that house. And 3^et those 
 souls were waiting for somebody to cap- 
 ture them for the divine Lord. We 
 need to be on the alert for the wayside 
 opportunities. 
 
CHAPTER XIV I 
 
 i 
 
 THE RAILROAD REVIVAL \ 
 
CHAPTER XIV: 
 
 SOME years ago I was pastor in a 
 large city which is a great rail- 
 road center. Tens of thousands 
 of railroad men have their homes 
 there and live either in the city or its 
 suburbs. This fact impressed me on 
 my first arrival, and as the months went 
 on it became more and more apparent 
 to my mind that the church was not 
 sufficiently awake to the spiritual needs 
 of this large and intelligent class of men. 
 I set myself to work to devise some way 
 of getting at the situation. Whatever 
 measure of success may have come to 
 me in the course of my ministry has been 
 largely due to the fact that I have always 
 tried to work as faithfully and with as 
 much devotion as the most successful 
 business man works. So I set myself 
 
\92 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 to work to find a plan for calling the 
 attention of these railroad men to Christ 
 and the Gospel. 
 
 After some weeks of thought and 
 prayer I decided to have a series of 
 revival meetings to which railroad men 
 should be specially invited and in which 
 sermons and prayers and everything 
 should bear upon railroad men. I had 
 printed many thousands of invitations 
 specially addressed to railroad men. In 
 these I stated in a frank and brotherly 
 way my desire to preach the Gospel to 
 railroad men and their families and the 
 welcome they would receive at my church. 
 These invitations I carried to all the 
 great centers of railroad employment, 
 and had them given out in all the great 
 freight depots and shops in the city. 
 
 The success of the movement in at- 
 tracting the attention of railroad em- 
 ployees far exceeded my expectations 
 from the very start. Railroad men 
 flocked to the services and some were 
 
The Railroad Revival. 193 
 
 converted the very first evenings. But 
 these men told of others who would not 
 come with them, and wished they had 
 some way of getting the Gospel to them 
 where they worked. I caught at this 
 suggestion at once, and visited the rail- 
 road managers and superintendents and 
 secured the privilege of speaking for 
 twenty minutes of the noon hour in any 
 of the shops or round-houses of the city. 
 Then for over a month I went every 
 week-day at noon to some great freight 
 depot, or round-house, or workshop to 
 hold service. Some men were converted 
 in these meetings at noon, but the far 
 greater result came from getting a hold 
 upon men who were indifferent or preju- 
 diced, and who followed us back to the 
 service at night. 
 
 When my strength began to weaken 
 I secured the help of two faithful Chris- 
 tian women who had been successful 
 in working with railroad men, and they 
 would give Bible readings which I would 
 
194 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 follow at each service with special ex- 
 hortation and invitation to accept Christ. 
 I have never known so many railroad 
 men to be converted in any one meeting. 
 Baggagemen, expressmen, telegraphers, 
 brakemen, freight-handlers, all had their 
 representatives, and their wives and 
 children came with them. Over two 
 himdred and fifty united with the church 
 of which I was pastor, and many found 
 homes in other churches. 
 
 Of course all were not railroad men 
 who were brought under the influence 
 of this revival and through God^s grace 
 were saved. Naturally these railroad 
 men had friends and neighbors, and 
 when they began to be interested in the 
 meetings they talked about them among 
 their friends, and they came, too, and 
 many of them were saved. T shall 
 never forget some interesting and strik- 
 ing cases developed in that meeting. 
 One night I found at the altar a middle- 
 aged man in great sorrow. He was 
 
The Railroad Revival. 195 
 
 sobbing with grief, and the great aepths 
 of his soul seemed to be broken up, and 
 yet he found no peace. I talked with 
 him and finally asked him why he did not 
 accept Christ's promise outright and 
 have peace. He said, "I cannot/' I 
 asked him then why he came to the 
 altar at all, that the invitation was only 
 for those who would accept Jesus. His 
 reply was that he could not stay away- 
 His sense of sin was so keen, and the 
 burden of guilt upon his soul so pressed 
 him down, that when the invitation 
 was given for sinners to come he could 
 not stay in his seat. 
 
 I continued to press him to be frank 
 with me, until finally he told me all. 
 He said that he worked in a brewery, 
 and had been working in a brewery ever 
 since he was a boy. He had a wife and 
 six children depending on him for sup- 
 port. He felt that it was a wicked 
 business and that he could not be a 
 Christian and continue in it, and yet he 
 
196 Soul- Winning Stories. 
 
 did not know anything else, and if he 
 gave it up his family would starve. 
 The man was very anxious; the great 
 beads of perspiration stood out on his 
 forehead. It was the awful problem 
 of his life. I urged that it was his 
 business to accept Christ as his Saviour, 
 to do the right thing and leave the result 
 to God. I assured him that God would 
 not let a man starve through doing right. 
 I specially pushed home on him that 
 passage where Christ says, "Seek ye 
 first the kingdom of God and his right- 
 eousness, and all these things shall be 
 added unto you.'^ He was a strong 
 man, a solid stanch German, and de- 
 cision came slowly. But when it did 
 come, it was all over. His face was 
 transformed, and everybody around him 
 knew that he had gained a victory over 
 himself and his sin, and that Jesus Christ 
 had made the conquest of his soul. He 
 left the brewery the next day. In two 
 weeks I found him a good position, and 
 
The Railroad Revival. 197 
 
 before I left the city he was earning a 
 much larger salary than he had ever 
 earned before, and he and his family 
 were very happy in the church. 
 
 I well remember another evening,' 
 when, as I was passing around through 
 the rear of the congregation while the 
 after-meeting was going on at the altar, 
 I came across a young lady who seemed 
 the very picture of despair. She had 
 an intelligent keen face, but the inner 
 agony was written all over it. I stopped 
 to talk with her, and after a little she 
 admitted that she was deeply affected 
 by the service and was sorely conscience- 
 stricken. But she said^ ^^I can't be a 
 Christian.'' 
 
 " Why?" I asked. 
 
 "Not because I do not want to," she 
 said, "but because I have become so 
 entangled with worldly and sinful things 
 that there is no way out. God knows 
 I would give my life to be clear of them, 
 but I can't get out! I can't get out!'* 
 
198 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 These last phrases she fairly moaned 
 from her lips like a wail of despair. 
 
 I talked with her until I saw that no 
 further advantage could be gained by 
 conversation there, and then arranged 
 for her to come and see me the next day. 
 Then she told me her story. It was a 
 sad story of misfortune and sin and 
 death on the part of others, which had 
 at last thrown the burden of an invalid 
 mother and little brothers and sisters 
 upon shoulders unable to bear so heavy 
 a load, and she was working now as an 
 acrobat in some low entertainment hall 
 in the city. I urged her, as I had the 
 man from the brewery, that it was 
 God^s world, and that one could do right 
 in it and trust him for the result. She 
 went away sad, but promised to come 
 to the evening meeting. That after- 
 noon I went to see a noble Christian 
 woman, a woman of wealth and high 
 social position, but who was also rich 
 in human sympathy and love. I told 
 
The Railroad Revival. 199 
 
 her the story of this poor girl, and, as I 
 had expected, she was immediately 
 awake to the situation and was ready to 
 be her friend. That night I introduced 
 them, and from that hour they were 
 sisters. The poor girl who had lost all 
 hope became a happy Christian, and 
 through her rich blessings, both tem- 
 poral and spiritual, found their way to 
 all the unfortunate family. 
 
 One interesting feature of this revival 
 was that its advertised purpose to reach 
 railroad men attracted wide attention, 
 and a number of traveling railroad men 
 having a night in the city came to the 
 meetings, and several such were con- 
 verted. These carried the fire-brands 
 into different parts of the country, so 
 that in my travels during years since 
 I have had strangers speak to me in 
 regard to blessings received at that meet- 
 ing more frequently than concerning 
 any other revival it has been my pri\dlege 
 to lead. 
 
CHAPTER XV 
 ON THE TRAIL OF A SOUL 
 
CHAPTER XV. 
 
 I SHALL never forget a lowering 
 morning, years ago, when I went 
 into the pulpit of a large city 
 church of which I was pastor, de- 
 pressed by the unusual gloom of the day. 
 One of the hardest burdens I have had 
 to carry in my ministry is bad weather 
 on Sunday. It was not really storming 
 on this Sunday morning, but it was cold 
 and raw, and the air was so heavy that 
 it seemed to weigh one down. 
 
 The first thing that started me out 
 of my depression after I had entered 
 the pulpit was the face of one of the most 
 striking looking men I have ever seen. It 
 was not only that it was a new face, but 
 that there was something about the 
 eyes and the whole look of the man which 
 aroused me. My depression was for- 
 
204 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 gotten; for me there was only one man 
 in that congregation, and he was that 
 stranger. I remember well the theme 
 that morning. It was the cowardice 
 of Aaron, and his poor, weak, shifty lie 
 to Moses when the stronger brother de- 
 manded of the weaker one the story of 
 the golden calf. The lesson which I 
 drew out of it that day, and which I 
 crowded home on the people with all 
 the power that was in me, was that we 
 were responsible for letting things take 
 their own course and go wrong; that we 
 had no right to go on permitting our 
 friends and our circumstances in social 
 and business relations to carry us away 
 from God. 
 
 I say I crowded this message home on 
 the people, but as a matter of fact, so 
 far as I was personally conscious, I only 
 pressed it home on one man. I had 
 scarcely opened my theme and gotten 
 on fire with it before I detected his inter- 
 est and was sure that he winced under 
 
On the Trail of a Soul. 205 
 
 the application of the truth to himself. 
 During the singing of the last hymn I 
 mentally determined that I would intro- 
 duce myself to him at the close of the 
 service and find out who he was. But 
 "man proposes and God disposes.^' I 
 had scarcely pronounced the benediction 
 before my man and his wife had slipped 
 down the aisle and were gone. 
 
 I immediately sought to know who 
 he was, and learned that he was one of 
 the wealthiest business men in the city, 
 a man of reserved temperament, who lived 
 in a great mansion in one of the most 
 fashionable suburbs. I confess I was 
 greatly disappointed to hear all this. As 
 a matter of theory I believed that God 
 was as interested in rich men as in poor 
 ones and that Jesus Christ was as able 
 to save this man as he would be if he 
 were some struggling lawyer or clerk. 
 But as a matter of fact I had had a good 
 deal more experience with tire other 
 class, and my optimism and enthusiasm 
 
206 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 in regard to being able to follow up my 
 message for the man's help and comfort 
 had received a great check. 
 
 I went on with the other duties of the 
 day, but during the Sunday-school and 
 all the afternoon ever and anon my 
 stranger of the morning would come 
 back and look up at me with those 
 piercing but anxious eyes through which 
 God had let me have a look into his 
 conscience until I could read his soul. 
 Somehow I knew this man was not a 
 Christian. I felt as sure as I could be 
 that he had been greatly convicted of 
 sin under the sermon of the morning, 
 and more and more I felt that I had no 
 right to leave it where it was. 
 
 I had a very uncomfortable afternoon. 
 On one hand something said to me, "You 
 will spoil everything if you follow this 
 man up. If the Holy Spirit used your 
 message for his good this morning, you 
 should be grateful. But he would no 
 doubt resent anything you could say if 
 
On the Trail of a Soul. 207 
 
 you were to go and visit him personally/' 
 On the other hand something else said, 
 "God used you to carry his message 
 to this man's conscience. Just as surely 
 as Peter saw the poor crippled man and 
 his conviction, you saw this man dumb 
 before God's word. Perhaps no other 
 man will ever have so good a chance 
 to win this man's soul as you have now. 
 Perhaps, just because he is rich and 
 prosperous, preachers are afraid of him. 
 If you let him alone for a few days, he 
 may be harder than ever. What are 
 you a preacher for if not to follow up 
 God's message when you see that it has 
 gone home?" On the whole, I was greatly 
 worried. I awoke several times in the 
 night, and every time I saw that stran- 
 ger's face and looked into those haunting 
 eyes. 
 
 Monday morning came, and yet I was 
 uncertain what I ought to do. The 
 hard nerve-giving of Simday always 
 leaves even the strongest preacher who 
 
208 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 is of a nervous temperament a little on 
 the ragged edge on Monday morning,' 
 and so the objections to going to see 
 this man at his house seemed multiplied 
 on Monday, though throughout the fore- 
 noon, again and again, his face came back 
 to me, and I felt that I should always 
 have a sense of defeat and failure unless 
 I sought personally to press God's mes- 
 sage home upon his soul. 
 
 At lunch I spoke to my wife about it,^ 
 and told her how I was haunted by the 
 man's face. I also told of what I had 
 learned of his wealth, and the style in 
 which he lived, and of my fear that he 
 would resent being followed up. I re- 
 marked that perhaps if I let him alone 
 he would come again, while if I followed 
 him up now I might lose him altogether. 
 I think if she had sided with this view 
 I would have settled down quite content 
 that it was right. But, to my surprise, 
 she was dead against it. She urged 
 that I had better go at once and see him; 
 
On the Trail of a Soul. 209 
 
 that the whole matter seemed provi- 
 dential, and at the worst it could do 
 no harm to let the man know that I was 
 interested in him. I was not at all 
 pleased to have her take this view, but 
 having asked her advice I was bound 
 to take it seriously into consideration. 
 The result was that a little after two 
 oVlock that Monday afternoon, in a 
 pouring rain, I hired a closed carriage, 
 took my wife with me, and we drove 
 some three miles into the country suburb 
 where stood the mansion of the man 
 who had been to hear me preach the 
 morning before. When we arrived at 
 the gate, we decided that it was best for 
 me to go in alone, so that I might have a 
 freer chance to approach him as to his 
 personal religion. I never did anything 
 so diffidently in my life. I fairly trem- 
 bled as I went up the walk. I rang the 
 bell in fear. A servant came and ushered 
 me into the parlor. A little later the 
 door opened at the farther end of the 
 
210 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 room, and through it came my strange^' 
 of yesterday. When he saw me a 
 startled look went over his face. He 
 came forward and took my hand in a 
 long grasp as he said, "This is a strange 
 thing. I have been thinking of you 
 ever since I heard you preach yesterday 
 morning. I thought of driving in again 
 last night, but I have not been well, and 
 my wife feared for me to do it. To-day I 
 have thought of going to see you, but the 
 storm kept me back. How did you happen 
 to come to see me through all this rain?^' 
 Then I just opened my heart to him 
 and told him the v/hole story which I 
 have tried to tell you; only in this case 
 we were two men sitting close together 
 with our eyes on each other^s faces and 
 our hearts greatly moved. He told me 
 that the sermon the day before had 
 seemed to be God's message to him, and 
 that he felt greatly condemned that he 
 had so long neglected making an open 
 surrender of himself to Jesus Christ. 
 
On the Trail of a Soul. 211 
 
 After we had talked awhile, I asked him 
 if I might pray with him, and he said 
 it would be a great comfort to him and 
 he would like his wife to be present. He 
 went out and brought her in and intro- 
 duced her, repeated to her something 
 of the conversation, and then I prayed 
 with them. The Holy Spirit was present 
 in that room during that prayer. Our 
 hearts were strangely warmed. 
 
 When we arose from our knees I shall 
 never forget the face or words of my 
 new friend. His face was bathed in 
 tears; his eyes shone with a new light; 
 he grasped me by the hand and ex- 
 claimed, "I thank you with all my 
 heart. You are the first man in twenty- 
 five years who has ever asked me about 
 my soul or asked permission to pray in 
 my house.'' 
 
 That prayer and conversation marked 
 the beginning of a new Christian life 
 in that household. 
 
CHAPTER XVI 
 A WAYSIDE CAPTURE 
 
CHAPTER XVi: 
 
 I WAS once a pastor in a part of an 
 Eastern city where there were a 
 number of large manufacturing 
 plants, many of them employing several 
 hundred and some of them as many 
 as a thousand young men or women, 
 or both. I was trying the experiment 
 of a special series of services to young 
 people for Sunday evenings, with a view 
 to securing conversions in the after- 
 service which followed each sermon. I 
 was very desirous of reaching these 
 young working people, and finally con- 
 cluded that the best way to do it was to 
 go directly to them myself with the cards 
 of invitation. So, with a great bag of 
 these cards, giving the themes and dates 
 of the series of sermons and a kindly- 
 worded invitation, I presented myself day 
 
216 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 after day at the noon hour beside the gate 
 of one manufacturing plant after another, 
 and handed one of these invitations 
 to each person coming out or going in. 
 Sometimes they were thrown away, on 
 rare occasions they were resented ; but for 
 the most part they were received kindly, 
 and my church was crowded to standing 
 room by the young people who responded 
 to the invitations. 
 
 One day while I was making these 
 rounds I took my stand before a factory 
 employing several hundred young boys 
 and girls. I was a few minutes early, 
 and while I waited I saw one of the 
 vilest specimens of humanity come up 
 on the other side of the door from me, 
 bowed down with a huge load of cheap 
 sensational literature which he was hired 
 to give out to these people. He was a 
 wretched-looking creature. He was rag- 
 ged and dirty; his face was seamed and 
 bloated with vice, and the stuff he had 
 to dispense was as vile as he was. He 
 
A Wayside Capture. 217 
 
 laid down his burden and looked up at 
 me with a leer and a grin as much as to 
 say, "We are a pair. There are two of 
 us." I confess I felt shaky. I never 
 in my life felt so like running under fire. 
 At first thought there was something 
 so repulsive about the idea of entering into 
 a competition with a fellow like that 
 that it seemed the best thing I could do 
 would be to slip away home. But that 
 lasted only for a moment. Then I said 
 to myself, "This is as it should be. This 
 only shows the competition that is going 
 on everywhere for every human soul. 
 This man is the proper type of the devil 
 whose servant he is. He is here to work 
 for his master. He is trying to win 
 these souls to the devil. I am trying 
 to win them for Christ. I want to do 
 them good, to draw them upward, and 
 make them stronger and purer in every 
 way. I will not nm. I will stand here 
 and compete in my Master^s name, and 
 for his sake, for the soul of every boy and 
 
218 Soul-Winning Stories. 1 
 
 girl in this shop." And so I never en- 
 joyed giving out cards so much as I did I 
 that day when that sense of the com- 
 petition which is going on for every \ 
 human soul was so keenly felt by me. | 
 But I was not the only one that day j 
 who had noticed the seeming incon- \ 
 gruity of the pastor of a big city church \ 
 and a notorious drunken man standing j 
 side by side at a factory door giving out ] 
 their literature to the workmen. Just 
 across the street, waiting, Uke a spider 
 for a fly, was a liquor-saloon watching ' 
 there for any waywsiTd boy or gu'l who 
 might be drawn into its net. Lounging 
 around the door were a number of fel- | 
 lows who had visited inside too often 
 for their own good, and who were alert 
 for anything that would start a laugh. 
 One of these noticed the giving out of I 
 the literature over the way, and with an ; 
 oath swore that that beat anything he j 
 ever saw, and then he pointed out the j 
 preacher and his associate. It raised a 
 
A Wayside Capture. 219 
 
 laughJ They went inside and called 
 out the bar-tender and some other 
 half-drunken fellows to enjoy the joke 
 with them. I heard the hilarity and 
 imagined the cause of it, but paid no 
 attention to it, except that after I had 
 gotten through with the factory people 
 I went across the street and, speaking 
 pleasantly to them, handed every one 
 of the loungers one of the invitations 
 and told them I would be very glad 
 indeed to welcome them the next Sunday 
 night at my church. Some laughed and 
 looked sheepish; one man swore he had 
 no use for churches, and others simply 
 looked at me dumbly and curiously and 
 said nothing. 
 
 Sitting there, lounging back against 
 the wall of the saloon that day, was a 
 man who had had a great deal of trouble 
 and misfortune. He was a big, broad- 
 shouldered, strong fellow, physically, and 
 with many good qualities. But his wife 
 had been ill for a long time in a sanitarium, 
 
220 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 and his little children had had poor care, 
 and he had drifted into drink, trying as 
 so many thousands have done to drown 
 his sorrow and still the aching of his heart 
 over the wreckage of what had promised 
 to be a happy home. He sat there, listen- 
 ing to the rough fun, while I was giving 
 out my cards across the street. He was 
 about haK drunk, and so did not pay 
 much attention to it until I came across 
 and spoke to them. I had noticed him 
 particularly, for there was something in 
 his big figure and in his large fine eyes 
 that told of the splendid man he might 
 be. And when I had said I would be 
 glad to welcome them at my church I 
 had looked straight into his eyes. 
 
 After I had gone on one of them began 
 to curse and abuse me behind my back. 
 He declared it was an insult for me to 
 go around shoving my religion under 
 people's noses and that I was only doing 
 it because I was paid for it. But my big 
 drayman was sobering up. My eyes 
 
A Wayside Capture. 221 
 
 had appealed to his, and the warm pres- 
 sure of the hand I had given hini and 
 the card of invitation I had left in his 
 hand were having their effect, and he 
 at once began to defend me. He said, 
 "That is not true. He is not paid for 
 doing this. His church would pay him 
 just as much as if he did not do it. Some 
 of them would like him better if he did 
 not do it. He could be at home reading 
 in his library just as well as not; but he 
 came down here, and stood over there 
 beside that drunken scoundrel, and gave 
 out those cards while we were poking 
 fun at him, and then he came over here 
 and shook hands with us when I am sure 
 he knew we had been laughing at him, not 
 because he is paid for it, but because 
 he wanted to help us and do us good. 
 You fellows can go on drinking and doing 
 just as you please, but I am going to 
 accept the preacher^s invitation, and I 
 am going to take this card with me, and 
 go up there to-morrow night and tell him 
 
222 Soul-Winning Stories. 
 
 I have come to see what he can do for 
 me.'' 
 
 I have given the substance of that 
 conversation as my drayman gave it 
 to me afterward. Sunday night he was 
 on hand. I was shaking hands at the 
 door when he came in. I knew him the 
 moment I got my eyes on him, and as 
 I shook hands with him I said, "I am 
 so glad that you have come.'' He was 
 much pleased to think I remembered 
 and told me he had accepted my invita- 
 tion, and if the church could do him 
 any good he would be glad of it. 
 
 I do not remember what the sermon 
 was about that night, except that it was 
 about Jesus, and in the after-service 
 the big drayman stood up and asked to 
 be prayed for, and humbly and tearfully 
 gave his heart to Christ. He became a 
 very useful Christian. For my own 
 personal comfort it was one of the hap- 
 piest captures God has ever helped me 
 to make. 
 
A Wayside Capture. 223 
 
 Everything seemed to blossom for 
 him after that day. His business pros- 
 pered. His wife, concerning whom it 
 had been feared that she was perma- 
 nently ill mentally, recovered and came 
 home to her family. It became a most 
 beautiful Christian home. I have never 
 gone near that city since to preach, 
 week-night or Sunday, but that before 
 the sermon began, sitting somewhere in 
 the audience, I have looked into the 
 eyes of my big drayman. God paid 
 me better than I knew that day. I was 
 competing for some of the souls inside 
 the shop and he gave me some of them; 
 but the most royal captiu-e of all was 
 across the street among that crowd of 
 drunken loungers. 
 
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