A Curl Cut Off With An Axe.

 

D0 you see this lock of hair?" said an old

 man to me. "Yes, but what of it? It

 is, I suppose, the curl from the head of a

dear child, long since gone to rest."

"It is not. It is a lock of my own hair, and it

is now nearly seventy years since it was cut 

from this head."

"But why do you prize a lock of your hair so

much?"

"It has a story belonging to it, and a strange

one. I keep it thus with care because it speaks 

to me more of God and of his special care than 

anything else I possess."

"I was a little child of four years old, with long,

curly locks, which, in sun or rain or wind, hung

down my cheeks uncovered. One day my father

went into the woods to cut up a log, and I went

with him. I was standing a little way behind him,

or rather at his side, watching, with interest the

strokes of the heavy axe as it went up and came

down upon the wood, sending off splinters at

 every stroke in all directions. Some of the 

splinters fell at my feet, and I eagerly stooped to

 pick them up.

In doing so I stumbled forward, and in a moment

 my curly head lay upon the log. I had fallen just

 at the moment when the axe was coming down

 with all its force. It was too late to stop the

 blow.

Down came the axe. I screamed and my father

 fell to the ground in terror. He could not stay 

the stroke and in the blindness which the sudden

 horror caused, he thought he had killed his boy.

 We soon recovered I from my fright, and he from

 his terror. He caught me in his arms and looked

 at me from head to foot, to find out the deadly

 wound which he was sure he had inflicted. Not a

 drop of blood nor a scar was to be seen. He 

knelt on the grass and gave thanks to a gracious

 God. 

Having done so he took up his axe and found a 

few hairs upon its edge. He turned to the log he

 had been splitting, and there was a single curl

 of his boy's hair, sharply cut through and laid 

upon the wood.

How great the escape! It was as if an angel had

turned aside the edge at the moment when it

 was descending on my head. With renewed 

thanks upon his lips he took up the curl and went

 home with me in his arms.

"That lock he kept all his days as a memorial of

God's care and love. That lock he left to me on

his death bed."




 YI