An incident is recorded of the great General which shows the tenderness of his noble heart. At an interval of his campaigns, Garibaldi had a gathering of friends in the neighborhood of Capri, for a day’s shooting. In the evening a shepherd came to the little company in distress at having lost a lamb. At once Garibaldi proposed that he and his friends should join the search, and they went off in different directions, but in vain—not one found the lost lamb. About midnight Garibaldi sounded a horn to call his friends back. They came, and giving them some refreshment he dismissed them. In the morning Garibaldi’s servant went, as usual, to his master’s room, but no one was there, nor had been all night. An expedition of search was quickly started, and before long the General was discovered in a shed, lying on the ground, with his soldier’s coat over him, asleep. On being roused, he opened his arms, and there nestled the little lamb safe and well! Garibaldi had found it, fed it with warm milk which he took with him, and then gathered it in his arms to sleep.
How beautiful a parable is this of the love of the Divine Shepherd, seeking unweariedly and never giving up the search for the lost one “until He find it.”
MARGARET ESDAILE.
NOTE. —I have received this beautiful incident in Garibaldi’s life from a friend, which I have greatly enjoyed, and doubtless many of the readers of the “Message” have also not seen it before, so I hope it may be a pleasure and blessing to them, as it has been to me, teaching us we must deny ourselves in every way by day and night to seek to save others, and especially, shall I say, the lambs of the flock so clear to our blessed Lord and Saviour, Jesus Christ.
EMILY P. LEAKEY.