In a rugged part of the country, where there are large granite quarries, two little girls named Polly and Rose lived there with their parents some years ago. Both had been brought to the Lord Jesus in very early years, and as there was no Sunday school in the place, they were in the habit of going with their mother, who was a devoted Christian, to visit the homes of the quarrymen with tracts on the Sunday afternoons. Polly, the elder of the girls, often gathered primroses on the hill, which she made up into posies, and gave them to sick people in the village with texts tied around them.
A well-known character named Dan, lived in the village by himself, with three large dogs as his only companions. Dan was a poacher, and had been more than once in jail. His evil ways had shattered his health, and completely broken him down. As they visited through the houses, they learned that Dan had been ill all the previous week, so they resolved to call and see him. When they knocked at the door a gruff voice said, “come in,” and lifting the latch, a sad sight presented itself. Dan lay on a bed of straw, evidently ill; there was no fire in the grate, and only a crust of bread in the cupboard. Polly’s mother learned that Dan had not tasted food that day, so she set to work, and lit the fire. Polly went home for some necessary things, and brought them along, and in less than an hour Dan had a nice tea, and felt much better. Before they left, Polly sang a hymn to Dan, then she put a bunch of her primroses into a glass of water, and set it on the table by his bed; her mother promising to come and see him at night. What happened during that afternoon no one knows, but when they entered Dan’s house that evening he said,
“Will the girlie sing to me again the good words about the sheep that was lost?” Polly sang the hymn again, and the tears flowed down Dan’s cheeks, and when she finished, he said, sobbing like a child, “The flowers and the hymn bring my childhood’s years to mind, when I went with my father to the church on the early Sunday mornings.”
Then as if the memory of these years had brought long lost conscience into exercise, he added, “But sin has brought me here.”
Polly’s primroses and her hymn had been God’s messengers to the hardened sinner’s heart, and opened a way for the Gospel message to reach it.
Polly was a daily visitor to Dan’s cottage, and God used the saved child to lead the sin-burdened man to the Saviour. Dan was raised up, and lived for several years to show that he had been truly converted. Polly often visited the cottage in which her first soul was won for Christ, with fresh primroses and words of cheer for Dan, the disciple.
“Christ Jesus came into the world to save sinners.” 1 Timothy 1:15.
“Believe on the Lord Jesus Christ, and thou shalt be saved.” Acts 16:31.
ML 07/12/1942