It was nearly 9 o’clock in the morning. The train, due 8:50 a. m., had stopped at the pretty little wayside station, taken up the passengers, and steamed away again. The stationmaster, who had grown gray in the service of the company, was settling down again after the momentary excitement, for an hour’s quiet, and turned to the luxuriant little garden which bloomed out a grateful return for all the labor he bestowed upon it.
A hasty step then was heard, and a gentleman with face red-hot, and temper apparently heated to the same point, came hurrying up. His haste and excitement had nearly robbed him of the power of speech, but he contrived to bluster forth a storm of invectives against the bus driver, who had neglected to call for him, and had thus caused him to miss the train.
“I would rather have given $25 than have been late this morning. I do not know what is to be done.”
Of course, there was only one reasonable thing to be done in such circumstances, and that was to wait quietly for the next train, which would pass at 10; but the poor fellow had not cooled down sufficiently to do anything quietly just then.
The stationmaster was kind and obliging; he was accustomed to deal with such cases, and had found, as he said, that “it was best to leave them pretty much to themselves; they generally came round all the sooner.” So he waited patiently until the gentleman began to slacken the speed at which he was pacing to and fro along the platform.
“There’s a comfortable waiting room inside, if you would like to sit down, sir,” he then ventured to say. The stranger turned and followed him into the pleasant little room, shaded by the climbing roses outside, and with an air of thorough cleanliness. A round table stood in the middle of the room with a supply of tracts—blessed little messengers of God to the wandering and weary. Well-chosen and attractive they were; and the gentleman began to turn them over, glad of some occupation for his restlessness. He chose one and seated himself to read it, and the stationmaster turned to his little garden.
“He’s keeping wonderfully quiet,” he thought to himself. Then, looking at the great clock, he saw the hands pointing to near train time. Some passengers began to arrive, and the ticket office was opened for the coming train. The gentleman was seated in the same place, bending over the tract, which was of some length, and so completely absorbed in its contents that he was forgetting the time.
“The train’s in sight, sir,” said the stationmaster.
“The train!” he exclaimed, jumping up like one just waking.
“Will you sell me this tract? I want to read it again.”
“Take it, and welcome, sir; the kind lady who supplies me with them will be delighted that you should.”
“Thank you and her;” and in another minute he was in the train.
A month after this the stationmaster was on the platform. As the train stopped a gentleman leaped out before him, and held out his hand, saying, “Do you remember me?”
“I do, sir. You are the gentleman that missed the train a few weeks back, and was so troubled about it.”
“I need not have been. I missed the train that morning, but I found the Saviour. O, what a tract that was! I had been so busy about business that I did not allow myself time to think about Gad, or to read about Him; but I could not get over the solemn questions it asked. I wish I had time to tell you all particulars; but say to the lady who gave you that tract, that it has led me to Jesus, and I am buying all I can and giving them away, wholesale. I never knew what happiness was before.”
The steam whistle ended the interview, and there was joy in the heart of the old stationmaster as he stood watching the train move slowly away, and saw the beaming, joyous look of one of its passengers— “a new creature in Christ Jesus.”
Dear reader, if you have not yet known Jesus as your Saviour, may you accept Him now, and be filled with the same joy and peace as the passenger.
Dear young Christian, are you scattering tracts which tell of the love of God through the Lord Jesus Christ to lost sinners?
“In the morning sow thy seed, and in the evening withhold not thine hand: for thou knowest not whether shall prosper, either this or that, or whether they both shall be alike good.” Ecclesiastes 11.6