Christian Age Nehemiah 1:1-11 The words of Nehemiah the son of Hachaliah. And it came to pass in the month Chisleu, in the twentieth year… Mr. Christie Murray, writing of the old Australian settlers, relates an incident to show how, after a long life of exile, they still pine for home and England. When his ship left Plymouth Sound a good deal of mud adhered to the anchor. After it was dried he broke off a bit, declaring, half in jest and half in earnest, that this piece of English earth should go with him around the world. In Australia he showed it to a white-haired ranchman among the hills. The old man eyed it wistfully. "Give it to me," he said at last. "You will see old England again; I never shall. I would value that bit of earth more than diamonds." Mr. Murray gave it to him, and continued his journey. When he came back, months later, he found that the old man had ridden more than a hundred miles to a settlement to buy a gay little plush stand and a glass case in which to preserve his treasure. De Maistre, describing the hut of the Moravian missionary in the most northern human settlement within the Arctic circle, says that he observed, suspended over the fireplace like a holy relic, a piece of rough, unbarked wood. He looked at it curiously. The Dane touched it with reverence. "It is a bit of the old oak-tree at home," he said, his eyes full of tears. Nothing can be more real than that clinging in the heart of a man to the land of his birth. It may be of all countries in the world the poorest, the least beautiful, the most insignificant. But it is his own, and if he is a genuine man the trifle which tells him of it, though he stands in a king's palace, will speak to him as with the power of his mother's voice. (Christian Age.) Parallel Verses KJV: The words of Nehemiah the son of Hachaliah. And it came to pass in the month Chisleu, in the twentieth year, as I was in Shushan the palace, |
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