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She Was a Stranger

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Review and Herald Publishing Association · Tacoma Park Station, Washington, D. C. · Jan 10, 1907

FromReview and Herald, Vol. 84, No. 2.

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“She Was a Stranger”

THE following story, which comes from the West, brings with it a lesson for all, both old and young.
A Sunday-school missionary, while addressing a Sunday-school, noticed a little girl, shabbily dressed and bare-footed, shrinking in a corner, her little sun-burned face buried in her hands, sobbing as if her heart would break.
Soon, however, another little girl, about eleven years of age, got up and went to her. Taking her by the hand, she led her out to the brook, where she seated the little one on a log. Then kneeling beside her, this good Samaritan took off the ragged sunbonnet, and dipping her hand in the water, bathed the other’s hot eyes and tear-stained face and smoothed the tangled hair, talking cheeringly all the while.
The little one brightened up, the tears vanished, and smiles came creeping around the rosy mouth.
The missionary, who had followed the two, stepped forward and asked, “Is this your sister?”
“No, sir,” answered the child, with tender, earnest eyes; “I have no sister.”
“O, one of the neighbor’s children,” replied the missionary; “a little schoolmate perhaps?”
“No, sir; she is a stranger. I do not know where she came from. I never saw her before.”
“Then how came you to take her out and have such a care for her, if you do not know her?”
“Because she was a stranger, sir, and seemed all alone, and needed somebody to be kind to her.”—The Silent Messenger.