A Protestant lady, just before entering a French church to see the interior, gave a tract to an old woman who chanced to be near the door. On the lady's leaving the church, the woman—who was doubtless a Roman Catholic—returned the tract, which she probably regarded as heretical trash. The lady, whose English companion did not sympathize with her tract-giving, took back the despised paper with a little feeling of embarrassment, which instantly passed away as a man held out his hand for what the woman had rejected, so that the lady had merely to pass the tract from the one to the other. Travellers, while in search of health or amusement, would do well to remember that valuable opportunities may be afforded to them, when thus casually meeting with those whom they never again may see, of helping to build the wall of Zion. They are not likely to behold any effect of their work here; but labour for God, with faith and prayer, is "not in vain in the Lord." Would that reflection on this subject would induce every reader who may glance at this little volume to form a prayerful resolution never to let "one day" pass without doing something, be it ever so little, towards raising the spiritual wall! How cold is our zeal, how careless our efforts, compared to those of the Jews under Nehemiah! "They" did not sit quietly in their homes, buried in studies, or absorbed by business, while the din of earnest work was going on around them, or the blast of the trumpet summoned all true sons of Abraham to do brave battle for the right. The nobles thought it an honour to be engaged in the work; the governor himself set an example of devoted energy in it. It was a day of triumph for Nehemiah and his companions when their glorious work was finished; when, in the words of the leader, "all our enemies heard thereof, and all the heathen that were about us saw these things, and were much cast down in their own eyes, for they perceived that this work was wrought of God." But what will be the joy of those who have toiled for Christ, and in His strength, when they gaze on the jasper wall of "the holy Jerusalem, descending out of heaven from God," wherein those shall dwell who, ransomed and pardoned by the Saviour, have loved, lived, and laboured for Him! The trumpet in the hand of the archangel shall sound then no summons to conflict. And when the blessed review the time of their sojourn upon earth, with all its mingled trials and blessings while God's work was slowly rising to completion, will it not be one of their sweetest joys then to be able to say, "Unworthy as I was of a privilege so glorious, I, even I, was a labourer too!" [Illustration] [Illustration] XXXVI. Writing Table of Zacharias.