Our poor missionaries do have such a time in mastering Chinese so they can converse with the people and preach the Gospel to them. The trouble is that a word may mean one of a dozen different things, just as you happen to give it this tone (sound) or that. A Mr. Meadows once wished to say “bargain money” to a Chinaman. He used the proper Chinese word for it, but pronounced it as though it meant to the Chinaman “Do you hear? do you hear?” And what said John Chinaman? Just nothing at all, but came nearer and nearer to Mr. Meadows, turning one side of his head then the other to listen. Once Mr. Pohlman asked a Chinese family if they drank wine, but he pronounced the word wine (_tsén_) so it sounded to them like their word for land (_t’sēn_). At another time he asked a mourning family if they had buried (_tái_) the body of their dead grandmother. But he sounded it _t’ai_, which means to kill. Imagine their looks. But the missionaries work away at the queer Chinese words and tones until they can tell the “old story” plainly—and hundreds have heard and understood, and now believe. You know how hard it is for the Chinaman to speak our language. He says “Amelican” for American, our _r_ is so difficult for him to get. But the time is coming when every one of God’s family will know the one great language, and there will be no hard schoolmaster to scold or whip it into them. L. WHEN HE WAS TWELVE YEARS OLD. OUR little lad, our bonnie twelve-year-old, Has journeyed to the city of the King; Our happy boy—ere heart could grow a-cold, Or soul turn bitter—in youth’s joyous spring, Went up to keep the feast in that bright place, City of Peace, where restful mansions be; And straightway looking on the dear King’s face, Remembered naught but joy that face to see! Long time ago, when He was twelve years old, The Holy Child climbed fair Judea’s hills, And his young mother in her heart did hold Strange words concerning him, whose mystery fills Her soul with wonder.—On their homeward way, The reverent pilgrims haste; and sorrowing She seeks her Son, and lo, in calm delay, He lingered in the temple of the King! She, coming to the sacred portal, waits With tear-wan face; her fair first-born she seeks; Weary and grief-worn, at the shining gates, With faltering lips his sweet home-name she speaks, And He is in her arms!—With tender word Of gentlest chiding, each to each revealed The love that to the depths of feeling stirred Hearts that brief absence near and dearer sealed.