builder's fault. Of course I took the lowest estimate for these houses, and the rascal's been and put me in green wood; but the carpenter shall set it all right to-morrow.'--But the worst of all was, the gas escaped so fast it had to be turned off at the meter. `Ah!' says he, `that won't matter for to-night, for I've bought a famous lamp, a new patent. I got it very reasonable, because the man who wanted to part with it were giving up housekeeping and going abroad.' So we had the lamp in, and a splendid looking thing it were; but I thought I saw a crack in the middle, only I didn't like to say so. Well, all of a sudden, just in the middle of the supper, the lamp falls right in two among the dishes, and the oil all pours out over my neighbour's clothes. Such a scene there was! I tried to keep from laughing, but I couldn't stop, though I almost choked myself.--Dick, you may be sure, weren't best pleased. It were a bad job altogether; so we bade good-night as soon as it were civil to do so. But I shall never forget Dick Trundle's house-warming, nor the lesson it taught me. "What we want, dear friends, is, not what's new, cheap, and showy, but what's solid, and substantial, and thoroughly well made. Will it _wear_ well? That's the question after all. Dick's fine things was just got up for show; they'd no wear in 'em--they was cheap and worthless. Now there's a deal of religion going in our day as is like Dick Trundle's house and purchases; it's quite new, it makes a great show, it looks very fine, till you come to search a little closer into it. But it ain't according to the old Bible make: it don't get beyond the head; it can't satisfy the heart. What we want is a religion that's real--just the religion of the gospel, as puts Jesus Christ and his work first and foremost. If you haven't got that, you've got nothing as you can depend on it'll fail you when you most want it. It may be called very wide, and very intelligent, and very enlightened, but it won't act in the day of trouble, and when the conscience gets uneasy. "Well, now, we've got a happy company here to-night; we're many of us total abstainers on principle and most of us, I hope, Bible Christians on principle, after the old fashion; for, if we haven't Christ and his Word for our foundation, we haven't got that as'll stand the test. No, friends, take the word of Tommy Tracks--and you've got what'll confirm what I say all round you in this meeting to-night--the life as is begun, continued, and ended in the fear of God, and with the Bible for its guide, and Jesus for its example, is the life that's just what you and I were meant to live by the God who made us and redeemed us, and it's plainly and unmistakably the life that _wears_ best." End of Project Gutenberg's True to his Colours, by Theodore P. Wilson