head on her lap.

"Will we have only hard cake for breakfast, mother, and to-morrow my
birthday, too?" he was saying.

"That is all, my little Manasseh, unless the good Father sees fit to
send us some way of earning more. You know even the hairs of our heads
are numbered, so he takes notice of the poorest and weakest of his
children, and has promised us that there will be no lack to them that
fear him."

"But, mother, we have had lack many, many times," said the boy
thoughtfully.

The mother smiled. "But things have usually come right in the end," she
said, "and you know 'Our light affliction, which is but for a moment,
worketh for us a far more exceeding and eternal weight of glory.' We
cannot understand all these things now, but it will be plain some day.
'We will trust, and not be afraid,' because our trust is in the Lord;
and we know that 'he will perfect that which concerneth us,' if we trust
him."

"And will he send father home soon?" asked the boy. "We have been
praying for him to come, so, so long! Do you think God hears us, mother?
Why doesn't he send father home?"

The woman's head drooped, and a tear rolled down her cheek, but her
voice was calm and firm.

"Manasseh, child," she said, "your father may never return; but, though