"
"What do you think of?" asked Claude, giving an alkali clod a push.
"I was thinking," answered Neil gently, "how once I had a hard
heart--very hard. It was like these clods, where nothing good can
grow. People who looked at me could see that my heart was hard. Men
would have said, 'Neil's heart can never be different' But Jesus
took away my hard heart and gave me a new one. That is what makes me
glad all the time, though I work on these hard alkali clods. Some
day this patch we work on will be different. There will be
beautiful, green, growing crops on it. But that is not so great a
change as it is to change a hard heart and get a new heart from our
Savior."
Claude did not say anything. He bent over the hard clods and worked
silently, but he was not thinking of his work. He was remembering
his mother's voice as it had sounded nights when she had knelt
beside his bed and prayed that her boy might become a Christian.
There had been one night that Claude would always remember, when his
mother had come for the last time to his bedside, and prayed feebly
for her boy. The next week she had died.
Claude looked up at Neil, now. The man evidently found the work
hard, but his face showed that he had spoken truly when he said that
he was glad, even though he did work on the hard, alkali clods.
"I wish I were like Neil," thought Claude.
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