THE MASSACRE OF THE IRROCERTS.

"Then said He unto the disciples, It is impossible but that offences will come; but woe unto him, through whom they come! It were better for him that a millstone were hanged about his neck, and he cast into the sea, than that he should offend one of these little ones." LUKE xvii. 1, 2.

HERE

were the men and women, Lord, to whom Thou hadst consigned
These helpless, simple little ones to have and hold and mind:
To love and cherish and protect by day, as well as night,

To always keep within their care, if e'en beyond their sight? *
Were their affairs so pressing, or were themselves on pleasure bent
That they could or would not trouble as to where their children went ;
Or was the daily strain so great these young ones how to feed,

That to things that seemed less urgent, they gave insufficient heed?
To those to whom they owed their life, owed they their death as well,
And was it those who loved them best that rang their funeral knell?
Failed they to recognize the trust their parenthood involved-

The sacred charge that on their heads in consequence devolved?

Or was it not in any wise plain duty had been shirked,

But Death, intent upon his prey, in secret places lurked;
And where man least expected it, and at the safest hour

On nine score unprotected babes, made manifest his power?

Nine score of unprotected babes that just a while before
Were jubilant with childish glee, now choked the fast-fixed door,
Till trodden down by hundreds who still rushed from overhead
They lay in one heart-sickening heap of dying and of dead!
Whatever was the cause of this o'erwhelming, saddening blow,
Thou know'st, O God, and Thou alone, the aggregate of woe
That blasts ten thousand infant lives unseen on every hand
Through criminal and base neglect, or murder deftly plann'd.
The blood of slaughtered innocents by men and women slain
Like Abel's blood, appeals to Thee, nor shall appeal in vain ;
Then by this dire calamity speak in the nation's ears,

And make parental eyes to see, though through parental tears.

Our Father Who in Heaven art, the Father of the young,

Give vigour to the languid pen, and loose the stammering tongue,
That pen and tongue cease not for them to point and plead and preach,
And to parental hearts and minds parental duties teach:

To teach the sacred trust of life to parents' hands consigned,
The solemn duties towards the SOUL, the BODY and the MIND,
That this life fitly ended they pass safely through THAT DOOR
Which 'twixt THE LIVING and THE DEAD is FIXED for evermore!

* This book was already in the hands of the printer when the terrible calamity occurred at Sunderland on the 18th of June, 1883, which suggested the above verses. It was too late to find a place for them uniformly with the remainder of the work, but a spare page has been utilized in order to give expression to words of remonstrance and warning against the common-very common!-neglect of parental duties and responsibilities-duties and responsibilities the importance and sacredness of which in matters both temporal and spiritual are second to none in the career of those to whom they are entrusted.