All over the world the advent message was being given. But I cannot tell you stories of it in every country, for it would make too big a book. Would you like to hear the story of how the children preached in Sweden? Over in that country the law let nobody preach except the priests of the state church, and they wouldn't give the message. So the Lord worked upon the hearts of some of the common people to tell Sweden that the Lord was coming. Now the priests did not like this, so they had these people arrested, and hindered the work all they could.

Even some who were very young were persecuted. In one place, the county of Orebro, there were two young men, Ole Boquist, fifteen years old, and Erik Walbom, eighteen years old, who began to preach the coming of the Lord. They were not allowed to preach in the churches, so the people gathered to hear them in private houses, and oftentimes even out in the woods. The priest tried to stop this; he was going to have the young men arrested. But they fled to the woods and stayed out there, away from their homes, for six weeks. Finally, however, they went to see the priest. He thought they must be crazy, and he felt of their pulses to see if they were sick. But when he found they were in good health, he grew angry, and had the police arrest them.

They were thrown into a dirty cell among thieves, and soon brought before the governor for examination. The governor stood them up and lashed them with a prison whip until he grew weak, and then he had another man lash them again. Next they were examined by a doctor and he sent them to an insane asylum. Here they were taken to one side, and a large powerful stream of very cold water was turned on them. When they put up their hands to protect their heads, they were knocked down, and left there in the water until they found strength to get up, when they had to go through it all again. Then they were taken before the doctor, who said, as they stood shivering, "I see you are cold. I'll soon warm you up," and taking a large bundle of sticks, he beat them until he could no longer. Then they were sent back to their cells.

After some time spent in this asylum, or prison, they were let go. They had been treated so badly that they both fell sick and almost died. The Lord raised them up again, however, and they preached once more. This time, when the priests tried to have them arrested, the good King Oscar sent word that they were to be left alone, and so he protected them.

In other places where the older ones could not preach, the Lord did a most wonderful thing. Little children who could not read or write were moved upon to tell of the coming of Jesus. In the humble cottages where they were born, they began to repeat the very words of the Bible: "Fear God and give glory to Him, for the hour of His judgment is come." And then they would reprove the people for their sins and tell them to get ready for Jesus' coming. The people flocked out to hear them. Let us go in imagination with some of them to one of these meetings.

It is winter. There has not been much snow, but the lakes and the rivers and the marshes are all frozen over, and as we start out for the cottage, two miles away, where lives the little girl we have heard of, we see people coming from every direction, across fields, over the frozen ground and water.

Soon the cottage comes in sight, snuggled down under the hill that protects it from the north winds. One-storied and low it is, with dead grass-blades peeping up through the scanty snow on its roof, and its dull red sides glow rather sullenly across the dreary landscape. Inside, however, all is cheer. The tall gray earthenware stove has been freshly fed, and inside its heavy timbered walls and under its turf roof, the large room glows with warmth and cheer.

Some few besides the family are there when we enter, and the eldest son, an earnest, fair-haired young man, is telling the group of how he was won from reckless ways by the warnings of his baby sister. Like an angel of God, he says, she seemed as she pointed out the end the ale-house was leading him to. "And how could she know, the pretty one, the little innocent," says Hans, "what evil men do in their drink? Surely the angels teach her, and leave her white as ever from the evil she describes."

"We know not," says the father, "what the spirit is, save it be the wonderful gift of God. For she says the hour of God's judgment is come; and who was there to teach her that? But I have found her words in the Bible."

"It was not the priest," declares the mother, "for we have never heard the like from him, and we have never been to hear the advent heralds preach."

All this time the little girl of five is playing about the room, never noticing the talk that is so much about herself. Absorbed in her play with her brother, two years older (they are driving a reindeer sledge like the Lapps), she is as happy and childlike as any of her age. The older children, awed by the presence of the strangers, keep shyly in the background. It seems a strange meeting, where we have come to hear a preacher, and find the preacher playing reindeer sledge. And yet it is very solemn too; for the little child, now so innocent in her play, will soon be moved to speak as a messenger of God.

The room fills up, and many cannot get in, so they stand about the open door, willing to endure the cold if they can only hear. And when the murmur of voices at last is hushed, in expectation of what is coming, then the little girl looks up from her play, surveys the people with grave eyes, and comes forward a little in the room.

"The spirit is upon her," whisper the people.

In her clear, childish voice she starts a hymn, and some of the people join in. At the close, her father lifts her to the table, and there she stands for a moment, and then opens her baby lips to proclaim: "Blow ye the trumpet in Zion, and sound an alarm in My holy mountain: let all the inhabitants of the land tremble: for the day of the Lord cometh, for it is nigh at hand."

The tall clock loudly ticks off its seconds in the silence that follows her first words. Then in solemn tones, with slow, graceful gestures unlearned on earth, she calls upon the backslidden and the worldly to turn again to their Saviour. Old men's heads are bowed, and the younger sit trembling, as she points out, with Scripture proof, the nearness of the judgment day. And as she tells of the love of Jesus, who will receive the lowest and the lowliest, sobs rise from every part of the room, and penitent sinners cry out for mercy.

The neighbors know the child. Dutiful and obedient she is to .her parents, living herself so that she may see Jesus; and they know the message has entered her own young life. But this power,—it is, as they say, the angels who talk to her. Almost an angel herself she seems, and truly she is a messenger of God. The people remember how the older ones who preached this message have been silenced in the jails; but God's message, they say, cannot be stopped. Out of the mouth of babes and sucklings hath God perfected praise.

As the little girl doses with a call for all to come to Jesus who have not already done so, an old man, a father in the neighborhood, but not a priest, kneels down to pray, and all fall upon their knees with him. He prays earnestly, and afterwards many others pray, some pleading for themselves, some for dear ones who are not yet saved.

The short afternoon is gone, and the shadows slip over the assembly as they still kneel. And when they rise, it is to sing another hymn for dosing. The little girl has slipped down from the table, and sits meekly in a chair by her mother, quiet as any little girl by her mother's side, no longer the preacher. Her message has been given, her work is done for today; and they who would find peace turn to the old men and the old women, Christian fathers and mothers who can lead them to Jesus in private prayer and study.

At last we all slip out to go back over the frozen lakes, under the clear white moonlight, to our homes, made certain in our souls that the King is near the door.

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