This in substance is what the minister said in the little church at the quiet summer resort by the river side, where Edith Manton was staying. "For," continued the speaker, "it may be my last opportunity to speak for Christ, or it may be some one's last chance of hearing the truth."

Edith was thinking of these words that morning when she went out in Jerry's boat after lilies. Jerry knew where the flowers were thickest and fairest, and too he was counted as the best oarsman on the river. Edith often went out with Jerry, and that morning she was thinking, "I have had more than one opportunity to present Christ to Jerry. But I do not even know whether or not he belongs to Christ. If I had only spoken to him before! I don't know how to begin now." Presently she began singing,

Jerry listened and when she ended he said:

"That's a good one, Miss."

"Yes; but, Jerry, are you pulling for the other shore?"

"Well, I don't know much about them things," replied Jerry. "Reckon as how when one has no oars to pull with he must just drift. And maybe he will drift to the shore, and maybe he won't."

"But why shouldn't you have the oars?" asked Edith.

"Well, I s'pose it's like this; sometimes a boat gets loose and starts off without oars, and then at other times the oars gets broken or lost in the middle of the river. I never lost nor broke an oar in my life, so I s'pose I must have started without any."

"And so you mean to keep on drifting?" asked Edith, growing interested.

"What can a fellow do? Out in the middle of the river without any oars? He hasn't much chance of getting back to the wharf after them."

"But if the oars have been lying in the bottom of his boat all the time? Wouldn't a man be foolish if he didn't pick them up and use them when he found he was drifting down stream and making no progress toward the other shore?"

"Humph! it ain't much likely that a fellow would let them oars lie right afore his eyes and never touch them, is it, now?"

"That is what puzzles me," replied Edith. "You have only just to put out the hand of faith and take hold of the oars of prayer and the word of God and pull for the shore."

"My! Miss, I never thought of that! I've got a Bible that my old mother gave me when I started out; and she taught me a prayer too. And I've been letting them oars lie idle in the bottom of the old boat all these years. D'ye s'pose they are as good and stout as ever? And would they pull an old fellow like me into port?"

"I am sure they would. O, Jerry, I wish you would take hold of them and pull!"

"I believe I will! I'll get out the old Bible to-night and I'll say that little prayer; or if I can't remember that I'll whittle out a new one. I promise you, Miss, I'll do it!"

The next morning, Edith was just starting out to walk down to the river when a messenger came in haste: "O, Miss Manton! There's been an accident, and Old Jerry is most killed! He wants you. You'll have to come quickly, for they say he can't last long. He is out of his head and keeps saying something about pulling for the shore. Folks say he thinks he is out in a boat." This the boy said as they were hastening to the wharf.

"How did it happen?" asked Edith.

"I don't rightly know. They were unloading a vessel at the wharf and some way Jerry slipped and a heavy cask rolled over him. The doctor says he can't live."

When they reached the place where Jerry was slowly breathing his life away, some one said—"Jerry, Jerry, here is Miss Manton!"

Jerry opened his eyes and said faintly, "Sing that!"

And there, surrounded by a group of rough, though kindly men, Edith sang:

As she paused Jerry's lips moved, and bending low to hear, Edith caught the whisper:

"I did it! I took the oars; I pulled for the shore. I guess I'll make the harbor!"

A few more labored breaths and Jerry had, as we trust, "made the harbor."

"What if I had not used that last opportunity?" said Edith to herself as she walked back to her cottage.