oving Mary Magdalen wash his feet with costly ointment, that might
have been sold for three hundred pence, and the money given to the
poor--'and us.' Judas was so thoughtful for the poor, so eager that
other people should sell all they had, and give the money to the
poor--'and us.' Methinks that, even in this nineteenth century, one can
still hear from many a tub and platform the voice of Judas, complaining
of all waste, and pleading for the poor--'and us.'

"They were present at the parting of Mary and Jesus by Bethany, and it
will be many a day before the memory of that scene ceases to vibrate in
their hearts. It is the scene that brings the humanness of the great
tragedy most closely home to us. Jesus is going to face sorrow and death
at Jerusalem. Mary's instinct tells her that this is so, and she pleads
to him to stay.

"Poor Mary! To others he is the Christ, the Saviour of mankind, setting
forth upon his mighty mission to redeem the world. To loving Mary
Mother, he is her son: the baby she has suckled at her breast, the little
one she has crooned to sleep upon her lap, whose little cheek has lain
against her heart, whose little feet have made sweet music through the
poor home at Bethany: he is her boy, her child; she would wrap her
mother's arms around him and hold him safe against all the world, against
even heaven itself.

"Never, in any human drama, have I witnessed a more moving scene than
this. Never has the voice of any actress (and I have seen some of the
greatest, if any great ones are living) stirred my heart as did the voice
of Rosa Lang, the Burgomaster's daughter. It was not the voice of one
woman, it was the voice of Motherdom, gathered together from all the
world over.

"Oliver Wendell Holmes, in _The Autocrat of the Breakfast Table_, I
think, confesses to having been bewitched at different times by two
women's voices, and adds that both these voices belonged to German women.
I am not surprised at either statement of the good doctor's. I am sure
if a man did fall in love with a voice, he would find, on tracing it to
its source, that it was the voice of some homely-looking German woman. I
have never heard such exquisite soul-drawing music in my life, as I have
more than once heard float from the lips of some sweet-faced German
Fraulein when she opened her mouth to speak. The voice has been so pure,
so clear, so deep, so full of soft caressing tenderness, so strong to
comfort, so gentle