1.02.01. Book 2: Ch 1. That Thy Work Might Appear
That Thy Work Might Appear The pride of the height, the clear firmament, the beauty of heaven, with his glorious show .... Then commandedst Thou a fair light to come forth of Thy treasures, that Thy work might appear.- Sir 43:1; 2Es 1:1.
CHAPTER I
GREEN, green forest stretching as far as the eye can see on three sides, rising in mighty billows up the mountains, leaving bare only the rocky tops; high climbing, low dipping forest. A valley, like the trough of the wave of forest green. In the middle of the smother of green the red roof of a house, our forest house. The house looks as if it could not breathe for forest, but it can; in front the trees drop sharply down, like a cliff dropping to the sea, the green, green sea of the forest. And still further down, framed between mountains, the plains.
They might be the plains of the world, so vast are they in this evening light, losing themselves in the mists that hang over the Indian Ocean, mixing themselves with the sky in the pale, far East. Up in our eyrie we, a little group of humans, crouch to the leeward of a huge sugar-loaf crag, each holding on with one hand to its rough side as we stoop forward and look down on the forest and the plains.
What infinitesimal dots we feel here, merest leaves blown up by the wind; but by no means were we blown up, under the jungle we crawled step by step, through a dried water-course at first, and then up what felt in parts like a roof for steepness, every foot of it tedious toil because of the thick undergrowth, till suddenly we came upon this great crag like a mountain-top in a child’s first drawing, as sharply cut, as definite as the mountain tops of one’s imagination always are, and in geographical fact so often are not. Thus it shot through the forest, and looked over the world; a wind-swept solitary palm clutching on with brave roots to a crevice half-way up, rough mountain grass embracing it a few feet higher, then nothing but three or four enormous rocks, tossed one on the top of the other, forming an arch for kings. The topmost of these is the hill-top. On a shelf six feet below the point of the highest sugar-loaf we have found room to sit. And Bala and Sella, all quick with the spirit of adventure, stand alone on the very tip, to appear from the house below as waving, gesticulating dolls. But the glory of the billows of green forest, the almost unearthly wonder of the mountains, seen thus in the light that only comes between rains, the blue-bordered embroidery of the spreading plains, not these things hold us, as we cling on to our various crannies on the sugar-loaf and gaze down enchanted: Dohnavur, it is our own Dohnavur that holds us; we can see into it; see part of its nearly mile-long wall, the little pointed red roofs of its nurseries, the trees of its gardens, the bungalow roof, a mere slip of red paint, my room’s roof a round-shaped daub, and most clearly of all the new, largest nursery, built all by itself in the field facing the hills. And now there is a sudden delighted shout, "See, its two porches! Oh, we can see its porches!" For the sun, now due west, has picked them out, and as clearly as if they had been three hundred feet below instead of something over three thousand, we see for a few bright moments the white mortar lines running down the long roof, the two porches, wherein are hanging the many little white hammocks ("we can see them too with our inward eyes" interpolate the fascinated children), the new boys’ nursery to the north, each like a small cameo carved by those level rays. For so was a fair light commanded to come out of His treasures that His work might appear. For surely more precious than even the glorious forest and the mountains which sweep in new and beautiful curves unperceived from below, more precious than all the coloured glory of the plains in so far as it is only of earth, air, water, is that little square within its garden walls, the work of the everlasting God. And here in the midst of the vast, the imposing, where the eye is satisfied with seeing, and the heart in some measure is enlarged to feel its own insignificance, we look down upon that little patch on the far-spreading plains and are glad with an exultation that asks for the shout of the waterfall, the song of the birds at dawn to tell it, that such as the Workman is, so also His work.
Why should we fear for His work, whether it be in a place dear as the apple of our eye to us, or in a soul to succour whom we would pour out all we have? Are the children of these lands, yes and of our cities at home and of all waste places, unregarded by Him? On many a life fell, as we looked down, what seemed like a special ray of that commanded light, and we saw, as if we had never seen it before, that we need not, dare not, fear for any single child in whose inconspicuous life is set the imperishable work of the Lord. And proof after proof of it floated from that patch on the plains, among them the Brownie’s story, now to be told. The Brownie My son, if thou come to serve the Lord, prepare thy soul for temptation.- Sir 2:1.