E-text prepared by Al Haines
by
Edited by His Friend, Reuben Shapcott.
London:
Kegan Paul, Trench, Truebner, & Co., Ltd.
1890
I dedicate this result of my editorial labours to you, because youwere dear to our friend who is dead, and are almost the only person nowalive, save myself, who knew him at the time these papers were written.A word of explanation is necessary with regard to the picture at thebeginning of the book. You will remember that Rutherford had in hispossession a seal, which originally belonged to some early ancestor.It was engraved with a device to illustrate a sentence from Lilly. Themeaning given to the sentence was not exactly Livy's, but still it mayvery well be a little extended, and there is no doubt that the Romanwould not have objected. This seal, as you know, was much valued byRutherford, and was curiously connected with certain events in his lifewhich happened when Miriam was at school. Nevertheless, it cannotanywhere be found. It has been described, however, to Mr. WalterCrane, and he has reproduced it with singular accuracy. It struck me,that although it has no direct relation with anything in the volume, itmight be independently interesting, especially considering the part themotto played in Rutherford's history.
The story which Jotham told his children on the day before his deathconcerning the achievements of his father Gideon—His comments andthose of Time thereon.
I am an old man, and I desire before I die to tell you more fully theachievements of your grandfather. Strange that this day much that Ihad forgotten comes back to me clearly.
During his youth the children of the East possessed the land for sevenyears because we had done evil. We were driven to lodge in the cavesof the mountains, so terrible was the oppression. If we sowed corn,the harvest was not ours, for the enemy came over Jordan with theMidianites and the Amalekites and left nothing for us, taking away allour cattle and beasts of burden. We cried unto God, and He sent aprophet to us, who told us that our trouble came upon us because of oursins, but otherwise he did nothing to help us. One day yourgrandfather was threshing wheat, not near the threshing-floor, for theMidianites watched the threshing-floors to see if any corn was broughtthere, but close to the wine-press. It was at Ophrah in Manasseh, thehome of his father. While he threshed, thinking upon all his troublesand the troubles of his country, not knowing if he could hide enoughcorn to save himself and his household from hunger and death, the angelof the Lord descended and sat under the oak. He may have been therefor some time before my father was aware of him, for my father was busywith his threshing, and his heart was sore. At last he turned and sawthe angel bright and terrible, and before he could speak the angel saidto him, "The Lord is with thee, thou mighty man of valour." My father,as I have said, was threshing by the wine-press, on his guard eventhere lest he should be robbed or slain, and it seemed strange to himthat the angel should say the Lord was with him. So strange did itseem, tha