Chapter IV: Front Matter (4)

“And what would you do with the money, if you had it?”

“I’d--I’d use it,” said Fred, beginning to feel that he had come to debating school without sufficiently understanding the question.

“Do you see that pile of large stones near my barn?” said the gentleman. “I’ll give you those, and lend you a wheelbarrow to get them home.”

“I thank you,” said Fred; “but I don’t want them. They’re of no use.”

“O, yes, they are! You can build a house with them,” said the gentleman.

“But I’m not ready to build a house,” said Fred. “I haven’t any land to build it on, nor any other materials, nor anything to put into it; and I’m not old enough to be married and keep house.”

“Very true, my son! and if you had a cart-load of money now, it wouldn’t be of any more value to you than a cart-load of those building stones. But, after you have been to school a few years longer, and trained yourself to some business, and made a man of yourself, and developed your character, then you will have tastes, and capacities, and duties that require money; and if you get it as you go along, and always have enough to satisfy them, and none in excess to encumber you, that will be the happiest fortune you can find.”

Fred took a few minutes to think of it. Then he said,--

“I believe you have told me the truth, and set me on the right track. I will go home again, and try to make a man of myself first, and a rich man afterward.”

“Before you start, perhaps you would like to come into my house and get rested, and look at some pictures.”

Fred accepted the invitation. The lady of the house gave him a delicious lunch, and he spent an hour in the clergyman’s study, looking over two or three portfolios of prints and drawings, which they explained to him. Then he bade them good-bye, shouldered his bundle, and started for home, having the good fortune to catch a long ride, and arriving just as I did.

“What I’ve learned,” said he, as he finished his story, “is, that you can get rich if you don’t care for anything else; but you’ve either got to work yourself to death for it, or else cheat somebody. You can get it out of the ground by working, or you can get it out of men by cheating. But who wants to do either? I don’t. And I believe it isn’t much use being rich, any way.”

Then I told Fred my adventures. “And what I’ve learned,” said I, “is, that you can get rich without much trouble, if you’re willing to wait all your life for forests to grow and property to rise. But what’s the use of money to an old man or an old woman that’s blind and deaf, and just ready to die? Or what good does it do a mean man, with a lot of loafers round him? It can’t make him a gentleman.”

And meditating upon this newly-acquired philosophy, Fred and I went to our homes.

“Mother,” said I, “I’ve got back.”

“Yes, my son, I expected you about this time.”

“But I haven’t found a fortune, nor brought your camel’s-hair shawl.”

“It’s just as well,” said she; “for I haven’t anything else that would be suitable to wear with it.”

THE LITTLE CHRISTMAS PIES.

BY E. F.

Floris shut up her book, and looked at mamma. “Mamma, I wish we could be s’prised Christmas!”

“Surprised.” It was a moment before mamma understood. “It is somewhat difficult,” she said then, “to surprise little girls who feel at liberty to go to mamma’s drawers at any time, and to untie all the packages when the delivery-man comes. In a small house like this people have to help surprise themselves.”

“Who wants to help surprise theirselves!” exclaimed little Katy. “You ought to be cunning, mamma, and hide things; a ‘truly’ hide--you know--and not just in bureau drawers.”

“_That’s_ not what I mean at all, Katy,” said Floris. “Mamma, I mean a _surprise_, and not our Christmas presents. Of course, Katy and I know what them’ll be, or _most_ know. It’ll be our new hats, or some aprons, or something we’d had to have any way, and just one of the every-day Christmas presents besides; a book, or a horn of candy. I most know mine’ll be a silver thimble this year, ’cause I lost my old one, and I heard you tell papa that Katy’d better have a workbox, so’s to s’courage her to learn sewing more. Now, see ’f ’tain’t so.”

Mamma sat before her little daughters, her guilt confessed in her looks.

“Not that we blame you, mamma,” added Floris, kindly. “I’m old ’nough now to know that if Santa Klaus brings us anything, he comes round beforehand, and gets every cent they cost out of papa--great Santa Klaus, that is!”

“But what did you mean by a surprise, Floris?”

“O, I d’no, quite,” answered Floris. “But I thought I sh’d like to have something happen that never had before; something planned for me ’n’ Katy that we didn’t know a breath about, and there was no chance of prying into, so that ’twould honestly s’prise us. I never was s’prised in my life yet, mamma. I always found out some way.”

Mrs. Dewey smiled. She went out to prepare dinner, and nothing more was said; and Miss Floris took up her book with a sigh.

But at night, while she was buttoning the two white night-dresses, Mrs. Dewey returned to the subject. “My little daughters, if you will keep out of the kitchen to-morrow, all day, I think I can promise that something very strange and delightful shall happen on Christmas.”

Four little feet jumped right up and down, two little faces flew up in her own, four little hands caught hold of her, four bright eyes transfixed her--indeed, they came pretty near having the secret right out of her on the spot.

“O, mamma! What _is_ it?”

“You must be very anxious to be ‘truly s’prised,’” remarked mamma.

Floris saw the point. She subsided at once. She smiled at mamma with the first elder-daughter smile that had ever crossed the bright child-face.

“I guess I _shall_ be ‘truly s’prised’ if we _are_ s’prised,” she said, with a funny little grimace, as she laid her head on the pillow.

“Now, remember, it is to be a ‘truly keep-out,’” warned Mrs. Dewey. “You are not to enter the kitchen at all--not once all day to-morrow.”

“Why, surely, mamma Dewey, you are not to do anything towa’ds it before breakfast,” reasoned little Katy.

“I shall at least notice whether I am obeyed.”

“What’ll happen if we don’t?” inquired Katy.

“Nothing’ll happen then,” said mamma, quietly.

The little voices said no more, and mamma went down stairs. They said not a single word more, because the little Deweys were so constructed that had there not been a standing command that they should not speak after mamma closed the door, their little pink tongues would have run all night; but they squeezed each other’s hands very tightly, and also remained awake somewhat longer than usual.

Mrs. Dewey smiled next morning to see her daughters seated at their lessons in that part of the sitting-room furthest from the door that opened into the hall and thus into the kitchen. They never once directly referred to last night’s conversation; but they were extremely civil to her personally, most charmingly civil, obedient, and thoughtful. Indeed, Katy’s little round shingled head would bob out into the hall almost every time mamma’s step was heard. “You must let me bring you anything I can, mamma--anything I can, ’thout going into the kitchen, I mean.”

But, to Katy’s disappointment, mamma wished no assistance. Floris offered to go down town, if mamma needed. But mamma wished nothing that Floris could do. However, to their delight, they saw the delivery-man, when he came, taking down lots of orders in his book. “Would it be w’ong to listen in the hall?” Katy whispered. “’Cause I could hear everything she told him, ’f I was a-mind to.”

Floris told her it would be very wrong.

The elder little girl studied, and played, and sang, and amused her doll all the morning, and refused to listen to any pleasant sound she heard from the kitchen. She shut her little nose, also, against a sudden whiff of deliciousness as some door opened. She even went to the well, and brought hard water for her room, because the rain water would have taken her near the forbidden regions.

But little Katy was as restless as a bee. She had a thousand errands through the hall. When Floris reprimanded her, she said she didn’t ’tend to go a-near the kitchen door. Floris looked out often; but, at last, the little one settled on the hall stairs with her paint-box, and the elder sister felt at rest.

But even to her it finally grew a long forenoon. Before ten o’clock she found herself infected with the same restlessness. Then the various sounds which she heard distracted her, such busy sounds--she would, at last, have given almost anything to know what was going on out there.

The mantel clock was just striking eleven when the hall door unclosed, and Katy’s plump little person partially appeared.

“Come here, quick, quick! or she’ll be back. _I’ve found out, Flory!_”

“O, _have_ you--Why, Katy Dewey!” Floris over-turned the music-stool as she ran. Katy, her head turned listeningly toward the kitchen door, blindly crowded a spoonful of something into her mouth.

“There! isn’t that ’licious good? O, Floris, such things as I have seen out there!--the box of raisins is down on the table, and all her extrach Lubin bottles. I couldn’t stay to look much; but, Floris, there’s twelve of the most beautiful mince patties--O, the most beautiful! all iced, and ‘Merry Christmas,’ in pink sand, on every one, and there’s twelve more in the iron ready to fill--_wasn’t_ that I gave you _crammed_ with raisins!”

Floris’s eyes danced. “Kit Dewey, I’ll bet we’re going to have a Christmas party--a party of little boys and girls! What else was there, do tell me!”

“O, I d’no; there was heaps of raisins--and, _mebbe_, there was ice cream;” suddenly remembering Floris’s fondness for that delectable.

Floris knew better than that; but still her eyes danced. Suddenly they heard the back kitchen door, and, as suddenly, Floris turned white. “The mince-spoon, Katy! You’ve brought the mince-spoon! Mamma’ll know!”

Katy’s little mouth dropped open.

“Quick! She’s coming this way!”

Floris softly got into the sitting-room, so did Katy.

“Where is the spoon?” hurriedly whispered the elder girl.

“I stuffed it under the stair carpet, where that rod was up.”

They could hear mamma coming through the hall. But she came only part way. After a pause, she returned to the kitchen.

“Katy, what if she’s found it?”

“She couldn’t.”

They stole out into the hall. The spoon was gone!

“O, Katy! I’ll bet you left it sticking out!” said Floris, and burst into tears. Katy did the same. With one accord they ascended the stairs to their room.

When, with red eyes, they came down to dinner, they found mamma in the dining-room as placid as usual. The kitchen door was wide open. After dinner Floris was requested to wipe the dishes. Her work took her into every part of the kitchen domains, and her red eyes peered about sharply; but nothing unusual was to be seen--not one trace of the beautiful patties, not a raisin-stem, even!

Christmas day came and went. Floris had her silver thimble, and Katy her work-box. The dinner table was in the usual holiday trim. But the little frosted pies, with the pink greetings, were not brought forward--no, and not one word was said concerning them, not even by mamma’s eyes.

At night they cried softly in their little white bed, after mamma had gone down. “And, Floris, I ’member now, there was something else, under a white cloth, like a plate of kisses, I thought,” sobbed Katy, her wet little face pressed into the pillows; “and I shall always think she was going to make fruitcake, for there was citron all cut up, and there was almonds--”

“Don’t, Katy! I don’t want to hear it! I _can’t_ hear it!” said Floris, in a thick voice; “and don’t let us disobey mamma more by talking.”

But what did become of the beautiful, frosted, pink-lettered little pies--would you like to know?

Floris and Katy cannot tell you; for never yet have mamma and her little daughters exchanged a word upon the subject--but I think _I_ can. At least I was told that a factory-weaver’s family, where there were several little girls, had the most lovely of patties, and kisses, and sugar-plums sent them for their Christmas dinner last year.

THE STRANGERS FROM THE SOUTH.

BY ELLA FARMAN.

Unless I take a long half mile circle, my daily walk to the post-office leads me down through an unsavory, wooden-built portion of town. I am obliged to pass several cheap groceries, which smell horribly of _sauer-kraut_ and Limburg cheese, a restaurant steamy with Frenchy soups, a livery stable, besides two or three barns, and some gloomy, windowless, shut-up buildings, of whose use I haven’t the slightest idea.

Of course, when I go out in grand toilet, I take the half mile circle. But, being a business woman, and generally in a hurry, I usually go this short way in my short walking-dress and big parasol; and, probably, there is an indescribable expression to my nose, just as Mrs. Jack Graham says.

Well, one morning I was going down town in the greatest hurry. I was trying to walk so fast that I needn’t breathe once going by the Dutch groceries; and I was almost to the open space which looks away off to the sparkling river, and the distant park, and the forenoon sun,--I always take a good, long, sweet breath there, coming and going,--when my eye was caught by a remarkable group across the street.

Yes, during the night, evidently, while the town was asleep, there had been an arrival--strangers direct from the Sunny South.

And there the remarkable-looking strangers sat, in a row, along the narrow step of one of the mysterious buildings I have alluded to. They were sunning themselves with all the delightful carelessness of the experienced traveler. Though, evidently, they had been presented with the liberty of the city, it was just as evident that they didn’t care a fig for sightseeing--not a fig, either, for the inhabitants. All they asked of our town was its sunshine. They had selected the spot where they could get the most of it. Through the open space opposite the sun streamed broadly; and the side of a weather-colored building is _so_ warm!

What a picture of _dolce far niente_, of “sweet-do-nothing,” it was! I stopped, hung my parasol over my shoulder,--there was a little too much sunshine for me,--and gazed at it.

“O, how you do love it! You bask like animals! That fullness of enjoyment is denied to us white-skins. What a visible absorption of luster and heat! You are the true lotus-eaters!”

The umber-colored creatures--I suppose they are as much warmer for being brown, as any brown surface is warmer than a white one. I never did see sunshine drank, and absorbed, and enjoyed as that was. It was a bit of Egypt and the Nile life. I could not bear to go on.

Finally, I crossed the street to them. Not one of them stirred. The eldest brother was standing, leaning against the building. He turned one eye on me, and kept it there. At his feet lay a bulging, ragged satchel. Evidently he was the protector.

The elder sister, with hands tucked snugly under her folded arms, winked and blinked at me dozily. The little boy with the Nubian lips was sound asleep,--a baby Osiris,--his chubby hands hiding together between his knees for greater warmth. The youngest sister, wrapped in an old woolen shawl, was the only uncomfortable one of the lot. There was no doze nor dream in her eyes yet--poor thing, _she_ was cold!

I didn’t believe they had had anywhere to lay their heads during the night. Liberty of a city, to one kind of new arrivals, means just that, you know. Sundry crumbs indicated an absence of the conventional breakfast table. Poor little darkies!

“Children,” I said, like a benevolently-disposed city marshal, “you mustn’t sit here in the street.”

“We’s gwine on soon, mistis,” said the protector, meekly.

“I ’low we ain’t, Jim!” The big sister said this without any diminution of the utter happiness of her look.

“It’s powerful cold comin’ up fru the norf, mistis. I _mus’_ let ’em warm up once a day,” said Jim.

“Up through the north! Pray, where are you going?”

Jim twisted about. He looked down at the toe of his boot, reflectively.

“I ex-pect, I ex-pect--”

“You _spec_, Jim! You allers spectin’! Mistis, we’s _free_--we kin go anywhars!”

I suspect there had been a great deal of long-suffering on the part of Jim. He burst out like flame from a smoldering fire,--

“_Anywhars!_ That’s what ails niggas! Freedom means _anywhars_ to ’em, and so they’re nuffin’ nor nobody. You vagabon’, Rose Moncton, you _kin’t_ go anywhars much longer--not ’long o’ me!”

“O, you white folksy Jim! I ’low this trompin’ was yer own plan. When you finds a town whar it’s any show of warm, I’ll hang up my things and stay, and not afore--ye hyar that! I ’low I won’t see Peyty and Kit a-freezin’!”

She scowled at me, she actually did, as if I froze her with my pale face and cool leaf-green dress, and kept the sun off her, talking with that “white folksy Jim.”

I fancied Jim was hoping I would say something more to them. I fancied he, at least, was in great need of a friend’s advice.

“Where did you come from?” I asked him. But the other head of the family answered,--

“Come from nuff sight warmer place than we’s goin’ anywhars.”

“Rose is allers techy when she’s cold, mistis,” Jim apologized. “Ole Maum Phillis used fer to say as Rose’s temper goose-pimpled when the cold air struck it. We kim from Charleston, mistis. We’s speckin’ to work out some land for ourselves, and hev a home. We kim up norf to git wages, so as we kin all help at it. I’d like to stop hyar, mistis.”

“Hyar! I ’low we’s goin’ soufard when we gits from dis yer, you Jim,” sniffed “Rose Moncton,” her face up to the sunshine.

Poor Jim looked care-worn. I dare say my face was tolerably sympathetic. It felt so, at least.

“Mistis,” the fellow said, “she’s kep us tackin’ souf an’ norf, souf an’ norf, all dis yer week, or we’d been somewhars. She don’t like de looks of no town _yet_. We’s slep’ roun’ in sheds six weeks now. I gits sawin’ an’ choppin’, an’ sich, to do once a day, while dey warms up in de sun, an’ eats a bite. Den up we gits, an’ tromps on. We’s got on so fur, but Rose ain’t clar at all yit whar we’ll stop. Mistis, whar is de warmest place _you_ knows on?”

I thought better and better of myself as the heavy-faced fellow thus appealed to me. I felt flattered by his confidence in me. I always feel flattered when a strange kitty follows me, or the birdies hop near for my crumbs. But I will confess that no human vagabond had ever before so skillfully touched the soft place in my heart. Poor, dusky wanderer! he looked so hungry, he looked so worn-out, too, as a head of a family will when the other head pulls the other way.

“Well, Jim, the warmest place I know of is in my kitchen. I left a rousing fire there ten minutes ago. You all stay here until I come back, which will be in about seven minutes; then you shall go home with me, and I will give you a good hot dinner. You may stay all night, if you like, and perhaps I can advise you. You will be rested, at the least, for a fresh start.”

Rose Moncton lifted her listless head, and looked in my face. “Laws!” said she. “Laws!” said she again.

Jim pulled his forelock to me, vailed the flash in his warm umbery eyes with a timely wink of the heavy lids. He composed himself at once into a waiting attitude.

I heard another “Laws!” as I hastened away. “That young mistis is done crazy. She’ll nebber kim back hyar, ’pend on dat!” Such was Rose’s opinion of me.

I opened my ears for Jim’s. But Jim made no reply.

Father and mother had gone out of town for two days. Our hired girl had left. I really was “mistis” of the premises. If I chose to gather in a circle of shivering little “niggas” around my kitchen stove, and heat that stove red-hot, there was nobody to say I better not.

I was back in five minutes, instead of seven. Jim stood straight up on his feet the moment he discovered me coming. Rose showed some faint signs of life and interest. “’Clar, now, mistis! Kim along, den, Jim, and see ye look to that there verlise. Hyar, you Kit!” She managed to rouse her sister with her foot, still keeping her hands warmly hidden, and her face to the sun.

But the other head took the little ones actively in charge. “Come, Peyty, boy! come, Kit! we’s gwine now!”

Peyty opened his eyes--how starry they were! “O, we goin’, mo’? Jim, I don’t want to go no mo’!”

“Ain’t gwine clar thar no, Peyty, boy; come, Kit--only to a house to warm the Peyty boy--come Kit!”

Kit was coming fast enough. But Peyty had to be taken by the arm and pulled up. Then he stepped slowly, the tears coming. The movement revealed great swollen welts, where his stiff, tattered, leathern shoes had chafed and worn into the fat, black little legs. “Is dat ar Mistis Nelly?” he asked, opening his eyes, wonderingly, at the white lady.

Rose had got up now. A sudden quiver ran over her face. “No, Peyty. Mist’ Nelly’s dead, you know. Wish we’s back to Mas’r Moncton’s, and Mist’ Nelly libbin’, an’ Linkum sojers dead afore dey cum!”

There was a long sigh from everybody, even from Jim. But he drew in his lips tightly the next moment. “Some niggas nebber was worf freein’. Come along, Peyty, boy--ready, mistis.”

I walked slowly along at the head of the strangers from the south. Little feet were so sore, Peyty couldn’t walk fast. Kit’s big woman’s size shoes were so stiff she could only shuffle along. Jim’s toes were protruding, and I fancied he and Rose were as foot-sore as the little ones. I dare say people looked and wondered; but I am not ashamed to be seen with any kind of children.

I took them around to the back door, into the kitchen, which I had found unendurable while baking my bread and pies. The heated air rushed out against my face as I opened the door. It was a delicious May-day; but the procession behind me, entering, proceeded direct to the stove, and surrounded it in winter fashion, holding their hands out to the heat. Even from Jim I heard a soft sigh of satisfaction.

Poor, shivering children of the tropics! I drew up the shades. There were no outer blinds, and the sun streamed in freely.

“There, now. Warm yourselves, and take your own time for it. Put in wood, Jim, and keep as much fire as you like. I am going to my room to rest for an hour. Be sure that you don’t go off, for I wish you to stay here until you are thoroughly rested. I have plenty of wood for you to saw, Jim.”

I brought out a pan of cookies. I set them on the table. “Here, Rose, see that Peyty and Kit have all they want. When I come down, I’ll get you some dinner.”

The poor children in stories, and in real life, too, for that matter, always get only bread and butter--dear me, poor dears! When I undertake a romance for these waifs in real life, or story, I always give them cookies--cookies, sweet, golden, and crusty, with sifted sugar.

I left them all, even to Jim, looking over into the pan. My! rich, sugary jumbles, and plummy queen’s cakes? When I saw their eyes dance--no sleep in those eyes now--I was glad it wasn’t simply wholesome sandwiches and plain fried cakes, as somebody at my elbow says now it ought to have been. I would have set out a picnic table, with ice-cream and candies, for those wretched little “niggas,” if I could! I nodded to them, and went away. It is so nice, after you have made a child happy, to add some unmistakable sign that it is quite welcome to the happiness!

I knew there was nothing which they could steal. I expected they would explore the pantry. I judged them by some of my little white friends. But the silver was locked up. China and glass would hardly be available. If, after they had stuffed themselves with those cookies, they could want cold meat, and bread and butter, I surely shouldn’t begrudge it. Then I thought of my own especial lemon tart, which stood cooling on the shelf before the window; but I was not going back to insult that manly Jim Moncton by removing it.

Just as I was slipping on my dressing-gown up in my own cool, quiet chamber, I caught a faint sound of the outside door of the kitchen. Something like a shriek, or a scream, followed. Then there was an unmistakable and mighty overturning of chairs. I rushed down. At the very least I expected to see my romantic “Rose Moncton” with her hands clenched in brother Jim’s kinky hair. With loosened tresses, without belt or collar, I appeared on the scene.

What did I see? Why, I saw Phillis, Mrs. Jack Graham’s black cook, with every one of my little “niggas” in her arms--heads of the family and all! There they were, sobbing and laughing together, the portly Phillis the loudest of the whole. One of Mrs. Jack’s favorite china bowls lay in fragments on the floor.

Phillis called out hysterically as she saw me. Jim discovered me the same moment. He detached himself, went up to the window, and bowed his head down upon the sash. I saw the tears roll down his cheek and drop.

“Laws, Miss Carry! dese my ole mas’r’s niggers! dey’s Mas’r Moncton’s little nigs, ebery one! dey’s runned roun’ under my feet in Mas’r Moncton’s kitchen many a day down in ole Carline--bress em souls!” She hugged them again, and sobbed afresh, The children clung to the old cook’s neck, and waist, and arms like so many helpless, frightened black kittens.

Phillis at last recovered her dignity. She pointed them to their chairs. She picked up the pieces of china in her apron. “Done gone, anyhow--dese pickaninnies gib ole Phillis sich a turn! It mose like seein’ Mas’r Moncton an’ Miss Nelly demselves. Whar you git ’em, Miss Carry?”

I told her.

“Bress your heart, Miss Carry! Len’ me a cup, and git me some yeast, and I’ll bring Mistis Graham ober, an’ I’ll be boun’, when she sees dat ar lubly little Peyty, she’ll hire him to--to--to--lor! she’ll hire him to look into his diamint eyes.”

I know she herself kissed tears out of more than one pair of “diamint eyes” while I was getting the yeast. I heard her.

“O, Maum Phillis!” I heard Jim say. “You think we’ll hire out roun’ hyar?”

“_Could_ we, Maum Phillis?” pleaded Rose, her voice soft and warm now. “We’s done tired out. I’m clean ready to drop down in my tracks long this yer blessed stove, and nebber stir anywhars!”

“Bress you, chilluns! You _hev_ tromped like sojers, clar from ole Carline! Spec it seems like home, findin’ one of de old place hands--Phillis knows. Dar, dar! don’t take on so. Miss Carry, she’ll bunk you down somewhar it’s warm, and thar you stay an’ rest dem feet. I’ll send my mistis ober, and dey two’ll pervide fer ye on dis yer street; dis yer one ob de Lord’s own streets.”

Well, do you think Mistis Graham and Mistis Carry dishonored Maum Phillis’s faith in them?

No, indeed! The family found homes on “de Lord’s own street.” Jam is coachman at Squire Lee’s. Peyty is at the same place, taken in at first for his sweet disposition, and “diamint eyes,” I suspect. He is now a favorite table-waiter.

Kit is Maum Phillis’s right-hand woman. Rose is our own hired girl. She is somewhat given to sleepiness, and to idling in sunny windows, and to scorching her shoes and aprons against the stove of a winter’s evening. But, on the whole, she is a good servant; and we have built her a bedroom out of the kitchen.

I have never regretted crossing the street to speak to the strangers from the south.

WI’ WEE WINKERS BLINKIN’.

BY J. E. RANKIN, D. D.

Wi’ wee winkers blinkin’,
Blinkin’ like the starn,
What’s wee tottie thinkin’?
Tell her mither, bairn.
On night’s downy dream-wings,
Where’s the bairnie been,
That she has sic seemings
In her blinkin’ een?

Let her mither brood her,
Like the mither-doe;
When enough she’s woo’d her,
She maun prie her mou’:
Let her mither shake her,
Like an apple bough,
Frae her dreams to wake her:--
That’s our bairnie now!

There! I’ve got her crowin’
Like the cock at dawn;
Mou’ wi’ fistie stowin’,
When she tries to yawn:
She’ll na play the stranger
Drappit frae the blue,
Lest there might be danger
Back she sud gae through!

She’s our little mousie,
In this housie born,
That I tumble tousie,
Ilka, ilka morn:
She’s her mither’s bairnie,
Only flesh an’ blood;
Blinkin’ like the starnie
Through a neebor cloud.

THE CHILDRENS’ SHOES.

BY BLANCHE B. BAKER (_nine years’ old_).

Four pairs of little shoes.
All in a row;
Four pairs of little shoes
For to-morrow.

Four pairs of little shoes
Worn every day;
Four pairs of little shoes
Ready for play.

Four pairs of little shoes
By the fire’s glow;
Four pairs of little shoes
White at the toe.

Four pairs of little shoes
Travelling all day;
Four pairs of little shoes
Resting from play.

Four pairs of little shoes
Waiting for day;
Four pairs of little shoes
Never go astray!

ETHEL’S EXPERIMENT.

BY B. E. E.

White flakes on the upland, white flakes on the plain,
Frost bon-bons in meadow, in garden, in lane;
And wise little Ethel--the strangest of girls--
Puts on her grave thinking-cap, shakes her brown curls,
And talks to herself, in a curious way,
Of “snow” and a “ball” and a “hot summer’s day!”
Then, down to the brook, where the gnarled willows grow,
And the ice-covered reeds stand like soldiers in row,
Our brave little girl trudges off all alone,
And rolls a large snow-ball just under the stone
That lies on the brink of the streamlet, and then
In this wise begins her soliloquy: “When
The Fourth of July comes, what fun it will be
To have all this snow tucked away, for you see
Nobody will guess how it came there,--but me!”
Green leaves on the upland, green leaves on the plain,
And bluebirds and robins and south winds again.
The brook in the meadow is wide awake now,
And fragrant bloom drops from the old willows bough,
When Ethel remembers her treasure, her prize,
That under the edge of the great boulder lies;
And stealthily creeping close down to the brink,
Where the slender reeds quiver--now what do you think
Our little girl found? Why, never a trace
Of the snow-ball--O no! but just in its place
A tiny white violet, sweetest of sweet,
Because of the coverlid over its feet
Through all the long winter! And Ethel’s mamma,
When she heard the whole story said, “Truly we are
No wiser than children. We bury our grief,
And find in its hiding-place Hope’s tender leaf!”

CINDERS:

THE FORTUNE CARL FOUND IN THE ASHES.

BY MADGE ELLIOT.

How artful the wind was that cold March morning, hiding away every now and then, pretending to be quite gone, only to rush out with a fearful howl at such unexpected moments that Carl was nearly blown off his feet each time.

But he struggled bravely forward, bending his head to the blast, and holding his brimless hat on with one hand, while he carried his battered tin pail in the other.

There was not a gleam of fire in the wretched room he had just left; and Tony and Lena, his little sisters, wrapped in the old piece of carpet that served them for a blanket, were _almost_ crying with hunger and with cold.

They would have cried outright if Carl had not kissed them, and said, “Never mind, young uns--wait till I can give you each a reg’lar bang-up lace hankercher to cry on,--_then_ you may cry as much as you please.”

Father and mother had died within a week of each other, when February’s snows were upon the ground, leaving these three poor children without money and without friends--a bad way for even grown-ups to be left.

So Carl, poor boy, found himself, at ten years of age, the head of a family.

Of course he became a newsboy.

Almost all heads of families ten years and under, become newsboys.

Twenty-five cents given him by an old woman who sold apples and peanuts, and who, by the way, was not much better off than he was himself, started him in business.

But the business, I am sorry to say, scarcely paid the rent, leaving nothing for clothing, food and fire, three very necessary things,--be a home ever so humble.

So every morning, almost as soon as the day dawned--and I can tell you day dawns very quickly in a room where the window hasn’t a scrap of shade or curtain--before he went down town for his stock of morning papers, Carl started out to bring home the family fuel.

This consisted of whatever sticks and bits of wood he could find lying about the streets, and whatever cinders and pieces of coal he could pick from the ash-barrels and boxes.

If the weather was at all mild, Tony, the eldest sister, and the housekeeper, went with him, and helped him fill the old pail.

She carried a forlorn-looking basket, that seemed ashamed of the old piece of rope that served for its handle, and stopped on her way home at several houses, where the servant girls had taken a fancy to the gray-eyed, shy little thing, to get the family marketing.

But alas! very _very_ often the supply fell far short of the demand, for the winter had been a very severe one, and everybody had such a number of calls from all sorts of needy people, that they could afford to give but little to each one.

This particular March morning Carl went out alone, wondering as he went when “the fortune” was going to “turn up.”

For these poor children, shut out from dolls, fairy-books, and all things that make childhood merry and bright, used to while away many an hour, talking of “a fortune” which the brother had prophesied would one day be found in the ashes.

At different times this dream took different shapes.

Sometimes it was a pocket-book, oh! so fat with greenbacks, sometimes a purse of gold, sometimes “a diamint ring:” but, whatever it should prove to be, Carl was convinced, “felt it in his bones,” he said, it _would_ be found, and found hidden among the cinders.

Once he had brought home a silver fork, “scooped,” as he called it in newsboy’s slang, from an ash-heap in an open lot.

On this fork the family had lived for three days.

Once he rescued a doll, which _would_ have been _lovely_ if it had had a head; and at various times there were scraps of ribbon, lace and silk, all of which served to strengthen the belief that something wonderful must “turn up” at last.

“Cricky! how that old wind does holler,” said Carl to himself, as he toiled along, “an’ it cuts right through me, my jacket’s so thin an’ torn--I’d mend it myself if I only knew how, and somebody’d lend me a needle and thread.

“Don’t I wish I’d find the fortune this morning!

“I dreamt of it last night--dreamt it was a bar of gold, long as my arm, and precious thick, too.

“Guess I’ll go to that big bar’l afore them orful high flat houses--that’s _allus_ full of cinders.

“It’s lucky for us them big bugs don’t sift their ashes! _We_ wouldn’t have no fire if they did,--that’s what’s the matter.”

So he made his way to the “big bar’l,” hoping no one had been there before him, and, leaning over without looking, put his cold, red hand into the ashes, but he drew it out again in a hurry, for, cold as _it_ was, it had touched something colder.

“Hello!” cried Carl, “what’s that? It don’t feel ’zactly like the bar of gold,” and, dropping on his knees, he peeped in.

A dirty little, shaggy, once-white dog raised a pair of soft, dark, wistful eyes to his face.

“Why! I’m blessed,” said Carl, in great surprise, “if it ain’t a dog. Poor little beggar! that was his nose I felt, an’ wasn’t it cold?”

“I s’pose he’s got in among the ashes to keep warm; wot pooty eyes he’s got, just like that woman’s wot give me a ten cent stamp for the _Tribune_ the other day, and wouldn’t take no change. Poor old feller! Are you lost?”

The dog had risen to its feet, and still looking pleadingly at Carl, commenced wagging its tail in a friendly manner.

“Oh! you want me to take you home,” continued Carl. “I can’t ’cause I dunno where you live, and _my_ family eats all they can git theirselves--they’re awful pigs, they are,” and he laughed softly, “an’ couldn’t board a dog nohow.”

But the dog kept on wagging his tail, and as soon as Carl ceased speaking, as though grateful for even a few kind words, it licked the cold hand that rested on the side of the barrel.

That dog--kiss won the poor boy’s heart completely. “You _shall_ go with me,” he cried impulsively. “Jest come out of that barrel till I fill this pail with cinders, and then we’ll be off. He kin have the bones _we_ can’t crack with our teeth ennyhow,” he said to himself,--not a very cheerful prospect, it must be confessed, for the boarder.

The dog, as though he understood every word, jumped from the box, and seated himself on the icy pavement to wait for his new landlord and master.

In a few moments the pail was full, and the boy turned toward his home, running as fast as he could, with the dog trotting along by his side.

“See wot I foun’ in the ashes,” he cried, bounding into the room. “Here’s the fortune alive an’ kickin’. Wot you think of it?”

“Oh, wot a funny fortune!” said Tony, and “Wot a funny fortune!” repeated little Lena.

“It’s kinder queer,--the pocket-book an’ the dimint ring a-turnin’ into a dog!” Tony continued. “But no matter, if we can’t buy nothin’ with him, we can love him, poor little feller!”

“Poor ’ittle feller!” repeated Lina. “He nicer than dollie ’ithout a head, ennyhow. _We_ can lub him.”

“An’ now, Carl,” said the housekeeper, “you make the fire, an’ I’ll run to market, for it’s most time you went after your papers.”

And away she sped, to return in a few minutes with five or six cold potatoes, a few crusts of bread, and one bone, with very little meat--and that gristle--clinging to it.

And this bone--think if you can of a greater act of self-denial and charity--the children decided with one accord should be given to “Cinders,” as they had named the dog on the spot.

That night, after Carl had sold his papers, and come home tired but hopeful, for he had made thirty cents clear profit to save toward the rent, they all huddled together, with doggie in the midst of them, around the old iron furnace that held their tiny fire.

Presently the Head of the Family began whistling a merry tune, which was a great favorite with the newsboys.

Imagine the astonishment of the children when Cinders pricked up his ears, rose on his hind legs, and, after gravely walking across the room once, began to walk round and round, keeping perfect time to the music!

“Hurrah! hurrah!” shouted Carl, his eyes sparkling. “Look at that! look at that! Tony, it _’tis_ the fortune after all! an’ I _did_ find it in the ash-box!”

“Why, wot do you mean, Bub?” cried Tony, almost as excited as her brother. “Wot do you mean, an’ ware’s ‘the fortune?’”

“Why there, right afore your eyes. I mean Cinders is one o’ them orful smart hundred-dollar dogs wot does tricks. He’s bin lost by that circus wot went away night afore last, an’ he’s bin lost a-purpose to make my dreams come true! I’ll take him out the fust fine day, an’ we’ll bring home lots of stamps. You see if we don’t!”

“_I’ll_ sell the papers,” said Tony, by this time _quite_ as excited as her brother; “I kin do it, Carl. ‘’Ere’s the mornin’ Herald, Sun, Times an’ _Tri_-bune!’” imitating the shrill cry of the newsboy, and doing it very well, too, “an’ the fellers’ll be good to me, ’cos I’m your sister, an’ they like you.”

“You’re a brick, Tony!” said Carl, “an’ for sich a small brick the brickiest brick I ever knowed; but I kin sell ’em myself in the mornin’, an’ you kin take ’em in the afternoon, for that’s the time Cinders an’ me must perform. ‘Monseer Carlosky an’ his werry talented dog Cinders, son of the well-known French performing poodle Cinderella.’ How’s that, Tony? O I’ve read all about ’em on the circus bills, and that’s the way they do it. Yes, you’ll have to take the papers in the afternoon, cos then’s when the swell boys an’ gals is home from school,--’cept Saturdays, then we’ll be out most all day.”

“Dance more, Tinders, dance more!” here broke in little Lena; but Cinders stood looking at his master, evidently waiting for the music.

So Carl commenced whistling--did I tell you he whistled like a bird?--and Cinders once more marched gravely across the room, and then began waltzing again in the most comical manner.

He had evidently been trained to perform his tricks just twice; for when the music ceased _this_ time he proceeded to stand on his head, and then sitting up on his hind legs, he nodded politely to the audience, and held out one of his paws, as much as to say, “Now pay if you please.”

The poor children forgot hunger and cold in their delight, and that miserable room resounded to more innocent, merry laughter that night than it had heard for many long years, perhaps ever before.

Cinders got another bone for his supper--the others had nothing--and then they all went to bed, if lying on the bare floor, with nothing for a pillow can be called going to bed, and dreamed of “the fortune” found at last in the ashes.

The next afternoon, which fortunately was a fine one, for March having “come in like a lion was preparing to go out like a lamb,” Carl came racing up the crazy stairs, taking two steps at a time, and, tossing a bundle of evening papers to Tony, he whistled to Cinders, and away they went.

Poor Carl looked shabby enough, with his toes sticking out of a pair of old shoes--a part of the treasures “scooped” from the ash-heap--and not mates at that, one being as much too large as the other was too small, his tattered jacket and his brimless hat.

But Cinders followed him as faithfully as though he had been clad in a costly suit of the very latest style.

Turning into a handsome, quiet street, Carl stopped at last before a house where three or four rosy-cheeked children were flattening their noses against the panes of the parlor windows, trying to see a doll which another rosy-cheeked child was holding up at a window just opposite.

“Now Cinders, ole feller!” said Carl, while his heart beat fast, “do your best. BONES!” and he began to whistle.

At the first note Cinders stood up on his hind legs, at the second he took his first step forward.

At the beginning of the fourth bar the waltz began; and by this time the rosy-cheeked children had lost all interest in the doll over the way, and were all shouting and calling “Mamma!” and the cook and chambermaid had made their appearance at the area gate.

The march and waltz having been gone through with twice, Cinders stood on his head--“shure,” said the cook, “I couldn’t do it betther myself”--tumbled quickly to his feet again, nodded affably once to the right, once to the left, and once to the front of him, and held out his right paw.

“He’s the cliverest baste ever _I_ seen,” said the chambermaid, “so he is!” and she threw a five cent piece in Carl’s old hat; and, at the same moment the window was opened, and out flew a perfect shower of pennies, while the little girl across the way kept shouting, “Come here, ragged little boy! Come here, funny doggie! Oh, _why_ don’t you come here?”

And, making his best bow to his first audience, Carl went over to the doll’s house, and was received by the whole family, including grandpa and grandma, with great delight and laughter, and was rewarded at the end of his entertainment with much applause, three oranges, and a new ten cent stamp.

That afternoon Cinders earned one dollar and three cents for his little master; and I can’t describe to you the joy that reigned in that small bare room when Carl, in honor of his debut as “Monseer Carlosky” brought in, and spread out on a newspaper on the floor, a wonderful feast! Real loaf of bread, bought at the baker’s, bottle of sarsaparilla at the grocer’s, and peanuts, apples, and a hunk of some extraordinary candy from the old woman who kept a stand at the corner, and who had started Carl as a newsboy. She also received her twenty-five cents again, with five cents added by way of interest.

“Why! didn’t they look when they see me a-orderin’ things, and payin’ for ’em on the spot!” said “Monseer,” with honest pride, as he carved the loaf with an old jackknife.

As for Cinders, no meatless bone, but half a pound of delicious liver, did that remarkable dog receive, and more kisses on his cold, black nose than he knew what to do with.

After that, as the weather grew finer and finer, and the days longer, Carl and his dog wandered farther and farther, and earned more and more money every day, until the little sisters rejoiced in new shoes, hats and dresses, and the housekeeper had a splendid basket--not very large, of course--with a handle that any basket could be proud of, and actually _did_ go to market, fair and square, and no make believe about it.

And Carl presented himself with a brand-new suit of clothes, from the second-hand shop next door, including shoes that were made for each other, and a hat with a brim.

By-and-by the cheerless room was exchanged for a pleasanter one; and the story of the fair-haired Head of the Family, and the fortune he found in the ashes, took wings, and returned to him laden with blessings.

And five years from that bleak March morning, when Cinder looked up so pleadingly in the boy’s, face, Carl found himself a clerk in the counting-room of a generous, kind-hearted merchant.

“A boy who worked so hard and so patiently to take care of his little sisters,” this gentleman said to his wife, “and who was ready to share his scanty meals with a vagrant dog, _must_ be a good boy, and good boys make good men.”

And Tony and Lena, both grown to be bright, healthy, merry girls, befriended by many good women, were going to school, taking care of the house, earning a little in odd moments by helping the seamstress who lived on the floor below, and still looking up with love and respect to the Head of the Family.

Cinders, petted and beloved by all, performed in public no more, but spent most of his time lying by the fire in winter, and on the door-step in summer, waiting and listening for the step of his master.

So you see Carl was right.

He _did_ find his fortune among the ashes.

But would it have proved a fortune had he been a cruel, selfish, hard-hearted boy?

Ah! that’s the question.

TOM’S CENTENNIAL.

_A FOURTH OF JULY STORY._

BY MARGARET EYTINGE.

“Hurrah! To-morrow’s the Fourth of July--the glorious Fourth!” shouted Tom Wallace, careering wildly around the flower garden, as a Roman candle he held in his hand, evidently unable to contain itself until the proper time, went off with a fizz and a pop and flashed against the evening sky, “and it’s going to be the greatest Fourth that ever was known, because it’s the Centennial!”

“A _cent_-tennial!” said his little sister Caddy, “that won’t be anything great.”

“Pooh! you don’t understand--girls never do--Centennial don’t mean anything about money. Centennial means ’pertaining to, or happening every hundred years’--if you don’t believe me ask Noah Webster--and just a hundred years ago this magnificent Republic of America, gentlemen of the jury,” he continued, mounting a garden-chair, and making the most absurd gestures, “was declared free and independent, and its brave citizens determined not to drink tea unless they chose to, and our cousins from the other side of the Atlantic went marching home to the tune the old cow died on.”

“What tune was that?” asked Caddy.

“Gentlemen of the jury,” said Tom, “I’m astonished to find such ignorance in this great and enlightened country. The name of that memorable tune was and still is, as _Your Honor_ well knows, Yankee Doodle;” and the orator, descending from the chair, commenced whistling that famous melody.

“Well, then,” said Caddy, after a moment’s thought, “if a Centinal is something about a hundred years old, Aunt Patience is one, for she’s a hundred years old to-morrow--she told me so--and she feels real bad ’cause she can’t go to the green to see the fire-works, on ’count of the pain in her back, and Faith ain’t got any shoes or hat, and the flour’s ’most gone, and so’s the tea, and she says ‘the poor-house looms.’”

“‘The poor-house looms,’ does it?” said Tom laughing; and then he stuck his hands in his pockets, and hummed “Hail Columbia” in a thoughtful manner.

“I say, Frank,” he called out at last, going up on the porch, and poking his head in at a window, “what are you doing?”

“‘The king was in the parlor, counting out his money,’”

answered Frank.

“How much, king?”

“Twenty--thirty--thirty-five,” said Frank, “one dollar and thirty-five cents. How do you figure?”

“Two, fifteen. Come out here, I want to tell you something.”

Frank, who was two years younger than Tom appeared.

“What’s up?” he asked, throwing himself into the hammock which hung from the roof of the porch, and swinging lazily.

“Would it break your heart, and smash the fellows generally, if we didn’t go to the meeting on the green to-morrow evening, after all the fuss we’ve made about it?”

“_What?_” asked Frank, in a tone of surprise, assuming a sitting position so suddenly that the hammock--hammocks are treacherous things--gave a sudden lurch, and landed him on the floor.

Tom’s laughter woke all the echoes around.

“Forgive these tears,” he said, as he wiped his eyes, “and now to business. You know not, perhaps, my gentle brother, that we have a centenarian, or as Caddy says, a centinal among us?”

“A centinal?” said Frank, stretching himself out on the floor where he had fallen.

“A centenarian, or centinal, whichever you choose, most noble kinsman, and she lives on the outskirts of this town. Her name--a most admirable one--is Patience. Her granddaughter’s--another admirable one--Faith.

“Patience has the rheumatism. Faith has no shoes. They want to see some fire-works, and hear some Fourth of July--being centinals they naturally would.

“What say you? Shall we and our faithful clan, instead of swelling the ranks of the militia on the green, march to the humble cottage behind the hill, and gladden the hearts of old Patience and young Faith with a pyr-o-tech-nic display?”

“Good!” said Frank, who always followed the lead of his elder brother.

And “Good!” echoed Caddy; “but don’t spend all your money for fire-works. Give some to Aunt Patience, ’cause she’s the only centinal we’ve got.”

“And she’ll never be another,” said Tom,