Chapter XI: Part II (4)

“Now when they looked around this grand home and saw all its richness and glory they drew a deep sigh, Caractaca begging Claudius to send them back to their home, the brave Caractacus only saying he did not see why such a rich family cared for the plain hut he lived in.”

Master Claude never again insisted upon having the little wagon and goat. Nay, he helped him to better ones.

L.

THE LONGEST DAY.

IT is quite important, when speaking of the longest day in the year, to say what part of the world we are talking about, as will be seen by reading the following list, which tells the length of the longest day in several different places. How unfortunate are the children in Tornea, Finland, where Christmas Day is less than three hours in length!

At Stockholm, Sweden, it is eighteen and one half hours in length. At Spitzbergen the longest day is three and one half months. At London, England, and Bremen, Prussia, the longest day has sixteen and one half hours. At Hamburg in Germany, and Dantzig in Prussia, the longest day has seventeen hours. At Wardbury, Norway, the longest day lasts from May 21 to July 22, without interruption. At St. Petersburg, Russia, and Tobolsk, Siberia, the longest day is nineteen hours, and the shortest five hours. At Tornea, Finland, June 21 brings a day nearly twenty-two hours long, and Christmas one less than three hours in length. At New York the longest day is about fifteen hours, and at Montreal, Canada, it is sixteen.—_Selected._

THREE YOUNG MISSIONARIES.

“WHO are they?”

The one with his hat off and flag in hand—his name is Judson. The neat little Miss, her fingers tucked in that warm muff, and her satisfied face saying: “See what a nice big snowball we’ve made,” she is Miss Emily Chubbuck, to be sure. The third—wouldn’t you give a penny to see his face?—he looks like a young Scotch Highlander in plaids. He it is who fixed up the funny mouth, nose and eyes, and is now putting something sweeter than a nasty cigarette into his snow mouth; well, this one is Master Carey. Now they look only like children having fun. Not a hundred years after they became missionaries. Heard you ever of Carey? Of Adoniram Judson? Of his wife, Emily Chubbuck?

L.

FIRST TIME AT CHURCH.

A GRAVE sweet wonder in thy baby face,
And look of mingled dignity and grace,
Such as a painter hand might love to trace.

A pair of trusting innocent blue eyes,
That higher than the stained-glass window rise,
Into the fair and cloudless summer skies.

The people round her sing, “Above the sky
There’s rest for little children when they die.”
To her, thus gazing up, that rest seems nigh.

The organ peals; she must not look around,
Although with wonderment her pulses bound—
The place whereon she stands is holy ground.

The sermon over, and the blessing said,
She bows, as “mother” does, her golden head,
And thinks of little sister who is dead.

She knows that now she dwells above the sky,
Where holy children enter when they die,
And prays God take her there too, by and by.

Pet, may He keep you in the faith alway,
And bring you to that home for which you pray,
Where all shall have their child hearts back one day!
—_Selected._

AN IDEA THAT GREW.

IT was Nancy and the book together which put the idea into Clara’s mind. They were slipping along in the shadows of the quiet river, she and Wallace. It was the Fourth of July, and most of the boys and girls of the region were busy with what firecrackers they could get—those of them who had not taken a five-mile tramp to the village to attend the celebration.

But Clara was too old to care for firecrackers, and Wallace had had enough of them before he came; he was only here for a few days, and preferred a visit with his sister to all the Fourth of July celebrations that could be planned. She was reading aloud to him bits from a new book which he had brought her as a birthday present; for the Fourth of July was not only the birthday of freedom, it was also Clara’s birthday.

“O, Wallace!” she said, “this is a lovely book.” She had said the same thing at least a dozen times that day. “Just see what queer ideas she had,” Clara continued, meaning the girl in the book; “she was very good—better than anybody I ever knew. I should think it would be lovely to do half the nice things she did. One plan was to pick out a friend—another girl—and try to help her in every way she could. Pray for her, you know, and talk with her, and influence her, until at last the girl would be converted; then they two would choose two others to help in the same way, and they were going to see how large a circle they could make of that kind. She thought perhaps she could reach all around the world; she was only a young girl, and she thought if she lived to be a woman perhaps she could. Wallace, what are you laughing at?”

“At the modesty of the young woman and her ideas,” said Wallace, laughing afresh. “She hasn’t gotten around the world yet, I take it; I’ve never seen anything of her.”

“I am sure the idea is beautiful,” said Clara, half-inclined to be vexed with Wallace for making sport of it. “And of course one could do a great deal of good in that way. I would just like to try it.”

“Why don’t you?” Wallace asked, his eyes twinkling; “I’m sure you have a good field for work of the sort here among the natives. Look at that specimen on the bank at this moment. Her eyes are as large as sunflowers, and she looks as though she might take any amount of doing good to and not be hurt by it.”

Clara turned around and stared back at Nancy on the shore.

A little girl with a sallow, wistful face, and great mournful-looking eyes. She had on a worn and faded dress, an apron which was much too long for her, but seemed to have been put on to cover the deficiencies of the dress. She wore neither shoes nor stockings, and was hanging tightly by the two strings to her pink gingham sunbonnet, and gazing at the people in the boat with the most unutterable longing in her eyes that Clara had ever seen.

“Poor thing!” said Clara; “she envies us our row. I wonder if she never has a chance to take a row on the river? Only see how hungry her eyes look.”

“It is more probable that she envies you your hat and dress,” said Wallace; “she keeps her eyes on them. She has an eye to the beautiful, that is what is the matter with her. I am not sure but it is your hair she wants most, after all, though hers is arranged elaborately. She would make an excellent beginning for your scheme, Clara.”

“I am not sure but she would.” Wallace was teasing, but his sister was grave and in earnest. “Row toward the shore, Wallace, and let me speak to her; I never saw a child who had such a wistful look.

“Good afternoon, little girl,” she said pleasantly, as Wallace obeyed directions and the boat drew near, “are you having a pleasant Fourth of July?”

“No,” said the child, without hesitation or ceremony.

“Not? I am very sorry. What has been the trouble?”

“Nothing,” said the child, as promptly as before. Then, seeming to consider something more necessary, added: “Nothing more than always is. We don’t never have no pleasant times to our house.”

“You see,” said Wallace, in low tones, nodding significantly to his sister, “she is in perishing need of being chosen.”

“So she is. Wallace, you are simply making fun, but I am in earnest. I wonder what I could do for the poor little thing? I have been here for two months, and haven’t done a thing for anybody. I have tried to get acquainted with a few of the girls of my age, but they are shy of me; this child does not seem to be shy.”

“Not in the least,” said Wallace. “Very well, how shall we commence? Shall I invite her to sail with us this afternoon as a sort of entering wedge?”

“Do you mean it?” Clara asked, well pleased, and she turned again to Nancy. “Do you ever go rowing on the river?”

“No.”

“Why not? Would not you like to?”

“Never had no chance. We ain’t got no boat, and nobody won’t lend us poor folks any; and we don’t never go nowheres, me and Billy.”

“Poor little girl! Who is Billy? your little brother? Would you like to take a ride with us this afternoon? If you would you may come down to the landing and get in the boat.”

The child stared for a moment as though she felt her ears were not to be trusted, then turned and made a dash for the landing below. Wallace laughed and steered the boat in the same direction. A few moments more and they were off, with the barefooted Nancy seated comfortably beside Clara.

It is only the very beginning of this story that I have space for. I am wondering if you Pansies cannot sit down thoughtfully and think it out for yourselves, perhaps write it out. The story is true, and it happened years ago. Such a girl as Clara, who was spending a summer in a backwoods region, for reasons which I need not stop here to explain, and such a girl as Nancy met first in the way I have described; and in the course of that afternoon ride Clara heard enough about the home where they “never had no pleasant times,” to make her heart ache. The beautiful idea in the book kept coming to her, or rather staid with her and kept asking if she could not do something of the kind with this Nancy. To be sure Nancy was not like the girl chosen in the book; she had been of about the same age and station as her friend. “But then,” said Clara to herself, “she did not need help half so much as this one does; and I think with this kind of people I might help one younger than myself better than one of my own age. At least I can pray for her.”

Now the story for you to work out is begun, and I will give you just a few more facts, and then jump to the end of it—that is so far as I know it—leaving you to fill up the blank space. It was a stony, hilly, desolate country side, where the people were very poor, and were cursed with more rum saloons than with any other form of business; where the nearest church was five miles away; where there was no Sunday-school, and no day-school except for three months in the winter. And Nancy, being questioned, showed that she not only did not know what Fourth of July meant, but she did not know what Sunday meant in the true sense of the word; nor did she know about Jesus Christ, save as she had heard “Pap swear his name sometimes!” Did ever girl need helping more?

Now for the end, so far as it can be said to be ended, for the people are still living. Nancy is a young woman who wears the neatest of dresses and hats, and the nicest fitting boots and gloves. She is herself a teacher in the day-school in that part of the country where her home has always been. The school is in session nine months of the year. She is a teacher in the Sunday-school, which has a room of its own, opening from the pretty church where every Sabbath day the people gather to hear of Jesus Christ. And Nancy’s father is the superintendent of the Sunday-school! And there is not a saloon left within two miles of the neighborhood; and the change began that Fourth of July afternoon, when Clara, reading from her new book, caught an idea which grew.

You will perhaps be glad to hear that Wallace, although he professed to be only amused, was much more than that, and helped to form Clara’s “circle” so effectually that he preaches in the little church whenever he comes to this part of the world for a few weeks of vacation. “You haven’t reached around the world yet,” he said to Clara not long ago; “but I am not sure but you will. Do you know that boy Billy wants to be a missionary and go to China?”

Billy is Nancy’s youngest brother.

Now see if you can plan ways by which Clara may have helped to bring about such changes. No, better than that; look about you and see what you can do to make a circle of good that shall reach—as far as it can.

PANSY.

TEACHING THE CHINESE.

AND so you thought the Chinese do not know anything?

Look into this school; see wise Mr. Ah Lee sitting before his thirteen youngsters. See how bright they look. And surely they know how to get as much fun out of a cat’s tail and get rapped over the knuckles as hard as any American boy. Yes, they sit upon the floor, and they don’t seem to have blackboards and maps and many other nice school contrivances, but they manage somehow to learn one of the most difficult languages in the world.

Our poor missionaries do have such a time in mastering Chinese so they can converse with the people and preach the Gospel to them. The trouble is that a word may mean one of a dozen different things, just as you happen to give it this tone (sound) or that.

A Mr. Meadows once wished to say “bargain money” to a Chinaman. He used the proper Chinese word for it, but pronounced it as though it meant to the Chinaman “Do you hear? do you hear?” And what said John Chinaman? Just nothing at all, but came nearer and nearer to Mr. Meadows, turning one side of his head then the other to listen.

Once Mr. Pohlman asked a Chinese family if they drank wine, but he pronounced the word wine (_tsén_) so it sounded to them like their word for land (_t’sēn_).

At another time he asked a mourning family if they had buried (_tái_) the body of their dead grandmother. But he sounded it _t’ai_, which means to kill. Imagine their looks.

But the missionaries work away at the queer Chinese words and tones until they can tell the “old story” plainly—and hundreds have heard and understood, and now believe.

You know how hard it is for the Chinaman to speak our language. He says “Amelican” for American, our _r_ is so difficult for him to get.

But the time is coming when every one of God’s family will know the one great language, and there will be no hard schoolmaster to scold or whip it into them.

L.

WHEN HE WAS TWELVE YEARS OLD.

OUR little lad, our bonnie twelve-year-old,
Has journeyed to the city of the King;
Our happy boy—ere heart could grow a-cold,
Or soul turn bitter—in youth’s joyous spring,
Went up to keep the feast in that bright place,
City of Peace, where restful mansions be;
And straightway looking on the dear King’s face,
Remembered naught but joy that face to see!

Long time ago, when He was twelve years old,
The Holy Child climbed fair Judea’s hills,
And his young mother in her heart did hold
Strange words concerning him, whose mystery fills
Her soul with wonder.—On their homeward way,
The reverent pilgrims haste; and sorrowing
She seeks her Son, and lo, in calm delay,
He lingered in the temple of the King!

She, coming to the sacred portal, waits
With tear-wan face; her fair first-born she seeks;
Weary and grief-worn, at the shining gates,
With faltering lips his sweet home-name she speaks,
And He is in her arms!—With tender word
Of gentlest chiding, each to each revealed
The love that to the depths of feeling stirred
Hearts that brief absence near and dearer sealed.

O mother, mourning for thy fair first-born,
He tarries in his Father’s House of Light,
With God’s beloved; and thou in some glad morn,
Finding the glorious gates beyond the night,
Shalt breathe his name, and ere it leaves thy lips,
In thy dear arms, aglow with life and joy,
All strong and beautiful—death’s long eclipse
Forgotten in the first kiss of thy boy!
ROSA EVANGELINE ANGEL.

* * * * *

MISS HALSEY read a letter from Miss Patton, of India, who after wittily describing some of the daily trials of housekeeping there, between her rising hour, five o’clock, and that of reaching her first school, says:

“This school, over a mile away, is upstairs in a large house in an alley. The children looked so nice and bright this morning, I wish you could see them. Prayers are over, so I begin by taking the wee tots in the first class and teach them the Lord’s Prayer. Then I take class after class until half-past nine, when with pony and queer little two-wheeled tonga I go on about half a mile to the other school. There I teach until nearly eleven and then drive home to breakfast, after which we have English prayers. By that time the gun has gone off, and that means twelve o’clock. The gun is the signal for our servants and native Christians living near to come in and have Marathi prayers.

“Then I teach my servants to read, and ask a few questions in the Catechism, then teach the Christian girls and young women whom we want to train for Bible women, from two until three P. M. At three o’clock we have a cup of tea and some bread and butter; then I am free to settle ‘cases’ and hear ‘tales of woe’ until half-past four, when I go into town to teach the women and girls in the zenanas. I get home in time to have a good bath and get into a fresh dress before dinner at half-past seven. After dinner we talk over our experiences and plans of work, and sometimes one reads aloud while the rest of us sew until it is time to retire, generally an early hour.”—_Interior._

YOUNG FOLKS OF ALASKA.

THIS face is not like yours, but more like some of the young folks of Alaska. Of course you want to know a bit about the boys and girls away off there.

Here it is from Mrs. Cady, who was there not long ago:

“Mr. Austin, the missionary, and these boys dragged all the timber by ropes to build the first house.

“The Sabbath evening service was opened by a fine anthem, these boys and girls being among the singers. Mr. Austin read a Psalm in English, which was interpreted by a boy fourteen years old.

“He asked a girl twelve years old to offer the closing prayer, and she expressed it beautifully in English.

“They are very polite. If a boy taps at the door his hat is off before the door is opened. Their table manners are good. One boy is head waiter.

“He can offer thanks or call upon some other boy to do so, or sing a blessing.”

Of course you ought to know just how the grandmothers of these bright Alaska children look. Our picture will enable you to judge somewhat of their appearance.

L.

BABY’S CORNER.

POOR TABBY.

TABBY thought she was a very smart cat, but there were some rats living in the barn who knew almost as much as Tabby did herself.

One morning Tabby went to the barn. She had tried for days to catch a rat, but just as she got her paw out to strike one off he scampered. “To-day I shall get the old gray rat, see if I don’t,” said Tabby to herself as she walked down the path.

She stepped softly into the door. But what was this new shining thing she saw?

Why, Farmer Jones had put a big trap there to catch the rats.

Now Tabby had never seen a trap, and she said to herself:

“Why, here is a pretty little house! It must be for me; I will walk right in. How nice!”

So she stepped in. Snap! went the door, shut! and there poor Puss was in prison.

She tried to get out, but she could not. She cried, but nobody came to let her out.

While she sat there feeling sad, two rats came and looked at her. The old gray one, as he stood on his hind legs, said:

“Aha! I see; I see! Anybody who goes into that door does not come out. I shall never go in.”

By and by Tommy Jones missed his pussy and went to the barn to look for her.

Oh! was not Tabby glad to see him coming?

MRS. C. M. LIVINGSTON.

DAVIE’S WITNESSES.

IT was Fourth of July morning, and Davie Carson had been up since a good while before the sun, not firing crackers and torpedoes, nor watching the firing of the great cannon, but doing the chores. He was in tremendous haste. An entire holiday was a thing he did not have twice in a year. A hard-working boy was Davie, with not only his own bread to earn, but with a great longing in his heart to help earn the bread of two sisters and a brother younger than himself. He lived in a small village where there was little chance of a boy of his age earning much. The best that he had been able to do, so far, was to seize odd jobs as they happened along; or rather as he hunted them out. Not very pleasant jobs, all of them. Davie liked horses, and was glad of a chance to lead Dr. Bristol’s to water; but to like to clean out their stalls was another thing. But he knew how to do this work, and did it well, and had put on his great work apron this morning for the purpose of taking that job next.

It was his last one for the morning; after that breakfast, and then a four-mile brisk run to the next village to the Fourth of July celebration. His mother had not made the least objection to his staying to the celebration. On the contrary she had said heartily: “I am glad the doctor wants an errand done there; it will give you a good excuse for going. Of course you may stay, and welcome; and I’ll put you up a nice Fourth of July lunch; and if there is something to see, or to buy, that doesn’t cost more than ten cents, you just have it, or see it, whichever it is. You deserve a treat, Davie.”

Davie laughed gleefully. It was pleasant to hear his mother speak such words, but he had a very different plan. Hurried as he had been that morning, he leaned on his spade and thought it all out. In the village where the celebration was to be was a large book store, where he had once or twice been sent on errands for Dr. Bristol, and had feasted his eyes upon the rows and rows of books and magazines, and thought what a thing it would be to have a chance to handle them. The day before, while holding the horses and waiting for the doctor, his eyes had rested on an advertisement in the paper—WANTED: A BOY. Then had followed a brief statement of the kind of boy, and what his duties would be, and the whole was signed by the proprietor of the book store.

Davie’s cheeks had glowed so while reading it, that the doctor, returning just then, had looked hard at him, and asked him if he was getting up a fever. The splendid plan which the boy had thought out leaning on his shovel was, that he would clip around to the book store the moment the doctor’s errand was done, and try for that place!

To be sure there was hardly a possibility that he would succeed, but then he might, and certainly he would never accomplish anything if he did not try. But he did not mean to let any body know of his ambitions, so he had only a laugh for his mother’s suggestion.

“If I get a chance to see the procession and hear the music and a few such things it will be all the lark I want,” he said cheerily, “except the lunch; I’ll be sure to want that. You are sure you can get along without me for such a long time?”

“O, yes, indeed!” the mother said, smiling back on him. It was so like her Davie to think of mother.

Davie made good speed over the road, though it was up hill and dusty, and the day was warm. He believed himself to be in ample time to see the parade which was to be made in honor of the day. At the corner he halted and glanced wistfully toward the book store; it was within half a block of him, and who knew but that if he should appear so early in the day he might get ahead of somebody?

“No, it can’t be done,” he said at last, speaking aloud and firmly. “Davie Carson, I am ashamed of you! A package of medicine in your pocket that the doctor said an old lady was anxiously waiting for, and you thinking about stopping on an errand of your own. Just march down to Coleman Street as fast as your feet can carry you!”

And the order was meekly obeyed. Here he was detained for minutes which seemed like hours to him. The sound of martial music was heard in the near distance, and people all along the streets were dodging to the doors to see if anything was to be seen; but the old lady’s daughter wanted to write a note to the doctor to send back by Davie. She would not be a minute, she said; but she was.

“I might call for the note on my way home,” Davie timidly suggested. But she said, “O, no! that was not worth while; she could just as well write it now, and make sure of it; she would have it ready very soon.” And the sound of music drew nearer and nearer, until it passed the corner and faded in the distance; and the note was ready at last.

Davie crowded it into his pocket, tried to listen respectfully to several messages besides, and went down the stairs three steps at a time to follow that fading music. The street was nearly deserted; all the boys had rushed out of sight with the procession. Davie took long strides in the same direction, and wondered if it would be improper to break into a run.

Appearing at that moment around the corner ahead of him was a belated group—a father, mother and two children; odd-looking people, queerly dressed, and seeming to be entirely out of place in a town.

“Halloo! what’s the matter now?” Another corner had been reached and turned by the people ahead of him, with the exception of the youngest of the group, who had tumbled down; it was her outcry which roused him. He picked her up, brushing the dust and soil from her clothes, straightening the much bent sunbonnet, and urging her not to cry, that they would find the others in a jiffy. She stopped crying the moment she discovered herself in kind hands, and looked confidingly at Davie out of great blue eyes, and slipped her small brown hand into his with great satisfaction. Then they two turned the corner, and were at once in a crowd. The thing which astonished and troubled him was, that the father and mother and older sister of his little girl seemed to have disappeared. For a weary half-hour the two jostled against the crowd and stared and hunted. At last there darted toward him an angry father, talking broken English in loud tones, followed by an angrier mother and a crying little girl. “What was he doing with Gretchen? How dare he steal their Gretchen and make off with her! Bad, wicked boy! The police should know all about it, that they should!” In vain Davie tried to explain; they were too excited and frightened to listen to explanations. In the midst of Davie’s attempts two well-dressed boys standing near, broke into laughter, and so confused him that he stopped short, and the enraged family trudged away, his little girl in his arms, and the father shaking his head at Davie. But the little girl looked back and smiled lovingly on him.

Then Davie found that the crowd were trying to get near the band stand.

“Come this way,” said one of the boys who had laughed, touching his shoulder; “there is a chance to slip in behind here and get a first-rate position.” Davie thanked them, and was just going to slip in, when a little girl who was flying past, going in the opposite direction from the pushing crowd, jostled against him, and as she did so dropped from under her arm a small package. Davie picked it up and looked eagerly after the girl, shouting, “Hold on, you’ve lost something!” But she flew like the wind.

“You can’t catch her,” said a man; “she is lost in the jam by this time. You may as well pocket the bundle and call it Fourth of July luck.”

“And you will lose your chance in here if you don’t come this minute,” said one of the boys, trying to keep a way open for him.

“Thank you,” said Davie, “but I think I ought to find the little girl,” saying which he struck into the crowd, and began his search.

It was several hours afterwards that a boy who was very tired, and who, if he had not been so disappointed, would have been hungry, came out of the handsome book store and with slow steps started for his long walk home. He had delivered the medicine for which he came in the first place; he had the note for the doctor safe in his pocket; he had picked up a little German girl, and after much trouble given her back to a father who was angry at him about it; he had followed a little girl, or rather followed the road over which she vanished, for two weary hours, and at last found her and restored the lost parcel, only to hear her laugh gleefully and declare that there was nothing in it but some dried-up sandwiches, which he was welcome to if he wanted them. And not a glimpse of procession, or sound of martial music or voice of public speaker had he seen or heard that day, save the few strains in the distance which had lured him in the morning.

Moreover, he had called at the book store only to have the proprietor shake his head and say: “Of course, my boy, I couldn’t engage you for such a place as this without references. For whom do you work when you are at home?”

Davie explained that they had been but a short time in that part of the country; he had no regular place, but did odd jobs for Dr. Bristol—cleaned out the stable and such things. No, Dr. Bristol did not know much about him—nobody did but mother—and he had not known that a recommendation would be needed.

“I might just as well have staid at home and helped mother,” said Davie, as he walked slowly, with head down. “I’ve lost a day, and gained nothing at all. I wish I had—no, I don’t either. I did what I thought was right. I’m glad I did it.” Whereupon Davie whistled.

“Who was that boy, father, and what did he want?” A young man asked the question of the bookseller as he came back to his parlor; he liked the looks of the boy.

“Do you know anything about him?” replied the father, and before he could answer a bright-faced little girl chimed in: “O, Uncle Edward! what is his name? Don’t you know? I’m so sorry if you don’t; papa wants to know it.”

“No, sir,” said the young man; “I don’t know him; but he is the chap I was telling you about who wandered around with that little German girl, and took patiently a hard scolding from the father afterwards, and a laugh from two well-dressed, thoughtless boys.”

“Is he, indeed?” said the father; “I wish I had known it.”

Then the little girl: “And O, Uncle Edward! don’t you think he is the very same boy who hunted after me for two hours to give me those sandwiches. Papa said I was a little dunce not to ask his name; that he ought to be rewarded for honesty and faithfulness.”

“I know his name,” said Uncle Edward, “and I believe I will reward him.”

The next morning, when Davie was out in the little garden hoeing and whistling, a strange thing happened to him; he received a letter—the first letter with his name on the envelope which he had ever received. It was short and to the point:

After you left me yesterday two witnesses to your
honesty and faithfulness, as well as to your good
temper under provocation, called upon me, and made me
decide to give you a month’s trial in the store if
you still wish the situation. Call on me to-day if
possible; if not, to-morrow will do.

Yours sincerely,
EDWARD HAMMOND.

“Mother,” said Davie, as they went all over the plans for the third time, “who could have called on him who knows anything about me? I can’t imagine.”

PANSY.

ABOUT ST. AUGUSTINE.

BY THE PANSIES.

THE way it came to be called St. Augustine was this: it used to be named Seloy on the river Dolphins. That was when it belonged to the Indians. The French people named the river, and they gave it that name because they saw a great many dolphins playing in the mouth of the river. After awhile the Spaniards came and took the town on the day which was sacred to their saint, Augustine, so they named both town and river San Augustin.

RUFUS HUNTER.

* * * * *

IN the American Revolution Florida was the only colony which was loyal to the king. When they heard the news of the Declaration of Independence they burned John Hancock and Samuel Adams in effigy, calling them rebels. After that some of the “Liberty Boys,” as our soldiers were called, stole powder from the British brig _Betsey_, which lay at anchor at San Augustin and slipped away with it, to be used at Bunker Hill.

HARVEY DENNISON.

* * * * *

I READ about the services which they used to hold in St. Augustine on Palm Sunday. They marched from the church to the platform of the convent, where was a beautiful altar trimmed with flowers and fruits. The congregation knelt on the ground while the priest said mass, then the nuns took baskets of rose petals which were brought by many little children in the procession, and strewed them before the altar in honor of the Virgin.

LAURA EASTMAN.

* * * * *

I LIKE to read about St. Augustine when it was a walled town with earthworks and batteries; when you had to enter the town through the great gate or by the drawbridge. At sunset a gun was fired, which meant that the bridge was raised, the gate barred, and both were guarded by soldiers. I can imagine them pacing back and forth challenging people who passed. “_Centinela alerta_,” they said, and “_Alerta esta_,” answered the outsider if he knew enough. I think it must have been great fun. I should like to understand the Spanish language, the words have such a musical sound. But the outsider might say “_Alerta esta_” as much as he liked, after the gates were closed he could not get into the town until next morning, no matter if his home was just the other side of the gate. Once in a long time came a messenger with news for the governor so important that for him they would open the gate; but this was very unusual.

JOHN L. PARKER.

* * * * *

THEY had one fashion in St. Augustine in the early days when the town was ruled by Spaniards which might work pretty well nowadays in some places. When a fellow became a great nuisance, would not work, and disturbed people by making noises in the streets, and things of that kind, they used to make him dress himself in some ridiculous fashion, put him at the head of a procession made up of anybody who wanted to join it and help make fun of him; then the drum and fife started up and he was marched out of the town, and he could not come back again.

HELEN DUNNING.

* * * * *

I WENT with my father and mother to St. Augustine only last winter. We went through the Ponce de Leon, which I think must be the finest hotel in the world. It is built of some kind of stuff that glitters in the sun, and looks in the shade as if it were blue, and the trimmings are of terra cotta. The floors of the halls are inlaid with little bits of marble, and the marble columns everywhere make you think for a minute that you are stepping into an art gallery instead of a hotel. The rotunda is just lovely! It has eight oak pillars to support it, each beautifully carved. The rotunda is four stories high, and has corridors on each story with more columns and lovely arches. The dome has wonderful paintings and carved figures, giving in pictures the history of Spain and France. You can look straight up through an opening to the great copper columns which form the lantern at the top. The large parlor is perfectly splendid. It is a hundred and four feet long, and fifty-three feet wide; but there are arches and portières, so that it can be divided into five rooms whenever the people wish. It is magnificently furnished. I think, however, that the great dining-room is really more beautiful than the parlor. More than eight hundred people can take dinner there at one time, and you can look out of the windows at lovely orange groves, and hear the mockingbirds singing, and there is a band of music which always plays while the dinner is being served.

ANNA WHEELER AUSTIN.

* * * * *

A BAND of singers used to go about the streets of old St. Augustine on Easter eve, playing on their violins and guitars, and stopping under the windows to sing:

“_Disciarem lu doi,
Cantarem anb alagria,
Y n’arem a da
Las pascuas a Maria._”

It seems almost impossible to sing such queer-sounding words, but translated they mean:

“Ended the days of sadness,
Grief gives place to singing;
We come with joy and gladness,
Our gifts to Mary bringing.”
MARY GEDDIS.

* * * * *

IN the year 1821 Spain gave Florida to the United States, the old yellow flag of Spain was taken down forever, and in its place our own beautiful stars and stripes floated over the old town. I wonder if the people living there knew enough to shout for joy?

HENRY STUART.

* * * * *

IT is all very well for my brother to talk about the people shouting for joy when the stars and stripes floated over their town; but I guess he forgets what an awful time they had only about fifteen years later, when the Seminole War broke out. That was because the new people who had come in wanted the lands which had always belonged to the Indians, and wanted them driven further West. For the next seven years I think the people had reason to be sorry that they had ever seen the stars and stripes. Not but that I love the old flag as well as my brother does, but I think the Indians were ill-treated. It makes me very sad to read how they were at last cheated into a surrender, and carried away by force from the land they loved so well.

CHARLES MORTON STUART.

* * * * *

MY sister Anna thought the hotel was the nicest part of St. Augustine, but I liked the old fort the best. It used to be Fort San Marco, but when the United States got hold of it they named it Fort Marion, after General Francis Marion. I would like to describe it, but I don’t understand just how. It is in shape what is called a polygon, and has a moat all around it. The stone or shell of which it is built is used a great deal in St. Augustine, or used to be; it is called coquina. I think the narrow streets and queer-looking old houses are much more interesting than the new streets, which are just like any other city. At least I liked them better; but girls always like elegant hotels and splendid furniture and all such things.

GEORGE WHEELER AUSTIN.

* * * * *

MY mother used to live in St. Augustine years ago. She has told me a good deal about the streets, and the sea wall, and the little old houses. She has described St. George Street and Tolomato Street until it seems to me I could find my way up and down them almost as well as she could. But mother says things are very much changed since she was there; she reads in the papers about the beautiful new hotels, and says it does not seem possible they are in old St. Augustine. The old streets were very narrow; I suppose they are still. Next winter I am going there to see things for myself.

SARAH CASTLETON.

[The Pansies have seemed chiefly interested this month
in the history of old St. Augustine, rather than in a
description of the city. But I think our readers will
agree with me that they have managed to crowd a good
deal of information into a small space. Sorry we have
not room for all they said.—EDITORS.]

REUBEN AS AN ERRAND BOY.

(_Character Studies._)

REUBEN MINOR was in his own room in his shirt sleeves, and the sleeves rolled to his elbows. His paste pot was on the table, sheets of paper and scraps of pasteboard were on the floor, and Reuben, with a queer-shaped box before him, was in what Maria called “a brown study.”

The stair door opened, and his Aunt Mary’s voice called, “Reuben!”

“Yes’m.”

“Don’t you forget those errands that you’ve got to do in town. Have you got ’em all in your mind?”

“Yes’m.”

“There’s only the eggs and the kerosene and the vinegar, you know, so you won’t need to have ’em written down—just three things.”

“All right.”

Silence for a few minutes, during which Reuben turned the box endwise and squinted at it. “Let’s see,” he said, leaning his elbow on the table and his head on his hand, “I wonder how that would do?” Then he started for his row of shelves, seized upon a good-sized book in the corner, and dived into its pages. Something was not clear. The stair door opened again, and his aunt’s voice sounded: “Reuben!”

“Yes’m.”

“You must take that next car, you know, because there isn’t another for an hour, and I’m in a hurry for the eggs; if I don’t have them by noon there’ll be no pumpkin pie for Sunday. Are you all ready for the car?”

“I will be in a minute, Aunt Mary.”

“Well, you better get ready right straight off, then there won’t be any mistake; it will be along now in a little while.”

There was no reply to this, and the door closed again, Reuben, meantime, deep in his book. Ten minutes, fifteen minutes, then a sudden, sharp call from below: “Reuben, there’s the car coming. Hurry, now! don’t you miss it for anything.”

Reuben hurried. He made a frantic dash for his coat, ran his fingers through his hair by way of combing, concluded to go without a necktie, and tore down the stairs and out of the kitchen door and across the lawn, to the tune of his aunt’s words: “I believe in my heart you’ll lose that car, after all!”

No, he didn’t. He hailed it, panting and breathless, some minutes after it had passed the corner, and at last was seated in it, mopping his wet forehead, for the morning was warm. But he had not forgotten the big book. Four miles in a street car, with not many passengers at that hour, gave him a good chance to study up that puzzling portion which he could not get through his mind. So he studied and puzzled, and the car rumbled on, and stopped, and went on again many times, and people came in and went out, and Reuben knew nothing about them. At last he looked up; he believed he could make that box now, partitions and all, if he were only at home. Halloo! they were in town already, and were passing Porter’s. Why! then they must have passed the corner grocery where Aunt Mary always traded. What a nuisance! Now perhaps he could not get this car on its return trip. He must try for it. So he pulled the check, and made what speed he could back, three, four, five blocks, to the corner grocery. As he left the car he wondered how they managed the flap that made the fastening of the inner box, and still puzzling over it, presented himself at the counter of the city grocery.

“Well, sir,” said the clerk, after waiting a minute for orders, “what can I do for you?”

What indeed? Reuben stared at him, grew red in the face, stammered, mopped his face with his handkerchief, gazed up and down the rows and rows of crowded shelves, gazed about him everywhere. What had he come for? That was the awful question. What had Aunt Mary said? She had said several things, he remembered. He tried to recall the all-important one. Butter? No, of course not; they made their own butter. Flour, perhaps, or starch—women were always wanting flour and starch—or it might have been tea. He was sure he did not know, and the longer he thought the more confused he seemed to get. And there was the return car! Unless he took that he would have to wait a solid hour, and for what? Was there any likelihood that he would remember? Reuben asked himself that question in a most searching manner, then sorrowfully shook his head as he owned to himself that he did not believe he ever knew; he had not paid any attention to that part of the business.

Aunt Mary was watching for the return car. “Reuben has come,” she called out to Maria in the kitchen, as she caught a glimpse of him. “I must say I am relieved; I don’t know how we could have managed without those eggs. If I ever get hold of any hens that lay again, I’ll venture to say I won’t sell all my eggs to my neighbors and have to depend on store ones for myself. Why, what in the world has the boy done with them? He seems to be empty-handed! Hurry up, Reuben, we are waiting for the eggs. Where are your things?”

Poor red-faced, shamefaced Reuben! It was hard work, but there was nothing for it but to own that the first he had heard of eggs was at that moment; and as for the “things,” he had no more idea than the man in the moon what they were.

“I believe that boy is half-witted,” the clerk at the corner grocery had said, after watching him for a few minutes, and seeing him make a dash for the return car, not having bought a thing. But bless your heart, he wasn’t. He had wits enough. “Too many of ’em,” his Aunt Mary said. The trouble with Reuben was that he had never learned to withdraw his thoughts from the thing which wanted to absorb them, and fix them for the time being, instead, on the thing which ought to claim his attention.

MYRA SPAFFORD.

THE ADOPTED FAMILY.

IT was a beautiful summer day when the Westwoods arrived at their country home, most of them very glad indeed to see the dear old place. They had staid in town very late that season, Mr. Westwood’s business being such that there was a time when he feared he could not get away at all. Now here they were turning the corner which brought the house into view; the great wagon following close behind, piled high with baggage, and every one was glad, save Herbert. He was eleven years old, and fond of his city home, and of the school which he attended, and of the boys in his class, and felt very lonely and desolate. He “did not know a single boy out here,” he confided to his mother, “that he ever cared to see again.” “And when a fellow hasn’t any friends,” he said dolefully, “it is very lonesome.”

“Poor boy!” said Mrs. Westwood, when he was out of hearing, “I am sorry for him; I wish he liked the country as I used to; the long bright summer days were just crowded with happiness for me; but then I had sister Fanny to play with, and brother Will. Perhaps it would have been different if I had been all alone.”

“Children must learn to make friends of the birds, and the squirrels, and all sorts of living things,” answered his father. “When I was Herbert’s age, I used to know the note of every bird in the woods, and I don’t believe he can tell even a robin when he sees it.”

“No,” said his mother; “he has but little chance for that sort of education; and moreover he has no taste for anything of the kind; I wish he had.”

The carriage which had been winding up the drive, stopped in front of the old-fashioned, wide piazzaed country home. It did seem a pity that anybody should feel doleful coming to such a pleasant place as that; but Herbert felt doleful; as he stood with his hand in his pockets, and stared down the country road, he winked hard to keep back the tears, when he thought of the boys in town having their military drill at this hour. Meanwhile his father and mother, and Peter and Hannah, bustled about, opening doors and windows, and planning where the luggage should be set down. Presently Herbert heard an exclamation from his mother. “For pity’s sake!” she said—and in the next breath—

“Herbert, come here and see what I have found!”

So Herbert swallowed hard, and brushed away a tear or two, and went round to the side piazza from where his mother’s voice had sounded, and saw a sight which made him go on tiptoe and gaze in delight.

Pushed back, well under shelter from the summer storms, in the southeast corner of the piazza, was an old, somewhat dilapidated willow chair, large and very comfortable in its time, but which had long since been assigned to the piazza, and not considered worth bringing in out of the dews or the rain. In the fall when the family closed the house, the old chair had been forgotten. It had stood there all winter, deserted and lonely. But in the spring it had evidently been mistaken by a certain family as a house which was for rent, and they had rented it and moved in and set up housekeeping on a splendid scale; the consequences were, that fastened ingeniously to the back of the chair was a luxurious nest, most carefully woven, and within it at this moment were three of the prettiest speckled eggs that Herbert had ever seen. In fact his knowledge of birds’ eggs was limited; he had seen but very few.

“O, mother!” he said softly, “how pretty it is. There is one of the birds on the branches near by—a splendid fellow. Where is his mate, do you suppose?”

“Not far away, you may depend,” said his mother. “What a cunning place it is in which to build a house. How fortunate that the chair is so near that door instead of the other one. We can get along for awhile without opening that door at all, and they can raise their family without having trouble. If I were you, Herbert, I would adopt them and look after their interests and help to bring up their young ones; wouldn’t that be fun?”