Chapter IV: Part II (1)

IT was a January night, very cold. The snow which was always on the mountains looked down on the snow which sometimes melted from the valleys, and seemed to smile at it in a hard, cold way, for supposing itself to be of any importance at all. The white cross made by the peculiar shape of the mountains, and the action of the sun on the snow, gleamed in the moonlight more beautiful than usual to Teddy Simpson, as he pushed back the overcoat several times too large for him, thrust his hands into his pockets, and leaned against the snow-covered hill to think. Hundreds of stars twinkled down upon him, brighter and more filled with jewels than they ever are in any other sky, I think; but Teddy’s thoughts were not of them.

He was waiting for the teamster whose route lay along this mountain side, and who always brought the mail from the distant settlement, as well as any supplies or packages which the miners might need. Not that Teddy expected any mail! Bless your heart, he had never received a letter in his life, nor even a paper through the mails. To have done so even once would have almost taken his breath away. Yet he was deeply interested in the teamster’s wagon; as he stood still in the moonlight to think, there was an eager look in his eyes, and he listened for the sound of the cracking whip with such an air of expectancy as his face did not often wear. The fact is, Teddy Simpson had planned a wonderful surprise for his mother which his friend the teamster was helping him to carry out. Very poor they were, he and his mother; she cooked for the miners, and washed for them, and mended their clothes, but the miners, too, were poor, and could pay but little. The truth is, the people who lived and worked in this beautiful, desolate region were all poor together. Teddy had had plans, beautiful plans, for the Christmas three weeks behind him, and had failed in them. He and his mother knew all about Christmas; had not she hung up her stocking every year of her life until she was a great girl fifteen years old? Teddy never had, because Santa Claus seemed never to get so far West as where he lived; but while the father was alive Teddy always had at least one Christmas present, if it was nothing but a picture cut from some of the illustrated papers of the tourists, and framed by his mother with some bits of bright paper laid away for such purposes. Teddy had been a man grown now for two years—at least he felt like one—with no time for such trifles; but he had longed to make a bright Christmas for the miner’s family with five little children, their nearest neighbors. If his mother had not had a sick day when he was obliged to do her work as well as he could, and in doing it wasted some of the material and lost a good deal of time, he thought he should have accomplished it. As it was, he could not get the Christmas treat ready for them, but promised himself that another year he would be on hand. Then he had turned his thoughts to a surprise for his mother. That, too, had been a Christmas plan, but failing then, he resolved that he would not wait for the next season. The surprise was nothing more nor less than a half-pound of the best tea which the silver half-dollar he had sent by the teamster could supply. The poor little overworked mother was very fond of tea; he had often heard her say that a good cup of it after a hard day’s work seemed to rest her as nothing else would; but since the father died, she had bravely put it aside as one of the luxuries which they could not now afford.

If there were time to tell you how long and hard Teddy had worked for that extra half-dollar, never taking a cent for it from the regular wages of the day which he earned as his share of the family support, you would not wonder that he had grown almost feverish in his anxiety as the weeks went on, lest he should fail in having the right amount. He had accomplished it, and the day had come for the teamster to go on his fortnightly trip, and the day and evening had arrived for his return, and here at a bend in the road Teddy waited for him.

Away in the distance on the still frosty air broke at last the sound of a cheery whistle, and Teddy held himself still and listened. Jim Coon, the teamster, was a friend of his, and Teddy did not believe he would whistle if anything so cruel had happened as that the supply grocer had been out of tea.

“Halloo!” said Jim, as he came with a flourish around the bend in the snowy road, “waitin’, be you? I thought it was a ghost froze stiff to the rocks. Climb up here, and we’ll be home in a jiffy. Beats all what a hurry this team has been in this afternoon—all owing to you, I s’pose. O, yes! I got it, safe and sound; the very best kind of tea ever brought to these parts, Joe Derrick says, and he put in a good big half-pound of it, I’m witness to that.”

Then Teddy drew a long breath, and immediately the longing which he had kept in the background came to the front; also the problem over which he had been studying for weeks. Wouldn’t it on the whole have been better to have gotten a quarter of a pound of tea and spent the rest of the money in sugar? mother did so like a little sugar with her tea. But then, a quarter of a pound seemed such a very little bit, and the winter was long in this mountain region, and there was no telling when he would have a chance to get any more. But he wished, O, so much! that he knew how to get just a little sugar; that would make the present complete.

“I got somethin’ else,” said Jim, with a curious note of suppressed excitement in his tones; “somethin’ for you.”

“For me?” echoed Teddy, amazed.

“Yes, sir, for you; Teddy Simpson is the name on the box, as large as life.”

“On the box!” In his astonishment and excitement all that Teddy could do was to echo Jim’s words.

“Yes, sir, on the box; a good-sized box, and as heavy as though it had been stuffed with lead. Come by freight; got there yesterday just about an hour before I drove into town; come all the way from New York State, too.”

After that, the quarter of a mile between Teddy Simpson and home seemed endless. A box by freight for him! What would mother think, and the neighbors! Above all, what could be in the box?

Before it was half-unpacked the question became what was not in it? Two suits of clothes for Teddy, two new dresses for his mother—or dresses quite as good as new—a warm, bright shawl, and a fur hood. Shoes, and stockings, and socks, and mittens, and oh! books, and papers, and pictures, and more books. Was ever anything so wonderful? Then there were toys—dolls, and balls, and tops, and wooden dogs, and wax cats, and cloth elephants—and some little bits of dresses and sacks which could fit only the children further down the mountain. Teddy felt this, even before he discovered that these were all labeled, “For Teddy to give to his friends, the little Perkinses.” Moreover, there was a little leather bag in the very bottom of the box, drawn together by a bright cord and securely tied, which when opened was found to contain seventeen bright silver dollars, the gifts of the cousins and aunts and uncles for Teddy to use as he thought best. Do you want to know what he thought of first? A whole pound of sugar to go with that half-pound of tea which was still lying snugly in his overcoat pocket, where Teddy meant to leave it until the next morning. Such a box as that, and a half pound of tea in the bargain, he considered altogether too much for his mother’s nerves in one evening.

Such a wonderful morning as it was—such a wonderful day, indeed! The Perkinses were hopelessly wild all day, and their poor little half-discouraged mother was not much better.

The next time teamster Jim went over the snow road between the mountains he carried a fat little letter written in Teddy’s best round hand—and he was by no means a bad writer; his mother had taught him. In this letter he described to the cousins just how he stood by the rocks and waited for Jim Coon’s team, just how surprised he was, just how the box was opened, just what he and his mother exclaimed as long as they had any breath for exclaiming, just how the Perkinses acted the next day—at least as well as language would do it—and altogether wrote so surprising a letter that Hortense said, drawing a long sigh of delight: “Isn’t it lovely? Hasn’t this been a long Christmas? It is better than the Christmas-tree a great deal, isn’t it?”

“It is the jolliest Christmas I ever had,” said Holly.

“And it has taught us how to have some more jolly ones,” said Tom.

As for Tom’s father, he said: “That boy Teddy is a smart fellow; he ought to have an education. There ought to be a good school out there. Why wouldn’t that be a good place for us to send Richard Winston? He would be a grand fellow to work among just such people.”

So the “long Christmas” is in a fair way to grow longer, you see, for every cousin in the three homes is interested in Tom’s father’s idea, and so is Richard Winston.

PANSY.

SOMETHING FOR MAMMA.

YOU want it for Christmas, of course; and you are a little girl who has very few pennies of your own to spend; and mamma, like other mammas, thinks that something which her daughter has made with her own hands is of far more value than an article, however fine, bought at a store. You have been disconsolate for several days because there are so few “things” which you know how to make, and because you have so little money with which to buy material. Take heart, my dear, there are happy surprises in store for mamma.

How much money have you for this particular gift? “Twenty-five cents,” and you blush and are troubled, and say in your heart, “Just as though anything worth having could be made for twenty-five cents!” Why, my dear, that is enough and to spare. Did you notice the table mats yesterday at dinner? They are made of bits of oiled wood ingeniously put together, and in their prime were pretty, and rather expensive; but they are sadly worn now—so much so, indeed, that Hannah declared only yesterday that she did not know what to do with the things; they were so much worn that she could not wash them any more. She knew what she would like to do with them; if she had her way she would “chuck” them into the fire.

What I propose is, that you plan your Christmas present so that Hannah can have the pleasure of doing just that thing.

What you want is a ball of macremé cord, of a delicate creamy tint, price fifteen cents, and a ball of candle wicking for three cents, or possibly five, though it ought not to be if your merchants are up with city prices. Positively that is all. O, yes! a crochet needle, large size; but that of course you have; or if not, I am almost certain that mamma, or better still grandma, will make you a present of one, because of the many useful things you can make with it; still, if you wish to be entirely independent, why, buy one, for five cents surely (a large price), and you are ready.

Hold the end of candle wicking over your left forefinger and crochet the macremé cord over it with what is known as the long stitch; it is very rapid work after you have once mastered the stitch, and before you realize it, you will have a long, long rope of creamy cord. Do not pull hard on the crochet cord, but let the work lie up loose and fluffy. When you think you have enough done to experiment with, get your neat little work box, thread a needle with strong cotton—number thirty being a very good size—curl the beginning of your cord into a graceful circle, and take firm stitches on the under side to hold it there; then another coil, and another, sewed neatly and firmly, and continue until you have a table mat large enough round to take the vegetable dishes, or the soup tureen, or whatever you wish to set on it. Then cut off the supply, fasten the end firmly, and finish the whole with a pretty crocheted scallop all around. Just compare that mat with the slippery, stained wood one with frayed edges! You admire it now, but what will it be when Hannah has washed and starched it until it holds its shape as firmly as the wooden one, and yet is flexible and graceful? More of them? Certainly, an entire set, varying in size to match the uses to which they are to be put.

Have I made a mistake? Are your vegetable dishes all oval? Well, my dear, your table water pitcher is not, I am sure. Just use this first one for it, and start your next sewing with an oval shape instead of a circle; it must be a very small oval for the beginning—not over three quarters of an inch in length—else your mat will grow too long for its width. Your best plan would be to experiment a little. Lay the work loosely, confined by a mere basting stitch, and see whether, when the mat has grown as long as your paper pattern, it will be of the proper width. You will not find the planning difficult; it merely needs the patience and carefulness which I feel sure you will bestow; and the result will be an entire nest of pretty and useful mats which will be a delightful surprise to mamma on Christmas morning, and a comfort to her as well as to Hannah throughout the year. Try it, and be sure to let me hear how you succeeded.

PANSY.

ETHEL CARLISLE’S FACE.

(_Character Studies._)

I CAN see her now as she looked to me that winter morning wrapped in furs, ready all but her fur cap to brave the frosty air, when she held up in triumph a spray of brilliant bloom, and said: “Look, Aunt Myra, did you ever see anything prettier than that from a conservatory? And they blossomed in my window-seat!” I was not her auntie, but was so old and intimate a friend of the family that the children had adopted me.

“Hasn’t Ethel a beautiful face?” I said to Miss Margaret, another friend of the family, who, with myself, was a guest at the Carlisles’. “It is so very bright. Did you notice what a peculiar brightness there is to her eyes when she smiles? And she has a lovely smile.”

Miss Margaret looked grave, almost troubled. “It is a sweeter face than it will be in a few years, I am afraid,” she said, shaking her head, which already had threads of silver in it. Miss Margaret was a wise sweet woman, not given to croaking, so I waited somewhat anxiously to hear her words. “Ethel is cultivating habits which will spoil her face,” she said; “I have not been here before for two years, and I notice a very decided change in it since then. She was one of the sweetest little children I ever knew, but if you watch through only one day you will discover what I mean. Unless something occurs to change her habits, there will be another spoiled face in the world in a few years.”

I had been in the house but a day, and had been absent from the country for more than two years, so I knew very little of the younger Carlisles. Ethel had always been my favorite, and it made me sad and a trifle annoyed to hear Miss Margaret’s words. I felt sure she must have grown over particular.

Of course, with such a warning, it would have been impossible not to have watched. Long before night I knew what Miss Margaret meant.

“Where in the world is my French Grammar?” I heard Ethel’s voice, with a very sharp note in it, rasping through the hall. “I left it on the dining-room table while I ran out to speak to Nellie, and somebody has taken it. I declare, I cannot lay down a thing for a second and find it again. I do wish Ann could be taught to let my books alone!”

“Indeed, Miss Ethel, I have not touched a book this morning; I have not dusted in the dining-room yet.” This was Ann’s voice; then Ethel’s, by no means sweetened: “That is perfect nonsense, Ann; I left it here not two minutes ago, and now it is gone. What do you think could have become of it? It couldn’t walk off without hands.”

“Ethel!” from Mrs. Carlisle, in a reproving tone, “do not speak so to Ann, daughter; she has not been in the dining-room since breakfast.”

“Well, but, mother, my French Grammar is gone that I just laid there, and the bell is ringing; I shall be late, and I think it is just too bad!” There was an ugly frown all over the fair forehead, and a sharp and at the same time whining tone to the voice which had been so sweet but a little while before.

“Ethel,” called her older sister Nannie from the hall above, “here is your book; you left it on the hat rack a few minutes ago.”

Away went Ethel without a word of explanation to mother or to Ann, and we heard her voice, still sharp, saying to Nannie, “Why couldn’t you have told me before, and not kept me hunting half the morning?”

I heard the mother sigh, and was sorry for her, and glad that the alcove curtains shaded me from view, and that I had a book in my hand and could appear not to have heard.

Ethel came home at lunch time, and was out of sorts with the soup because it tasted of onions, and with the squash because it had been peppered. She said she wished anybody ever consulted her tastes, and she would just as soon think of puffing tobacco smoke in the face of people as of eating onions for them to smell afterwards. She scolded her brother Tom for forgetting the music he was to call for; and when he said he was very sorry, and it was because he had so many important errands for his father that he forgot it, she tossed her head and said sharply, “Oh! you needn’t explain; of course you would forget what I wanted; I’m of no consequence.”

In short, with my eyes opened as they had been by Miss Margaret I could not help seeing that Ethel spoiled the sweetness of almost every room she entered that day, and complained of unkindness or of discomforts at every turn. Yet at family worship, when she played,

“Sun of my soul, thou Saviour dear,”

and led the singing with a very sweet voice, she looked like an angel. It broke my heart to hear her, not ten minutes afterwards, scolding Baby Frank for overturning her spool basket. “You are just a little nuisance!” she said, sharp-voiced again; “I think mamma ought to whip you. Well, mamma, I do,” in response to a reproving look from her mother; “you are just spoiling him, I think.”

“Is it possible that this is a fair specimen of that child’s days?” I asked Miss Margaret, as we went down the hall together.

“I am afraid it is,” said Miss Margaret. “She is learning to frown and fret over the veriest trifles, and to answer even her mother rudely, as you noticed just now. How many years of such living will it take to utterly spoil the pretty face? Isn’t it strange that a young girl who believes herself such an ardent admirer of beauty, should deliberately undertake to spoil the lovely work of art which God gave her to take care of?”

MYRA SPAFFORD.

ORIGIN OF A NEW ENGLAND INDUSTRY.

IN 1798 Betsey Metcalf, of Dedham, Mass., made a bonnet out of oat straw, fashioning it after an English bonnet then very fashionable. She flattened the straw with the blade of her scissors, split it with her thumb nail, braided it into the requisite number of strands and bleached it by holding it over the vapor of burning sulphur. She afterward taught the young ladies of her vicinity how to do it, and thus laid the foundation of the extensive business now carried on in straw hats in New England.—_Selected._

MOTHER DUNLAP’S STORY.

IF my father and mother had been at home it would never have happened, but they started in the morning as soon as they could see the road for my Aunt Margaret’s, taking Emeline with them. I remember just how I felt when I saw them drive from our gate with Emeline sitting between them; it seemed so terrible, somehow, to think of her sitting in my place, because I was the one who always sat between father and mother. But Cousin Emeline was Aunt Margaret’s little girl, and word had come that Aunt Margaret was very sick, and that Emeline must be brought home as fast as possible; so of course they started, though there was every sign of a storm, Uncle Peter said, and he hardly ever made a mistake in the weather. He was our “signal service” in those days. Cousin Edward was at our house, too; he was Uncle Edward’s son, and always spent his short vacation with us, because his folks lived too far away for him to go home. He was thirteen years old, and thought he knew all there was to know in life. He was a smart fellow, and would have been real nice if he had not felt so sure of it himself. Father and mother had not been gone an hour when he began to plan to drive to town to the New Year festival which was to be held in one of the churches, and take me along. Kirke said everything in the world to hinder us from going; he thought it was going to storm.

“Who’s afraid of a few snowflakes?” said Edward. “I want Nannie to have a cheery time for New Year’s; it is dreadful dull for her with Auntie and Uncle both gone.”

Kirke was a boy who did chores at our house for his board, and went to school; we lived two miles nearer the schoolhouse than his mother did, and they were pretty poor, and Kirke earning his board away from home helped them a good deal. We all loved Kirke; he was a good sensible boy, and stood at the head of his classes in school. But I did not approve of him that day; I wanted to go to town. I was a silly little thing in those days, not afraid of anything; I laughed at the storm just as Edward did.

“It will be more than a few flakes,” Kirke said, shaking his head gravely; “I think we are going to have the worst storm of the season.” Then Edward began to make fun of him—call him Uncle Peter, and ask what kind of a winter it was forty years ago; because Uncle Peter was always going back to old times and telling stories about the weather. Kirke kept good-natured, and laughed with me over Edward’s speeches, but for all that he did not stop trying to keep us from going to town.

“Look here,” he said, “I have a tip-top plan for this afternoon. Mrs. Baker gave me a jug of molasses and some splendid ears of pop-corn to take home: suppose you and Nannie walk out home with me, and we will pop some corn, and make candy with hickory nuts in? We’ve got a bushel of nuts stored away in the garret, and we’ll have no end of fun. Nannie can stay all night—she has done it before, you know—and sleep with my sister Mary, and you and I will turn in with little Billy up in the attic; he likes company.”

The picture looked quite inviting to me; I had often been out to Kirke’s house, for my father and mother liked their family very much, and were always willing to have me play with their children.

But Edward was not to be persuaded. “No, you don’t, old fellow,” he said; “candy and nuts are first-rate things for any night in the year but New Year’s; a fellow needs something extra then. I’ve set my heart on seeing the festival tables, and watching them give out the prizes, and I’m going; my uncle said three days ago that I could.”

“But he did not know that it was going to snow,” Kirke said, more and more anxious. “Really, Edward, I do not think Mr. and Mrs. Baker would like to have you take Nannie out when it looks so much like a storm.” Then Edward got angry and told Kirke to mind his own business, that we were not left in his charge at least, and that he should do as he liked; and Kirke was to remember that Mr. and Mrs. Baker were his own uncle and aunt, and that he might be supposed to know as much about what they would like as a stranger could. Kirke said no more, but he looked very much troubled. I was half-disposed to give up the plan, but Edward laughed at me. The good-natured housekeeper in whose care we were left never paid much attention to the weather, and made no objection to my going. I don’t know but that it would have come out all right even then, if Edward’s pride had not got the upper hand. He took a notion to drive to town by the old road.

“O, don’t!” I urged; “you do not know that way at all, and Uncle Peter said this morning that the wind last night must have drifted the snow on the old road.”

“Poh!” said Edward, “Uncle Peter is an old croaker; he’s an old man, Nannie, and always makes mountains out of molehills. The wind will be at our backs part of the time on the old road, and I’m going that way. What if I have not driven it? The horse won’t get lost, if you think I will.”

Well, we started, and for the first ten minutes everything was right; then we began to come to drifts, and I was dreadfully scared. We almost turned over two or three times. I kept squealing out, and that provoked Edward. “Keep still,” he would say; “I did not know you were such a little coward.” To make matters worse, it began to snow harder than I ever saw it before, and grew so dark that we could hardly see our way. We had been riding a good while, and ought to have reached the town, but no sign of a town was to be seen.

After a while Edward made up his mind that he must have taken the wrong turn, and said he was going back a little way to see if he had. He tried to turn around, but the wind blew so that the snow blinded his eyes; and it was not a good place for turning around, any way. The first thing I knew over went the sleigh, and I was in a snowdrift! That was not the worst of it, either; the runner of the sleigh snapped as if it had been a pipe-stem. Good old Jim stood still, fortunately. But there we were with a driving storm, with a broken sleigh! I do not think I was ever so glad of anything in my life as I was to hear Kirke’s voice above the roar of the wind.

“What in the world are you doing there?” he said, bounding along over drifts of snow. “Is Nannie hurt? If she is not all right never mind anything else. Oh! the sleigh is broken. How came you to be on this road? This is not the way to town; it is an old wood road that was used early in the winter, but it is all snowed up; you could not have got much farther; you ought to have turned to the right a mile below here; I thought you knew the way. Now I’ll tell you what will have to be done. Nannie must go to our house—it is less than a quarter of a mile from here—and I’ll get a rope and tie up that sleigh somehow, enough to get it and Jim back to the stable; then I’ll tell your folks that you are going to stay at our house all night—shall I?”

He seemed to have forgotten how disagreeably Edward had spoken to him, and was just as nice as could be. But Edward’s cheeks were pretty red. “No, sir,” he said firmly; “I started out to have my own way and ought to have the benefit of it. If you will take Nannie to your house I’ll get this rig home myself and take care of Jim; it is not fair that you should lose your New Year’s fun to help me out. I’ll foot it out to your house if it is not too late after I have been to see Mr. Ormstead about mending this sleigh; but I’m not going to let you go for me a single step.”

No amount of coaxing could turn him from his purpose. So at last Kirke, after helping him to tie up the runner with some twine which they found in their pockets, tucked me under his arm, and we marched off to their little house.

Their kitchen was the cleanest, brightest, cheeriest place you ever saw, and the molasses taffy was splendid. I had a lovely time; but there was such a dreadful storm that Edward could not get back that night, and Jim had lamed himself somehow in stumbling through deep drifts; and it cost four dollars to mend the sleigh, which Edward had to pay, because my father said he did not believe in boys having their own way and not being willing to take the consequences. To be sure he gave the money back again, and more too, when Edward’s next birthday came. But I don’t think Edward ever forgot the lesson. I ought to have been punished too, for I pretended to agree with Edward, even when I thought he was foolish; but some way I slipped through the trouble and had all the pleasure, just as girls often do, I think.

“Mother,” said little Cathie Dunlap, “father’s middle name is Kirke; did he have anything to do with the nice boy who took care of you?”

“Why, yes,” said Mother Dunlap, laughing, “come to think of it, his full name was William Kirke Dunlap.”

MYRA SPAFFORD.

HUNGER AND THIRST.

THERE is a story of a little boy who was very fond of angling, and who one day told his grandfather that he had caught a fish as large as a horse.

“Look here, Tom,” said the old man, “don’t you know it’s wrong for a little boy like you to tell such a big untruth? You are not six years, are you?”

“No,” said Tommy; “I am only five, and I’ll not do it again. After this I’m going to tell only little bits of fish stories.”

That boy often reminds one of people who talk about being “temperate” and “moderate” in the use of things which they ought to let alone altogether. A little glass of strong drink, a little cigar, are just as certainly wrong as a little untruth.

But how can we know what is good or bad for the body? The answer is, that our body itself will tell us. The body has a conscience as well as the soul. Put your hand into a potful of warm water, and your hand will at once let you know if the water is too hot. Go out sleigh-riding in a light straw hat on a cold winter morning, and your ears will soon ask for a warmer cover. After a laborer has been hard at work for eight or ten hours, his body will ask for rest. Make a child sit down in a chair without moving for six hours, and its body will ask for exercise. Our body soon lets us know if a coat or a shoe is too tight, or if a burden is too heavy. And it can just as certainly be relied upon to warn us against unwholesome food. It is true that we can silence that voice of our body’s conscience. After a man has swallowed a good many glasses of bad drink or smoked a cigar every morning for a couple of weeks, he at last gets “used to it,” as we call it; his nature gets changed, and at last he is unable to let such things alone. But at the first trial our sense of taste will plainly warn us against unwholesome food and drink. Before an apple is ripe it tastes sour. The taste of over-ripe or spoiled fruit gets more and more disagreeable.

An Italian naturalist, during his travels in Southern Africa, noticed that a little pet monkey of his never made a mistake in choosing its food, and could tell poisonous herbs and berries from good ones the moment he tasted them. The traveler made that little creature his kitchen master, as he called it, and always let it try a bit of every kind of food that was offered to him for sale. “If Jocko ate a spoonful of honey and stretched out his hand for more,” he writes, “I was satisfied that it was worth buying; if the little chap grinned and flung the sample away, I felt sure that the bees must have gathered their honey from poisonous flowers. Jocko never made mistakes in such things, and that our own people blundered so often might be explained by the fact that we have blunted our sense of taste with strong drink and hot spices.”

A boy who has been brought up on perfectly wholesome food can tell injurious things almost as quick as that little monkey. He will dislike the taste of sharp pepper sauces, of pickles, of strong cheese, of spoiled meat, and will not be apt to mistake a bitter swamp berry for a huckleberry.

Our stomach also lets us know when we should stop eating. In that case, too, it is not safe to disregard the warnings of our bodily conscience. If a boy keeps eating, just to while time away, after he feels that he has had enough, and after his stomach has asked him again and again to stop, his nature at last changes, and he wants to be stuffing himself all the time. I knew a little chap of ten years who seemed to think it a pity to lose a chance for gorging himself, and who had to be watched like a tricky cat to keep him from slipping into his mother’s pantry and helping himself to all the good things in sight. On his way to school he would stop to buy a package of peanuts or pick up a pocketful of apples on the outside of an orchard, and when he came home for dinner he ate away as if nothing had happened. All his schoolmates called him “Glutton Joe.”

Such gluttons are apt to think that they are getting more fun out of life than other people. The truth is, that they hardly ever know an hour of real happiness. They feel dull and weary; they become too sluggish to play; they take no interest in their studies, and drop a new book or new paper after a short look at the pictures; they would rather not know the end of a pretty story than go to the trouble of reading it through. They feel drowsy as soon as the weather gets a little warm, but when they go to sleep their rest is broken by ugly dreams. Glutton Joe had no friends; he was so cross and lazy that nobody wanted him for a playmate.

An old fisherman once told me that it was worth while going out sailing in bad, chilly weather, just for the fun of getting home again and taking a rest in a warm chimney-corner, and I have often thought that many people would find it worth while to fast once in a while, when they begin to complain that they cannot enjoy their meals. After a day’s exercise in the woods and mountains the plainest food tastes well. A supper of bread, milk and huckleberries tastes better to the poor Tennessee mountain boy, who has been out herding cows all day, than a banquet of thirty dishes tastes to a rich merchant who has not yet digested his last meal. There is no danger in an occasional fast, though some people seem to think it a misfortune to miss one of their three daily meals. There was a time when rich and poor thought it enough to eat one good meal a day. The old Romans and Greeks ate a biscuit and perhaps half a handful of dried fruit in the morning, and then did not eat again till they had finished their day’s work, when they took a bath, changed their dress, and then sat down to a good supper. An Indian hunter thinks nothing of going a day without any food at all. A few years ago an American physician thought it worth while to try how long a man could fast without hurting himself. People thought he was crazy, and told him he would kill himself in less than a week. He made no reply, and his friends changed their opinion when he had fasted forty days and nights. Few of those friends would have cared to try their own pluck in that manner, but they would certainly have been ashamed to complain of an accident that might lose them a dinner and oblige them to eat their principal meal in the evening.

But though there can be no harm in a day’s fast, it is never safe to suffer for want of drinking water. The same doctor who passed nearly six weeks without a mouthful of food, took a sip of cold lemonade every few hours, and it is a curious fact that in warm weather a glass of water served with our dinner is by far the most important part of the meal. Hunger, or what we call a “good appetite,” often stops after the mealtime has passed without a chance of getting a mouthful of food, but thirst cannot be put off in that way, and becomes at last so intolerable that a starved traveler, after a three days’ journey in the desert, would give a wagon-load of food for a drink of cold water.

FELIX L. OSWALD, M. D.

WOULD AND SHOULD.

A PUPIL in a quiet boarding-school in —— displayed some time since no small degree of industry in collecting autographs of distinguished persons. The late James Russell Lowell was one of the number addressed. The address to him was in substance: “I would be very much obliged for your autograph.” The response contained a lesson that many besides the ambitious pupil have not learned: “Pray do not say hereafter ‘I would be obliged.’ If you would be obliged, be obliged and be done with it. Say ‘I should be obliged,’ and oblige yours truly, JAMES RUSSELL LOWELL.”—_Selected._

WESTMINSTER ABBEY.

YOU see it is most beautiful to the eye, though you Pansies of the great cities may think some of your churches quite as handsome. But none of them has such a history. This church was founded—started, as some would say—more than a thousand years ago! Now where’s your pretty “meeting-house” which was built only last year?

Old King Siebert, a Saxon, built Westminster Abbey, and many of the Saxons really believed that the Apostle Peter dedicated it, though Peter had died nearly one thousand years before!

However, this building is not the very same that King Siebert put up. That one stood several hundred years, when Edward, “the Confessor,” as he was called, rebuilt it. Two hundred years later King Henry the Third enlarged it, making it look about as it now is.

For years and years the English kings and queens have been crowned here, and buried, too, nearly all. Here the great ones of the nation are buried—Shakespeare, Milton, Ben Jonson, Wordsworth, and many more, the poets in the “Poets’ Corner.”

Under the coronation (crowning) chair is the “Stone of Scone,” which some actually say is the very one Jacob laid his head upon when he dreamed! However that be, many kings have sat upon it when they were crowned.

Of course you will search out the “Jerusalem Chamber” when you visit Westminster. The Presbyterian Church began in this chamber. Here, too, the Bible was revised (re-translated from the Hebrew and Greek).

“Why do they call it the ‘Jerusalem Chamber’?”

Probably because its windows came from that old city, and the Cedar of Lebanon forms the wainscoting.

So this wonderful building has served many purposes besides that of a church. For some hundred years the House of Commons (something like our House of Representatives) made laws here, especially laws to secure the liberties of the people.

So you see this building is something like Faneuil Hall of Boston and Independence Hall of Philadelphia.

What a book Westminster Abbey could make if it only could write. But somehow, like Nineveh and such places, it will rise up in the Judgment; then what will it say of the people who have had to do with it?

L.

A NEW YEAR’S TRIP.

TO Africa! Yes; here it is ’92, January 1, early in the morning, and we are in the sleigh, and away we glide over the snow to Africa, to return to-night.

“Twenty thousand miles in twelve hours, pooh! and going to hot Africa in a sleigh!”

Suppose, then, we just think we are there, and we are there to all intents and purposes.

“Well, here goes; I think I’m in South Africa at the mouth of some diamond hole (tunnel), January 1, ’92. Of course I’m there picking up diamonds to bring back for New Year’s presents, eh?”

Indeed you—the best part of you, your soul, your thought—are. Just wake up your imagination, and it’s about the same. Now you step down into the dark hole. Deeper you descend, as down a steep hill, to the very bottom—eight hundred feet or more—through fields full of diamonds.

See, just before you dim forms. They are naked natives digging. They fill up the small car of dirt, dotted with the precious stones, and away it goes up and out. It dumps its load and returns. It’s a dirty, dreadful place. Every little while there’s a roar; the ground shakes. There’s dynamite blasting to loosen the earth.

Hurry out now; the tunnel may cave in, and you’ll be choked, as were several hundred a few years ago.

Here we are outside. See, the ground is two feet deep with the earth carted out. They are harrowing it, or the rain is falling upon it. It is crumbling fine. Ah! see the shining treasures. But look out! Don’t put one into your pocket without permission; you are watched.

Now back we come—in thought. There! have not we had one of the brightest New Year’s?

Thus brighten up your imagination and you need not be bothering yourself forever with cars and steamboats and ships and seasickness and such things to see foreign lands. With a good book of travels or newspaper you can just trip over there—to Europe, Asia and Africa—in a moment, and see all you can carry back in a few more moments, and be home to tea the same day to show (tell) your treasures!

L.

ON A VISIT TO GERMANY.

HERE we are. It is midwinter—

“In Maine or New Hampshire or Canada, I guess.”

Guess again, you mistaken Pansy.

“Norway, then.”

Nor Norway, but just simply in Germany.

“Such snow-storms in Germany?”

Yes, and that miss with umbrella and fat face trudging on is—

“Fräulein, I dare say. Isn’t that, or something like it, the name of all the German girls?”

Wouldn’t that mix things in a family of six girls? Think of a mother calling each one Fräulein!

But that girl is no other than Bessie—

“Bessie a German girl? Never heard one called that in all my life.”

Who said she was a German girl? Can’t one be in Germany and not be a German? Do you expect to turn into one as soon as you get to—“Sweet Bingen on the Rhine,” or Frankfort? Frankfort, once the home of the great poet, Goethe, some of whose sayings it may make your dear head ache to understand. Frankfort, once a free city, as free from any king or great ruler as—the United States is of Mexico; a queer, bright old city—

“Bessie! Bessie! what about Bessie? Won’t she be lost in Frankfort? Who is she, any how?”

A Pansy, quite likely from Boston, by that name, on a visit to Germany. She will spend a few months in Frankfort, studying German and seeing the German sights, among them Luther’s house.

“But you do not explain what Bessie is doing out in a Frankfort snow-storm.”

Maybe she is after red cheeks; she left Boston looking pale enough. Her mamma thought a sea voyage and a few months in France and as many more in Germany would color her face again with rose tints as formerly. You see how she has improved. Now the Christmas festival of Frankfort begins, lasting three days. There will be trees and trees, and so much more that paper can hardly hold it or ink write it.

Bessie is on her way to the festival to see the German of it with Yankee eyes.

L.

(_From the painting by Raeburn._)]

A DELIGHTFUL WRITER.

WHEN you go to Edinburgh, Scotland—as some day go you may—you must not fail to visit one of the finest structures there, the monument of Sir Walter Scott.

Before you go it would be well to read some of his charming books: Ivanhoe, Old Mortality, Tales of a Grandfather, etc.

The Scottish folks are justly proud of Sir Walter. Few nations have produced so delightful a writer. So no wonder this grand monument was built. It is a Gothic edifice, the top of the spire of which is two hundred feet from the ground. The lower part is open, and here is a fine marble statue of Sir Walter, his favorite dog by his side.

Seventy-five thousand dollars have been put into this edifice! Many of you would be satisfied with a house costing one thousand. Young Walter Scott did not expect to become so great a man when he first took up his pen.

L.

A HERO.

AT Fort Smith, Ark., is Mrs. Edith M. Degen. She knows a great deal about Mr. “In.” If you will write her a letter saying you want to know something more about him, and if you will put in your letter a postal card addressed to yourself, it will soon get back to you with writing on the other side which you will like to read. Try it.

Now this man is really Mr. Lewis F. Hadley of Massachusetts. He has been many years among the Indians, studying their Sign Language.

You see the different tribes of Indians have different mouth or spoken languages, as do white people. To understand each other’s speech they must have an interpreter to give its meaning; but they all seem to have about the same sign speech; by using this the different tribes can understand each other when they meet.

You know the deaf and dumb talk with their hands. So with the Indians of different tribes when they can’t understand each other’s speech.

Here is a specimen of the sign language:

Morning come I give it firewagon;

go fast; pretty soon you catch it.

Day you catch it you show it

man, woman, all Maybe so give it

money print book many. Printing

done, I show it Indian The same

see it, know it good. Done.

Lightning Afraid Not.]

Well, Mr. Hadley has been mastering these signs, and now, after many years’ hard study, you see he can write it.

“What for?”

To spread knowledge among the Indians. To give them the Gospel—the blessed good news about the Lord who came and died for them.

“But has not the Bible been put into Indian for them to read, and don’t the missionaries preach to them in their own language?”

Yes, indeed; but don’t you see that for each one of the many tribes it may be necessary to have just the Bible and missionary that each can understand? But if all the tribes now know this one Sign Talk, then all can read the Lord’s Prayer, and any other part of the Bible, if put in this sign talk. And all the more so because every one can understand a thing better if he can see the language as well as hear it.

Now to do this good work Mr. H—— lived among the Indians. He is a missionary unlike any other. He has suffered much living as the Indians do to learn this language. Read what Mrs. Degen says: “Would you like to go out to dine where all the family kneel on an earth floor around the tin dish-pan in which the dinner has been cooked, and grab for ‘a little white meat,’ or ‘a little dark meat,’ or a ‘little of both, if you please’? Would you like to see your fellow diners throw the bones they have picked back into the pan? Or would you like to have your food brought to you in a wash-basin?”

Now you can see something of what Mr. Hadley bears. He is a hero. You can help him. So write to Mrs. Degen.

L.

HIS GIFT.

A LITTLE boy in Russia lay dying. But a few months before he had heard of Jesus and his love, and given his heart to that wonderful friend. His greatest desire in life was to have other Russian children get acquainted with Jesus. He meant when he grew up to be a missionary among his people; but God wanted him in heaven. Just before he died he called his father, and told him how much he wanted to have the Bible sent to people who were not acquainted with Jesus. Said he: “I haven’t much money, you know, father, but if you would take what is in my box and send it to the house where they print Bibles, I think there might be enough to dot the I’s in the name of Christ. I feel sure there must be enough to do that in one Bible, and I would like it so much! Will you, father?”

You do not need to be told that the father carried out his boy’s last directions, and the little purse of money is helping to-day to “dot the I’s” in that blessed name.

Surely that little fellow ought to have had engraved upon his headstone, “He hath done what he could.”

WORK ENOUGH.

SOME years ago—

“Some years ago!” Why, it was as long ago as five times the age of your grandpapa—he was eighty, I think—a brave man and a few sailors got into a small ship on the coast of Spain, spread its sails, and away westward they sped, over the ocean wide and rough with waves. They found America at last. Others came. Villages grew up. Still they came.

About this time, three thousand miles away, walked two—

“Lovers, I guess.”

Indeed they did love each other, if that is what you mean. See them in the picture of the “Two Missionaries;” were there ever sweeter faces, purer and more pitiful? It is because the love of God is shed abroad in their hearts. Dress and feathers don’t make beauty so much as a right heart, you must know.

These two hearts were walking near the dear old church, and as they walked they thought of the sermon the day before about bearing the tidings—the Gospel—to the needy. They had heard of America, and their hearts bled for the people here.

“And did they go to a seminary, and learn how to teach and preach, and get ordained, and get married, and come over here and have a Sunday-school and church?”