Chapter III (5)

Long before he came to town, there were more baby-clothes made up for him than he could wear, should he stay a baby twenty years; and all loaded with lace and embroidery, and finified with silk and satin; and the people left their workshops, and ran to see them, as if they had not another minute to live. Then there were half a dozen rooms, all prepared for his expected little cry-babyship; for you had better not believe that he was going to stay in _one_ room, like any common baby; not he! Then all the gray-haired old men, and beautiful women, bent over his magnificent cradle, and declared him to be the most splendid baby that ever was born; and it was as much as his nurse’s life was worth to stick a pin into him, or wash his little flabby nose the wrong way, or tie his frock a tenth of an inch too tight or too loose, or nurse him a minute too long or too short, or allow an impertinent sunbeam to make him sneeze, when he didn’t want to. Oh, he was a great baby that! Even his playthings were gold crosses and ribbons, that kings have been known to cut each other’s heads off for, scrambling which should wear. Step softly—bend low before his cradle; royal blood flushes that little face. He is the _King of Algiers_.

Peep with me into yonder stable; the door is a-jar; there is nothing there to frighten you. The light glances through a chink in the roof upon the meek, submissive cattle, who with bowed heads, drowsily dose the listless hours away. Is there nothing else in the stable? Look again. Yes, there in yonder corner, sits a fair young mother. Her coarse mantle is wrapt around her shrinking form, and her small head is drooping, partly with weariness, partly with tender solicitude for the new-born babe upon her lap. No rich wardrobe awaits the little stranger; clothed only in his own sweet loveliness, he slumbers the quiet hours away. But see! above that stable glows a star, brighter than ever glittered on the breast of earthly prince or king; and above that star is a city, “which hath no need of the sun, nor of the moon to shine in it, for the glory of God doth lighten it, and the Lamb is the light thereof;” and that is the Heavenly Home of the lowly “Babe of Bethlehem.”

THE LITTLE SISTERS.

Hark! there is a bird singing—the first one I have heard this spring. How can you expect me to sit looking this stupid sheet of paper in the face, when that pretty bird is calling me out-doors, with all his sweet might? I have a great mind to throw my inkstand right out of the window! No I won’t; it might hit that bent old woman, who is raking the gutter with her long iron poker. Oh, it is hard enough for young people to be poor; but to be poor, feeble, and gray-headed—oh, ’tis very sad! The _young_ heart is always hopeful; it can bear a great deal of discouragement; it leaps to a bird’s sweet trill, or a patch of green grass, or a bit of blue sky, although its owner may be covered with rags, and knows not where he shall get his next meal, or find his next night’s shelter.

The other day, I saw two little bits of girls, with tangled hair, dirty skins, bare legs, and ragged skirts, crouching down upon the pavement, and clapping their little tan-colored hands, because they had found—what do you think? A diamond? No—they never saw such a thing; though could they have seen their own eyes just then in a looking-glass, they might have found out how diamonds look. Had they found a sixpence or a shilling? No, I think by their appearance, they might never have seen so much money. “A London doll, with blue eyes, and red checks, and flaxen curls?” No; all the dolls they ever saw were made of old newspapers rolled up. What then? Why, two little blades of grass, that even the mayor, aldermen, and Common Council could not keep from struggling up through the pavement, to tell those poor little children that spring had come. No more little shivering toes and fingers, no more imprisonment in a dark, damp, underground cellar room, gloomy enough to chill even the light, hopeful heart of a little child. No, indeed! Oh, but they were lovely, those two tiny blades of grass! and the children lay flat down on their stomachs upon the pavement, and called it their “little garden,” and kicked their poor thin calves up in the air, and were happier with their treasure, than many a rich man, worth millions, with his hot-house and conservatory full of costly flowers and mimic fountains, whose beauty he scarce notices, for thinking of some great ship of his, off on the water, and trembling for fear she may be lost, with her rich freight of silks and laces.

“Get out of the way, there,” growled a pompous old gentleman, with a big waistcoat, and a gold-headed cane, thrusting the two children rudely aside, as he strutted past; “Dirty little vagabonds—ought to be sent to ‘the Island.’ Pah!” “Yes—off with you,” said the policeman, bowing low before the gold-headed cane and the golden calf who carried it; “off with you, d’ye hear?”

“He has trod on our pretty garden,” whimpered the distressed little things, looking back; “he has spoiled our garden,” and they rubbed their dirty little fists into their eyes.

“Dis—gust—ing,” replied a lady, whose flounces the children had run against in their endeavor to “get out of the way.” Poor things—ever since they were born they had heard nothing but “get out of the way;” they had begun to think the world was not intended for children. Ah! but another lady who is coming along, and who has watched the whole scene, does not think so.

“Would you like this—and this?” said she, putting in their hands two of those delicious little bouquets, sold by the flower-girls of New York.

A shilling to give so much happiness! Who would have thought it? How the smiles drank up the tears on those little faces? Was there ever any thing so beautiful as those forget-me-nots? See those little bare feet trip so lightly home with them; now they crawl down into the dark cellar room. Comfortless enough, is it not? Their mother stands wringing out her husband’s red-flannel shirts, at the wash-tub; both children begin at once to tell about “the lady who gave them the flowers,” and their mother wipes the suds from her hands, and gets an old cracked mug, and places the violets in it, up against the dingy window-pane; and now and then she stops to smell them, for she has not always lived in the dirty, close, dark alleys of the city, and the odor of those violets brings the tears to her faded eyes, once as blue as they; but she must not think of that; and bending over them once more, with an “Ah me!” she goes back again to her work: for well she knows that by-and-by a step will be heard stumbling down those stairs, and a man’s voice—not singing, cheerily, because his home, his wife and children are so near, but cursing—cursing that patient, toiling woman, cursing those half-starved innocent little girls. Oh, what could have turned that once kind man into such a cruel brute? Ask him, who, for a few paltry pence, sells the _Rum_ that freezes the hearts of so _many_ little girls’ fathers, and sends their patient, all-enduring mothers weeping to the grave!

OURS; OR, A LOOK BACKWARD.

Yes, Swissdale was ours! The title-deeds were “without a flaw,” so lawyer Nix informed us. Ours—the money was paid down that very day. Those glorious old trees were ours; tossing their branches hither and thither, as if oppressed with exuberant animal life; or stooping to caress the green earth, as if grateful for its life-sustaining power. Ours were the broad sloping meadows, dotted with daisies and clover, waving responsive to every whisper of the soft west wind; ours were the dense woods, which skirted it, where the sentinel squirrel cocked up his saucy eye, then darted away to the decayed tree-trunk, with his smuggled mouthful of acorns; ours the pretty scarlet berries, nestled under the tiny leaves at our feet; ours the rose-tinted and purple anemones, whose telltale breath betrayed their hidden loveliness; ours the wild rose, fair as fleeting; ours the green moss-patches, richer than courtly carpet, trod by kingly feet; ours the wondrously fretted roof, of oak and maple, pine and chestnut, now jealously excluding the sun’s rays, now by one magic touch of their neighborly leaves, making way that their bright beams might crimson the heart of some pale and tremulous flower, languishing like a lone maiden for the warm breath of Love. Ours were the robins and orioles, sparrows and katy-dids; ours the whip poor-will, wailing ever amid marshy sedge, where the crimson lobelia, more gorgeous than kingly robes, defied the covetous eye, and timorous foot. Ours the hedges, tangled with wild grape, snowy with blossoming clematis, woven with sweet briar, guarded by its protecting thorns. Ours the hill-side; where the creeping myrtle charily hid under the tall grass its cherished blue-eyed blossoms; ours the gray old rocks, whose clefts, and fissures, the golden moss made bright with verdure; ours the valley lillies, ringing ever their snow-white bells for the maidens’ bridal. Ours the bower-crowned, vine-wreathed, hill-summit, whence with rapt vision we drank in that broad expanse of earth, and sea, and sky, in all its waving, glowing, sparkling, changing, glorious beauty!—one perpetual anthem to Him, who hath neither beginning nor end of days.

Ours was the little blue-eyed one, who, though of infant stature, measured thought with angels; and with finger on hushed lip and lambent eyes, listened to voices, alas! all unheard by us, that were wooing her fragile form away.

“Ours—” was she? God rest thee, Mary—naught is left us now, but this sweet memory, and our falling tears!

But we were not the only ones who had exultingly said, “Swissdale is ours.” One fine morning I stood upon the lawn, under the broad spreading trees, watching the mist, as it slowly rolled off the valleys, and up the hill sides. The air was laden with fragrance and music, and the earth bright with beauty. I heard a stifled sob near me! Oh, who could sorrow on such an Eden morning? I turned my head. Three young sisters, clad in sable, with their arms about each other, were looking at a luxuriant rose-vine whose drooping clusters hung above my door.

“Our mother planted it,” they sobbed—“she died in that room,” pointing to the second window, over which the rose-vine—_her_ rose-vine had clambered up.

“Could they roam over the old place?” I pressed a hand of each, and nodded affirmatively, for their tears were infectious.

There are sorrows with which a stranger may not inter-meddle; but hour after hour passed, and still those sable-clad sisters sat, on the hill-summit, with their arms about each other, mingling their tears. Oh, how plaintive to them the blithe song of the bird of the _unrifled_ nest, the musical murmur of the careless brook! Every twig, every tree, every flower, had its sorrowful history!

Ah! how little I thought as I looked at that weeping group—that years hence—I too, should make to that very spot, the same sorrowing pilgrimage! That strange eyes should moisten for _me_, when I asked leave to roam over the “old place;” that I, too, with streaming eyes, and tremulous finger should point to the trees and vines which _my_ dead had planted.

Wise as merciful is the Hand which draws before our questioning eyes the vail of the future!

CHILDREN’S TROUBLES.

I believe in children, and I can’t say that of all grown-up people, by a great deal. For instance, I don’t believe in an editor who feels too important or too busy to say a word now and then to the children of his subscribers. I would not give a copper for him; I don’t care how much he knows about politics (which you and I always skip when we read his paper) if he does not love children he is not the editor for me—there is something wrong about him. Why need he put on such big airs? Ten to one, if we inquired, we should find out he was once a little boy _himself_; cried for sugar candy; was afraid of the dark, and ran screaming to his mother whenever he saw a poor, harmless, old black man. He put on big airs indeed! that’s a joke! I’ve a great mind to set up a paper for you myself, and not notice the grown-up folks at all. Wouldn’t it be fun? But you see I have my own ideas about things—and there’s your Aunt Nancy, who was born and brought up when children were thumped on the head for asking the reason for things. She would take up our little paper, and scowl at it over her spectacles. Other papers for children generally keep an eye out for Aunt Nancy—and papers for big people too, for the matter of that. But _I_ couldn’t do it. Your Aunt Nancy believes that children should talk, move, and act as if they were a hundred years old. I respect your Aunt Nancy, but I can’t believe in that; and what is more, I am sure that God does not. I believe that the merry laugh of a little child is just as sweet in His ear, as the little prayer it lisps. He loves you all; oh, how much! He _likes_ you to be happy; He _made_ you to be happy as well as good. And He never—_never_ thinks, great as He is, that what little children say or think, is “of no consequence.” And though He keeps the sun, moon, and stars in their right places, and holds the roaring winds and the great mighty sea in His fists, and makes all the trees and flowers, and birds and beasts, and human beings all over the earth, He is never “so busy” that He can not bend down His ear whenever a little child sobs, or, looking up to Heaven, calls Him “Father.”

Well, you see, it looks very small when an editor or any body else, thinks himself too important or too busy to remember the dear little children whom God can watch over so lovingly. I don’t like it; and I don’t like a great many other things you children have to bear, and sometimes I get so troubled about it, that I want to go all round battling for your rights.

Now, the other day I saw a lady very gayly dressed, leading along her little girl by the hand. It was a bitter cold day, and by-and-by this lady met a lady friend of hers, and they both stopped just as they reached a corner where the wind blew the coldest, to admire each other’s new bonnets and cloaks. Now, though the lady had wrapped _herself_ up warmly in furs, her little girl’s legs, for two inches above her pretty gaiter-boots, were quite bare, and the cold wind nipped her little calves till they were quite purple, and she began to cry, as well she might; but her mamma only shook her impatiently, and went on for half an hour longer, talking about the fashions—foolish fashions, which tell foolish mammas to let their little children go bare-legged in winter, and tell them that a muslin ruffle will keep their little calves warm enough.

Now I did not know the name of that little girl; so, when I looked day after day at the list of deaths, I could not tell whether God had taken her up to heaven or not, but I hoped so, because I did not want her to suffer, and because I thought that a mother who would be so foolish as to do that, would make a great many other very sad mistakes in bringing up her little girl.

Yes, I felt very badly about it; and I felt badly about my little friend George, the other day. George goes to school; he has a great many lessons to get out of school. He is a very conscientious little boy, and can not be tempted away from his lessons after he sits down to learn them; so, when it was proposed the other night, after tea, to take him to some place of amusement, he said, “I would rather not go, because I am not sure that I have my French lesson perfectly for to-morrow.” So he staid at home and studied it, and the next morning trudged off to school, quite happy in the thought that he knew it perfectly.

Now, the boys in George’s school have a bad way of “telling” each other in the class. George is too honest to do this; he neither will tell them, nor let them tell him.

Poor little George! he missed in his lesson that morning, although he had tried so hard to learn it. The teacher reprimanded him (that means scolded him), and gave him a bad mark, while the naughty boys who had scarcely looked at their lessons got _good_ marks, because they peeped in the book and told each other the answers.

Poor little George!

He came home, with his large brown eyes full of tears, looking sick and discouraged. He could not eat a bit of dinner, though there was roast turkey and plum-pudding. His little heart was almost broke.

So I took him in my lap, and I told him that a great many men and women, too, all over the world, were suffering just such injustice; that when they tried hardest to do right, they got no credit for it from their fellow-creatures, and often had “bad marks” for it just as he did, and that it really seemed to them sometimes as if the lazy and deceitful prospered most.

But then I told little George that it was only in _seeming_ that they prospered, because God, who, as you know sees every thing, and is never careless or short-sighted as George’s teacher was, never lets those who do right suffer for it. He may take His own time to right them, (which is always the best time), but He _does_ it; and I told George that those naughty boys would grow up ignorant though they _did_ get good marks, and that he would grow up to be well educated and useful if he did get bad ones when he did not deserve them; and I told George that one of these days, when they all grew up, that while those lazy, ignorant fellows found it impossible to earn a living, and what was worse, had no heart to do good, some College which wanted a splendid president, would write a letter to George and make him one, and he could become at once both honorable and useful.

Yes, my children, just so surely as the bright sun shines over your dear little heads, our loving God, who writes down in His book every act of injustice and wrong-doing, even to little children, will, if you only work on with a brave, patient heart, turn all your trials into blessings.

_True as heaven—Aunt Fanny knows it._

THE VACANT LOT.

So they call it. Vacant? I wonder have they noticed its tenants? The noisy flock of geese, which waddle in procession to greet the rising sun, with a screech of delight; unfurling and clapping their huge snowy wings, as if to say, “Ah, we can have it all our own way, now, while yonder sluggards slumber.” Not so fast: yonder, with solemn step and slow, struts a pompous old rooster, whose blood-red crest defies goose-dom, and all its waddling works. See how meekly those wives of his—black, brown, white and speckled, tag behind his rooster-ship; too happy to pick up the smallest fragment of a worm which his delicate appetite disdains—and even that is to be approached at a proper distance from this two-footed Nero, or a handful of feathers remind their hen-ships that the lord of the harem is, and will be, cock of the walk. Pompous old tyrant! you should have a little tar mixed with your feathers. I could laugh at your ridiculous struttings, were you not the type of many a biped of whom _human_ laws take no notice.

Vacant lot?

See yonder urchin, who has crept from his bed while “mammy” is sleeping, that he may enjoy an unrebuked frolic with the hens and geese. Could any artist improve him? The red-flannel night-gown, scarce reaching to the bare fat calves, and falling gracefully away from the ivory shoulders; the little snowy feet, scarce bending the dewy grass; the white arms tossed joyously over the curly brown head. Pretty creature! that ever time should transform you into a swearing, drinking, roystering, bar-room loafer.

Vacant lot?

What could be more picturesque than the group round yonder pump? Those big Newfoundland dogs shaking the glistening drops from their shaggy sides. The master, and his two horses neighing, plunging, rearing, tossing their flowing manes and tails, and rolling upon the grass, hoofs uppermost, in uproarious fun; while the pretty occupant of the red-flannel night-gown, claps his dimpled hands in fearless ecstacy.

Vacant lot?

That old pump is a picture, any hour in the twenty-four. The matron, with her round white arms bared to the shoulder, poising the well-filled pitcher, the wee babe hanging at her skirts; the toil-worn father, laving his flushed brow and soiled hands, and quaffing the cool nectar. Were I an artist, the rosy morning light should show me no prettier pictures than may be found in “the vacant lot.”

“FOOLISH NED.”

So they call him. I have seen many persons who thought themselves quite in their senses, more foolish and less useful than Ned. Ned does an errand very correctly; he brings home the marketing as promptly as you could do it. He flies a kite for little Sam Snow till its tail is lost in the clouds, and the boys are lost in astonishment; he makes little boats for the school-children to sail in the pond; he carves wooden whistles; nobody can make a better horsewhip out of common materials; he picks up all the runaway babies in the neighborhood and carries them safely home to their mothers; he leads the gray horse to water, and rubs his glossy coat as well as any groom. I do not think he can read, at least not as you and I were taught to read; he sees the blue sky, and the green grass, and the flowers; he stops short and listens when a little bird sings; he looks up into the tall trees, and watches the shifting sunbeams light up their leaves; he lies under the tree-shadows and gazes, well pleased, at the soft white clouds. Who shall say that in their graceful flight they drop no message from their Maker (unheard by us) to “Foolish Ned?”

When Ned’s hat and coat are old, it does not fret him; when a bank fails, Ned laughs all the same; he likes Winter; he likes Summer; he likes Spring; he makes garlands of the Autumn leaves, and glides with nimble foot over the ice-bound brook. He stands at the church porch, and bows his head, as the grand old organ sends out on the summer air its holy anthem-peal. And yet, they who with careless foot cross its sacred threshold, call him “_Foolish_ Ned!”

Unto whom much is given; of him (only) shall God require much.

GREENWOOD.

Come—let us go to Greenwood. Where’s Greenwood? Oh, I forgot you were not a little New Yorker. Greenwood is the great cemetery, or burial-place, of the New Yorkers, on Long Island, and a very lovely place it is, too. I like to see burial-places filled with flowers, and waving trees, and sparkling fountains; I do not like that death should be made a gloomy thing. I do not like that children should lie awake nights in shuddering fear of it. Were you away on a journey from your pleasant home, and were your dear father to send a messenger for you to come to his arms, would you say, No, the messenger is ugly, I do not like his looks, I would rather never see my father than to go with him? Would you not say to yourself, it is but a short journey, I can trust a dear father who has been so kind to me, and who loves me so well, I will put my hand in that of the messenger he has sent, and go with him; my father surely knows what is best for me, I have never had any thing but kindness at his hands. Now why can not you think thus of the messenger whom your _Heavenly_ Father sends for you, even though his name is Death? Now, I do not like you to be afraid of death; I do not like you to pray to God because, if you do not, you are afraid he will do something dreadful to you. Oh, never pray that way, pray to him just as you would run up to your mother and throw your arms about her neck and love her, and thank her because she was so good and kind to you, not because you are afraid she will whip you. That is the way God wants you to pray to him. I am sure of it; and I am sure he loves you even better than your mother, and were she to die, would watch over you tenderly, for he takes special care of little orphans. No, do not think gloomily of the good loving God, or of His messenger, Death. Love him—how can you help it, when you see this beautiful earth He has made for you, and read all His sweet words that have comforted so many who are now happy with Him, beyond what you or I ever dreamed of.

But I must tell you about Greenwood, and how glad I was to see the pretty flowers blooming over the graves, and the long graceful willow branches dipping into the silver lakes, and then streaming out on the fresh wind as if they were too full of happiness to keep still. I liked the little squirrels which ran across the path, with their tails curled saucily over their backs, and their black eyes twinkling sociably at us as we passed. I saw some graves there of little children; there were no tombstones or monuments over them; their fathers and mothers had brought them to this country from far away beyond the blue sea, and in that country it is the custom, when a little child dies, to place all his little toys on the grave, with a little glass case over them (not to keep them from thieves, oh, no, I can’t believe that any thief who ever stole, would touch a little dead child’s toys, nobody is bad enough for that); the glass case was to keep the rain from spoiling them, because often the father and mother, little brothers and sisters, would like to come and look at them, and think of their little Wilhelm, or little Meta. On one little boy’s grave was a little rusty cannon, which he used to play with, on another, only a pair of half-worn little shoes, with the strings tied together, very coarse homely little shoes, with the little toes turned up, just as the child’s foot had shaped them. I think the little boy was too poor to have playthings, and this was all his sorrowing mother had to tell us that her little boy lay dead beneath. The tears came into my eyes when I saw them, not for the little dead boy, oh, no, I was glad he had gone home to God, but for his lonely mother, for I too, have little half-worn shoes, but the tiny feet which used to wear them, I may never see or hear again in this world, but heaven is not so far off from me, since little “Mary” went there, and I think that is why God often takes our dear ones to keep for us, just as the shepherd when he takes the lamb in his arms, knows that the mother will want to follow.

Well, then I saw another little grave and under the glass-case upon it was a little doll, a tiny tea-set, and three locks of hair, golden, brown, and black, cut from the little heads that lay pillowed there. On another grave was a riding-whip and a little horse, with the reins lying idly about his neck; there are no little busy fingers now “to make-believe ride;” but the little boy who used to play with them knows more now than the most learned person on earth, and perhaps if you and I go to heaven, as I hope we shall (not because we are “afraid of hell” but because we want to be there with “our Father”), if we should go there, perhaps that very little boy will sing us the first sweet song of welcome. Who knows?

After wandering round Greenwood a long while, and seeing many, many beautiful things, I got into the cars to come back to New York; beside me I saw two little girls, one about five years and the other three. I could scarcely see their bright black eyes for the curls which hung over them. The younger was playing with a bunch of flowers, humming the while a simple little song, just as if she were all alone by herself, instead of amid a car full of people. Presently the little five year old girl looked up in my face; then she said with a very sweet little voice,

“Have you been to Greenwood?”

“Yes, dear.”

“There’s _a_ many people dead there, ain’t there?”

“A great many.”

“Are any of your peoples dead?”

“Yes, my dear,” said I.

“Is?” (and the little creature put her hand in my lap, as if that brought us nearer to each other), “Is? we just put little brother in Greenwood.”

“What ailed him?” said I.

“Sick,” answered the little girl, playing with my bracelet.

“Mother is dead too, mother is in Greenwood, we put _her_ there two weeks ago.”

“What ailed your mamma?”

“Sick,” answered the little one again.

“I hope you have a father,” said I, looking around the cars, for the little sisters seemed quite alone.

“Yes, out there (pointing out on the platform to a man with black crape on his hat, who was—shall I tell you? laughing and joking with some men outside), that’s father.”

“Yes, that’s father!” sang the little one, twisting her flowers, “that’s father.”

Poor little things.

“I loved mother,” said the elder girl, as she saw my eyes moisten; “mother loved me too. I used to go to store for mother; when she died she kissed me, and gave me her parasol;” and the poor child drooped her head over my hand with which she was playing.

“Do you know that you will see your mother again?” said I.

“No! shall I?”

“Yes; she will not come here; but God will take you to see her, if you are a good child.”

“I’m glad;” said she, softly.

“Don’t go away,” said she, as the cars stopped for me and my party to get out.

“Rock-a-baby—by-baby,” sang the happy little sister, still twisting the flowers.

I kissed them both. I looked into their father’s face, as I passed him on the platform. I read nothing there that made my heart happier when I thought of his little girls; but I looked up in the bright blue sky, and I read there that “not a sparrow falls to the ground without God’s knowledge,” and I knew that He who cares for the sparrows, would surely care for the motherless little sisters.

BED-TIME.

“Just half an hour; only just half an hour more, mother.”

“Not one minute, Tommy—you have been saying ‘just half an hour more,’ these two hours; I think you would keep on saying so till daybreak, if I would let you set up all night; little boys should go to bed early, that they may get up early.”

“I wish there was no such thing as bed,” muttered Tommy, as he picked up his playthings, and followed his mother up-stairs.

“I am sorry to hear you say that, my boy; bring me your night-gown, and while I am undressing you, I will tell you a little story.

“The other night I was lying in my bed awake; it was between eleven and twelve o’clock; it was a damp, chilly night, but there are always plenty of people about the New York streets, long after twelve o’clock. I lay there listening to a hand-organ beneath my window; I don’t like hand-organs much, but this was a very good one, and the tunes were sweet, mournful tunes, such as I like best to listen to. The organist played as long as he could get any pennies, and then strapping his organ across his back trudged off. Lulled by the sweet music, I was just falling asleep, when I heard a child’s scream beneath the window—then another—then another; then the words ‘Oh—don’t! oh—don’t! let me go—oh, dear—oh, dear!’ What could a little child be doing out in the street at that time of night? and who could be hurting it? I flew to the window and opened it. There was a great crowd beneath the window, for the little girl had screamed so loud that every body had run, as I did, to know what was the matter. At first I could not make out what it all meant; it seemed so strange that not one of all those people who were looking on, should take the little girl away from that great tall man, who was holding her so tight, while she still kept on screaming, ‘Oh, don’t! oh, let me go!’

“Not only did they not take hold of him, but they moved on one side to let him go off with the little girl, who was throwing herself about in his arms, as if she were wild with fear. Presently the man who had the child, passed under a bright gas-light, and as he did so I saw a _star_ glitter upon his broad breast. A policeman! that was why nobody meddled with him then; but what naughty thing could a little girl like that have done, that she must be carried off by a policeman at twelve o’clock at night? Surely—surely—so young a child as that could not have done any thing so _very_ bad.

“But the policeman carried her off, still shrieking, and as her voice died away in the distance, I could still hear ‘Oh don’t! oh let me go!’ and then the crowd scattered, and every body went home; and I went back to bed, and dreamed that the little girl was going to be hung, and that I saved her. Not till the next morning, could I find out what was the cause of the trouble. The little girl’s name was Ann Mahon. Her father and mother were Irish, and lived in a cellar, with a great many people, black and white, who were all very bad and idle. Little Ann had never lived in any other way than this; she was born in a cellar; and had been beaten and starved and abused, till she was not more than half the size of children of her own age. Her father and mother were both drunkards; they were too idle to work for a living, so they sent poor little Ann out into the streets at nine o’clock at night, to beg money; thinking that people would pity a little girl so much for being all alone at that time of night, that they would certainly give her something. But to make sure of her getting it, they told little Ann, when they pinned the thin ragged dirty shawl over her little brown head, that if she sat down on the steps anywhere, and went to sleep, or did not bring some money when she came back, they would whip her, till she was almost dead. So the poor little thing went out, and pattered up and down the cold pavements, with her bare, weary feet, hour after hour, never daring to sit down a moment to rest herself, running up to the gentlemen who were hurrying home, with ‘A penny please sir? a penny please sir?’ Now, a lady would come along, a bright beautiful lady, with a gay cloak, just from the theater or opera, leaning on a gentleman’s arm, her eyes flashing like the diamonds in her bosom; she would hear little Ann’s ‘A penny please,’ as she stepped into her carriage, and gathering up her beautiful clothes in her snowy fingers, lest Ann should soil them, would turn away and pass on, and the gentleman with her, would say, ‘What a pest these beggars are.’ Sometimes some gentlemen who had little girls at home like Ann, would put their hands in their pockets, and give her a penny, and say kindly, ‘Run home, my dear, out of the street,’ but the poor child did not dare to go, till she had more pennies, and so she wandered on.

‘By-and-by little Ann heard the organ under my window; she liked the music, it sounded like kind words to her, and poor Ann had heard so few of those, in her little lifetime; so she drew closer to the crowd to listen still saying, in a low voice, ‘Penny please, penny please,’ to the people who stood there; for she did not dare to stop saying it on account of what her mother had told her, and because it was getting late, and she had as yet only two pennies.

“Presently little Ann felt a heavy hand on her shoulder; she started, and turned round—there was a tall policeman! Little Ann screamed; she knew well enough what a policeman was—poor little girl, she had seen the bad people among whom she was forced to live, hide away from them, many a time; and she had seen them, when the policeman caught them, struggle, and kick, and scream, to keep from being carried to prison; no wonder that little Ann screamed out, ‘Oh, don’t—let me go—oh, don’t!’ as the policeman lifted her up in his arms, just as he would a feather, to carry her off, as she thought, to jail.

“But that was not what the policeman was going to do; he was only going to take her to the watch-house, and keep her safely till morning, and then have her show him where her parents (who sent the poor thing out nights) lived; that he could take them and have them punished for doing it; that was what the policeman was going to do with little Ann; but the poor child did not know that, nor if she had, would it have comforted her any to have been told that her father and mother were to be sent to jail, and she to the almshouse; for bad as they were, they were all she had to care for; and so the poor little friendless thing clung to them. No, Ann did not know where she was going or what for, and the policeman being used to seeing misery, did not take any trouble to explain, or to quiet her, as he should have done; so when poor Ann had screamed till she was all tired out, she fell asleep in the dreary watch-house, with the policemen.

“What do you think that little girl would have given, Tommy, for a nice safe home like this; a clean warm little bed, and a kind mother to undress her every night, and put her into it? Think of that, my boy, when you scowl, and pout, and wish that ‘there never was such a thing as a bed.’”

SOLILOQUY OF OVERGROWN FIFTEEN.

I sprang up, like Jonah’s gourd, in a night; I am as tall as a bean-stalk and as green; I am thick where I ought to be thin, and thin where I should be thick; I am too big to drive hoop, and not old enough to wear one; too tall to let my hair loose on my shoulders, and not old enough to fix it up with a comb; I am too large to wear an apron, and I can’t keep my dress clean without one; I have out-grown tucks, and am not allowed to wear flounces; I have to pay full price in the omnibuses, and yet gentlemen, because of my baby-face never pull the strap for me; I have lost my relish for “Mother Goose,” and am not allowed to read love-stories; old men have done giving me sugarplums, and young men have not begun to give me “kisses;” I have done with gingerbread hearts and nobody offers me the other sort; I have given up playing with “doll-babies,” and am forbidden to think of a husband; if I ask my mother for a “dress-hat,” she says “Pshaw! you are nothing but a child;” if I run or jump in the street, she says, “My dear, you should remember that you are a young lady now.” I say it’s real mean; so there, now, and I don’t care.

A TEMPERANCE STORY.

Charley Colt’s father was a grocer. There was a great sign stuck up on the corner with a sugarloaf painted on either end; and outside the door were hogsheads of “Jamaica brandy,” and “Old Cogniac.” He was not a temperance man of course; temperance was not so much talked about in those days as it is now; it was a matter of course that drunkards went reeling home from such places as Mr. Colt’s, and nobody seemed to think the worse of the man who sold such maddening stuff. Many a poor heart-broken woman turned away her head when the fat, jolly Mr. Colt walked, on Sundays, into the best pew in church, and sat up as straight as if he had not taken the bread out of the mouths of so many widows and their children. Nobody thought the worse of Mr. Colt for taking, for liquor, all the wages which a poor man had been all the week earning, instead of telling the foolish fellow to take it home to his destitute family. Mr. Colt slept just as soundly as if he had not been doing this for years; and the law did not meddle with him for it; and as to that old-fashioned book, the Bible, which says, “Love thy neighbor as thyself,” Mr. Colt never troubled himself to wipe the dust from its covers. Mr. Colt had a bright little boy named Charley, of whom he was very fond; he was an only child. Charley spent all his time in the store when he was not in school, listening to the men who came there to drink, as they lounged round the door, or sat on the counter, or perched themselves on top of the barrels of whisky and rum. Sometimes they would ask him questions, to see what queer old-fashioned answers he would make, and then his father would wink with one eye and say “Oh, he’s a case, that boy, he is going to college one of these days, and going to be a gentleman, ain’t you, Charley?” and then the men would set him up on the barrels and give him the sugar and rum in the bottom of their glasses, and then Charley would talk so fast and so loud that you would think he was crazy, and so things went on at the grocer’s till Charley was a big boy, big enough to go to college. Then his father fitted him out with a great many fine clothes, because he said his handsome Charley should be a gentleman, and gave him a purse full of money, and told him to hold up his head, and not let any body tread him down. And Charley opened his bright eyes and shook his thick curls, and said, whoever wanted to get the better of him would have “to get up early in the morning.” And so off he went to college “to be made a gentleman of.”

When Charley got there, he found out that the way to be a gentleman in college was to insult his teachers, break windows, run up great long bills at the tailor’s, the hatter’s, the pastry cook’s, and the eating and drinking saloons.

It was very easy work, and when he got through, the bills were sent to his father to pay. As to his lessons, his father had never said any thing about those—it was stupid work studying, well enough for poor men’s sons, whose fathers were not rich, and who would have to earn their own living, but all he was sent there for, was to learn to be a gentleman. His teachers reproved him for neglect of study, and Charley plainly told them it was none of their business to speak to a gentleman in that way; and when his tutor told him that he must not use such language to him, he knocked the tutor down with his gentlemanly fists. To be sure he was drunk when he did it, but the tutor did not seem to think much, even of that gentlemanly excuse, and so Charley was expelled—that is, sent away from college, and went back again to his father. Mr. Colt did not keep the store now; he had made so much money, making drunkards, that he could afford to sell out all his rum-barrels to another man, who wanted to get rich too, by breaking women’s hearts, and starving poor innocent children. Mr. Colt now lived in a fine large house, with great high stone steps like a palace, and a great bronze lion on each side of the door. There were beautiful sofas and chairs inside, and mirrors the whole length of the wall, from floor to ceiling. The carpets were as thick and soft as the moss-patches in the woods, and the flowers in them so beautiful that you hesitated to put your foot on them. Then there was silver, and cut-glass, and porcelain, and a whole army of servants, all bought with the poor drunkards’ money; and Mr. Colt walked up and down his rooms, and thought himself a good man, and a gentleman. Charley Colt thought it was all very fine when he came back from college. But what he liked better than any thing else was his father’s wine-cellar. He smoked and drank, and drank and smoked, and lolled around the streets to his heart’s content. One night he was brought home very drunk, by two policemen, who had found him quarreling in the street; his head was badly cut, and his fine clothes were soiled and covered with mud, and his hat was so bruised, that you could not have told what shape it was when it was made.

Old Mr. Colt was sitting in his handsome parlor, in his dressing-gown and slippers, reading the evening paper, when the policemen rang at the door; hearing a scuffling in the entry, he opened the door of the parlor and there was his son, bruised, ragged, dirty, bleeding, and dead drunk.

Old Mr. Colt had often seen other men’s sons, whom he had helped to make drunkards, in this condition, without being at all troubled by it; but his _own_ son—his fine handsome Charley—his only child—to look so beastly—to be so degraded—ah, that was quite another thing. His brain reeled, his knees tottered under him, his hand shook as if he had the palsy; then, for the first time in his life, he knew the misery he had brought to other firesides, other happy homes. All that night he walked up and down the floor of those splendid rooms; now he remembered the poor women who used to come to his shop to coax home their drunken sons and husbands, and all the fine furniture in his rooms seemed to be stained with their tears; now he remembered an old gray-haired man, who prayed him with clasped hands never to sell his son another drop of that maddening drink; and then there seemed to come a hand-writing on the wall, and this it was: “With what measure ye mete, it shall be meted to you again!” and the wretched old man bowed his head upon his breast and said, “Oh, God, thou art just!”

ALL ABOUT HORACE.

Now what is that little boy crying for? A rocking-horse? Some marbles? A bat and ball? A pair of skates? What a curious-looking boy he is! Thin, small, stooping, awkward; but what clear blue eyes; and what a singularly sweet innocent expression in his colorless face. Every body hates to see him cry, because every body loves Horace. His father and mother are poor, hard-working people, and have other children beside him to take care of; and each one must do something toward helping support the family, too. Horace’s mother works in the field, hoes, rakes up the hay, plants, and digs, just like his father: perhaps you think she must get so tired doing all this, and in door women’s work beside, that she could have no time at all to attend to her little boy, Horace. Don’t you believe it; women in those days were made of better stuff than most of the women of our day. Horace’s mother could not have planted potatoes or raked hay, in corsets or a hoop-skirt. She could not have done it had she lived on cake, cordial, pies and confectionery. She could not have done it had she slept in close, heated apartments. She did none of all those foolish things. Neither was she cross or ill-tempered, nor did she beat and push little Horace round and tell him that he was always in the way, as some poor, tired, hard-working women do; not she—she was the merriest, jolliest, funniest, story-telling-est woman you ever heard of; went singing after the hay-cart, singing to the plow, singing to the barn-yard, singing to dinner, and singing to bed. That robbed labor of half its weariness, and winged the feet of every body about her; so little Horace was not afraid to follow his mother about. No matter how busy she was, she always found time to speak a pleasant word to her fair-haired little boy. And _such_ stories as she told him, and such “a lot” of them, fairy stories, and “old legends,” why, she was as good as a whole library of child’s story-books; and better too, because half of those are written either so that children can not understand them, or so babyish as to disgust them. She was better than any story-book, you may be sure, and Horace would have run his legs off for her any day, as well he might.

But I have not told you yet, what Horace was crying about. Well, it was because he had missed a word and lost his place in the class. You must know that Horace was a famous speller; but the best sometimes are caught tripping, and so it proved with him, and it mortified him so much that he could not choke the tears away. Now, perhaps you think the boys who got above him in the class were glad of this; perhaps you have known boys who have felt so. Horace’s schoolmates did not: they all loved him because he was so good and gentle, and when they saw how badly he felt, they refused to go above him: that dried up his tears very quick. There is nothing like kind words and deeds to dry up tears; try it, and you will see.

Little Horace’s fame as a speller (you must not think because he occasionally tripped at it, that this was not true, any more than that because there are some hypocrites that there is nothing in religion)—little Horace’s fame as a speller went all over the country. There was an old captain of a vessel who lived on a farm near, and who had heard of him; whenever he met the boy he would say, “Horace, how do you spell Encyclopædia?” or “Kamschatka,” or “Nebuchadnezzar.” Then he used to lend him books to read, and question him about them afterward, and I promise you that Master Horace was always able to answer any of his questions, for he did not read “skipping” as do some boys. The old captain was kind to Horace’s brother, too; and gave him a sheep, and a load of hay to feed the sheep on, one winter.