Little Eppie, and other tales
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V . , \. \ *\ * > sS>\ v.. . < v \ X > V i K ' ^ « • - N v > v % \ ,, \ )•’ • *' V >A N N ■ - A', ^ J '.v^V*S \ S'* > > ^ \ <•. * LITTLE EPPIE Page 27 LITTLE EPPIE f 0 AND OTHER TALES. COMPILED FOR THE PRESBYTERIAN BOARD OF PUBLICATION. PHILADELPHIA : PRESBYTERIAN BOARD OF PUBLICATION, No. 821 CHESTNUT STREET. X) ?ZS Ln^ Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1865, by ” THE TRUSTEES OP THE PRESBYTERIAN BOARD OP PUBLICATION, * in the Clerk’s Office of the District Court for the Eastern District of Pennsylvania. STEREOTYPED BY WESTCOTT & THOMSON. 3 o % o 3 CONTENTS PAGE I. Little Eppie 5 II. The Basket of Strawberries...-. 33 III. The Italian Organ Boy 44 IV. The Crowning 54 V. Jenny’s Trial and Triumph 60 VI. The Child Martyr of Antioch 70 VII. Nellie’s Apricot Tree 75 VIII. Emma and Eliza 86 IX. Esther, the Jewish Maiden 95 X. Johnny’s Fate 104 XI. The Worst Boy in School 114 XII. The Worst Girl in School 139 XIII. The Shipwreck 159 3 4 CONTENTS, PAGB XIY. No Time like Present Time 16S XV. Lending a Half-Crown 203 XVI. Story of a Violet 208 XVII. Believing, but not Understanding 215 LITTLE EPPIE. I. ZITTZE jepeie. {Abridged from “ Silas Mamer , the Weaver of Raveloe.”) Silas Marner was a weaver, who lived in the early part of this century, near a l(^iely gravel pit, some distance from the village of Raveloe. He had only one object in life, and that was to add to the hoard of guineas which was hidden under some loose bricks in the floor. His only pleasure was to take them out when his day’s work at the loom was done, and his door made fast, and count them over. It was only fifteen years since he had come to Raveloe, as a young man, but these fifteen years had made him old. He avoided his neighbours and they avoided him, for they felt a kind of superstitious dread of the si- 1 * 5 6 LITTLE EPPIE. lent, self-absorbed man, who had come no one knew whence, and worked week-days and Sundays at his loom. This dread was in- creased by certain fits to which he was liable. When they came on, he did not fall, but be- ' came rigid and unconscious, nor did he know, wThen he came to himself, that anything unu- sual had happened to him. Silas had not al- ways been a lonely miser ; in his youth he had had many friends. One man in partic- ular he had loved, as David loved Jonathan, and this friend had been false to him. He committed a theft, and contrived that the blame should fall on Silas. The religious community to which they belonged held that such matters ought to be referred to the judg- ment of Heaven, by drawing lots. This was done, and the lots declared Silas guilty ! He was unused to independent thought, and it never occurred to him that the will of Heaven .could not be discovered thus. He grew des- perate, and lost all faith in God or man. Soon the woman whom he was to have mar- ried became the wife of his false friend. LITTLE EPPIE. 7 Then Silas left his native town and went to Raveloe, where no one knew his past history. Gradually he grew to be the miser we have described. Nobody in this world but him- self knew that he was the same Silas Marner wTho had once loved his fellow with a tender love, and trusted in an unseen goodness. Even to himself that past experience had be- come dim. But about Christmas, in the fifteenth year of his Raveloe life, another change happened. His money was stolen, and the loss nearly broke his heart. As he sat in his loneliness by his dull fire, he leaned his elbows on his knees, and moaned very low, — not as one who seeks to be heard. His trouble softened the hearts of his neighbours, and they lost their dread of him ; but he was too wretched to understand or respond to their sympathy. On the New Year’s Eve after Marner’s loss, a wretched woman was walking along the snow-covered Raveloe lanes with a child in her arms. The poor creature had taken opium, to deaden the feeling of cold and 8 LITTLE EPPIE. weariness, and at last, overcome by drowsi- ness, she sank down into the snow. • She did not feel that the bed was cold, and did not heed whether the child would wake and cry for her. As the mother sank into a heavy sleep, the child’s blue eyes opened wide on the cold starlight, and it rolled from her arms into the snow. Suddenly its eyes were caught by a bright' glancing light on the white ground, and it was immediately ab- sorbed in watching the bright living thing running towards it, yet never arriving. That bright living thing must be caught ; and in an instant the child had slipped on all-fours, and held out one little hand to catch the gleam. But the gleam would not be caught in that way, and now the head was held up to see where the cunning gleam came from. It came from a very bright place ; and the little one, rising on its legs, toddled through the snow,. the old grimy shawl in which it was wrapped trailing behind it, and the queer little bonnet dangling at its back — toddled on to the open door of Silas Marner’s cot- LITTLE EPPIE. 9 tage, and right up to the warm hearth, where there was a bright fire of logs and sticks, which had thoroughly warmed the old sack (Silas’ greatcoat) spread out on the bricks to dry. The little one, accustomed to be left to itself for long hours without notice from its mother, squatted down on the sack, and spread its tiny hands towards the blaze, in perfect contentment, gurgling and making many inarticulate communications to itself, like a new-hatched gosling beginning to find itself comfortable. But presently the warmth had a lulling effect, and the little golden head sank down on the old sack, and the blue eyes were veiled by their delicate half-transpar- ent lids. But where was Silas while this stranger- visitor had come to his hearth ? He was in the cottage, but he did not see the child. Since he had lost his money he had con- tracted the habit of opening his door and looking out from time to time, as if he thought that his money might be somehow coming back to him. This evening he had 10 LITTLE EPPIE. stood and gazed for a long while. As he was going to shut the door he was seized by one of his fits, and stood with wide but sightless eyes holding open the door, powerless to re- sist either the good or evil which might enter. When he came to himself he felt chilled and faint, but was not aware what had hap- pened to him. He seated himself in his fire- side chair, and was stooping to push the logs on the hearth together, when, to his blurred, short-sighted vision, it seemed as if there were gold on the floor in front of the hearth. Gold ! — his own gold — brought back to him ! He felt his heart begin to beat violently, and for a few moments he was unable to stretch out his hand and grasp the restored treasure. The heap of gold seemed to glow and get larger beneath his agitated gaze. He leaned forward at last, and stretched forth his hand ; but, instead of the hard coin, his fingers encountered soft warm curls. In ut- ter amazement Silas fell on his knees, and bent his head low to examine the marvel ; it was a sleeping child — a round, fair thing, LITTLE EPPIE. 11 with soft yellow rings all over it's head. Could this be his little sister come back to him in a dream, — his little sister whom he had carried about in his arms for a year before she died, when he was a small boy without shoes or stockings ? That was the first thought that darted across Silas’ blank won- derment. Was it a dream? He rose to his feet again, and, throwing sticks on to the fire, raised a flame ; but the flame did not disperse the vision — it only lit up more distinctly the little round form of the child and its shabby clothing. It was very much like his little sister. Silas sank into his chair overpowered. How and when had the child come in with- out his knowledge ? He had never been beyond the door. But along with that ques- tion was a vision of his old home. He had a dreamy feeling that this child was somehow a message come to him from that far-off-life ; it stirred fibres that had never been moved in Raveloe — old quiverings of tenderness — old impressions of awe at the presentiment of some Power presiding over his life. 12 LITTLE EPPIE. But there was a cry on the hearth ; the child had awaked, and Marner stooped to lift it on his knee. It clung round his neck, and burst louder and louder into that min- gling of inarticulate cries with “mammy,” by which little children express the bewilder- ment of waking. Silas pressed it to him, and almost unconsciously uttered sounds of hushing tenderness, while he bethought him- self that some of his porridge, which had got cool by the dying fire, would do to feed the child with if it were only warmed up a little. He had plenty to do through the next hour. The porridge, sweetened with some dry brown sugar from an old store which he had refrained from using for himself, stopped the cries of the little one, and made her lift her blue eyes with a wide quiet gaze at Silas as he put the spoon into her mouth. Presently she slipped from his knee and began to tod- dle about, but with a pretty stagger that made Silas jump up and follow her lest she should fall against anything that would hurt her. But she only fell in a sitting posture on the LITTLE EPPIE. 13 ground, and began to pull at her boots, look- ing up at him with a crying face, as if the boots hurt her. He took her on his knee again, but it was some time before it occurred to Silas’ dull bachelor mind that the wet boots were the grievance, pressing on her warm ancles. He got them off with difficulty, and baby was at once happily occupied with the primary mystery of her own toes, invi- ting Silas, with much chuckling, to consider the mystery too. But the wet boots had at last suggested to Silas that the child had been walking on the snow. He raised the child in his arms and went to the door. Bending forward, he could just see the marks which the little feet had made on the snow, and he followed their track. “ Mammy ! ” the little one cried again and again, stretch- ing itself forward so as almost to escape from Silas’s arms, before he himself was aware that before him lay a woman, — frozen to death. A few hours afterwards, Silas sat by his hearth lulling the child. She was perfectly quiet now, but not asleep, — only soothed by 2 14 LITTLE EPPIE. sweet porridge and warmth into that wide- gazing calm which makes us older human beings, with our inward turmoil, feel a certain awe in the presence of a little child, such as we feel before some quiet majesty in earth or sky — before a steady-glowing planet, or full- flowered eglantine, or the bending trees over a silent pathway. The blue eyes fixed them- selves on the weaver’s queer face, which was bent low down to look at them, while the small hand began to pull Marner’s withered cheek with loving disfigurement. “ You’ll take the child to the parish to- morrow ?” asked a neighbour. “Who says so?” said Marner, sharply. “Will they make me take her ?” “Why, you wouldn’t like to keep her, would you — an old bachelor like you?” “ Till anybody shows they’ve a right to take her away from me,” said Marner. “ It’s a lone thing, — and I’m a lone thing. My money’s gone I don’t know where — and this is come from I don’t know where. I know nothing — I’m partly mazed.” LITTLE EPPIE. 15 Silas Marner ’s determination to keep the tramp’s child was the subject of much talk in the village. Notable mothers and lazy moth- ers were equally interested in conjecturing how a lone man would manage with a two- year-old child on his hands, and were equally ready with their suggestions ; the notable chiefly telling him what he had better do, and the lazy ones being emphatic in telling him what he would never he able to do. Among the former, Dolly Winthrop was the one whose neighbourly offices were the most ac- ' ceptable to Marner, for they were rendered without any show of bustling instruction. Silas had asked her what he should do about getting some clothes for the child. “Eh, Master Marner,” said Dolly, “there’s no call to buy no more nor a pair o’ shoes ; for I’ve got the little petticoats as my Aaron wore five years ago, and it’s ill spending money on them baby clothes, for the child ’ull grow like grass i’ May, bless it- — that it will.” And the same day Dolly brought her bun- 16 LITTLE EPPIE. die, and displayed to Marner, one by one, the tiny garments in their due order of suc- cession, most of them patched and darned, but clean and neat as fresh spring herbs. This was the introduction to a great ceremony with soap and water, from which baby came out in new beauty, and sat on Dolly’s knee, handling her toes, and chuckling, and patting her palms together with an air of having made several discoveries about herself, which she communicated by alternate sounds of “gug- gug-gug” and “mammy.” The “mammy” was not a cry of need or uneasiness. Baby had been used to utter it without expecting either tender sound or touch to follow. “ Anybody ’ud think the angils in heaven couldn’t be prettier,” said Dolly, rubbing the golden curls and kissing them. “And to think of its being covered with them dirty rags — and the poor mother froze to death ; but there’s them as took care of it, and brought it to your door, Master Marner. The door was open, and it walked in over the snow, like as if it had been a little LITTLE EPPIE. 17 starved robin. Didn’t you say the door was open ?” “Yes,” said Silas, meditatively. “Yes — the door was open. The money’s gone I don’t know where, and this is come from I don’t know where.” He had not mentioned to any one his un- consciousness of the child’s entrance, shrink- ing from questions which might lead to the fact he himself suspected — namely, that he had been in one of his trances. “Ah,” said Dolly, with soothing gravity, “ it’s like the night and the morning, and the sleeping and the waking, and the rain and the harvest — one goes and the other comes, and we know nothing how nor where. We may strive and scrat and fend, but it’s little we can do arter all — the big things come and go wi’ no striving o’ our’n — they do, that they do ; and I think you’re in the right on it to keep the little ’un, Master Marner, seeing as it’s been sent to you. You’ll happen to be a bit moithered with it while it’s so little ; but I’ll come and see to it for you.” 18 LITTLE . EPPIE. “ Thank you — kindly,” said Silas, hesitat- ing a little. “ I’ll be glad if you’ll tell me things. But,” he added, uneasily, leaning forward to look at baby with some jealousy, as she was resting her head against Dolly’s arm, and eyeing him contentedly from a distance — “but I want to do things for it myself, else it may get fond o’ somebody else, and not fond o’ me. I’ve been used to fending for myself in the house — I can learn, I can learn.” “ Eh, to be sure,” said Dolly, gently. “ I’ve seen men as are wonderful handy wi’ children. You see this goes first, next the skin,” she proceeded, taking up the little shirt and putting it on. “ Yes,” said Marner, bringing his eyes very close, whereupon baby seized his head with both her small arms, and put her lips against his face with purring noises. “See there,” said Dolly, with a woman’s tender tact, “ she’s fondest o’ you. She wants to go o’ your lap, I’ll be bound. Go, then; take her, Master Marner ; you can put LITTLE EPPIE. 19 the things on, and then you can say as you’ve done for her from the first of her coming to you.” Marner took her on his lap, trembling with an emotion mysterious to himself, at some- thing unknown dawning on his life. Thought and feeling were so confused within him, that if he had tried to give them utterance he could only have said that the child was come instead of the gold — that the gold had turned into the child. He took the garments from Dolly, and put them on under her teaching, interrupted, of course, by baby’s gymnastics. “ There, then ! Why, you take to it quite easy, Master Marner,” said Dolly; “but what shall you do when you’re forced to sit in your loom? For she’ll get busier and mischievouser every day — she will, bless her. It’s lucky as you’ve got that high hearth i’stead of a grate, for that keeps the fire more out of her reach; but if you’ve got anything as can be split or broke, or as is fit to cut her fingers off, she’ll be at it — and it is but right you should know.” 20 LITTLE EpiE. Silas meditated a little while in some per- plexity. “ I’ll tie her to the leg o’ the loom,” he said at last — “ tie her with a good long strip o’ something.” “Well, mayhap that’ll do, as it’s a little girl, for they’re easier persuaded to sit i’ one place nor the lads. Eh, if it wasn’t a sin to my lads to wish ’em made different, bless ’em, I should ha’ been glad for one of ’em to be a little girl ; and to think as I could ha’ taught her to scour, and mend, and the knitting, and everything. But I can teach ’em this little ’un when she gets old enough.” “ But she’ll be my little ’un,” said Marner, rather hastily, “ she’ll be nobody else’s.” “ No, to be sure ; you’ll have a right to her if you’re a father to her, and bring her up according. But,” added Dolly, “ you must bring her up like christened folks’ children, and take her to church,— that’s what you must do, Master Marner, if you’d do the right thing by the orphan child.” Marner’s face flushed under a new anxiety. His mind was too. busy trying to under- LITTLE EPPIE. 21 stand Dolly for him to think of answering her. “ And it’s my belief,” she went on, “as the poor little creatur has never been chris- tened, that the parson should be spoke to. For if the child ever went anyways wrong, and you hadn’t done your part by it, Master Marner, — ’noculation, and everything to save it from harm, — it ’ud he a thorn i’ your bed for ever, o’ this side the grave ; and I can’t think as it ’ud be easy lying down for any one when they’d got to another world, if they hadn’t done their part by the helpless chil- dren as come wi’out their own asking.”. ^ Dolly was disposed to be silent now, for she had spoken from the depths of her own simple belief, and was much concerned to know whether her words would produce the desired effect on Silas. He was puzzled, for Dolly’s word “ christened ” conveyed no dis- tinct meaning to him. He had only heard of baptism, and only seen the baptism of grown up men and women. “ What is it as you mean by 4 christened V ” he said at last tim- 22 LITTLE EPPIE. idly. “Won’t folks be good to her without it?” “ Dear, dear ! Master Marner,” said Dolly, with gentle distress and compassion, “ had you never no father n-or mother as taught you to say your prayers, and as there’s good words and good things to keep us from harm ?” “ Yes,” said Silas, in a low voice ; “ I know a deal about that — used to, used to ; but your ways are different. My country was a good way off.” He paused, then added more de- cidedly, “ but I wrant to do everything as can be done for the child. And whatever’s right for it i’ this country, and you think ’ull do it good, I’ll act according, if you’ll tell me.” “Well, then, Master Marner,” said Dolly, “ you must fix on a name for it, because it must have a name giv’ it wThen it’s chris- tened.” “ My mother’s name was Hephzibah,” said Silas, “ and my little sister was named after her.” “Eh, that’s a hard name,” said Dolly; “I partly think it isn’t a christened name.” LITTLE EPPIE. 23 “It’s a Bible name,” said Silas, old ideas recurring. “ Then I’ve no call to speak again’ it,” said Dolly, “but you see I’m no scholard. But it was awk’ard calling- your little sister by such a hard name, when you’d got nothing big to say, like — wasn’t it?” “We called her Eppie,” said Silas. “Well, if it was noways wrong to shorten the name, it ’ud be a deal handier. And so I’ll go now, and speak about the christening afore dark ; and I wish you the best o’ luck, and it’s my belief as it’ll come to you, if you do what’s right by the orphin child.” Baby was christened; and on this occasion Silas appeared for the first time within the church, and shared in the observances held sacred by his neighbours. He had no dis- tinct idea about the baptism and the church-go- ing, except that Dolly had said it was for the good of the child ; and in this way, as the weeks grew to months, the child created fresh and fresh links between his life and the lives from which he had hitherto shrunk. Unlike 24 LITTLE EPPIE. the gold which needed nothing, which was hid- den away from the daylight, was deaf to the song of birds, and started to no human tones, — Eppie was a creature of ever-growing de- sires, seeking and loving sunshine, and living sounds and living movements ; making trial of everything with trust in new joy, and stir- ring the human kindness in all eyes that looked on her. The gold had led his thoughts to nothing beyond itself, hut Eppie forced them onward and carried them far away, to the new things that would come with the com- ing years, when Eppie would have learned to understand how her father Silas cared for her. The gold had asked that he should sit weaving longer and longer, deafened and blinded to all things except the repetition of his web ; but Eppie called him away from his weaving, and made him think all its pauses a holiday, re-awakening his senses with her fresh life, and warming him into joy because she had joy. And when the sunshine grew strong and lasting, so that the buttercups were thick LITTLE EPPIE. 25 in the meadows, Silas might be seen strolling out to carry Eppie beyond the stone-pits, to where the flowers grew, till they reached some bank where he could sit down, while Eppie toddled to pluck the flowers, and make re- marks to the winged things that murmured happily above the bright petals, calling “ Dad- dad’s” attention continually by bringing him the flowers. Then she would turn her ear to some sudden bird-note, and Silas learned to please her by making signs of hushed still- ness, that they might listen for the note to come again ; so that when it came she set up her small back and laughed with gurgling tri- umph. As the child’s life unfolded, his soul, long stupefied in a narrow prison, was unfolding too, and trembling gradually into full con- sciousness. By the time Eppie was three years old, she began to devise ingenious ways of being troublesome, which found ‘much exercise for Silas’ watchfulness and patience. Sorely was he puzzled on such occasions by the in- 26 LITTLE EPPIE. compatible demands of love. Dolly Win- tbrop told him punishment was good for Ep- pie. “ You might shut her up once i’ the coal hole,” said Dolly, meditatively. “ That’s what I did wi’ my Aaron; for I could never bear to smack him. But I put it upon your con- science, Master Marner, as there’s one of ’em you must choose, — ayther smacking or the coal hole, — else she’ll get so masterful, there’ll be no holding her.” Silas was impressed with the truth of this last remark ; but his force of mind failed, not only because it was painful to him to hurt Ep- pie, but because he trembled at a moment’s contention with her lest she should love him the less for it. It was clear that Eppie must lead father Silas a pretty dance on any fine morning when circumstances favoured mis- chief. For example: He had wisely chosen a broad strip of linen as a means of fastening her to his loom when he was busy ; it was long enough to allow of her reaching the bed LITTLE EPPIE. 27 and sitting down on it, but not long enough for her to attempt any dangerous climbing. One bright summer’s morning Silas had been more engrossed than usual in “ setting up” a new piece of work, an occasion on which his scissors were in requisition. These scis- sors had been carefully kept out of Eppie’s reach, but the click of them had had a pecu- liar attraction for her ear. Silas had seated himself in his loom, and the noise of weaving had begun ; but he had left his scissors on a ledge which Eppie’s arm was long enough to reach ; and now, like a small mouse, she stole quietly from her corner, secured the scissors, and toddled to the bed again, setting up her back as a mode of concealing the fact. Hav- ing cut the linen strip in a jagged but effec- tual manner, in two moments she had run out at the open door, where the sunshine was in- viting her, while poor Silas believed her to be a better child than usual. It was not until he happened to need his scissors that the ter- rible fact burst upon him : Eppie had run out by herself, — had perhaps fallen into the stone- 28 LITTLE EPPIE. pit. Silas rushed out, calling “ Eppie ! ” and ran eagerly about, looking into the dry holes into which she might have fallen, and then gazing with questioning dread at the smooth surface of the water in the bottom of the pit. The cold drops stood on his brow. How long had she been out ! There was one hope, that she had crept through the stile, and got into the fields where he habitually took her to stroll. The first meadow was searched in vain ; and he got over the stile into the next field, looking with dying hope towards a small pond, which was now reduced to its summer shallowness, so as to leave a wide margin of mud. Here, however, sat Eppie, discoursing cheerfully to her own small boot, which she was using as a bucket to convey the water into a deep hoof mark, while her little naked foot was planted com- fortably on a cushion of olive-green mud. Silas, overcome with joy at finding his treasure again, could do nothing but snatch her up and cover her with half-sobbing kisses. It was not until he had carried her home, LITTLE EPPIE. 29 and had begun to think of the necessary washing, that he recollected the need that he should punish Eppie, and “make her re- member.” The idea that she might run away again and come to harm, gave him un- usual resolution, and for the first time, he determined to try the coal hole — a small closet near the hearth. “Naughty, naughty Eppie,” he suddenly began, holding her on his knee and pointing to her muddy feet and clothes; “naughty Eppie to cut with the scissors, and run away. Eppie must go into the coal hole for being naughty. Daddy must put her in the coal hole.” He half expected that this would be enough, and that Eppie would begin to cry. But, instead of that, she began to shake herself on his knee, as if the proposition opened a pleasing novelty. Seeing that he must pro- ceed to extremities, he put her into the coal hole, and held the door closed, with a trem- bling sense that he was using a strotig meas- ure. For a moment there was silence, but 3 * 30 LITTLE EPPIE. then came a little cry, “ Opy, opy ! ” and Silas let her out again, saying, “ Now, Ep- pie ’ull never be naughty again, else she must go in the coal hole — a black, naughty place.” The weaving must stand still a long while this morning, for now Eppie must be washed, and have clean clothes on ; but it was to be hoped that this punishment would have a lasting effect, and save time in future. In half an hour she was clean again, and Silas having turned his back to see what he could do with the linen band, threw it down again, with the reflection that Eppie would be good without fastening for the rest of the morning. He turned round again, and was going to place her in her little chair near the loom, when she peeped out at him with black face and hands again, and said, “ Eppie in de toal hole ! ” This failure shook Silas’ belief in the effi- cacy of punishment. “ She’d take it all for fun,” he observed to Holly, “ if I didn’t hurt her, and that I can’t do, Mrs.Winthrop. If she makes me a bit o’ trouble, I can bear it. LITTLE EPPIE. 31 And she’s got no tricks but what she’ll grow out of.” So Eppie was reared without punishment. The stone hut was made a soft nest for her, lined with downy patience, and also in the world that lay beyond the stone hut, she knew nothing of frowns and denials. Silas took her with him in most of his journeys to the farm-houses, and little curly- headed Eppie, the weaver’s child, became an object of interest to many. No child was afraid of approaching Silas when Eppie was near him ; there was no repulsion around him now, either for young or old ; for the little child had come to link him once more with the whole world. There was love between him and the child that blent them into one, and there was love between the child and the world — from men and women with parental looks and tones, to the red lady-birds and the round pebbles. Silas’ disposition to hoard had been ut- terly crushed at the very first by the loss of his long-stored gold. And now something 32 LITTLE EPPIE. had come to replace his hoard which gave a growing purpose to the earnings, drawing his hope and joy continually onward beyond the money. In old days there were angels who came and took men by the hand and led them away from the City of Destruction. We see no white-winged angels now. Yet men are led away from threatening destruction : a hand is put into theirs, which leads them gently forth towards a calm and bright land, so that they look no more backward, and the hand may be a little child’s. II. THE BASKET OF STB A WB ETl HIES. One Wednesday afternoon, at the cldke of school, a little girl might have been seen run- ning towards her home as fast as her feet could carry her. Hot and breathless with haste, she bounded into the parlour, shouting “ Abby, Abby,” so loud, that the house rang like a trumpet. What’s the matter ? ” “ I want you to go strawberrying with me, to-night. Now don’t put on that long face, and say you can’t : you always say so. You haven’t been with me once this summer, and if you only knew how much I want you to go, I am sure you would.” Abby did not answer at once. Etta could not brook the disappointment of her plan, and impatient with fear, she seized her sis- ter’s arm with a gentle shake, exclaiming, 33 34 THE BASKET OF STRAWBERRIES. “ Don’t stop to think, get ready, and we’ll g0-” “ Etta, I should love dearly to go, both for your sake and my own ; but how can I ? Be- fore we can get back, father and the boys will be up, tired and hungry, and somebody must be here to get their supper, and take care of the milk when it comes in.” “ Oh, I can fix that ; I arranged it all be- fore, because it is your constant bug-bear. We will set the table now ; we can get every- thing ready but the tea, and you can put the tea-pot on the hearth with the tea in it, and they will -know enough to put the water t? it when they come in ; the milk they can strain and set up, and we will take care of the pails, and other dishes, when we come home. Now haven’t I fixed it ? ” demanded she, with a very triumphant air. “You do seem to have made it all easy, Etta,” she replied, with a smile a little sad, for she saw how impossible it would be to make the child see it in any other light. “But I think it will seem anything but THE BASKET OF STRAWBERRIES. 35 easy and pleasant to our dear father, when he finds no one here to welcome or wait on him ; the fire down, and no Abby to get his tea. We should be so late home, too, as to break up our evening, his only quiet time at home, and that you know he never likes. I am sorry, my dear sister, but I don’t think I can go to-night.” “ But just for this once, only once, Abby, and our berries, which father loves so much, will make up to him for the loss of other things.” “ I will go with you, on Saturday, when school does not keep, and it shall be just as early after dinner as you please, and you shall stay as long as you please.” “No, I want you to go to-night ; you say nobody can tell what will Happen on the mor- row, and just as likely as not it will rain on Saturday, and we can’t go : so come now, just for once; I know father won’t care.” “ No, dear, not to-night ; I do not feel that it would be right, and I should be very unhappy.” 36 THE BASKET OP STRAWBEKRIES. u Dear me ! what a fuss you do make about nothing. You stay mewed up here all day, and never will go anywhere I want you to. Come, go.” Abby shook her head, but did not trust herself to speak. “ Humph! you are just as obstinate and selfish as you can be. I shall go alone, and if I get ever so many you won’t have one.” With these words she snatched up her bonnet and basket, and flung out of the house, slam- ming the door violently behind her. Abby was bitterly grieved ; large hot tears dropped like rain from her eyes, and cover- ing her face, she wept as she had never wept but once before, — three years before — as she knelt beside her mother’s dying bed, to re- ceive her last blessing, and with it the solemn charge, “ Abby, I give Etta to you ; be a mother to her.” Her all but breaking heart accepted the charge, and held the fulfilment thereof as a solemn vow. Abby was now sixteen, and Etta four years younger ; but her mother’s loss, and the re- THE BASKET OF STRAWBERRIES. 3T sponsibilities which had thence fallen upon her, had given her a maturity of character far beyond her years. With a wrise and steady hand, and a heart full of love and sympathy, she had watched over and guided her little sister, winning in return her confidence and fond affection. Etta was indeed sometimes selfish, sometimes unreasonable ; but she had never before given way to such a burst of passion. “ Oh, my mother ! my mother !” sobbed out the distressed girl, as she sank, heart-broken upon the floor. Did her mother hear her ? Perhaps not ; but there was One who did. Raised, as by an unseen hand, she went to her chamber and fell upon her knees before Him who always comforts the comfortless. Her grief and trouble were too deep for many words ; but her very soul went out, and up to God for pity and help : and they came. The dark cloud parted, and the peace which faith brings, fell softly in upon the troubled spirit ; the sorrow which had overwhelmed her rolled quietly and obediently away, at the word of 4 38 THE BASKET OE STRAWBERRIES. Jesus, as he gently whispered, “ Peace, be still.” Her tears were dried, and if she was not quite as gladsome as before, she went forth to her labours and responsibilities, sus- tained by a trust far more lovely and precious. As Etta flung herself away from Abby, and from home, a fierce tumult swelled in her own bosom ; all sorts of angry and wicked charges and purposes were, on the one hand, raised against her sister, while on the other, the loud and earnest remonstrances of con- science made her tremble. She tried to shut her ear, and stifle its voice, but in spite of herself, its solemn admonitions now and then thrilled through and shook her, like the voice of God : and then she would redouble her ef- forts to persuade herself of the selfishness and unkindness of her sister. Thus wrought upon from within, she was hurrying down the street and over the mea- dow, utterly blind and deaf to the world around her. The neighbours passed her, but she did not heed them ; little birds she loved, sang to her their songs of love, but she THE BASKET OF STRAWBERRIES. 39 did not hear them ; sweet wild flowers at her step, looked up and smiled, but she did not see them. Selfishness and anger darkened her heart, and sliut out, even from her senses, the beauty and sweetness and joy of earth. She leaped over the fence* and sat down among clusters red and ripe; she picked rap- idly, almost spitefully, but her thoughts were not of them. The sun-light fell softly in a golden shower over her ; but its influence did not reach her heart ; the evening wind breathed cool around her, but it did not temper the furnace fires of passion which burned within, and glowed upon her cheek. Her basket was presently filled, and throwing her sun-bonnet across her arm, she started homeward ; she walked slowly along, but the softening, sooth- ing influences of the hour were lost upon her. She found her sister at the window, watch- ing for her return, and the supper-table wait- ing for her evening meal. Without any re- mark, she drew her chair to Abby’s side, and sat down with her basket in her lap. “ How beautiful your berries are,” said 40 THE BASKET OF STRAWBERRIES. Abby, in the sweetest, kindest tone, as she reached out her hand to take one. Etta rudely turned away and began eating them. Tears filled her sister’s eyes again, and her heart was grieved, but she said nothing. Etta went on eating, until her sister be- came anxious lest she should be sick in con- sequence. Revolving the matter a few mo- ments, 'she arose, brought a plate from the closet, and sitting down by Etta, said, “ Shall I help you pick over a few berries, for father ?” Etta vouchsafed no reply, but moved still further olf. Abby waited a moment, and then said tenderly : “ Dear Etta, if you eat more to-night I am sure you will be sick. Put up the rest until to-morrow, and take some supper now ; do, dear.” But pride and selfishness were having their own way in Etta’s heart, and she was ready to brave all consequences for their gratifica- tion. She finished her berries to the last one, put away her basket and went up to her room without speaking one word to her sis- ter. THE BASKET OF STRAWBERRIES. 41 Abby sat up later than usual, waiting for her father, who had been called away. Not far from ten o’clock, she heard a strange noise from her room. She listened : it came again, the cry of anguish. She flew up stairs, and found her sister in her night-gown roll- img upon the floor, in great distress. “ What is the matter, dear?” she inquired, as she knelt beside her. 