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diff --git a/old/63793-h/63793-h.htm b/old/63793-h/63793-h.htm deleted file mode 100644 index a89ddd7..0000000 --- a/old/63793-h/63793-h.htm +++ /dev/null @@ -1,9214 +0,0 @@ -<!DOCTYPE html PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" - "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> -<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" xml:lang="en" lang="en"> - <head> - <meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html;charset=utf-8" /> - <meta http-equiv="Content-Style-Type" content="text/css" /> - <title> - The Project Gutenberg eBook of Little Helpers, by Margaret Vandegrift. - </title> - - <link rel="coverpage" href="images/cover.jpg" /> - -<style type="text/css"> - -a { - text-decoration: none; -} - -body { - margin-left: 10%; - margin-right: 10%; -} - -h1,h2 { - text-align: center; - clear: both; -} - -h2.nobreak { - page-break-before: avoid; -} - -hr { - margin-top: 2em; - margin-bottom: 2em; - clear: both; - width: 65%; - margin-left: 17.5%; - margin-right: 17.5%; -} - -div.chapter { - page-break-before: always; -} - -ul { - list-style-type: none; -} - -li { - margin-top: .5em; - padding-left: 2em; - text-indent: -2em; -} - -p { - margin-top: 0.5em; - text-align: justify; - margin-bottom: 0.5em; - text-indent: 1em; -} - -p.dropcap { - text-indent: 0em; -} - -img.dropcap { - float: left; - margin: 0 0.5em 0 0; -} - -p.dropcap:first-letter { - color: transparent; - visibility: hidden; - margin-left: -0.9em; -} - -table { - margin: 1em auto 1em auto; - max-width: 40em; - border-collapse: collapse; -} - -td { - padding-left: 2.25em; - padding-right: 0.25em; - vertical-align: top; - text-indent: -2em; -} - -.tdr { - text-align: right; -} - -.tdpg { - vertical-align: bottom; - text-align: right; -} - -.blockquote { - margin: 1.5em 10%; -} - -.caption { - text-align: center; - margin-bottom: 1em; - font-size: 90%; - text-indent: 0em; -} - -.center { - text-align: center; - text-indent: 0em; -} - -.figcenter { - margin: auto; - text-align: center; -} - -.figleft { - float: left; - clear: left; - margin-left: 0; - margin-bottom: 1em; - margin-top: 1em; - margin-right: 1em; - padding: 0; - text-align: center; -} - -.figright { - float: right; - clear: right; - margin-left: 1em; - margin-bottom: 1em; - margin-top: 1em; - margin-right: 0; - padding: 0; - text-align: center; -} - -.gothic { - font-family: 'Old English Text MT', 'Old English', serif; -} - -.larger { - font-size: 150%; -} - -.noindent { - text-indent: 0em; -} - -.pagenum { - position: absolute; - right: 4%; - font-size: smaller; - text-align: right; - font-style: normal; -} - -.poetry-container { - text-align: center; - margin: 1em; -} - -.poetry { - display: inline-block; - text-align: left; -} - -.poetry .stanza { - margin: 1em 0em 1em 0em; -} - -.poetry .verse { - padding-left: 3em; -} - -.poetry .indent0 { - text-indent: -3em; -} - -.poetry .indent2 { - text-indent: -2em; -} - -.right { - text-align: right; -} - -.smaller { - font-size: 80%; -} - -.smcap { - font-variant: small-caps; - font-style: normal; -} - -.tb { - margin-top: 2em; -} - -.titlepage { - text-align: center; - margin-top: 3em; - text-indent: 0em; -} - -@media handheld { - -img { - max-width: 100%; - width: auto; - height: auto; -} - -.poetry { - display: block; - margin-left: 1.5em; -} - -.blockquote { - margin: 1.5em 5%; -} - -img.dropcap { - display: none; -} - -p.dropcap:first-letter { - color: inherit; - visibility: visible; - margin-left: 0; -} -} - - </style> - </head> -<body> - - -<pre> - -The Project Gutenberg EBook of Little Helpers, by Margaret Vandegrift - -This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most -other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions -whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of -the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at -www.gutenberg.org. If you are not located in the United States, you'll have -to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook. - -Title: Little Helpers - -Author: Margaret Vandegrift - -Release Date: November 17, 2020 [EBook #63793] - -Language: English - -Character set encoding: UTF-8 - -*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK LITTLE HELPERS *** - - - - -Produced by MFR and the Online Distributed Proofreading -Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from -images generously made available by The Internet Archive) - - - - - - -</pre> - - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_1"></a>[1]</span></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;" id="fp1"> -<img src="images/fp1.jpg" width="500" height="700" alt="" /> -<p class="caption">“PICKING FLOWERS.” <a href="#Page_218">See page 218.</a></p> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_2"></a>[2]</span></p> - -<hr /> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_3"></a>[3]</span></p> - -<p class="titlepage larger">LITTLE HELPERS</p> - -<p class="titlepage"><span class="smaller">BY</span><br /> -MARGARET VANDEGRIFT<br /> -<span class="smcap">AUTHOR OF “THE DEAD DOLL AND OTHER POEMS” Etc.</span></p> - -<p class="titlepage gothic">Illustrated.</p> - -<div class="figcenter titlepage" style="width: 125px;"> -<img src="images/ticknor.jpg" width="125" height="125" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p class="titlepage">BOSTON<br /> -TICKNOR AND COMPANY<br /> -<span class="gothic">211 Tremont Street</span><br /> -1889</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_4"></a>[4]</span></p> - -<p class="titlepage smaller"><span class="smcap">Copyright, 1888,<br /> -By Ticknor and Company.</span></p> - -<p class="titlepage smaller">ELECTROTYPED BY<br /> -<span class="smcap">C. J. Peters & Son, Boston</span>,<br /> -U. S. A.</p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_5"></a>[5]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak">CONTENTS.</h2> - -</div> - -<table summary="Contents"> - <tr> - <td class="tdr"><span class="smcap">Chapter.</span></td> - <td></td> - <td class="tdpg"><span class="smcap">Page.</span></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdr">I.</td> - <td><span class="smcap">Independence</span></td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#CHAPTER_I">11</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdr">II.</td> - <td><span class="smcap">Thinking and Thinkephones</span></td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#CHAPTER_II">23</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdr">III.</td> - <td><span class="smcap">Letter and Spirit</span></td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#CHAPTER_III">39</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdr">IV.</td> - <td><span class="smcap">The First Move</span></td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#CHAPTER_IV">50</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdr">V.</td> - <td><span class="smcap">Inalienable Rights</span></td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#CHAPTER_V">61</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdr">VI.</td> - <td><span class="smcap">Leaning</span></td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#CHAPTER_VI">70</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdr">VII.</td> - <td><span class="smcap">The Extra Horse</span></td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#CHAPTER_VII">81</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdr">VIII.</td> - <td><span class="smcap">“Long Patience”</span></td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#CHAPTER_VIII">89</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdr">IX.</td> - <td><span class="smcap">A Contract</span></td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#CHAPTER_IX">99</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdr">X.</td> - <td><span class="smcap">Neighbors</span></td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#CHAPTER_X">108</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdr">XI.</td> - <td><span class="smcap">Battle and Victory</span></td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#CHAPTER_XI">122</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdr">XII.</td> - <td><span class="smcap">Fasting</span></td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#CHAPTER_XII">131</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdr">XIII.</td> - <td><span class="smcap">A Chance for a Knightly Deed</span></td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#CHAPTER_XIII">140</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdr">XIV.</td> - <td><span class="smcap">The Valley of the Shadow</span></td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#CHAPTER_XIV">149</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdr">XV.</td> - <td><span class="smcap">More Chances</span></td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#CHAPTER_XV">157</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdr">XVI.</td> - <td><span class="smcap">Enlisting</span></td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#CHAPTER_XVI">168</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdr">XVII.</td> - <td><span class="smcap">The Wrong End</span></td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#CHAPTER_XVII">178</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdr">XVIII.</td> - <td><span class="smcap">Turning the Glass</span></td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#CHAPTER_XVIII">189</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdr">XIX.</td> - <td><span class="smcap">At the Farm</span></td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#CHAPTER_XIX">195</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdr">XX.</td> - <td><span class="smcap">The Tin Mug</span></td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#CHAPTER_XX">204</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdr">XXI.</td> - <td><span class="smcap">Seeing Why</span></td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXI">212</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdr">XXII.</td> - <td><span class="smcap">The Way of Escape</span></td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXII">221</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdr">XXIII.</td> - <td><span class="smcap">The Circular City</span></td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXIII">232</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td class="tdr">XXIV.</td> - <td><span class="smcap">The Circular City, continued</span></td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#CHAPTER_XXIV">243</a></td> - </tr> -</table> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_6"></a>[6]</span></p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_7"></a>[7]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak">FULL-PAGE ILLUSTRATIONS.</h2> - -</div> - -<table summary="List of full-page illustrations"> - <tr> - <td><span class="smcap">“Picking Flowers”</span></td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#fp1"><i>Frontispiece</i></a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td><span class="smcap">The Skating Lesson</span></td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#fp2">75</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td><span class="smcap">The New Knife</span></td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#fp3">125</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td><span class="smcap">Minding the Baby</span></td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#fp4">163</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td><span class="smcap">The Field Glass</span></td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#fp5">185</a></td> - </tr> - <tr> - <td><span class="smcap">Poor Katy</span></td> - <td class="tdpg"><a href="#fp6">225</a></td> - </tr> -</table> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_8"></a>[8]</span></p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_9"></a>[9]</span></p> - -<h1>LITTLE HELPERS.</h1> - -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_10"></a>[10]</span></p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_11"></a>[11]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_I">CHAPTER I.<br /> -<span class="smaller">INDEPENDENCE.</span></h2> - -</div> - -<div> -<img class="dropcap" src="images/dropcap-ch1.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p class="dropcap">His name was Johnny Leslie, and he was -standing on an empty flour barrel; in his -hand was his United States History, and -he was shouting at the top of his little -voice,—</p> - -<p>“All men are born free and equal, -and endowed with certain in-in-alienable -rights, such as life, liberty, and the pursuit of happiness.”</p> - -<p>He stopped a minute to draw a long breath, and his audience, -who was sitting in an easy position upon the upturned kitchen -coal scuttle, with her oldest child in -her arms, took the opportunity to ask -meekly,—</p> - -<p>“What does that dreadful long -word mean, Johnny? I never heard -of that kind of rights before.”</p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus1.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>“You’ll know when you’re older, -Tiny,” said Johnny, loftily, and he was -going on with his oration, but the audience -was not to be silenced in this easy manner, and persisted,—</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_12"></a>[12]</span></p> - -<p>“But I want to know right away, now! I don’t believe you -know yourself, Johnny Leslie!”</p> - -<p>“Well, I don’t believe I do,” said Johnny, candidly, and in -his own natural voice. “We might -ask mamma, she’s up there at her -window, I can see the back of her -head. O mamma!”</p> - -<div class="figleft" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus2.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>There was no doubt about Mrs. -Leslie’s hearing; if she had been in -the top of the apple tree, at the foot -of the garden, she could have heard -that “O mamma!” perfectly well.</p> - -<p>A pleasant face appeared where -Johnny had seen the head, and a sweet voice said, “O Johnny!”</p> - -<p>“Mamma, what does in-a-li-en-able mean?” shouted the -orator, still loudly enough for the top of the apple tree.</p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus3.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>“I’ve the greatest mind in the -world to drop my new ‘Webster’s -Unabridged’ on your head, you -wild Indian,” said Mrs. Leslie, -holding the big dictionary threateningly, -over the edge of the -window-sill, and Johnny’s head. -“Don’t you suppose I have any -inalienable rights? And do you -think I can even pursue my happiness, -much less catch it, with all this hullaballoo under my -window when I am trying to write a letter?”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_13"></a>[13]</span></p> - -<p>“Well, mamma, Tiny and I would just as lief go to the -barn,” replied Johnny, in a reasonable -tone of voice, “if you’ll just -please tell us first what that word -means. You see, as Tiny’s asked me, -maybe some of the boys might ask, -and I ought to be able to tell them.”</p> - -<div class="figleft" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus4.jpg" width="200" height="100" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>“Come up here, then, if you please,” said Mrs. Leslie. “I -am not a Fourth-of-July orator, and so I do not need to practise -shouting, just now.”</p> - -<p>So Johnny and Tiny and Veronica—who was Tiny’s oldest -child, and was made of what had once been white muslin, with -cotton stuffing—came upstairs, and had it explained to them -that inalienable meant that which cannot be separated, or taken -away.</p> - -<p>“But, I don’t see how that works,” said Johnny, looking -puzzled, “for folks do take our rights away; I’m having lots of -mine taken away, all the time. I’m very fond of you, mammy, -and you know it, but still you sometimes take away my rights -yourself.”</p> - -<p>“For a Fourth-of-July orator,” said Mrs. Leslie, gravely, -“you are showing a painful amount of ignorance. We will -suppose, for the sake of argument, that I take away, or deprive -you of, certain things to which you have a right, but the right -to have them is there, all the same. Taking away the things -does not touch that. Do you see what I mean?”</p> - -<p>“Yes, mamma, I think I do,” answered Johnny, thoughtfully, -“but it’s kind of puzzling. It’s most as bad as ‘if a herring and<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_14"></a>[14]</span> -a half cost a cent and a half, how much will three herrings -cost?’ But I did get that through my head, and I suppose I -can get this.”</p> - -<p>“But, sometimes,” said Mrs. Leslie, “people’s ‘inalienable -rights’ seem to conflict; I say seem, for they never really do. -For instance, as you have a gentleman for a father, and a woman -who tries to be a lady for a mother, I feel as if I had an inalienable -right to a gentleman for a son, and a lady for a daughter; -and when my son talks about getting a thing through his head, -I begin to wonder what is becoming of <i>my</i> rights!”</p> - -<p>“Now, mamma,” said Johnny, appealingly, “that’s just -nothing at all to what some of the boys say. But I’d like to -hear anybody say that you aren’t a lady, or that papa isn’t a -gentleman!” and Johnny doubled his fists fiercely at the bare -idea of such a statement.</p> - -<p>“You may live to have that pleasure,” said Mrs. Leslie, “if -you let the boys have more of a right in you than I have.”</p> - -<p>Johnny caught his mother in a “bear hug.” “I never -thought of it that way,” he said. “No ma’am! You’ve the -very first, best right and title to me, Mrs. Mother, and the boys -may go bang—oh, there I go again! I mean the boys may—what -shall I say?”</p> - -<p>“You might say that the boys may exercise their inalienable -rights over somebody else,” said his mother, laughing and kissing -him. “But now I’ll tell you what we will do—I really -don’t think it would look well for a Fourth-of-July orator to -read his oration out of an United States History, so when papa -comes home, I will ask him to have the Declaration of Independence<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_15"></a>[15]</span> -printed on two or three sheets of paper for you, and we’ll -tie them together with a handsome bow of blue ribbon, and -meanwhile, if you’ve no objection, you will practise in the -barn.”</p> - -<p>“Of course I will, you loveliest woman alive!” said Johnny, -rapturously, “and I shall try not to have my rights treading on -anybody else’s rights’ toes!” with which extraordinary declaration, -he pranced off to the barn, closely followed by Tiny and -Veronica.</p> - -<p>There was to be a picnic on the Fourth-of-July. Mr. and -Mrs. Leslie and three or four neighbor families had agreed to -take their dinners in baskets and -butter-kettles, to a very pretty -grove which grew obligingly near to -the little village-city where they -lived, and where Mr. Leslie edited -the one newspaper of the place, -which fact enabled him to have the -Declaration conveniently printed for -Johnny, who had been chosen by -the boys for the orator of the day, because he stood highest in -his reading and declamation classes. It wanted three or four -days, yet, of the “glorious Fourth,” and Johnny was diligently -practising his voice, for he was afraid, notwithstanding his -mother’s earnest assurances to the contrary, that it was not loud -enough for an open air oration!</p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus5.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>Johnny was a very sociable and friendly little boy, and he -had recently made acquaintance with a boy somewhat older than<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_16"></a>[16]</span> -himself, whose profession was bootblacking. This boy had a -cool, knowing, and business-like air, which had greatly taken -Johnny’s fancy, and it occurred to him that a partnership with -Jim Brady might be a very good thing. Jim had happened to -mention that he owned a wheelbarrow, -and Johnny owned an -apple tree, which had been planted -by his father on the day of Johnny’s -birth, and which, this season, was -full of promising apples. So Johnny -resolved, if Jim improved on acquaintance, -and showed symptoms -of honor and honesty, to propose -to him, when the apples should be -ripe, to take his wheelbarrow and peddle them “on shares.”</p> - -<div class="figleft" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus6.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus7.jpg" width="200" height="125" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>He would probably have made Jim the offer on the second -day of their acquaintance, but his -mother advised him to wait a little. -She felt sure that Johnny would tell -her at once, if Jim should use bad -language, or say or do anything -which would make him a dangerous -acquaintance for her boy, and she thought it would be time -enough then to break off the intercourse which might put a little -pleasure into the hard life of the bootblack, whose sturdy figure -and face she had often noticed in passing his stand, and she had -also noticed that he was almost always busy, even when other -boys of his trade were idle.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_17"></a>[17]</span></p> - -<p>Johnny was such a very small boy that it had never entered -his mother’s head to forbid him to smoke. She thought of -it once in a while, and hoped that -when the time came for him to choose -about it, he would elect to go without -a habit which is certainly useless, -and which in many cases involves a -great deal of selfishness. She wished -Johnny’s wife, if he should be so fortunate -as to have a good wife some -day in the far future, to love him altogether, -not with a “putting-up” with -one thing, and “making allowances” for another; and she meant, -when the time came, to lay the whole subject plainly before him, -and let him choose rationally for himself. It was quite true that -his father smoked; but he smoked very moderately, never where it -could annoy any one, and, whenever he bought cigars, he deposited -a sum equal to that spent for them, in the little earthern -jug with which he presented his wife once -a year, and this money was neither “house -money” nor “pin money”; it was for -Mrs. Leslie to spend absolutely as she -liked. And Johnny’s mother meant him, -if he should smoke at all, to be just such a -smoker as his father was.</p> - -<div class="figleft" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus8.jpg" width="200" height="225" alt="" /> -</div> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus9.jpg" width="200" height="225" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>But on the third of July, as “Johnny -came marching home,” he met Jim at the usual corner, and Jim -had a long cigar in his mouth! Johnny felt a good deal awed. -He thought Jim looked very manly indeed.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_18"></a>[18]</span></p> - -<p>“Have a cigar?” asked Jim affably. “One of my best customers -gave me this,” he added, “and the one I’m smoking, and -I tell you it’s not many fellows I’d offer this to, for they’re -prime! It was a regular joke on him—he’s always poking fun -at me, and this morning, when I said I’d give anything to be a -sailor, he just pulls these out of his pocket, and says, seriously, -‘Smoke these, my boy, and you’ll be as sure you’re at sea as -you ever will if you really get there!’ He thought I wouldn’t -take ’em, but I did,” and Jim chuckled, “I thanked him kindly, -and told him I’d learned to smoke years ago!”</p> - -<p>“Learned?” said Johnny, “why, what is there to learn? It -looks easy enough.”</p> - -<p>“So it is,” said Jim, with another chuckle, “it’s like what -the Irishman said about his fall; ‘Sure, it’s not the fall, it’s the -fetch up that hurts!’ I wasn’t sea-sick after that first cigar? -Oh, no! not at all!” and he gave an indescribable wink.</p> - -<p>All this time Johnny held the cigar doubtfully in his hand. -Was it worth while deliberately to make himself “sea-sick?” -That long, coarse, black thing did not look as if it would taste -nice.</p> - -<p>“What are you waiting for?” asked Jim, “a light? Here’s -one,” and he drew a match from his pocket, struck it, and -handed it to Johnny, who, prevented by a false and foolish -shame, from saying what was in his mind, lighted the cigar, -hastily thanked Jim, and walked off, smoking.</p> - -<p>But he had not gone a block before a queer, dizzy feeling, and -a bitter, puckery taste in his mouth, which reminded him of a -green persimmon, made him resolve to finish his cigar another<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_19"></a>[19]</span> -time; so he put it out, wrapped it carefully in paper, thrust -it into his trousers pocket, and then hurried home.</p> - -<p>When he kissed his mother, she exclaimed, “Why, Johnny! -You smell exactly as if you had been -smoking!”</p> - -<p>Johnny had never, in all his life, -concealed anything from his mother; -what made him wish to, now?</p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus10.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>“I stopped to talk to Jim,” he -said, hastily, “and he was smoking -a cigar that a gentleman had given -him.”</p> - -<p>“I’m sorry to hear that,” said Mrs. Leslie, gravely; “I must -speak to Jim. He is too young to begin to smoke.”</p> - -<p>Johnny said nothing, but his mind was made up; he was not -going to be beaten by that cigar! There were no lessons to be -learned for the next day, and he could give the whole afternoon, -and the whole of his mind to it.</p> - -<p>He did. I am not going into particulars, they are not agreeable; -but late that afternoon, as a heavy thunderstorm was -coming up, Mrs. Leslie grew uneasy about Johnny, who had not -been seen since dinner.</p> - -<p>“Run to the barn, Tiny,” she said, “and see if he is there—though -I don’t think he can be, for I haven’t heard a word of -the oration.”</p> - -<p>Tiny ran, and came back in five minutes, breathless, and -with a horrified face.</p> - -<p>“Oh, mamma!” she exclaimed, “Johnny’s cap and his speech<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_20"></a>[20]</span> -are on the barn floor, and the most dreadfullest groans are -coming out of the haymow!”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Leslie was running to the barn before Tiny had finished.</p> - -<p>“Johnny!” she called wildly. “My darling! What has -happened?”</p> - -<p>A pale face, a rough-looking head, with hay sticking out of -its hair, appeared at the top of the ladder, and Johnny staggered -weakly down.</p> - -<p>“Oh, mamma!” he groaned, “I think I must be going to -die! I never felt this way before!”</p> - -<p>His mother caught him in her arms, and as she did so, the -smell of the rank cigar which Johnny, with wasted heroism, -had smoked to the end, struck her indignant nose.</p> - -<p>“Johnny!” she exclaimed, reproachfully, “you’ve been smoking, -and you told me what was just as bad as a lie about it!”</p> - -<p>And the warm-hearted, offended little mother burst out crying, -and sobbed with her head on Johnny’s dusty shoulder.</p> - -<p>Nothing she could have said would have gone to Johnny’s -heart of hearts as those sobs did. He forgot his alarming illness -as he caught her in his arms, and said, imploringly,—</p> - -<p>“Oh, mammy, my darling mammy, please don’t cry like -that; I’ll die before I’ll ever tell you a lie, or act you one, -again. Oh, please say you forgive me!”</p> - -<p>Of course Tiny felt obliged to help with the crying, and -when Mr. Leslie, coming home to a deserted house, traced his -family to the barn, he came upon a place of wailing.</p> - -<p>At first, he was inclined to laugh, but when he heard of the -deceit which had followed Johnny’s first effort at smoking, he<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_21"></a>[21]</span> -looked very grave. No one, however, could doubt Johnny’s -penitence, and as he lay on the lounge in his mother’s room, -while the heavy thunder and sharp lightning seemed to fill the -air, and waves of deathly sickness rolled over him, he made -some very good resolutions, which were not forgotten, as such -resolutions sometimes are, after his recovery.</p> - -<p>The orator of the day was somewhat paler than he usually -was when he took his place upon the barrel which he had previously -assisted to the grove, the -next morning.</p> - -<div class="figleft" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus11.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>He read the Declaration of Independence -in a voice which reached -the ears of his most distant listener -with perfect distinctness, and when -he had finished, and the applause -had subsided, he added, “out of his -head,” as Tiny proudly announced.</p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus12.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>“I’ve got a declaration of my -own to make, now—it’s not at all -long, so you needn’t worry—it’s -just this: Folks sometimes think -they’re being independent, when -they’re only being most uncommonly -foolish, and you never need -think that anything you’re afraid -to have anybody know is independence—it’s -pretty sure to be sneaking meanness! And I’ve -heard somebody that knows more than all of us put together,<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_22"></a>[22]</span> -say that if we want to be presidents and things, and govern -other folks, we’d better begin on ourselves!”</p> - -<p>And Johnny stepped, in a dignified manner, from the barrel -to a box, and thence to the ground, amid a storm of applause, -while Mr. Leslie rose and bowed gracefully, from his place -among the audience, in acknowledgment of the tribute paid -him by the orator.</p> - -<p>A prisoner in a dungeon may be one of those “freemen whom -the Truth makes free,” and an absolute monarch may be “the -servant of sin.” Each one of us must frame for himself his own -especial Declaration of Independence.</p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_23"></a>[23]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_II">CHAPTER II.<br /> -<span class="smaller">THINKING AND THINKEPHONES.</span></h2> - -</div> - -<div> -<img class="dropcap" src="images/dropcap-ch2.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p class="dropcap">It is a great pity that little boys’ legs -are so short; they have to hurry so -much, and a pair of good long legs, like -those of the stately giraffe, for instance, -would be such a convenience to a small -boy, who wished to run home from -school—half a mile—ask his mother -something, and be back again, inside of five minutes.</p> - -<p>It is difficult to think and run both at once, but something -like this was passing through Johnny’s mind, as he tore home to -ask if he might spend his shiny new -half dollar in going to the circus -with “the other boys.”</p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus13.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>Flaming posters on all the available -fences and walls, had been -announcing for some days that Barnum -was coming, and that there -would be two afternoon and two -evening performances, “presenting -in every respect the same attractions.” -Mr. Leslie had an engagement for the first afternoon, -but he had promised to take Tiny and Johnny, and as many<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_24"></a>[24]</span> -neighbor children as chose to join the party—with mothers’ and -fathers’ consent, of course—on the second afternoon, and with -this promise Johnny had been well content.</p> - -<p>But when he went to school, on the morning of the first day, -he found that several of his schoolmates had arranged to go that -afternoon, and they soon succeeded in talking him into a belief -that life would not be worth living unless he could join them.</p> - -<p>“You see, Johnny,” said Ned Grafton, solemnly, “some of -the ‘feats of strength and agility’ are about as hard to do as it -would be for you or me to turn ourselves inside out and back -again, and it stands to reason that they’ll not do them so well -the second day as they will the first, when they’ve just had a -rest; and the beasts and things always roar and fight more the -first day, because they’re mad at having been shut up in their -boxes and jolted about so; and then, forty things may happen -to hinder your father from taking you to-morrow, and just think -how you’d feel, if you were the only fellow at school who hadn’t -been! You couldn’t stand it at all! So just cut home, and -explain it to your mother, and ask her to let you come with us -to-day, and we’ll wait for you here.”</p> - -<p>“I’ll tell you what I can do,” said Johnny, eagerly, “I’ve -half a dollar, all my own, left from my apple money, so I’ll take -that, and then I can go with papa to-morrow, too,—I wouldn’t -like to hurt his feelings, nor Tiny’s either.”</p> - -<p>“Well, I should think your mother’d have to say yes to -that,” said Ned, “and you’ll be luckier than the rest of us, if -you go twice; but hurry up—you know it begins at three, and -it’s after two, now.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_25"></a>[25]</span></p> - -<p>So Johnny hurried up, and was so perfectly breathless when -he reached home, that he gasped for several minutes before he -could begin to shout through the house for his mother.</p> - -<p>His very first shout was enough; it was given at the foot of -the front stairs, and, as his mother was in the dining-room, it -reached her instantly, and without losing anything by the way. -She came out at once, and boxed his ears lightly with the -feather-duster, saying,—</p> - -<p>“Johnny Leslie! This is <i>not</i> a deaf and dumb asylum. Did -you imagine, when you came in that it was?”</p> - -<p>“I didn’t know you were so near, mammy dear,” panted -Johnny, “and I’m in the worst kind—I mean, a dreadful hurry, -I don’t see why there couldn’t be a thinkephone, so that we -could just think things at each other, it would save so much -time. The boys are all waiting for me, and they want me to go -to the circus with them this afternoon, because Ned Grafton says -the first performance is always the best, before the beasts get the -roar out of them, and before the people are tired, so mayn’t I -take my own half dollar, and go with them, and then I can go -with papa and Tiny to-morrow, too—it isn’t that I don’t want -to go with him, but I want to have the best of it!”</p> - -<p>“Is any grown person going with the ‘boys’?” asked Mrs. -Leslie.</p> - -<p>“N-o, mamma,” replied Johnny, hesitatingly, “at least, they -didn’t say there was, and I don’t believe there is, but some of -the boys are quite old, you know—Charley Graham is ’most -fifteen—and there isn’t any danger; all the things are in cages, -except the Tattooed Man.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_26"></a>[26]</span></p> - -<p>“I’m ever so sorry, dear,” said his mother, putting her arm -around him, “but indeed I don’t feel willing to have you go -without some grown person. There will be a very great crowd, -and I don’t know all the boys with whom you want to go, and -you might be led into all sorts of dangers. And it is all nonsense -about the beasts getting the roar out of them by to-morrow; -poor things! they’ll keep on roaring as long as they -are caged. So you must be patient. I really think you’ll -enjoy it more with papa to explain things, and Tiny to -help you.”</p> - -<p>“But they’re all waiting for me!” said Johnny, choking -down a sob, “and something may happen between now and to-morrow—it’s -a great while! Oh, <i>please</i>, dear mammy! I’ll -be just as careful as if papa were there, and come right straight -home when it’s out!”</p> - -<p>Johnny’s mother looked nearly as sorry as he did.</p> - -<p>“Dear little boy,” she said, “I know just how hard it is, and -how foolish it seems to you that I am afraid to trust you there -without papa, or some other grown person, and <i>you</i> know how -dearly I love you, and now you have a chance to wear my sleeve -in earnest; you must run back and tell the boys that you cannot -go till to-morrow, and then come home to me, and I’ll comfort -you.”</p> - -<p>Johnny turned away without a word; he did not quite shake -off his mother’s arm, but he drew away from under it, and ran, -not to keep the boys waiting, back to the schoolhouse. But it -was not the light-footed running which had brought him home, -and although, before he reached the playground, he had conquered<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_27"></a>[27]</span> -his tears, because he was ashamed for the boys to see -them, his voice trembled as he said,—</p> - -<p>“Mother says I can’t go to-day,—that I must wait till to-morrow, -and go with papa.”</p> - -<p>The boys all knew Johnny’s mother, more or less; those who -knew her more adored her, and those who knew her less admired -her profoundly, so there were no jeers or tauntings upon this -announcement, but they all looked sorry, and Ned Grafton -said,—</p> - -<p>“We’re awfully sorry, old fellow, but we can’t wait—it -wants only five minutes of three now; good by.”</p> - -<p>There was a general rush, and the boys were gone. Johnny -walked home very slowly, thinking bitter thoughts.</p> - -<div class="figleft" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus14.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>“I just believe it is because -mamma never was a boy!” he -thought. “If papa had been at -home, and I’d asked him first, he’d -have let me go! Ladies don’t know -about boys—they can’t. Mamma -knows more than most ladies, but -even she doesn’t know everything.”</p> - -<p>The circus tent was in plain sight all the way home; it stood -on a vacant lot about half way between the school and Mr. -Leslie’s house, and, just as Johnny entered the gate, a burst of -gay music came to his ears. His mother stood on the porch -with a little basket in her hands. It was very full, and covered -with a pretty red doily. Tiny and little Pep Warren, from<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_28"></a>[28]</span> -next door, were jumping up and down on the porch, and the -baby was tottering from one to the other, chuckling, and talking -in what they called “Polly-talk.”</p> - -<p>“Johnny,” said his mother, eagerly, as he came heavily up -the walk, “Tiny says there are lots of blackberries in our -field, and I want you and Pep to go -with her and get some for tea. You’ll -have to eat up what is in the basket -first, and then you can fill it with -blackberries. And I’m going to lend -you Polly!”</p> - -<p>Johnny’s dull face brightened a -little; he and Pep were great friends; -he liked picking blackberries when he -did not have to pick many, and to have Polly lent to them for -even so short and safe an expedition as this was an honor which -he appreciated.</p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus15.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>“Oh, thank you, mamma!” he said, almost heartily, as he -took the basket, and they started down the lane together, he -and Pep holding Polly between them, with one of her chubby -hands in a hand of each, and Tiny marching on in front. Pep -sympathized deeply upon hearing of Johnny’s woe, but added, at -the same time:—</p> - -<p>“I can’t help being sort of glad, Johnny, that you’ll not -see it before I do. You know mamma is going to let me go -with all of you to-morrow.”</p> - -<p>Johnny thought this was a little selfish in Pep, but he did -not say so, and the party reached the blackberry bushes in harmony.<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_29"></a>[29]</span> -Polly was even funnier than usual. She was just at that -interesting age when babies begin trying to say all the words they -hear, and the children were never -tired of hearing her repeat their -words in “Polly-talk.”</p> - -<div class="figleft" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus16.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>It was necessary to empty the -basket first, of course, so they chose -a nice grassy spot at the edge of the -field, where the woods kept off the -afternoon sun, spread the little red -shawl which Tiny had brought, -seated Polly on it, and themselves -around it, and opened the basket. There were two or -three “lady-fingers,” labelled “For Polly,” three dainty -sandwiches, three generous slices of loaf cake, and three -oranges.</p> - -<p>“I think your mother is the very nicest lady I know, except -<i>my</i> mother!” said Pep, through a mouthful of loaf-cake, and -Johnny, who had just bitten deeply into his sandwich, nodded -approvingly.</p> - -<p>The lunch was soon finished, and then they began, not very -vigorously, to fill the basket with blackberries, laughing at -Polly as she tangled herself in a stray branch, and then -scolded it.</p> - -<p>Johnny put his hand in his pocket for his knife to cut the -branch, and drew it out again, as if something had stung it—there -was his half dollar! Then he remembered that he had -taken it when he went to school in the morning, because he had<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_30"></a>[30]</span> -half made up his mind to buy a monster kite. At that moment -the music struck up once more in the distant tent. Johnny -stopped his ears desperately.</p> - -<p>“If I keep on hearing that, I shall go!” he said to -himself.</p> - -<p>He could not pick blackberries and stop his ears at the same -time. The music swelled louder and louder. Then came a cheer -from the audience. Johnny looked round for the other children. -They were all standing together; Pep was holding down -a branch for Polly, and he and Tiny were laughing as the -little lady stained her pretty fingers and lips with the ripe -berries.</p> - -<p>“She’s all safe with them; they’ll take her home,” he whispered -to himself, as he slipped into the wood, unseen by the -other children.</p> - -<p>“Suppose you had your thinkephone <i>now</i>, Johnny Leslie!” -somebody seemed to say inside of his head, “you’d like your -mother to know what you’re -thinking <i>now</i>, wouldn’t you?”</p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus17.jpg" width="200" height="175" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>“Papa would have let me -go—mamma’s never been a boy, -and she don’t know anything -about it!” said Johnny, stubbornly, -and speaking quite -aloud. He ran fast as soon as -he was through the wood, and, -never stopping, handed his half dollar to the doorkeeper, and -went in. The vast crowd bewildered him; he could not see a<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_31"></a>[31]</span> -vacant seat anywhere, nor a single boy that he knew, but a good-natured -countryman pushed him forward, -saying:—</p> - -<p>“Here, little fellow, there’s a seat on the -front bench for a boy of your size.”</p> - -<div class="figleft" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus18.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>He struggled past the people into the -place pointed out to him, and leaned eagerly -over the rope. The clown was in the ring -performing with the “trick donkey,” and everybody was roaring -with laughter.</p> - -<p>The donkey wheeled around suddenly, and flashed out his -heels, just as Johnny, recognizing a boy on the -other side of the tent, leaned still farther forward -and nodded.</p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 100px;"> -<img src="images/illus19.jpg" width="100" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>Johnny had a dim impression that he had been -struck by lightning; the roaring of the crowd -sounded like thunder; he did not remember -what came next.</p> - -<p>It was some minutes before the other children -missed him; then they called him several -times at the top of their voices, and, when he -neither came nor answered, Tiny began to cry. Pep wished to -explore the wood, but Tiny fairly howled at the idea of being -left alone with Polly.</p> - -<p>“I just believe,” she sobbed, “that some of the elephants and -tigers and things have broken out of the circus, and got into the -wood, and eaten my Johnny all up, and if we stay here they’ll -eat us up, too!”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_32"></a>[32]</span></p> - -<p>And, taking Polly’s hand, she set off up the lane toward -the house. Pep followed her, greatly troubled. If the “elephants -and tigers and things” -really were in the wood, he was -missing a glorious opportunity! -His heart swelled at the thought -of throwing a big stone at the -elephant, demolishing the tiger -with a club, and leading the -rescued Johnny home to his glad -and grateful mother! But Tiny -was only a girl, and a badly frightened one at that; they had -been trusted with baby Polly, and something seemed to tell -him that it was his duty to see his charge safely home, and -lay the case before Mrs. Leslie, rather than to rush into the -wood and leave them frightened and alone.</p> - -<div class="figleft" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus20.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>Mrs. Leslie was sitting in the back porch, peacefully sewing, -when the three children came up the garden walk, and she saw -at once that something was the matter.</p> - -<p>“Why, where’s Johnny, Pep?” she asked, anxiously, “and -what has happened?” and she sprang up, dropping her sewing.</p> - -<p>“We don’t know, ma’am,” said Pep, looking scared, “Tiny -and I were holding down the branches for Polly to pick, and -when we looked ’round, Johnny was gone, and I’m afraid he -went into the wood, and that some of the circus beasts have -carried him off!”</p> - -<p>“Have any of them broken loose? Did anybody tell you?” -gasped Mrs. Leslie.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_33"></a>[33]</span></p> - -<p>“No ma’am,” said Pep, “but I don’t see what else could -have gone with him.”</p> - -<p>“Run home, dear,” said Mrs. Leslie, “I’m sorry to send you -away, but I must go look for Johnny. Take Polly to the -nursery, Tiny, and I’ll send Ann up to you.”</p> - -<p>And, only stopping to speak to the servant, Mrs. Leslie -sped down the lane and into the wood, calling “Johnny! -Johnny!”</p> - -<p>It was a very small wood, and she soon satisfied herself that -her boy was not there. She ran up the lane, intending to go to -Mr. Leslie’s office, and see what -he thought had better be done -next, when the front gate -opened, and the man who had -shown Johnny to a seat, came -in with the poor little boy in his -arms.</p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus21.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>Johnny was still insensible, -and at the first glance, his -mother thought that he was -dead. Her face grew as white as his, and it was with great -difficulty that she kept herself from falling.</p> - -<p>“Don’t be scared, ma’am,” said the farmer, kindly, “the little -feller’s only fainted, and his hurt ain’t but a trifle—the -donkey’s hoof just grazed him kind of sideways. If it had -struck him square, it would have finished him, but a miss is as -good as a mile.”</p> - -<p>While he was speaking, the farmer had laid Johnny on the<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_34"></a>[34]</span> -bench in the porch, and now he went hastily to the pump, and -brought a dipperful of water to Mrs. Leslie.</p> - -<p>“A little of that will bring him to,” he said, and as she -gently bathed Johnny’s face and head, his new friend fanned -him gently with his own large straw hat, and in two or -three minutes the little boy “came to,” and sat up, feeling -strangely dizzy, and wondering where he was, and what had -happened.</p> - -<p>“There!” said the farmer, putting on his hat, and then -making a bow, “Good afternoon, ma’am—he’ll do now,” and -he was gone before Mrs. Leslie could even thank him.</p> - -<p>“I went to the circus, mammy!” said Johnny, feebly, and -throwing his arms around his mother’s neck as he spoke, “and -the donkey was quite right to break my head, only I don’t see -how he knew, or how <i>you</i> knew, and if I’d really had the thinkephone, -then you could have stopped me. But I’m not good -enough to wear your sleeve any more—you’ll have to take it -back!”</p> - -<p>Johnny had been very much interested about knights, a few -weeks before, when his mother had told him some stories of the -Knights of the Round Table, and how each one chose a lady -whom he might especially honor, and for whom he was always -ready to do battle, and wore her token, a glove, or a silken -sleeve, or something of the kind that she had given him, and -how Launcelot wore the sleeve of the fair Elaine. They were -ripping up a silk gown of Mrs. Leslie’s, which was to be made -over for Tiny, at the time of one of these talks; it was a summer -silk, soft, and of a pretty light gray color, and he had<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_35"></a>[35]</span> -begged one of the sleeves. His mother had humored him, and -twisted the sleeve around his straw hat.</p> - -<p>“Be my own true knight,” she had said, as she gave him his -decorated hat, and Johnny had fully intended to render her all -knightly service and homage. So that now, when he had so -flagrantly deceived and disobeyed her, he felt that he was -degraded, and had no longer any right to wear her token.</p> - -<p>“We will not talk about that now, dear,” said his mother, -very gently and gravely, “You must go to bed at once, and -have a mustard plaster on the back of your neck. Does your -head ache much?”</p> - -<p>“I should think it did!” said Johnny, feebly, “it feels as big -as the house, with an ache in every room!” and he closed his -eyes.</p> - -<p>He was feverish at bedtime, and his mother, too anxious to -go to bed, put on a soft wrapper, and drew the easy-chair to his -bedside. She had sent for the doctor, but he was not at home, -and she could not hope to see him now, until morning.</p> - -<p>Johnny moaned and muttered a good deal in his sleep, -through the night, but toward morning he grew quiet, and when -he woke, the pain was nearly gone, but he felt very weak and -forlorn. The doctor came, and said he had better stay in bed -until the next day, and against this advice he felt no desire to -rebel.</p> - -<p>“Mamma,” he said, earnestly, when the doctor had gone, “I -wish I felt well enough to want to go with papa and Tiny and -Pep and the rest of them, right badly. I don’t feel punished -enough.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_36"></a>[36]</span></p> - -<p>His mother stooped to kiss him.</p> - -<p>“The punishing will not help you for next time,” she said, -“unless you see just where the fault was. When did the going -wrong begin?”</p> - -<p>Johnny was silent for a few moments; then he said,—</p> - -<p>“I think it began when I said to myself that you didn’t -know about boys because you were a lady. Then, when I found -I had my half dollar in my pocket, and heard the music, that -seemed to make it all right,—I made myself believe that if -papa had been at home, he would have let me go,—only I didn’t -really and truly believe it, for he never does let me do things -that you don’t.</p> - -<p>“But, mamma, don’t you think it would be a splendid thing -if there really were thinkephones? Something like telephones, -you know, only for thinks instead of words? You see, if you -and I had one, you would always be able to stop me when I was -going to do anything bad! I had such a queer dream last night, -when my head hurt so; I thought somebody had really and -truly invented thinkephones, and I was hearing everybody think, -and some of the people that I had liked ever so much were -thinking such disagreeable things that I did not like them any -more, and they heard me think that, and then <i>they</i> didn’t like -<i>me</i> any more, and things were getting into a most dreadful mess -when you came in and cut the wires, and then the dream -stopped, and I went into a nice quiet sleep.”</p> - -<p>“So you see,” said his mother, smiling at this remarkable -dream, “that if anybody ever should invent the thinkephone, it -will make more trouble than pleasure, for no one, not even the<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_37"></a>[37]</span> -best people, would be ready to have all their thoughts known to -any other human being. But, dear Johnny, Who is it to whom -all our thoughts lie bare, Who hears them just as if we spoke, -Who, if we ask Him, can take away the wicked ones, and put -good and holy ones in their place?”</p> - -<p>“It is the Saviour, mamma,” said Johnny, reverently, “and -if I had just asked Him yesterday, when I heard the music, and -found the half dollar in my pocket, that would have been better -than stopping my ears. But it seems to me that just when I -am most bad and need Him the most, I forget all about Him.”</p> - -<p>“We can teach our minds, as well as our bodies, to have -habits,” said his mother, “and the habit of sending up a quick, -earnest prayer, whenever we are especially tempted, will often -save us from yielding to the temptation, when there is nothing -else to do it. Even if I could read your thoughts, I cannot -always be with you, and I could not always help you, but the -Saviour is always near, and always ‘mighty to save,’ from small -things as well as great, and you can <i>think</i> to Him, and know -that it will be just the same as if you had spoken.”</p> - -<p>Johnny was obliged to keep rather quiet for several days, but he -was much more patient and gentle than he had ever been before -during a slight illness, and he seemed sincerely pleased when he -heard what a good time Tiny and Pep and the rest of his small -friends had had at the circus.</p> - -<p>Tiny had been much impressed by seeing the identical donkey -that had come so near to breaking Johnny’s head.</p> - -<p>“I didn’t half like that part,” she said. “I wanted that -donkey punished for kicking you, Johnny.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_38"></a>[38]</span></p> - -<p>“He didn’t do it on purpose, Tiny,” said Johnny, indulgently. -“You see, I stuck my head out over the rope, and, -though I couldn’t help thinking at first that he knew and did it -to punish me, I know now that that was foolish. And I’m -really very much obliged to him! If nothing ever happened to -folks, I don’t believe they’d think of anything!”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Leslie left Johnny to decide for himself whether or not -he should give her back her sleeve, and, very sorrowfully, he -brought her his hat to have the “token” ripped off.</p> - -<p>“It wouldn’t be fair for me to keep it on, mamma,” he said, -“when I deserted Polly and Tiny and you all at once. But -please don’t cut it up, or anything,—just put it away safely, -and the very first time I’ve been tempted right hard, and -remembered what you said, and been helped through, then I’ll -ask you to put it on my hat again!”</p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_39"></a>[39]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_III">CHAPTER III.<br /> -<span class="smaller">LETTER AND SPIRIT.</span></h2> - -</div> - -<div> -<img class="dropcap" src="images/dropcap-ch3.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p class="dropcap">Tiny and Johnny congratulated themselves, -and each other, at least once a week, -upon being the children of an editor.</p> - -<p>You will think, perhaps, that they had -literary tendencies, and hoped to grow up -into co-editors? Not in the least! They -each wondered, as they groaned over -“composition day,” how anybody could -be found willing to spend the greater part of his time either in -writing, or in reading what other people had written; they -knew that at least a column of the -“large print” in their father’s paper, was -always written by himself, and they had -often seen him plodding through pages -of bad writing, which must be read and -decided upon, so that, proud as they were -of him for being able to do these things, -and much as they admired him, I am -afraid they pitied him even more.</p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus22.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>“Poor papa!” they would say to -each other, when they saw him at his desk, with a mountain of -manuscript before him; and sometimes, I must confess, Mr.<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_40"></a>[40]</span> -Leslie echoed this sigh, for an editor’s life is not invariably -“a happy one,” any more -than a policeman’s is.</p> - -<div class="figleft" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus23.jpg" width="200" height="150" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>No, their pleasure in having -an editor for their father -was a very practical one; -among the many books which -were sent to him for review -were numbers of nice story -and picture books for children; -among the “exchanges” which -came to the office were delightful picture papers, selected, apparently, -with a view -to playroom walls -and scrap-books. -And last, but by no -means least, there -was the waste-paper -basket! They had -learned the signs -and tokens, and whenever a very fat manuscript was being read, -they would ask eagerly,—</p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus24.jpg" width="200" height="125" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>“Did she send any stamps, papa?”</p> - -<p>They were so nearly sure that the fat manuscript would -prove “not available for the purposes of, etc.,” that the whole -thing hinged on the stamps—if she had sent them, why then, -of course, she must have her “old manuscript” back, if she -wished it; but if she had not, then, oh, then! there were all<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_41"></a>[41]</span> -those sheets of paper, perfectly blank on one side, anyhow. -And what with colored envelopes, and pamphlets printed on pink -and blue paper, and envelope bands, and monograms, and occasional -coats-of-arms, that waste paper basket, with skilful handling -of its contents, had yielded many a handsome kite.</p> - -<p>Its contents had been given over to Johnny, and those of the -rag-bag to Tiny, at the same time, but they preferred to make -partnership affairs of both. As the rag-bag yielded sails for -boats, and covers for balls, and “bobs” for kites, so did the -waste-paper basket yield colored paper wherewith to dress paper -dolls, and stiff cards which made excellent cardboard furniture, -not to mention those pieces of blank-on-both-sides writing paper, -which could be cut into small sheets and envelopes. And if a -monogram is really handsome, why should -not one person use it as well as another?</p> - -<div class="figleft" style="width: 150px;"> -<img src="images/illus25.jpg" width="150" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>Johnny was beginning to be famous -for his kites, and as he was a warm-hearted -and generous little boy, with a -large number of friends, he frequently -made a kite to give away. Tiny was -always ready to help him, and was particularly -“handy” at making the devices of -bright paper with which the kites were -generally ornamented, and pasting them neatly on. When the -kite was very large, she did even more than this, and Johnny -never gave one away, without explaining that Tiny had shared -in the making.</p> - -<p>They had been saving all the best paper of every sort lately<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_42"></a>[42]</span> -for the largest kite they had ever undertaken; it was so large -that it was already named the Monster, and it was stretched, -half finished, upon the floor of the spare garret, where it would -not be disturbed. It was designed for a birthday present to one -of Johnny’s very best friends, and everybody in the house was -interested in it. It was to be pure white, with a pair of wings, -and a bird’s head and tail, in brilliant red paper, pasted upon -one side, and on the other, in large blue letters, the initials of -the boy for whom it was intended.</p> - -<p>But, with the perversity of things in general, or rather -because it had been a very warm summer, and most of the poor -authors had been taking holidays as much as they could, the -waste-paper basket of late had not been worth the trouble of -emptying.</p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus26.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>So it was with no very great expectations that Johnny went -to it one Saturday morning to see if by chance there should be -a rejected manuscript of sufficient length to satisfy the Monster. -No, there was nothing there but a -letter written on both sides of the -paper, a few pamphlets, likewise -without blank sides, and some -envelopes and postal cards. -Johnny was turning away with a -natural sigh, and the conviction -that, if the Monster was ever to -be finished, he must make a small -appropriation out of his Christmas money, when behold! on the -floor, just under the edge of the desk, and hidden by the basket,<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_43"></a>[43]</span> -he spied a lovely manuscript; large sheets, firm, white, unruled -paper, written upon only on one side.</p> - -<p>He jumped for it with a joyful exclamation, but stopped as -suddenly—had it been <i>thrown</i> down, and missed the basket, or -had it fallen, and been neglected for -the moment, because it was hidden -by the desk and basket?</p> - -<div class="figleft" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus27.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>If Mr. Leslie had only been -there, how quickly these questions -could have been answered! But -alas! he had left home that very -morning, to be gone two days; and -must a whole precious Saturday be -lost on account of what was, perhaps, -after all, only a needless and foolish scruple?</p> - -<p>Then the two Johnnys—you may have observed that -there are two of you?—began an argument something like -this:—</p> - -<p>Johnny No. 1. You’d better not take that thing till you’ve -asked your father about it. It looks to me as if it had merely -fallen from the table.</p> - -<p>Johnny No. 2. But papa won’t be back till Monday morning, -and I can’t wait. Bob’s birthday is next Wednesday, and -the kite’s only half done now!</p> - -<p>No. 1. That makes no difference. It is not the question. -And you might at least ask your mother what she thinks, and -let her decide.</p> - -<p>No. 2. Mamma never knows anything about papa’s papers;<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_44"></a>[44]</span> -I’ve heard her say so a dozen times. And why should it have -been on the floor if it was worth anything?</p> - -<p>No. 1. You know quite well that your father never throws -on the floor things which are meant for the basket, and that it -looks much more as if it had fallen from the table. Come, put -it back, and either wait till Monday, or go and buy the rest of -the paper you need.</p> - -<p>No. 2. Papa’s a very careful man, and he wouldn’t have -gone off for two days and left anything worth while on the floor. -It was almost in the basket, and it’s all the same, and I mean to -take it, so there!</p> - -<p>The other Johnny made no reply to this conclusive argument—in -fact, he had no time, for the wrong Johnny rushed out of -the library, shouting:—</p> - -<p>“Tiny! Oh, Tiny! come at once! Here’s enough to finish -the Monster, tail and all!”</p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus28.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>Tiny dropped some very important -work for her best doll -without a moment’s hesitation, -and reached the garret almost -as soon as Johnny did.</p> - -<p>“Oh, that’s perfectly lovely!” -she panted, “and it’s more than -enough! But oh, Johnny,” -she added, in a changed tone, -“if we should ever write poems and stories and things, after -we’re grown up, do you believe that some dreadful editor will -let his children make kites out of them?”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_45"></a>[45]</span></p> - -<p>“I’m afraid he will, of mine,” said Johnny, frankly, “for -that’s about all they’d be good for, but you write much better -compositions than I do, Tiny, for all you’re so much younger -than I am, so perhaps the editors will print yours. But it -does seem a sort of shame, when you think of all the time it -must take them to do it, and how flat they must feel when it -turns out to have been for nothing. Now this one”—looking -at it critically—“is really beautifully written, and on such good -paper. Why, even the paper must cost them ever so much! I -say, Tiny, it’s just as if we had to put on five dollar gold pieces, -or gold dollars, for bait when we go fishing, and then had them -nibbled off without catching anything. I’ll tell that to papa—I -think he might make a story, or a poem, or a fable, or something -out of it—don’t you?”</p> - -<p>“Yes, it’s just the kind of thing they use for a fable,” said -Tiny, approvingly, and so, in steady work at the kite, enlivened -by such intellectual conversations as this, the day flew by, and -by evening the Monster was finished, tail and all.</p> - -<p>There had been more than enough of the strong white paper -for everything, and Tiny had carefully cut the “bobs” out of -it, fringing each one at both ends. The colored paper for the -enterprise had been on hand for some time, and Mrs. Leslie put -the crowning glory on, by drawing a monogram to take the -place of the separate initials of Bob’s name, which were to have -adorned one side of the kite. This monogram was cut by Tiny’s -deft fingers from pink and blue paper, and carefully pasted -together in the middle of one side.</p> - -<p>Johnny had so entirely succeeded in silencing his scruples<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_46"></a>[46]</span> -about the manuscript, that he would probably never have -thought of it again, if it had not been rather forcibly recalled to -his memory. It had not occurred to Tiny to ask any questions -about it; such streaks of luck had come to them before, -and she had perfect faith in Johnny. So when, at the dinner-table, -on Monday, Mr. Leslie said to his wife,—</p> - -<p>“I’ve somehow mislaid a very bright article by Mrs. —— -which I meant to use in the next number. Did you empty the -waste basket, dear, or did the children?”</p> - -<p>Before his mother could answer, Johnny, with a very red -face, and a lump in his throat, had told the whole story.</p> - -<p>Mr. Leslie looked exceedingly grave.</p> - -<p>“I am very much annoyed by the loss of this manuscript,” -he said, “for even should Mrs. —— have a rough draft of it, -she will be obliged to take the trouble of making a second copy, -and should she not, it will be necessary for me to pay her for it, -as if I had used it. But that is not the worst of it, Johnny. -If we deliberately stifle our consciences, after a while, we cease -to hear from them. Do you remember asking me what ‘Quench -not the Spirit’ means?”</p> - -<p>“Yes, papa,” said Johnny, in a choked voice.</p> - -<p>“I think, then, that you remember what I told you, my boy, -and I shall pray that you may not again forget it. And now, -the next thing is, reparation, so far as you can make it. You -must write to Mrs. —— and tell her the whole story.”</p> - -<p>“Oh, papa! please! I’ll do <i>anything</i> else!” said Johnny, -piteously. “But won’t you <i>please</i> write for me, and let me sign -it, or put that it’s all true, at the bottom?”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_47"></a>[47]</span></p> - -<p>“No, my son,” said his father, firmly, “you must do this -yourself, and I shall take it as a proof of real repentance, if you -do it promptly, and without complaint.”</p> - -<p>Johnny said not another word, and that evening, when he bade -his father good-night, he handed him a letter, saying meekly,—</p> - -<p>“You’ll direct it for me, won’t you, papa?”</p> - -<p>“Certainly, I will, my dear boy,” said his father, throwing -his arm around Johnny’s shoulder, and drawing him near for -another kiss.</p> - -<p>“And you’ll read it, and see if it will answer? Indeed, I did -my very best!” said poor Johnny.</p> - -<p>“I don’t doubt it, dear boy,” said his father, warmly, “and -I shall add a few lines to tell Mrs. —— so.”</p> - -<p>“Oh, will you do that? Thank you very much, dear papa!” -said Johnny, and he went to bed with a wonderfully lightened -heart.</p> - -<p>This was his letter:—</p> - -<div class="blockquote"> - -<p>“<span class="smcap">Dear Mrs. —— </span> Perhaps you will think I have no right to -call you that, when you hear what I have done. I took a story -of yours, which I heard papa say was a very bright one, and -used nearly all of it to finish a Monster Kite, which Tiny and I -were making. Tiny is my sister, but she knew nothing about -the way in which I took the story. It was this way. Papa lets -us have everything which he puts into the waste-paper basket, -but people don’t seem to have written much lately, and we had -not near enough. On Saturday morning I went to look. There -was nothing of any account in the basket, but your story had -fallen on the floor, and I made myself believe that I thought it -had been thrown at the basket, and missed it. Papa was away<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_48"></a>[48]</span> -and was not coming back till Monday, and we were in a great -hurry to finish the Monster for Bob Lane’s birthday, so I just -took it, and let Tiny think I found it in the basket, which was -as bad as a lie, though I didn’t say so. Now, I am so sorry that -I don’t know how to tell you, but that is not enough. If I -could unpaste your story, I would, but we put on a great deal of -paste—you have to, you know, or it don’t stick—and some of -it is all cut into fringe, for the bobs. But what I mean to say -is this: if you have any little boys, or little nephews, or know -anybody you would like to give that kite to, I will send it right -on. I have money enough, I am pretty sure, to pay for expressing -it, and I know a way of fixing it so that it will not break. -I sent one to my cousin. Will you please let me know <i>at once</i>, -if I may send it, and oblige,</p> - -<p class="center">“Yours very sorrowfully and very respectfully,</p> - -<p class="right">“<span class="smcap">John Leslie.</span>”</p> - -</div> - -<p>It had taken Johnny three good hours to write and copy that -letter. His father made no alteration in it, merely adding a few -courteous lines to express his own regret for what had happened, -and to say that he believed his boy had repented his fault very -sincerely, and had done his best with the enclosed letter.</p> - -<p>Mrs. —— was not a monster, if the kite was. She laughed -till she cried, and then cried a little till she laughed again, over -Johnny’s letter. Then she answered it, and this is what she -said:—</p> - -<div class="blockquote"> - -<p>“<span class="smcap">My dear John</span>,—You have my hearty forgiveness. And I -would like very much to have the kite for my son, who is nearly -as old as I imagine you are, and has never yet made one. But -you must allow me to pay the expressage; I can only accept it -on that condition. I have a rough copy of the article which<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_49"></a>[49]</span> -helped to make the Monster, and from this I will make a fair -copy for your father to-day and to-morrow. Please tell him so, -with my kindest regards,—and that I hope it will circulate as -widely as will the first one, and in as high circles! I should -very much like to hear from you again; if you will write once -in a while, so will I, and some day, I hope, you and my boy -will meet and be friends. In the meantime, believe me sincerely -and cordially your friend,</p> - -<p class="right">“<span class="smcap">Mary ——</span>.”</p> - -</div> - -<p>Johnny proved the sincerity of his repentance still further by -the perfect willingness with which he packed the Monster for -his journey. Tiny helped him, having first, by working very -carefully, soaked off the monograms, not much the worse for -wear, and, as they were so fortunate as to have some gilt paper -in stock, the rough spot was covered with a shining star.</p> - -<p>An explanation was made to Bob, who, not having expected -a kite, or indeed any birthday present at all from Tiny and -Johnny, was quite resigned to wait, with so brilliant a prospect -ahead of him, until one or two more unfortunates had contributed -a large enough supply of waste paper. If they had known -how eagerly it was welcomed, it might have helped to console -them a little, poor things!</p> - -<p>The children built a third Monster for themselves, after Bob’s -was finished, and on this they pasted, in large gilt letters, upon -a blue ground, the motto they intended to use if they should ever -have a coat-of-arms—“Be sure you’re right, then go ahead.”</p> - -<p>“Only I suppose it will have to be in Latin then,” said Johnny, -as he smoothed down the last letter of the last word, “and -perhaps, by that time, I’ll know enough Latin to do it myself!”</p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_50"></a>[50]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_IV">CHAPTER IV.<br /> -<span class="smaller">THE FIRST MOVE.</span></h2> - -</div> - -<div> -<img class="dropcap" src="images/dropcap-ch4.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p class="dropcap">There were just two things which could -keep Johnny quiet for more than two -minutes at a time; one was having some -one read aloud to him, and the other was -playing checkers. He could read to himself, -more or less, but stopping once in a -while to spell a long word, or to wonder -what it means, breaks the thread of the most entertaining story, -so whenever anything very attractive-looking in the way of -books and magazines came into the Leslie family, Johnny coaxed -his mother to read it aloud.</p> - -<p>But it is one thing to hear reading because you have begged -for it, and have been running and jumping enough to make -keeping still not only possible but really quite pleasant, and -another to hear it because your mother asks you to stay in the -house until it clears up, or your cold is well.</p> - -<p>New Year’s Day had been bitterly cold and raw, and Johnny, -coming from the well-warmed church in the morning, had -stopped on the way home to do a little snowballing. He had -“cooled off,” as he expressed it, rather too quickly, and the -result was an unpleasant cough. Now Johnny did not in the<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_51"></a>[51]</span> -least object to drinking the agreeable beverage made of Irish -moss and lemons and sugar, which his mother had prepared for -him, but it was hard work to -stay in the house when all the -other boys were building a -snow-fort, and making ready -for a magnificent battle.</p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus29.jpg" width="200" height="175" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>“Oh, mammy dear!” he -implored, “if you’d ever in -your life been a boy, you’d -know how I feel when I look -out of the window! If you’ll -let me out for just one little -hour, right in the middle of the day, I’ll put on my rubber-boots, -and my overcoat, and my fur cap, and my ear-tabs, and wind -my neck all up in Tiny’s red scarf, and not stand still one single -moment—oh, please, please! They’re just building the tower!”</p> - -<p>“Poor Johnny!” said Tiny, with much sympathy, “would it -hurt him that way, mamma?”</p> - -<p>“Yes, dear, I’m afraid it would,” said Mrs. Leslie, and turning -to Johnny, she asked, “My Johnny, were you quite in -earnest, when you said you would try to win back my sleeve?”</p> - -<p>“Why mammy! of course I was!” he answered, opening -his eyes very wide, and for a moment forgetting his woes. No -opportunity which he considered large enough had yet occurred, -for him to try to win back his mother’s “silken sleeve,” which -he had worn twisted around his hat to show that he meant to -render her knightly service, and which he had given back to her<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_52"></a>[52]</span> -the day after the circus, because he felt that he was unworthy to -wear it, and he often looked at it sorrowfully as it hung, where -he had placed it, above his mother’s picture, in his little room.</p> - -<div class="figleft" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus30.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>“Very well,” she said, gently pulling him down upon her lap, -and turning his face away from the distracting window. -“Imagine that you are really a -knight, and that you are storm bound -in my castle, as the foreign knight -was in Sintram’s. You’d be too -polite, in that case, I hope, to be -grumbling and howling because you -were compelled to pass a whole day in -the charming society of the lady of -the castle—now, wouldn’t you?”</p> - -<p>“Well, yes, mamma, I suppose I -should,” admitted Johnny, reluctantly, “but somehow it doesn’t -seem exactly the same thing. You see, the snow may all be -melted before you let me out again, and when the real old -knights were storm bound, or anything, they always knew that -their enemies and battles and things would keep!”</p> - -<p>“Very well then,” replied his mother, promptly, “that gives -you a chance to be just so much more knightly than the ‘real old -knights’ were! And if you don’t give another howl, or scowl, -or grumble, all day, but are my very best Johnny, instead of my -second best or third best, I’ll twist my sleeve around your new -school cap this very night!”</p> - -<p>“Oh, mammy! will I really and truly be winning it, that -way?” asked Johnny, eagerly.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_53"></a>[53]</span></p> - -<p>“Indeed you will,” said his mother, kissing him, “for you’ll -never, even if you should some day be a soldier, and fight for -your country, find a worse enemy, or one that will take more -conquering, than my third-best Johnny Leslie!”</p> - -<p>Johnny returned the kiss with interest, and then, resolutely -turning his back to the window, he said,—</p> - -<p>“Tiny, if you’ll bring your old black Dinah here, I’ll get out -all the blocks, and my pea-shooter, and my little brass cannon, -and we’ll make a huge fort, and put Dinah in the tower, and -storm it! You don’t mind -our making a muss here, -mammy, if we clear it up -again, do you?”</p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus31.jpg" width="200" height="150" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>“Not a bit,” said his -mother, cheerfully, while -Tiny, with a little scream of -delight rushed off for Dinah. -The playroom stove was out -of order, and the children were obliged to play in the dining-room, -which made Johnny’s imprisonment all the harder to bear.</p> - -<p>Tiny came back presently, with an assorted cargo, presided -over by Dinah, in the basket.</p> - -<p>“I brought all my tin housekeeping things,” she explained, -as she proceeded to unload. “I thought we could put them on -top, and they’d make such a lovely clatter when the fort fell!”</p> - -<p>“Now, that’s what I call really bright!” and Johnny nodded -his head approvingly. “It’s almost a pity you’re a girl, Tiny—you’d -be such a jolly little fellow if you were only a boy!”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_54"></a>[54]</span></p> - -<div class="figleft" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus32.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>It made Tiny very happy when Johnny approved of her, so -the building of the fort went merrily on with so much laughing -and talking that Mrs. Leslie, who -was in the kitchen, not “eating -bread and honey,” but making -doughnuts, looked in once or twice -to see if any of the children’s -friends had called. And when the -stately fort, with its tin battlements, -at last yielded to the fierce attack -of the brass cannon and the pea-shooter, -used after the manner of battering-rams, she rushed to -the scene of conflict with the dreadful certainty that the stove -had been knocked over, but an invitation to help hurrah for the -victory quieted her fears.</p> - -<p>The ruins had just been picked up and repacked in the basket, -when Ann came in to set the dinner table, and Johnny found, to -his astonishment, that the morning was gone.</p> - -<p>“But there’s all the great long afternoon yet!” he thought, -ruefully, “and mamma will have to lie down, I’m afraid, and -Tiny’s going to that foolish doll-party, and—hello! if I keep -on this way I shall say something, and, if I do, Tiny will stay at -home; it would be just like her, she’s such a good little soul. -Brace up, Johnny Leslie, and win your sleeve!”</p> - -<p>And Johnny marched up and down, and tried to sing “Onward, -Christian Soldier!” but only succeeded in coughing.</p> - -<p>“Mamma, I wish to whisper something to you,” said Tiny, -after dinner. “Don’t listen, please, Johnny,” and she whispered,<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_55"></a>[55]</span> -“Don’t you think it would be dreadfully mean for me to go to -the doll-party, mamma, when poor Johnny has such a cough and -can’t go out? Because if you do, I’ll stay at home, and I -wouldn’t mind it, or not so very much, if Johnny would play -with me as he has played this morning.”</p> - -<p>“No, darling,” whispered her mother, “Johnny would not be -so selfish as to wish you to stay; and the other little girls you -are to meet would be disappointed, for they all know about your -new Christmas doll. So run and get ready, and Ann will carry -you and your daughter across the street. You will have a great -deal to tell us when you come home, you know.”</p> - -<p>Tiny went, but not very briskly, and, when she was gone, -Johnny said,—</p> - -<p>“I’ll bet—I mean I <i>think</i> I know what Tiny said, mamma; -didn’t she offer to stay at home from her doll-party?”</p> - -<p>“What a brilliant boy!” said his mother, smiling. “She -did, but I knew you would not like her to make such a sacrifice; -she has been counting upon the party for a week.”</p> - -<p>“No, indeed!” said Johnny, warmly, “I hope I’m not such -a great bear as all that! But it was a jolly thing for the dear -little soul to do, and I’ll not forget it.”</p> - -<p>“Would you like me to read to you again, dear?” asked his -mother, when she had put the finishing touches to Tiny’s dress, -and seen her off.</p> - -<p>“No, Mrs. Mother, thank you,” said Johnny, stoutly, “I am -going to read to myself, and you are going upstairs to lie down -for at least an hour. You’re making your back ache face, and if -you don’t lie down I’ll not eat one single doughnut or gingerbread—so -there!”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_56"></a>[56]</span></p> - -<p>“I couldn’t stand that, of course,” said his mother, laughing, -and kissing him, “and I find my back does ache, now you mention -it, so I will take you at your word, my own true knight!”</p> - -<p>If they had been looking out of the window just then, they -would have seen a bright-faced little girl running up the walk, -and before Mrs. Leslie had started upon her upward journey the -door-bell rang, and there was Johnny’s especial friend, Kitty -McKee, with a little basket of rosy apples, and permission to -spend the afternoon, “if it would be convenient.”</p> - -<p>To say that Johnny was glad to see her but faintly expresses -his feelings. She was a year or two older than he was, and he -considered her friendship for him a flattering thing. She played -checkers so well that his occasional victories over her were -triumphs indeed, and, what was better still, she never lost her -temper with her game. So, after performing a war dance -around her while she took off her cloak and hood, Johnny rushed -for the checker-board, and Mrs. Leslie, with an easy mind and a -tired body, went upstairs for a delightful nap.</p> - -<p>Johnny took a white checker in one hand, and a black one in -the other, mixed them up under the table, and held up his -hand, asking,—</p> - -<p>“Which’ll you have?”</p> - -<p>“Right,” said Kitty, and, as it happened, that gave Johnny -the first move.</p> - -<p>The battle was fierce, but the advantage which the first move -had given Johnny was followed up until he felt so sure of victory -that he began to grow a little careless, and was startled by -losing a king and seeing Kitty gain one in rapid succession. -Then he resumed his caution; his hand hung poised over the<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_57"></a>[57]</span> -piece he was about to move until he had taken in all the possible -consequences. Slowly he pushed his man to the back row; two -more well-considered moves and the game was his!</p> - -<p>Perhaps the triumph of winning the first game made him too -self-confident; at any rate, victory perched upon Kitty’s banner -for the rest of the afternoon, and when the early dusk fell they -drew their chairs to the cheerful fire, quite willing to exchange -their battle for Tiny’s eager account of the doll-party.</p> - -<p>Mrs. Leslie had come down, rested and refreshed, and presently -Mr. Leslie was heard stamping the snow from his boots in -the porch, and Kitty said she really must go, if she did live only -next door but one, and Mr. Leslie said it was highly personal for -her to rush off the minute she heard his fairy footsteps, and he -should step in and tell her mother they were keeping her to tea. -Kitty thanked him with a kiss, and the supper was a very cheerful -one. When it was over, the meeting adjourned to the parlor, -and Mr. Leslie found a Christmas -<i>Graphic</i> and a <i>London News</i> and -a number of <i>Punch</i> in his pockets, -and it was time for Kitty to go -home and for Johnny to go to -bed before anybody knew it. -Tiny had gone an hour ago, too -sleepy even to wish to sit up -longer.</p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus33.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>When Mrs. Leslie came to -tuck Johnny up and give him his last dose of cough mixture and -last good-night kiss, she took down the sleeve, saying,—</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_58"></a>[58]</span></p> - -<p>“You’ll find it on your cap in the morning, my own true -knight.”</p> - -<p>“But, indeed, mamma,” said Johnny, earnestly, “I don’t -think I’ve half won it. It hasn’t been hard at all, but the very -pleasantest day since Christmas Day.”</p> - -<p>“And why has it been so pleasant?” asked his mother, drawing -a chair to the bedside and sitting down. “Begin at the -beginning, and tell me.”</p> - -<div class="figleft" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus34.jpg" width="200" height="150" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>“Why, you know all that happened, mammy,” replied -Johnny. “But I’ll go over it, if you like. First, I had some -good fun with Tiny, because -she played fort so nicely, and -then you made us laugh with -the doughnut woman and gingerbread -man, and then Kitty -came with those beautiful -apples, and then I beat her -the very first game of checkers -we played—and I don’t see why in thund—I mean <i>why</i> I -didn’t beat her any more, for we played six games after that, -and she beat me every single one. And then Tiny made us -laugh telling about the doll-party, and then papa kept Kitty to -tea, and gave us those jolly papers, and if that isn’t a pretty -good day, I should like to know what is!”</p> - -<p>“But you didn’t begin at the beginning,” said his mother. -“Now I am going to suppose. Suppose, when you found you -could not go out this morning, you had kept on looking out of -the window and watching the boys until your vexation and disappointment<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_59"></a>[59]</span> -had made you cry, I am very certain that would -have set you to coughing, and then your body would have felt -worse, as well as your mind. Suppose that, instead of offering -to play with Tiny, and doing it heartily, you had been cross and -sulky, and hurt her feelings, and had spent the morning bemoaning -your hard fate, and thinking how ill-used you were; you -would have been in such a bad way by dinner-time that my -doughnut woman and gingerbread man would scarcely have -made you smile, and by the time Kitty came, the sight of your -face would have been enough to make her turn round and go -home again. Fretting and fuming all the afternoon would have -left you too tired of yourself and everything else to care for -Tiny’s account of the party and papa’s papers. In short, everything -would have looked to you the ugly color of your own dark -thoughts.”</p> - -<p>“Then it’s just like checkers!” exclaimed Johnny, sitting up -in bed; “if you get the first move, and make that all right, the -rest is pretty sure to come straight.”</p> - -<p>“Yes,” said his mother. “There is a French proverb which -means, ‘It is only the first step that costs.’ If we make the -first step, or the first move, in the right direction, we have gone -a good deal more than one step toward the right end.”</p> - -<p>“And it’s like checkers in another way,” said Johnny, -thoughtfully; “if we’re too uncommonly sure we’re all right, -and can’t go wrong, we get tripped up before we know it. I do -believe that the reason why Kitty beat me every time but that -one, was because I felt so stuck up about the first game that I -didn’t try my best afterward; I thought I could beat her anyhow.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_60"></a>[60]</span></p> - -<p>“That is very likely,” answered his mother. “And now you -see how needful it is to ask that we may obey God’s ‘blessed -will’ in all things—not only large, important-looking things, -which only come once in a while, but in the veriest trifles, or -what seem to us like trifles, that are coming all the time. -Sometimes I think that <i>there is no such thing as a trifle</i>, Johnny. -Good-night, darling—you will find my sleeve on your helmet -in the morning, my own true knight!”</p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_61"></a>[61]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_V">CHAPTER V.<br /> -<span class="smaller">INALIENABLE RIGHTS.</span></h2> - -</div> - -<div> -<img class="dropcap" src="images/dropcap-ch5.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p class="dropcap">As time went on, from that Fourth of -July when Johnny had reason to -change his views about independence, -and as he thought more about that, -and other matters connected with it, he -grew only the more firmly convinced -that any of his rights which trod upon -the toes of other people’s rights, were only wrongs under a -false name.</p> - -<p>The boys at his school nearly all liked him; he “went into -things” so heartily, that he was wanted on both sides in all the -games that had more than one. But with all his love of fun, -the boys soon found that there were some sorts of fun—or what -they called so—for which it was useless to ask his help. So -when recess came, the morning before school closed for the -summer, a group of boys gathered in a corner of the playground, -whispering together, and did not ask him to join them. He -felt a little left out in the cold, for some of his best friends were -in the group, but he was not naturally suspicious, and his -mother had brought him up in a wholesome fear of imagining -himself injured or slighted.</p> - -<p>“Always take good-will for granted, Johnny,” she said to<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_62"></a>[62]</span> -him once, when he fancied himself neglected by somebody, “at -least until you have the most -positive proof of ill-will.”</p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus35.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>So he joined some of the -smaller boys, who did not seem -to have been invited to the conference, -and made them supremely -happy by getting up a game -of football.</p> - -<p>He had just parted from one -of the larger boys, on his way -home from school that afternoon, and was near his gate, when -a little fellow, the youngest of all his schoolmates, stuck his -head cautiously out of the nearly closed gate, and, after seeing -that the coast was clear, said in a mysterious whisper,—</p> - -<p>“Hold on, Johnny, will you? I’ve got something to tell -you, but if you ever say I told you, you’ll get me into the awfullest -scrape that ever was!”</p> - -<p>If little Jamie Hughes had been talking to anybody but -Johnny, he would have exacted a very solemn “indeed and -double deed and upon my sacred honor I’ll never tell!”</p> - -<p>But the boys all felt very sure, by this time, that Johnny -would not do them an ill-turn, no matter what chance he -might have; so Jamie went hurriedly on, linking his arm in -Johnny’s as he spoke, and drawing him inside the gate and up -the walk, as if he feared being seen.</p> - -<p>“You see, they didn’t mean me to hear,” said Jamie, talking -very fast, “but it wasn’t my fault. I was up the apple tree cutting<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_63"></a>[63]</span> -my name, and two of them were under it, and one of them -said, ‘The old gentleman will open his eyes, for once in his life,’ -and then the other said, kind of uneasy, ‘I don’t think we need -take <i>cannon</i> crackers; wouldn’t the small ones do just as well?’ -and then I began to sing, and they never let on they heard me, -but the first fellow said: ‘My dear boy, my grandfather -expressly requested that the salute in his honor should be fired -with cannon-crackers!’ and then they both burst out laughing, -and walked away, and I never thought, till ever so long afterward, -that that one who spoke last hadn’t a grandfather to his -name, and I’m sure they’re going to do something to—to Mr. -Foster.”</p> - -<p>“What makes you think that, Jamie?” asked Johnny, kindly, -“It may be all a joke; perhaps they saw you up there, and are -just putting up a game on you.”</p> - -<p>Jamie shook his head.</p> - -<p>“No, they’re not!” he said, very positively, “they both -jumped like everything when I began to sing, and the one -who said little crackers would do turned as red as a beet. -Now, Johnny, I came to you because I knew you wouldn’t -give me away, and because I thought you could think of some -way to checkmate them, and you’d just better believe it’s what I -think! You know Mr. Foster always leaves his window wide -open at night, and the ceilings are so low in that house where -he boards that anybody could throw a pack of crackers into a -second-story window easy enough. I was in his room once, and -his bed’s right opposite the window, and suppose those fellows -should throw so hard that the crackers would hit him in the<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_64"></a>[64]</span> -face, or light in the bed and set the clothes afire? I can’t tell -you all I know, or you’d believe me, and spot the fellows in -a minute, and then <i>they’d</i> spot <i>me</i>, and I -wouldn’t give much for my skin if they did!”</p> - -<div class="figleft" style="width: 100px;"> -<img src="images/illus36.jpg" width="100" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>Jamie would have been a good deal more -nervous than he was if he had known that -Johnny had already, and without the least difficulty, -“spotted the fellows.” Jamie was a -timid little boy, and his affection for Mr. -Foster, who was the teacher of mathematics -at the school, had grown out of that gentleman’s -patient kindness to him. Mr. Foster -never mistook timidity for stupidity, but he was a very clear-headed -man, with little patience for boys who tried to make -shifts and tricks do duty for honestly-learned lessons. So the -school was divided into two pretty equal camps concerning -him. The boys who really studied hard were his enthusiastic -admirers, and those who studied only enough to “pull through,” -as they expressed it, were very much the reverse. But when it -came to a question of “fun,” things were sometimes a little -mixed, and it seemed, in this particular case, as if some of the -boys had thoughtlessly gone over to the enemy, and then been -somewhat dismayed when they saw where they were being led.</p> - -<p>Johnny was very much troubled by what he had heard, and -the more he thought of it the less he liked it. A pack of cannon-crackers, -flung at random through a window, and flung all -the harder by reason of the flinger’s haste to put himself out of -sight, might do untold mischief. Beside the possibility that<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_65"></a>[65]</span> -they would start a fire in the room, there was another even -worse one—they might explode dangerously near the face of -the sleeping victim.</p> - -<p>No, the thing must be stopped; but how to stop it? He -thought of asking the boys, point-blank, what they were whispering -about, but, even should any of them give him a truthful -answer, they would probably suspect that somebody had suggested -the question to him, and then, of course, remember -Jamie’s presence in the tree. He thought of giving Mr. Foster -a confidential warning, but, if it took effect, it would be open to -the same objection, and he did not like to think of the life Jamie -would lead for the next few months were he even suspected of -being the informer.</p> - -<p>Johnny’s face wore so puzzled and hopeless an expression, that -evening after he had learned his lessons, that his father said, -kindly,—</p> - -<p>“There’s nothing so desperate that it can’t be helped somehow, -my boy; what’s the special desperation this evening? -Grief at the prospect of a temporary separation from your -beloved studies?”</p> - -<p>Johnny laughed a little at that.</p> - -<p>“Oh, no, papa!” he said. “I like one or two of them well -enough, but I think I can stand it without them for a while. I -wish I could tell you all about what’s the matter, but I haven’t -any right to. I will ask you a question, though. Can you -think of any kind of game, or spree, or anything that would -make the fellows at school take such an early start on the -Fourth that they wouldn’t have time for anything else first?”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_66"></a>[66]</span></p> - -<p>Mr. Leslie had not in the least forgotten how he had felt and -acted when he was a boy, and he also remembered various things -which Johnny had said from time to time about the way in -which Mr. Foster was regarded by the boys, so he had no great -difficulty in guessing that some mischief was on foot which -Johnny was anxious to forestall, but could not hinder by attacking -the enemy on high moral grounds.</p> - -<p>“I should not be much of an editor if I had not enough -invention and to spare for such an emergency as that,” said Mr. -Leslie, smiling; “How many fellows are there, altogether?”</p> - -<p>Johnny thought a minute, and then said,—</p> - -<p>“Only thirty, papa, since the mumps broke loose—we had -over forty before that.”</p> - -<p>“I’ll call around to-morrow, just before the exercises are -over,” said Mr. Leslie, “and ask permission to address the meeting. -By a curious coincidence, a plan for jollifying the Fourth -was seething in my brain before you spoke, and I think a trifling -alteration will make it fit the case to a nicety.”</p> - -<p>Johnny fell upon his father’s neck with smothering affection, -and went to bed with a light and easy heart; if “papa” undertook -the business, all would go right.</p> - -<p>“And he didn’t ask me a single question, except about how -many of us there were!” said Johnny to himself, proudly, -“What a first-class boy he must have been himself!”</p> - -<p>Mr. Leslie was on very good terms with the principal of -Johnny’s school, and had no difficulty in obtaining leave to -“address the meeting.” His address was an invitation to attend -an all-day picnic, on the Fourth of July, and included teachers<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_67"></a>[67]</span> -as well as scholars. Two hay-wagons, half filled with hay, were -to be the vehicles, and a brass band was to be in attendance. -The refreshments, Mr. Leslie -stated, would be simple, but -abundant, nobody need feel -called upon to bring anything, -but anybody who -chose to bring fruit, and -could bring it from home, -would have the thanks of -the community.</p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus37.jpg" width="200" height="175" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>“It is not usual,” concluded -Mr. Leslie, “to impose -conditions in giving an invitation, but I must ask a promise -from all of you, as we are to start at seven, sharp, on our collecting -tour, not to leave your homes that morning until you are -called for. We shall have a long drive to take, and I wish to -have it over before the heat of the day begins. Will all the -boys who agree to grant me this favor raise their right hands?”</p> - -<p>Most of the right hands flew up as if their owners had nothing -to do with it; there was a very short pause, and then the -remainder followed. Johnny drew a long breath of intense -relief. He knew that, although some of the boys were anything -but strictly truthful, they would consider it “a little too mean” -to break their pledge to their entertainer, and besides, Mr. Leslie -had said, emphatically, that there would be no hunting for -absentees, but simply a call at each door.</p> - -<p>That picnic was unanimously pronounced the most brilliant of<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_68"></a>[68]</span> -this, or of any, season. Mr. Leslie was voted “as good as forty -boys,” and the woods rang again with laughter and joyous -shouting. But when a long tin horn had given the signal which -had been agreed upon, and the boys were gathered together for -the return, Mr. Leslie mounted a convenient stump.</p> - -<p>“Boys!” he said, as the noisy throng grew silent to listen, -“No Fourth of July celebration is complete without a speech, so -I feel called upon to make a short one. How does the Declaration -of Independence begin?”</p> - -<p>“‘All men are born free and equal, and endowed with certain -inalienable rights!’” shouted at least half the party.</p> - -<p>“And what does ‘inalienable’ mean?” pursued the orator.</p> - -<p>Silence. And then somebody said doubtfully, “Something -you can’t lose or give away?”</p> - -<p>“Exactly,” said Mr. Leslie. “So, as we travel through life, -we are to bear in mind this fact, that no matter how great, or -wise, or rich, or powerful, or poor, or oppressed, or injured we -may be, we are bound to respect the ‘inalienable rights’ of other -people, and that we shall never gain anything really worth gaining, -or that will bring a blessing with it, by disregarding those -rights.</p> - -<p>“I will not undertake to tell you what they are; I think we -can generally tell nearly enough for all practical purposes by -two ways; remembering what we consider our own rights, -and imagining what we should consider our rights, were -we in the places of the people with whom we are dealing. We -have had a happy day, I think; I know I have——”</p> - -<p>“So have we!” in a vast shout from the audience——</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_69"></a>[69]</span></p> - -<p>“——and I have been pleased to see what good Republicans -you all may be, if you choose. I see you are pleased with my -pleasure, and I want to ask you all to remember, as each day -closes, leaving its record of good or evil, that the longest life -must close some time, and that nothing will be of much value to -us then, but the Master’s ‘Well done, good and faithful -servant.’ Thank you for listening to me so patiently. This -day will be a pleasant memory, I hope, for all of us.”</p> - -<p>“Three cheers for Mr. Leslie!” shouted the “fellow” who -had not any grandfather, and the amount of noise that followed -was truly astonishing.</p> - -<p>But a good many people’s ideas of what it is to be manly -underwent a gradual change from that evening.</p> - -<p>“If Johnny’s father thinks so—why, there’s nothing mean -about Johnny’s father! I should hope we all knew that!”</p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_70"></a>[70]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_VI">CHAPTER VI.<br /> -<span class="smaller">LEANING.</span></h2> - -</div> - -<div> -<img class="dropcap" src="images/dropcap-ch6.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p class="dropcap">A pair of shiny steel skates had been -among Johnny’s Christmas presents, and -had very nearly eclipsed all the rest, -although he had many pretty and useful -things beside.</p> - -<p>He had never yet learned to skate, -for the only good skating-pond was at -some little distance from his home, and he had no big brother to -take him in hand, and see that he had only the number of falls -which must be accepted by nearly every one who ventures on -skates for the first time.</p> - -<p>But the winter following the famous picnic of which I have -just told you, Pep Warren’s almost grown-up brother Robert -was at home, because he had strained his eyes, and been -forbidden to study for a month or two; but, as he sensibly observed, -he didn’t skate on his eyes, and, being a big, jolly, good-natured -fellow, he gave Pep a pair of skates exactly like -Johnny’s, and offered to teach both the little boys to skate.</p> - -<p>He had made this offer privately to Johnny’s mother and -father before Christmas, for he had heard Johnny bewailing himself, -and saying he didn’t believe he ever should learn to skate -till he was as old as papa, and then he wouldn’t wish to!</p> - -<p>Robert said nothing at the time, but made his kind offer in<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_71"></a>[71]</span> -season for Kriss Kringle to learn that nothing he could bring -Johnny Leslie would so delight his heart as a pair of steel skates -would.</p> - -<p>Johnny came home from his trial trip on the new skates with -his transports a little moderated. He was “not conquered, but -exhausted with conquering,” and quite ready to go to bed early -that night, and to submit to a thorough rubbing with arnica -first. His head ached a little. Some of the numerous and hitherto -unknown stars which he had seen still danced before his -eyes, and he felt as if he had at least half-a-dozen each of elbows -and knees.</p> - -<div class="figleft" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus38.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>“You see, mamma,” he said, confidentially, as his mother’s -soft, warm hand, wet with comforting arnica, passed tenderly -over the black and blue places, -“I looked at the other fellows, -and it seemed to me it was just as -easy as rolling off a log. Rob was -cutting his name and figures of -eight and all sorts of things while -Pep and I were putting on our -skates, and I thought I had nothing -to do but sail in—begin, I -mean, and it would sort of come naturally, like walking!</p> - -<p>“I think Pep must have been born sensible—he hardly ever -wants to do foolish things, the way I do, and, when Rob held -out his hand, Pep just took it, and went very slowly at first, exactly -as Rob told him, and, if you’ll believe it, he could really -stand alone, and even strike out a little, before we came home!</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_72"></a>[72]</span></p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus39.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>“But I started out alone to meet Rob, and, first thing I -knew, my feet went up in the air, as if they had balloons on, and -down I came, whack! right on -the back of my head! I tell you, -I saw Roman candles and rockets, -but Rob helped me up, and only -laughed a little, though I must -have looked dreadfully funny, and -then he took my hand, and told -me how to work my feet, and I -got along splendidly, till I felt -sure my first flop was only an -accident, and that I could go alone well enough. So I let go of -Rob’s hand, and kept up about two minutes, and was just crowing -to myself when everything seemed to give way at once, and -the ice flew up and hit all my knees and elbows, and there I was -in a heap, with my skates locked together as if they were a padlock. -Rob sorted me out, and tried not to laugh, till I told him to -go ahead, and then he just roared! He said if I’d only been -lighted, I’d have made such a gorgeous pin-wheel!</p> - -<p>“Perhaps you’ll think I’d had enough—I thought I had -then myself, but just before we started for home I believed I -really had got the hang of it this time, so I let go again. I -struck out all right, and went ahead for two or three yards, and -Rob and Pep had just begun to clap their hands and hurrah when -before I knew what had happened I was sure I felt my backbone -coming out of the top of my head, and there I was again, sitting -down as flat as a pancake, and feeling a good deal flatter! I<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_73"></a>[73]</span> -didn’t try any more after that, but just took off my skates and -came home.”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Leslie could not help smiling at this graphic account of -Johnny’s first attempt at skating, but when she tucked him up -and gave him his last kiss, she said,—</p> - -<p>“Johnny, do you know of what your adventures to-day have -made me think? A verse in the Bible—‘Let him that thinketh -he standeth take heed lest he fall.’ Nearly all our falls come -from being very sure we can stand, and from refusing the offered -help.”</p> - -<p>“Pep didn’t fall once,” said Johnny, thoughtfully, “though -it was his first skate, too, and he’s younger than I am. Yes, -I see what you mean, mamma, and I hope I’ll remember it -at the right time—but I’m so apt not to remember till -afterward!”</p> - -<p>“That is why we are taught to ask that God’s grace ‘may -always prevent’—that is, go before to smooth the way—‘and -follow us,’” replied his mother, as she stooped to give him -another last kiss.</p> - -<p>Johnny applied his lesson to his next attempt at skating, and -came home triumphant, saying,—</p> - -<p>“We didn’t fall once, mamma, either of us, and Rob let us -go a little way alone, but he skated backward, just in front of -us, and caught us every time we staggered much.”</p> - -<p>But in two weeks, during which time the skating remained -good, Rob’s pupils ventured fearlessly all about the pond, without -a helping hand, and had even begun to try to cut letters and -figures—though not, it must be admitted, with any great<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_74"></a>[74]</span> -amount of success. Mrs. Leslie declared that she must see some -of the wonderful performances of which she heard so much, so -one bright afternoon, when the mildness of the air threatened to -spoil their fun before long, she wrapped Tiny and Polly warmly -up, hired Mr. Chipman’s safest horse and best wagon, and drove -in state to the pond.</p> - -<p>The boys were delighted, and did their best, but of course, in -his eagerness to excel himself, Johnny managed to fall once or -twice, and Rob was obliged to testify that this was now quite -unusual.</p> - -<p>Then they begged for Polly—Tiny had been allowed to leave -the wagon when it first arrived, and was successfully and joyfully -sliding.</p> - -<p>“Oh, do let us have Polly, if it’s just for five minutes, -mamma!” said Johnny, eagerly. “We’ll take off our skates -and give her a slide. It’s first-rate sliding, here by the bank, -and it’s quite safe.”</p> - -<p>So Miss Polly, chuckling with delight, was lifted from the -wagon, while Johnny and Pep pulled off their skates, but she -was a little frightened when she felt the slippery ice under her -feet, and “hung down like a rag doll,” as Johnny said, instead -of putting herself in sliding position.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_75"></a>[75]</span></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;" id="fp2"> -<img src="images/fp2.jpg" width="500" height="700" alt="" /> -<p class="caption">THE SKATING LESSON.</p> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_76"></a>[76]</span></p> - -<p>“Stand up straight, Polly, and put your feet down flat, <i>so</i>,” -said Johnny, as Polly slid helplessly along on the backs of her -heels, resting all her little weight confidingly upon the boys. -And, after two or three earnest explanations from Johnny and -Pep, she suddenly seemed to understand; she stiffened up, -grasped a hand on each side, and went off in such style that the<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_77"></a>[77]</span> -boys had almost to run to keep up with her, and she obeyed her -mother’s call very unwillingly.</p> - -<p>“Wasn’t it fun to see her little face, though!” said Johnny, -as he and Pep walked home, having declined the proffered drive -for the sake of a little more skating. “I think she thought -something had made her feet slippery, all of a sudden—she’d -never been on ice before.”</p> - -<p>The thaw came very soon after this, as thaws will come, even -when people have new steel skates, but happily, there are always -tops and marbles, and, as -some wise person has remarked, -“When one door -shuts, another opens.”</p> - -<div class="figleft" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus40.jpg" width="200" height="150" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>Johnny did not play -marbles “for keeps”; his -father had explained to him -that taking anything without -giving a fair return for -it is dishonesty, and as he -quite understood this, he had no desire to “win” marbles -from boys who could not shoot so well as he could, but he -enjoyed playing fully as much as anybody did, and found -the game exciting enough when played merely for the hope of -victory.</p> - -<p>It was in the midst of a very even game that the school bell -rang one morning. Johnny and one other boy were the champions; -the rest had “gone out.” They lingered for one more -shot—two more—then just a third to finish the game, and<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_78"></a>[78]</span> -then, as they hurried into the schoolroom, they found that the -roll had been called, and they were marked late.</p> - -<p>Johnny had intended to take one more look at his history -lesson, but there was no time. He was sure of it all, except two -or three dates, and of course, one of those dates came to him—or -rather, didn’t come; it was the question that came. The next -boy gave the answer, and Johnny’s history lesson for the first -time that term, was marked “Imperfect.”</p> - -<p>This vexed him so, that he gave only a small half of his mind -to his mental arithmetic, and he lost his place in the class,—lost -it to a boy who was almost certain to keep it, too.</p> - -<p>Thinking of this misfortune, he dropped a penful of ink on -his spotless new copy-book, and, although he promptly licked it -off, an ugly smear remained, and the writing teacher reproved him -for untidiness. So he was very glad when two o’clock struck, -and he could go home and tell his mournful story, for he had an -uncomfortable feeling, under the injured one, that the real, -responsible cause of his misfortunes was one Johnny Leslie.</p> - -<p>When his mother had heard it all with much sympathy, she -paused a moment, and then repeated these words,—</p> - -<p>“‘That they who do lean only upon the hope of Thy -Heavenly grace, may evermore be defended by Thy mighty -power.’”</p> - -<p>A sudden light came into Johnny’s face, and he exclaimed,—</p> - -<p>“That was it, mamma dear! I wasn’t leaning on it at all, -and of course, I went down! I know all about it now. I didn’t -get up when you called me the first time, and I said my prayers -in a hurry, just as if they were the multiplication table, and I<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_79"></a>[79]</span> -didn’t wait to read the verse in my little book—I meant to do -it after breakfast, but the marbles rattled in my pocket, and I -forgot all about it, I was in such a hurry to have a game before -school. And I wouldn’t stop to think, when the bell rang, -except a sort of make-believe think that a minute more would -not make me too late to answer to my name, and so I lost the -chance to go over those dates. And the question I missed in -mental arithmetic was a mean little easy thing, if I’d had my -wits about me, but I was worrying about the history, and I -made that dreadful blot because I was thinking of both, and did -not look, and dug my pen down to the bottom of the inkstand. -It’s just like ‘The House that Jack built.’”</p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 125px;"> -<img src="images/illus41.jpg" width="125" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>“Yes,” said his mother, “I don’t think anything, -the smallest thing, stands quite alone; -it is fast to something else that it pulls after -it, so we must keep a sharp lookout for the -first things. We can’t rub out this bad day—it -is like the blot on your copy book; you -will keep seeing the mark, even if you don’t -make another. But then, you can use the -mark, with the dear Saviour’s help, to keep -you from making another. To-morrow will be another day. -You know Tiny and you like Tennyson’s ‘Bugle Song’ so much, -here is something else he said,—</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"> -<div class="poetry"> - <div class="stanza"> - <div class="verse indent0">‘Men may rise on stepping-stones</div> - <div class="verse indent0">Of their dead selves, to higher things.’</div> - </div> -</div> -</div> - -<p class="noindent">So to-morrow you must stand on this thoughtless, careless -Johnny, who forgets what he ought to remember, and be the<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_80"></a>[80]</span> -Johnny you <i>can</i> be, if you ‘lean only on the hope’ of that -Heavenly grace which God gives to His faithful children.”</p> - -<p>It was an humble, but bright and hopeful Johnny who sprang -up at the first call the next morning, and started for school, -with fresh courage and resolution.</p> - -<p>Try not to be defeated, little soldier, but, if defeats come, do -you too try to make them stepping-stones to victory.</p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_81"></a>[81]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_VII">CHAPTER VII.<br /> -<span class="smaller">THE EXTRA HORSE.</span></h2> - -</div> - -<div> -<img class="dropcap" src="images/dropcap-ch7.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p class="dropcap">Johnny did not have a great deal of time -for thinking. It is difficult to think -when one is running, or jumping, or hammering, -or shouting, and still more difficult -when one is asleep! He often -intended to “take a think” about something -that bothered him, after he was in -bed, and before he went to sleep, but somehow, no matter how -wide awake he supposed he was before he began thinking, he -always found, before he had finished, that it was next morning, -and time to get up.</p> - -<p>But he actually walked all the way home from school, one -day, without shouting once at anybody; he came and sat down -in the sewing-room, after he had put his books away, and was -so quiet for five minutes that his mother was just going to ask -him if his head ached, when he suddenly asked her,—</p> - -<p>“Mamma, would you object to my keeping a peanut-stand—out -of school hours, you know, I mean?”</p> - -<p>“Not at all,” replied Mrs. Leslie, “if you were obliged to -earn your living at once, and that were the only way in which -you could possibly do it. But papa and I are both anxious that -you should earn your living in a way which will help as many<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_82"></a>[82]</span> -people as possible to earn theirs, and if you were to set up a peanut-stand -now, while you are trying to learn a better way, I am -afraid it would hinder our plans for you.”</p> - -<p>Johnny’s eyes had sparkled when his mother began with -“Not at all,” and now he looked a good deal disappointed.</p> - -<p>“Yes, mamma,” he said, meekly, “I see that’s your side of -it, but may I just tell you my side?”</p> - -<p>“Of course you may!” said Mrs. Leslie, smiling, and stopping -her sewing long enough to give him a hug and kiss. “I -always like to hear your side, even if I can’t agree with it, and -I know you trust me enough to come over to my side, even -when you can’t see why.”</p> - -<p>“It would be queer if I didn’t, mamma,” he said, drawing -his stool closer, and resting his arms on her knees, “you’ve come -out right so often when I was pretty sure you wouldn’t, you -know. Now, its just this way—I know you and papa aren’t -rich, and I know I oughtn’t to ask you for any more money than -you give me now, but I do want more, dreadfully, sometimes! -F’r instance, here’s Tiny’s birthday next week, and I’ve only -twenty-five cents to buy her a birthday present with, and she -really needs a new doll; that old dud she carries about isn’t fit -to be seen, but what kind of a doll can you buy for twenty-five -cents? And then your birthday will be coming along, and then -papa’s and then Easter, and I want to give presents and send -cards to lots and lots of people, and how can I do it without any -money?”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Leslie could not help laughing.</p> - -<p>“O Johnny, Johnny!” she said, “you’re as bad as the old<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_83"></a>[83]</span> -woman who called her lazy maids on Monday morning: ‘Come -girls! Get up! It’s washing day, and to-morrow’s ironing day, -and Wednesday’s baking day—here’s half the week gone, and -you not out of bed yet!’ Dear little boy, we can’t have more -than one day at a time, and here you are borrowing trouble for -almost a whole year!”</p> - -<p>“Well, anyhow, mamma,” said Johnny, laughing in spite of -himself, and looking a little foolish, “Tiny’s birthday is, most -here, and if I might buy a quarter’s worth of peanuts, and sell -them, and then invest the money again, I do believe I’d have a -dollar before it was time to buy her present.”</p> - -<p>“And I wonder,” said his mother, “how many of your -lessons you would learn, and on how many errands you would -go for me, and how many steps you would save for papa, when -he comes home tired, and how much carpentering you would do -for Tiny and her little friends? No, darling, if you can’t quite -see what I mean, you must just trust me. You can help a great -many people, in a great many ways, without money, and it is all -beautiful practice for you, against the time when you can help -them with money too; but just now, your main business is to -see that papa and I are not disappointed in the man that, with -the dear Father’s help, we are trying to help you to grow into. -Keep your heart and your eyes open, and you’ll see plenty of -chances without the peanut-stand.”</p> - -<p>Johnny looked, and felt, a good deal disappointed, but he -was a boy of his word, so he said resolutely,—</p> - -<p>“I promised to trust you, mamma, and I will, for although -you never were a boy, papa was, and I sometimes think he’s a<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_84"></a>[84]</span> -kind of one yet; but you see I can’t help feeling pretty badly -about it. Perhaps it’s partly from sitting still so long—my legs -are all cramped up. Come out and race me just twice ’round -the house,” he added, coaxingly. “I should think <i>your</i> legs -would be as stiff as pokers, sitting sewing here the way you do, -for half a day at a time!”</p> - -<p>“They do feel a little stiff,” said Mrs. Leslie, springing up, -and dropping her sewing into the never-empty basket, “but for -all that, I think I can beat you yet, Mr. Johnny.”</p> - -<p>She took off her apron and tucked up her skirt a little, and -Johnny made a line on the gravel-walk with a stick.</p> - -<p>“Now, mamma, are you ready? One, two, three, off!” and -away they skimmed, down the walk, across the grassplot; into -the walk again, over the line, around once more, and then—</p> - -<p>“There!” said Mrs. Leslie, triumphantly, “you’re beaten -again, Johnny Leslie!”</p> - -<p>“I don’t care,” said Johnny, panting, and very red in the -face, “you’re only a foot ahead this time, mamma, and at that -rate, I’ll be two feet ahead, next time.”</p> - -<p>The dinner-bell rang while Mrs. Leslie was smoothing her -tumbled hair and straightening her dress.</p> - -<p>“I have an errand that will take me almost to the park this -afternoon, Johnny,” she said, at dinner, “Tiny is going with -me, and if you’d like to go, I will call for you at three, and ask -to have you excused from the writing hour, and then we can -have a whole hour in the park before we need come home to -supper. Shall I?”</p> - -<p>This was an extremely pleasing arrangement, and when the<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_85"></a>[85]</span> -time arrived, a happy party took seats in the horse car, for the -park was more than two miles from Mr. Leslie’s house, and the -last part of the way was decidedly an “up-grade.”</p> - -<p>“Oh mamma!” exclaimed Tiny, “how will these two poor -horses pull such a car full of people up that steep hill? It’s too -much for them! Suppose we get out and walk?”</p> - -<p>Tiny was always on the watch about the comfort of horses -and dogs and cats.</p> - -<p>Just then the car stopped, and a third horse, that had been -standing patiently under a tree near the sidewalk, was fastened -to the pole in front of the other -two, and, with his help, the car -went easily up the slope.</p> - -<div class="figleft" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus42.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>“That’s nice,” said Tiny, looking -greatly relieved, “I didn’t -remember that they kept an -extra horse here, mamma; how -good it must make him feel, -when the poor tired horses stop -and say, ‘That hill’s a great deal -too steep for us to drag this great heavy car up it’; and then -he says, ‘Hold on, I’m coming. You can do it easily, with me -to help you!’”</p> - -<p>“But, then,” said Mrs. Leslie, “just think how much of his -time he spends standing under the tree, doing nothing but -wait.”</p> - -<p>“Why, mamma,” put in Johnny, “you know he knows the -car will be along presently, and while he’s waiting he’s resting<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_86"></a>[86]</span> -from the last trip, and getting up his muscle for the next one, -so it isn’t exactly doing nothing, even when he’s standing still.”</p> - -<p>“And you don’t imagine that it makes him feel sorry that -he hasn’t a special car of his own to pull, but must just help -other horses pull theirs?” pursued Mrs. Leslie.</p> - -<p>“I should think he’d be pretty foolish if he felt that way,” -said Johnny, confidently; “he’s doing something just as good, -in fact, I think perhaps it’s better, for he must make the two -regular horses feel good every time they come ’round there. Oh -mamma, you’re laughing! You’ve made me catch myself the -worst ki—I mean dreadfully! I see just what you mean; you -might as well have said it; you think that till I am old enough -to have a car of my own, I ought to be an extra horse!”</p> - -<p>“But how could Johnny be a horse, mamma?” asked Tiny, -deeply puzzled.</p> - -<p>They were out of the car by this time, and Tiny amiably -joined in the laugh which greeted this question.</p> - -<p>“I’ll explain how he could when we sit down by the lake, -darling,” said her mother, “You and Johnny walk on slowly, -now, while I stop here for a few minutes and leave my work—the -parcel, Johnny, please!”</p> - -<p>For Johnny was marching off with the parcel under one arm, -and Tiny under the other.</p> - -<p>When they were comfortably seated on the shady green bank -by the lake, Mrs. Leslie explained to Tiny that she did not really -expect Johnny to turn into a horse, but that everybody who is -looking out for chances to help other people over their hard -places will be sure to find plenty to do.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_87"></a>[87]</span></p> - -<p>“The world has a great many tired people in it,” said Mrs. -Leslie, “and a great many sick and sorrowful and discouraged -and disappointed people, and what a beautiful thought it is that -the very smallest and weakest of us may give help, and comfort, -and encouragement, every day of our lives, if we only will.”</p> - -<p>“You do, mamma,” said Johnny, softly, stealing his hand -into his mother’s as he spoke, “and so does papa, but I’m afraid -I’ve been too busy with my own fun and things to try to help -the poor tired ones pull, but I truly mean to turn over a new -leaf. I shall put it in my prayers,” he added, reverently, and—“when, -do you think, is a good time for me to think, mamma? -The time never seems to come.”</p> - -<p>“While you are dressing in the morning and undressing at -night would be very good times,” said his mother, “just before -you say your prayers, you know. You can think over in the -morning what you need most for that day, and at night what -you have done and left undone. I know your dressing and -undressing don’t take long,” she added, smiling, “but one can -do a good deal of thinking in a few minutes, if one gives the -whole of one’s mind to it.”</p> - -<p>The red sun, peeping under the tree beneath which they were -sitting, reminded Mrs. Leslie to look at her watch. It was high -time to start for home, and Tiny and Johnny, as the car went -down the steep hill, looked out with much affectionate interest -for the “extra horse,” and softly called good bye to him, as he -stood quietly under the tree, panting a little from his last pull, -and patiently waiting for the next.</p> - -<p>I wonder how many of the dear little men and women who<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_88"></a>[88]</span> -will read this are training for their own life race by watching for -chances to help the hard-pressed runners who have started. -Here is a motto for all of you; the motto which a noble and -earnest man has already given to many people—“Look up, not -down; look out, and not in; look forward, not back; and lend -a helping hand.”</p> - -<p>And if you want his authority for this beautiful motto, it is -easily found, for you will all know where to look for these -words,—</p> - -<p>“Bear ye one another’s burdens, and so fulfil the law of -Christ.”</p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_89"></a>[89]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_VIII">CHAPTER VIII.<br /> -<span class="smaller">“LONG PATIENCE.”</span></h2> - -</div> - -<div> -<img class="dropcap" src="images/dropcap-ch8.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p class="dropcap">Tiny and Johnny were planting their gardens, -and Jim Brady was helping them. -Johnny had happened to mention to Jim -that he liked a garden very well, after the -things were up, but that he did hate digging; -and Jim, after thinking hard for a -minute, had said,——</p> - -<p>“See here! If you’ll teach me some of the things you’re -learning at school, of evenings, after my day’s work is done, I’ll -dig your garden for you, and do it better than you can, for I’m -a good sight stronger than you are, and I’ll help you keep it -clean all summer, too. Is it a bargain?”</p> - -<p>Johnny hesitated. He did not like Jim’s tone. It was quite -true that Jim was the stronger of the two, but Johnny thought -it showed bad taste to mention it in that defiant sort of manner. -And he did not see any particular fun in teaching Jim, especially -on summer evenings. But it would be a great thing to have -such good help with his garden as he knew Jim would give, so -he swallowed his pride, and said, as graciously as he could,—</p> - -<p>“All right. You come up after tea this evening, and we’ll -begin. We have tea at six, and I’ll hurry through mine, and -then, when it’s too dark to work any more, we can come into -the playroom and have the lesson.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_90"></a>[90]</span></p> - -<p>You will remember that it was this Jim Brady who had -given Johnny his first, and—there is reason to believe—his last -cigar, and so led him, though quite unintentionally, into his first -act of deceit to his mother. And the remembrance of this act -was a very sorrowful one, for although Johnny, as you know, -had both confessed and repented, and had been freely forgiven, -the shameful act remained, never to be undone. Do you ever -think of that, when you are tempted to do some mean, wicked -thing?</p> - -<p>Mrs. Leslie had called on Jim, at his bootblacking stand, -soon after this occurrence, and had a long talk with him, and -the next time the boys met, Jim had said, severely,—</p> - -<p>“If <i>I</i> had an Angel for a mother, Johnny Leslie, I’d be shot -before I’d behave anyhow but on the square to her, and now I’ll -put you on your honor—if you find you’re learning anything -she wouldn’t like, from me, you’ve only to let me know, and I’ll -cut you dead!”</p> - -<p>This was a rather mixed statement, but Johnny understood -it, and felt himself blushing. It seemed to him that Jim had -somehow got things backward, but his recent downfall had -humbled him, in more ways than one, so instead of replying, as -he was greatly tempted to, that if anybody did any cutting, he -would be the person to do it, he merely said, rather shortly,—</p> - -<p>“Very well, I guess I know a little more about my mother -than you do, so you attend to your mother-minding, and I’ll -attend to mine!”</p> - -<p>“Glad to hear it,” said Jim, easily, “but <i>my</i> mother’s what -the dictionary-talkers call a traydition; I never saw her, so I’d<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_91"></a>[91]</span> -find it a little impossible to mind her, don’t you see? But I’ll -tell you one thing—if your mother ever cares enough about me -to give me a little extra minding to do for her, I’ll see what I’m -equal to in that line, perhaps!”</p> - -<p>Johnny had reported this speech to Mrs. Leslie, and she had -begun to work on the suggestion. Jim had already set his mark -to a promise not to smoke until he was twenty-one, and, although -he did not know it, Mrs. Leslie was trying to find him a situation -where he would have a certain, if small, salary, and be less -exposed to temptation than he now was. She was very glad -when she heard of the bargain which Johnny had made, and she -presented the new scholar with a -slate and spelling book, at once. -She also gave the schoolmaster a -little advice.</p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus43.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>“You must remember, Johnny,” -she said, “that Jim has had no -chance to learn anything, compared -with your chances, and you -mustn’t look superior, whatever you -do. Whenever you feel very -grand, just imagine how it would be if papa should write to you -in Greek, and talk to you in French and Latin, and then call you -a little stupid because you could not understand him.”</p> - -<p>Tiny looked rather mournful when she heard of the new -arrangement, but she brightened up, presently.</p> - -<p>“Is he a very big boy indeed, Johnny?” she asked.</p> - -<p>“Why, no,” said Johnny, considering, “at least, he’s not<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_92"></a>[92]</span> -much bigger than I am, Tiny. He’s only about half a head -taller, but he’s a good deal thicker.”</p> - -<p>“What did you say you’d teach him?” pursued Tiny.</p> - -<p>“Oh, all the things I’m learning at school, I s’pose!” replied -Johnny, “we didn’t settle about that, exactly, for I don’t know -yet how much he knows—he can’t write, but maybe he can read -a little—I hope so, for it must be awfully stupid work to teach -people their letters. But why do you want to know, Tiny?”</p> - -<p>“I have a reason,” said Tiny, nodding her head wisely. “You -needn’t think you know all of everything, Johnny Leslie!”</p> - -<p>“I never said I did!” retorted Johnny, warmly; then he -looked at Tiny, and began to laugh, she was so little, and was -trying so hard to look wise and elderly.</p> - -<p>“You may laugh if you like,” she said, serenely, “<i>I</i> don’t mind. -But if you don’t know what you are going to teach him, perhaps -you know what you’re not. Are you going to teach him to sing?”</p> - -<p>Johnny accepted Tiny’s gracious permission, and laughed a -good deal, but at last he answered,—</p> - -<p>“No, Tiny, I’m not going to teach him to sing. I am quite -sure about that. Mamma says I can sing straight ahead first -rate, but she never knew me to turn a tune yet. I wish I could -sing the way you do,” he added, regretfully, “I’m so full of sing -sometimes that I don’t know what to do, but I can’t make it -come out.”</p> - -<p>They were sitting on the back porch, pasting their scrap-books, -and Mrs. Leslie was sewing at the window.</p> - -<p>“Never mind, Johnny,” she said, consolingly, “you’ll not ‘die -with all your music in you’ while you do so much shouting.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_93"></a>[93]</span></p> - -<p>“Very well, then,” said Tiny, with a look of great satisfaction, -“when Jim comes, I shall tell him that if he will dig my garden -for me, I will teach him to sing.”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Leslie expected to hear Johnny first laugh, and then try -to dissuade Tiny from carrying out her plan, but to her surprise, -he did neither. He said,—</p> - -<p>“I shouldn’t wonder if he’d do it, Tiny; he’s all the time -whistling, and he whistles just like a blackbird, so very likely -he’ll be glad to learn to sing, too.”</p> - -<p>When Jim came that evening, Tiny and Johnny were both -in the garden, and as Tiny had not yet met Jim, Johnny introduced -them thus,—</p> - -<p>“Tiny, this is Jim. Jim, this is my sister Tiny, and she -wants to be in our bargain, too. Go ahead, Tiny.”</p> - -<p>And so encouraged, Tiny went ahead.</p> - -<p>“I have a garden, too,” she said, “but Johnny knows more -of everything than I do, except singing, and I thought perhaps -you’d like to learn to sing, and if you would, I’ll teach you that, -and then, if you think it is worth it, will you just do the hard -digging for me? I can do the rest myself, watching you and -Johnny.”</p> - -<p>A very gentle look came over Jim’s bold face, as he -answered,—</p> - -<p>“If you’ll teach me how to sing, Miss Tiny, it will be worth -as much to me as all Johnny can teach me of other things, and -I’ll be proud and happy to take charge of your garden.”</p> - -<p>“Oh, thank you very much!” said Tiny, warmly. “What -a nice, kind boy you are! Do you mind if I watch you while -you dig?”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_94"></a>[94]</span></p> - -<p>“Not a bit!” said Jim, cheerfully, “I’m not bashful. But -you’d better sit down.”</p> - -<p>“Wait a minute, and I’ll bring you your camp-chair, Tiny,” -said Johnny, and he raced to the porch for Tiny’s small chair, -while Jim pulled off the coat which he had put on as a mark of -respect to Mrs. Leslie, whom he hoped to see before the evening -was over, and went valiantly to work with the spade.</p> - -<p>“What nice big spadefuls you make!” Tiny said, after -watching him a while. “When I dig, it ’most all slides off -while I am picking up the spade.”</p> - -<p>“That’s because you are not quite so strong as I am,” said -Jim, smiling, and turning over an extra large spadeful by way of -proving his statement.</p> - -<p>The two little gardens were thoroughly dug by the time that -it was too dark to work any more, and Johnny had hoed and -raked Tiny’s smooth, while Jim was digging his. Then they -went into the playroom, and Mrs. Leslie brought them a lamp -to light up the lesson.</p> - -<div class="figleft" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus44.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>“We will have a little singing -first,” she said, opening the organ. -“Tiny and I will sing the evening -hymn, and you must listen, Jim, and -try to catch the tune.”</p> - -<p>Jim listened, and by the time -they reached the Doxology, he had -joined them, and went through the -tune without a mistake, seeming -even to know the words. His voice was a very sweet tenor, -and Tiny exclaimed delightedly,—</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_95"></a>[95]</span></p> - -<p>“It will be just as easy as anything to teach him to sing, -mamma!”</p> - -<p>“I’d have come in sooner,” said Jim, looking very much -pleased, “but that last verse was the only one I knew. I went -to Sunday-school a few times when I was a little boy, and that -verse came back to me as soon as you began to sing it.”</p> - -<p>Then Johnny and his pupil sat down by the table, and Mrs. -Leslie took Tiny’s hand and went to the parlor, thinking that -the two boys would manage their undertaking better without an -audience.</p> - -<p>Johnny felt very much embarrassed, but he plunged in boldly, -as the best way of overcoming his feelings.</p> - -<p>“I’ll do you the way they did me, the first day I went to -school,” he began, and taking his First Reader, he opened it, and -handed it to Jim, saying,—</p> - -<p>“Just read a little, will you?”</p> - -<p>Jim burst out laughing.</p> - -<p>“It’s heathen Greek to me,” he said. “I don’t know more -than half the letters. Why, if I’d known how to read, I could -have picked up the rest somehow, and that’s why I asked you -to teach me.”</p> - -<p>Johnny was about to whistle, but he suddenly recollected his -mother’s warning.</p> - -<p>“All right,” he said, composedly; “we’ll begin with the -letters, and I’ll teach you the way mamma teaches Tiny—it’s -easier than the way they do in school. Wait a minute, and I’ll -borrow her card, the letters are so much larger than they are -in the spelling-book.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_96"></a>[96]</span></p> - -<p>He came back with a large card, covered with letters in -bright colors, and pointing to A, asked,</p> - -<p>“Now, what does that look like to you?”</p> - -<p>“It looks something like the tents those soldiers put up when -they camped near here,” said Jim, after looking at it for a -moment.</p> - -<p>“Very well; that’s A. Now, when you say ‘<i>A</i> tent,’ there -you have it, all right.”</p> - -<p>“That’s easy enough to remember,” said Jim, “I thought it -would be harder.”</p> - -<p>“I’ll tell you what this second fellow looks like, to me,” -said Johnny, delighted with Jim’s quickness, “it always -makes me think of a bumble-bee, and -its name’s B.”</p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus45.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>“That’s queer,” answered Jim, “it -does look like a big, fat bee, sure -enough. I guess I can remember that, -too.”</p> - -<p>It was not easy to find likenesses -like these for all the letters, but when -Johnny could not think of anything in -the way of a likeness, he told Jim of something strange or funny -that the letter “stood for,” and felt quite sure, when the alphabet -had been “gone through,” that every letter was firmly impressed -upon Jim’s memory.</p> - -<p>“Do you want to begin to learn to write now, or wait till -you’ve learned to read?” inquired Johnny, when the reading-lesson -was finished.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_97"></a>[97]</span></p> - -<p>“I don’t know,” said Jim, “what’s the first thing you do -when you learn to write, anyhow?”</p> - -<p>“You make ‘strokes’ first, like that—” and Johnny made -a few rapidly on the slate—“to sort of get your hand in, and -then, when you can make them pretty well, you go on to ‘pot-hooks -and trammels’—like these”—and he illustrated on the -slate again—“and when you can make them pretty well, then -you begin to make letters.”</p> - -<p>“Well, then, I might as well begin right off,” said Jim, “I -don’t have to know how to read before I can make ‘strokes,’ -that’s plain, and if it takes so long just to get your hand in, the -sooner I start, the better!”</p> - -<p>“Yes, I think so too,” said Johnny, encouragingly, “for of -course, you needn’t know how to read, to make ‘strokes’ or -‘pot-hooks and trammels’ either, and you see you’ll be all -ready, this way, to make the letters, by the time you can read -printing—maybe before. Here, I’ll rule your slate, but I’ll ask -mamma to set you the copy. I can’t make as good strokes—or -anything else for that matter—as she can, and papa says a -copy, any kind of a copy, ought to be perfect.”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Leslie willingly set the copy, and guided Jim’s hand -over the first row. Nothing in her look or manner suggested to -Jim that her soft white fingers felt any objection to taking -hold of his grimy ones, but from that time he always asked -Johnny for soap and water, when the gardening was done, and -came to his lessons with hands as clean as vigorous scrubbing -could make them.</p> - -<p>When he had covered both sides of his new slate with<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_98"></a>[98]</span> -“strokes,” which Johnny assured him were quite as good as the -first ones he had made, they both decided that the lesson had -been long enough for that time, and parted with cordial good-nights.</p> - -<p>“I didn’t know it was so easy to teach people, mamma!” -said Johnny, exultingly, as soon as his pupil was out of hearing, -“why, it’s no trouble at all!”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Leslie smiled.</p> - -<p>“Jim seems to be a bright boy,” she said, “but you must -remember that his mind is like your garden; things must be -planted in it, and you must wait a while for them to come up. -I don’t wish to discourage you, dear, but learning is a new business -to him, as teaching is to you, and I think this would be a -good text for both of you to start with—‘Let not him that -girdeth on his harness boast himself as he that putteth it -off.’”</p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_99"></a>[99]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_IX">CHAPTER IX.<br /> -<span class="smaller">A CONTRACT.</span></h2> - -</div> - -<div> -<img class="dropcap" src="images/dropcap-ch9.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p class="dropcap">A three days’ rain which set in the morning -after Johnny’s first appearance as a -schoolmaster, put a stop to gardening, -and Jim decided for himself that he was -not entitled to any more lessons until he -had done some more work.</p> - -<p>This had not been Tiny’s and Johnny’s -idea of the contract at all; they expected Jim to help them -whenever they needed help, and intended to keep on regularly -with their teaching, unless some very special engagement should -prevent them. But, as they remembered when they came to -talk it over, they had not made this plain to Jim, and they -decided to draw up a contract, and have it ready for his signature, -or rather his “mark,” if, as Johnny said rather mournfully, -“it should ever clear up again.” They lamented very much not -having planted anything before the rain.</p> - -<p>“It would be soaking and swelling all the time,” mourned -Johnny, “and come bouncing up the minute the sun comes -out!”</p> - -<p>They tried shooting some radish seed at the beds with -Johnny’s pea-shooter, from an upstairs window, and had the -pleasure of seeing a flock of hungry sparrows make a breakfast<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_100"></a>[100]</span> -of the seed almost before it had touched the ground. Johnny -was indignant, but Tiny said tranquilly,—</p> - -<p>“I’m glad I saw that. It was in last Sunday’s lesson, you -know, Johnny,—about the fowls of the air devouring it up. -When things don’t come up in my head, now, I shall know it -was because I didn’t plant them deep enough.”</p> - -<p>It was after it had rained for two days and part of another, -that they drew up the contract, and thus it ran,—</p> - -<div class="blockquote"> - -<p>“We are going to teach James Brady all we know, that he -wants to learn, and he is to come every evening, unless we ask -him not to, which we shall not do except for something very -particular, like a birthday party, or having folks here to tea. -And he is going to help us work in our gardens, when we want -help, but he is to come all the same in the evening, whether he -has helped that day or not.</p> - -<p class="center">“Signed,</p> - -<p class="right">“<span class="smcap">Clementine and John Leslie</span></p> - -<p class="right">“James Brady.”</p> - -<p class="right">X HIS MARK</p> - -</div> - - -<p>They admired this production so much, that they made -arrangements for framing it, when Jim should have added, “his -mark.” The arrangements consisted chiefly of an old slate-frame, -which Tiny painted bright red, using up her entire cake -of vermillion to do it, and Johnny was obliged to copy the -contract in very large letters, to make it fill the frame.</p> - -<p>A day of brilliant sunshine followed the three days’ rain. -Johnny passed Jim’s stand on his way from school, reproached -Jim for his absence, told him of the contract, and secured his<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_101"></a>[101]</span> -promise to come that evening at a quarter past six, sharp. Tiny -carefully practised a little song for which she could herself play -the accompaniment, and both the children had their stock of -seeds in readiness, before tea.</p> - -<p>When Jim appeared, punctually at the appointed time, Mrs. -Leslie came out on the porch, and wished him good evening, and -she noticed with much pleasure that he had on a clean shirt, and -that a fresh patch covered the knee of his trousers, where a -gaping rent had been, four days ago. His face and hands shone -with scrubbing, and his hair with brushing, and he made the -best bow at his command, as he came up the steps.</p> - -<p>“You’ll have to come too, mamma,” said Tiny, “for we -haven’t quite made up our minds where the things are to go, and -we want you to help us.”</p> - -<p>“I’ll bring a camp-stool, and a board for your feet, mamma -dear,” chimed in Johnny, “and you can ‘sit on a cushion as -grand as a queen,’ and watch us work.”</p> - -<p>“But I haven’t given papa his second cup of tea yet,” remonstrated -Mrs. Leslie, “nor eaten my piece of cake.”</p> - -<p>“You can pour out the tea, and then ask papa to please -excuse you, and you can bring your cake with you,” said Johnny, -coaxingly, and to this Mrs. Leslie consented, although she said -something about tyrants. She came out, presently, with two -pieces of cake on a plate, and insisted upon Jim’s eating one of -them, which he did without the slightest reluctance, and then -went vigorously to work. You might have thought a large -farm was being planted, if you had heard the earnest discussion, -and the number and variety of seeds named, and dusk overtook<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_102"></a>[102]</span> -them before they were half done. It was decided that Tiny’s -lesson should be given first, as her bedtime came before Johnny’s -did. The little song was quite new to Jim, and he could not -join in it as readily as he had joined in the hymn, but Tiny -went patiently over it, again and again, until he caught the air, -and knew the words of one verse, and she did not stop until -they were singing together in perfect harmony.</p> - -<p>Then she gave him up to Johnny, and considerately left the -room. Johnny brought out the card with a flourish, saying -confidently,—</p> - -<p>“We’ll just run over the letters again, to make sure, and -then we’ll go on to the a-b-abs. Oh, here’s the contract—you -just put your mark to it there, where we’ve left a place, and -then we’ll frame it and give it to you.”</p> - -<p>Jim listened thoughtfully, while Johnny read him the -contract, but he made no motion toward affixing his mark -to it.</p> - -<p>“It don’t seem to me to be fair,” he said, “you’ll not need -much work done in those little gardens, and here you’ve promised -to teach me nearly every evening; I think I ought only to -have a lesson when I’ve done some work.”</p> - -<p>“Oh fiddlesticks!” said Johnny, impatiently, “you’ve worked -like everything already, and besides, we like to teach you; -papa says it’s the very best way to learn things, teaching them -to somebody, so you see it’s just as good for us as it is for you. -Come, put your mark there, where we left the hole for it,” and -Johnny dipped the pen in the inkstand, and handed it to his -pupil, who reluctantly made his mark in the “hole.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_103"></a>[103]</span></p> - -<p>“I’ll frame it to-morrow,” said Johnny, “Now for the letters. -What’s that?” and he pointed to V.</p> - -<p>Jim pondered a moment, then,—</p> - -<p>“That’s A,” he said, confidently.</p> - -<p>Johnny controlled himself by a violent effort, pointed out the -difference between A and V, and then “skipped” Jim through -the rest of the alphabet. To his utter consternation, Jim only -remembered about half the letters, and of some of these he was -not perfectly certain.</p> - -<p>“I didn’t think I was such a stupid,” said poor Jim, humbly, -“but I suppose that’s because I never tried to learn anything -before. I thought I knew half the letters before I began, but -the boys must have fooled me—I’m certain somebody told me -that was K,” and he pointed to R.</p> - -<p>This made Johnny laugh, and Jim’s humility gave him such -a comfortable feeling of superiority, that he took courage, and -went through the alphabet once more, with tolerable patience. -But Jim was too keen-sighted not to notice the effort which -Johnny was making, and when the lesson was at last over, he -said,—</p> - -<p>“It’s going to be more of a job than you thought it would, -Johnny; I can see that, and if you want to be off your bargain, -I’ve nothing to say.”</p> - -<p>But he looked so dull and disappointed, that Johnny’s conscience -reproached him with selfishness, and he said cheerfully,—</p> - -<p>“Oh, you mustn’t give up the ship so soon, Jim. I’ll stick to -it as long as you will, and it will get easier after you’ve once<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_104"></a>[104]</span> -learned the letters. You’d better take your spelling-book -home with you to-night, and then to-morrow you can try -to pick out the letters whenever you have a little time, you -know.”</p> - -<p>“I will do that,” said Jim, brightening, “and I’ll not forget -this on you, Johnny—you’ll see if I do!”</p> - -<p>Johnny went into the parlor, when Jim was gone, and -dropped his head on his mother’s shoulder.</p> - -<p>“O mamma!” he said, dolefully, “he’d forgotten nearly -every single letter, and I could see he hardly believed me, when -I told him that R wasn’t K!”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Leslie gently pulled Johnny down on her lap.</p> - -<p>“You must go out bright and early to-morrow morning, and -see if your seeds are up,” she said.</p> - -<p>Johnny looked at her in amazement.</p> - -<p>“Why, mamma!” he exclaimed, “they’re only just planted! -It will be several days before they show the least little nose -above ground.”</p> - -<p>“Oh!” said Mrs. Leslie, but she said nothing more, only -looking into Johnny’s eyes with a little smile in hers.</p> - -<p>He suddenly clapped his hands, exclaiming,—</p> - -<p>“I see what you mean, mamma! I’m sowing seeds in Jim’s -head, and expecting to see them come up before they’re fairly -planted! But indeed, it’s harder work than digging.”</p> - -<p>“‘Fair exchange is no robbery,’” said Mrs. Leslie, laughing -at Johnny’s mournful face. And then she said, quite seriously,—</p> - -<p>“I will give you another text, dear; one that I thought of<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_105"></a>[105]</span> -when I was watching you plant your seeds this evening. ‘The -husbandman waiteth for the precious fruit of the earth, and hath -<i>long patience</i> for it, until he receive the early -and latter rain.’ You see, the patience is -needed not only before the seeds come up, but -while the plants are blossoming, and while the -fruit is forming, and while it is ripening. It is -not being patient just for a day, or a week, or -a month, but for the whole season, for it says -‘the early and latter rain.’ Now a great -many of us can have a little—a short patience, -but it takes much more grace to have the long -patience, and this is what my little boy must strive for.”</p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 100px;"> -<img src="images/illus46.jpg" width="100" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>“I don’t think I’m naturally patient, mamma,” said Johnny, -with a sigh.</p> - -<p>“No, I don’t think you are,” replied his mother, “but Tiny -is, and her patience will be a great help to you, if you will only -let it, just as your courage and energy are a help to her, for she -is naturally timid, and a little inclined to be faint-hearted. You -have a chance now to win a great victory, and, at the same time, -you are running the risk of a great defeat; but you must not try -to have patience for the whole thing at once—ask every day -for just that day’s patience. You know when it is that we don’t -receive; it is when we ‘ask amiss.’ All our fighting for our -Great Captain will be in vain, unless we are ‘strengthened with -all might, according to His glorious power, unto all patience and -long-suffering, with joyfulness.’ We will see, next Sunday, how -many times we can find this word ‘patience’ in the Gospels and<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_106"></a>[106]</span> -Epistles; you will be surprised, I think, to find how often it is -used.”</p> - -<p>“It will be a help to remember, mamma,” said Johnny, with -a more hopeful look, “working in the garden, first. And I -shall say ‘long patience’ to myself ever so many times, before -we begin our lessons.”</p> - -<p>So instead of going to bed with the discouraged feeling which -the lesson had left, Johnny went with a vigorous determination -not to be beaten, and he added to his evening prayer a petition -for patience.</p> - -<p>“If it hadn’t been for that contract, I wouldn’t have come a -step to-night,” said Jim, as they finished planting the gardens, -the next evening, “but I thought I would try one more shot, -and then, if it’s like last night, you must just let me off, and -burn the contract up.”</p> - -<p>“Indeed I shall not!” said Johnny, stoutly, “there it is, all -framed and glazed, and here I am, and there you are, and you’ll -not get off till you know how to read, and then -you’ll not wish to!”</p> - -<div class="figleft" style="width: 125px;"> -<img src="images/illus47.jpg" width="125" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>We will not follow Johnny through all the -discouragements and encouragements which attended -his career as a teacher; but you will be -glad to hear that, with that help which is -always near, he conquered, and that by the -time he and Jim were husking the corn which -the little gardens had yielded, Jim could read -as fluently as his teacher could, and was beginning -to write a legible, if somewhat uncertain hand. He<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_107"></a>[107]</span> -had shown a real talent for music, and, having learned all that -Tiny could teach him, was joyfully and gratefully taking lessons -from Mrs. Leslie.</p> - -<p>“And just suppose my patience had turned out to be only -the short kind, Tiny!” said Johnny, as Tiny and he, with -heads close together, proudly popped the corn from their own -farms.</p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_108"></a>[108]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_X">CHAPTER X.<br /> -<span class="smaller">NEIGHBORS.</span></h2> - -</div> - -<div> -<img class="dropcap" src="images/dropcap-ch10.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p class="dropcap">The desk next to Johnny’s had been -vacant for a long time, and he did not -like this much, for he was a sociable -boy, and although of course, no great -amount of conversation was permitted -during school hours, it is something to -be able to make faces to a sympathetic -desk-mate. There was not an absolute rule against talking in -the school which Johnny attended. The teacher had said, at -the beginning of the term,—</p> - -<p>“Now, boys, I don’t forbid you to speak to each other during -school hours, if you have anything really worth saying on your -minds, and will speak so that you will not disturb your neighbors, -but all long conversations can be saved till school is out, -and I hope you will be honorable enough not to talk foolishly, -or to take advantage of this permission. If I find it necessary, -I shall resort to a rule, so you have the matter in your own -hands.”</p> - -<p>It had not been found necessary, so far, although the school -was full, excepting that one vacant seat next to Johnny’s.</p> - -<p>“It may be a coincidence, you know, Tiny,” said Johnny, -one day, when he had been lamenting his lonely lot to his sister,<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_109"></a>[109]</span> -“but I don’t know—I have a kind of a sort of an idea that it -isn’t.”</p> - -<p>“What is a coincidence, anyhow, Johnny?” inquired Tiny, -who was never above asking for information.</p> - -<p>“It’s two things happening together, accidentally, that look -as if they had been done on purpose,” explained Johnny, with -the little air of superior wisdom that he always wore when Tiny -asked him a question that he could answer. I am afraid he -sometimes hunted up one or two long words, to be worked into -his next conversation with Tiny, purely for the purpose of -explaining to her! It was so pleasant to see her large eyes -raised admiringly to his face.</p> - -<p>“But why shouldn’t it be a really and truly coincidence, -Johnny?” pursued Tiny.</p> - -<p>“Oh well, because Mr. Lennox said one day that he thought -Harry Conover and I might be shaken up together, and equally -divided, to advantage, and Harry’s the quietest boy I ever knew, -so it’s pretty plain what he meant by that. And I’ve noticed -how he does with the other boys; he finds out where their weak -spots are, and then tries to brace them up there, but while he’s -trying, he sort of keeps things out of their way that would be -likely to make them slip up, and so I s’pose that is what he is -doing to me. But it’s very stupid to be all alone, and I wish -another boy would come—then he’d have to use that desk, for -it’s the only one that’s left.”</p> - -<p>Two or three days after this talk with Tiny, Johnny rushed -in from school in a state of great excitement, exclaiming, as he -entered the room where his mother and sister were sitting,—</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_110"></a>[110]</span></p> - -<p>“The seat’s taken, mamma! And it wasn’t a coincidence, -Tiny! Mr. Lennox made a little sort of a speech to me, all by -myself, after school; he knew this boy was coming, and he saved -the seat on purpose for him, and I’m dreadfully afraid he’s a -prig! He didn’t act the least bit like a new boy, he just studied -and ciphered and wrote as if he’d been going there all his life! -And whenever I spoke to him, he just looked at me—so!” and -Johnny’s round face assumed an expression of mild and reproachful -surprise, which made Tiny laugh, and even made his mother -smile, though she shook her head at him at the same time, -saying reprovingly,—</p> - -<p>“Johnny, Johnny, you know I don’t like you to mimic -people, dear!”</p> - -<p>“I beg your pardon, mammy darling!” and Johnny poked -his rough head into his mother’s lap, “that sort of went off of -itself! But indeed, I didn’t talk much to him, and it was about -very useful things. He hadn’t any sponge, and I offered him -mine, and he was hunting everywhere but in the right place for -the Danube river, and I just put my finger on the map, and -said, ‘Here it is,’ and he didn’t so much as say ‘thank you!’ -And at recess I said, ‘Do you love cookies, Ned?’—his name is -Ned Owen—and he said, with a sort of a sniff, ‘I don’t <i>love</i> -anything to eat,’ so I thought I’d—I’d see him further before -I’d give him one of your cookies, mamma!”</p> - -<p>“Now Johnny Leslie,” said his mother, smoothing his hair -softly with her nice little cool hands, “you’ve taken a prejudice -against that poor boy, and if you don’t stop yourself, you’ll be -quarrelling with him before long! Something I read the other<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_111"></a>[111]</span> -day said that, when we find fault with people, and talk against -them, there is always envy at the bottom of our dislike. I don’t -think it is quite always so, but I do believe it very often is. -While you are undressing to-night, I want you to sort yourself -out, and put yourself just where you belong.”</p> - -<p>Johnny hung his head; he did not have to do a great deal -of sorting to find the truth of what his mother had said.</p> - -<p>There was a careful completeness about everything the new -boy had done, which, to a head-over-heels person, was truly -exasperating.</p> - -<p>And as days passed on, this feeling grew and strengthened. -There was a curious little stiffness and formality about all Ned -Owen said and did, which Johnny found very “trying,” and -which made him overlook the boy’s really pleasant side; for he -had a pleasant side, as every one has, only, unfortunately, we do -not always take as much pains to find it as we do to find the -unpleasant one.</p> - -<p>It seemed to most of the boys that Ned did not mind the fun -which was certainly “poked” at him in abundance, but Johnny -was very sure that he did. The pale, thin face would flush suddenly, -the slender hands would be clinched, either in his pockets, -or under cover of his desk. Johnny generally managed to keep -himself from joining in the fun, as it was considered by all but -the victim, but he did this more to please his mother than -because he allowed his conscience to tell him the truth.</p> - -<p>Boys are not always so funny and witty as they mean to be -and think they are. There was nothing really amusing in calling -Ned “Miss Nancy,” and asking him what he put on his<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_112"></a>[112]</span> -hands to whiten them, and yet these remarks, and others of the -same lofty character, could raise a laugh at any time.</p> - -<p>But deep under Johnny’s contempt for Ned, was the thorn of -envy. Before Ned came, Johnny had stood first in just one -thing. Twice a week the “Scholar’s Companion” class was -required to write “sentences”; that is, each boy must choose a -word out of the spelling and defining lesson, and work it into a -neatly turned sentence of not less than six, or more than ten -lines. Johnny liked this; it seemed to him like playing a game, -and he had stood at the head of the class for a long time, for it -so happened that no other boy in the class shared his feeling -about it. But now, Ned went above him nearly every other -time, and they changed places so regularly, that this too became -a standing joke among the other boys.</p> - -<p>Johnny was walking home from school one day with such -unnatural deliberation, that Jim Brady, whose stand he was -passing without seeing where he was, called out with much pretended -anxiety,—</p> - -<p>“You’re not sunstruck, or anything, are you, Johnny? I’ve -heard that when folks are sunstruck, they don’t recognize their -best friends!”</p> - -<p>Johnny laughed, but not very heartily.</p> - -<p>“I beg your pardon, Jim,” he said, “I didn’t see you, really -and truly—I was thinking.”</p> - -<p>“All right!” said Jim, cordially, “it’s hard work, thinking -is, and sort of takes a fellow’s mind up! I know how it is -myself.”</p> - -<p>While he was speaking, a little lame boy, ragged, dirty, and<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_113"></a>[113]</span> -totally unattractive-looking, shuffled up, and waited to be -noticed.</p> - -<p>“Well, Taffy,” said Jim, with a gentleness which Johnny had -only seen displayed to his mother and Tiny, before, “did you -sell them all?”</p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 100px;"> -<img src="images/illus48.jpg" width="100" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>“I did, Jimmy!” and the ugly, wizened -little face was brightened with a smile, “every -one I sold—and look here, will you?” and he -held up a silver quarter.</p> - -<p>“Well done, you!” and Jim patted him -approvingly on the back. “Now see here; -here’s two tens and a five I’ll give you for it; -you’ll give me one of the tens, to buy your -papers for you in the morning, and the fifteen -will get you a bed at Mother Rooney’s, and buy your supper and -breakfast. You’d better peg right along, for it’s quite a walk -from here. Be along bright and early, and I’ll have the papers -ready for you.”</p> - -<p>The little fellow nodded, and limped away.</p> - -<p>“Who is he, anyhow?” asked Johnny, when he was out of -hearing.</p> - -<p>“Oh, I don’t know!” and Jim looked embarrassed, for the -first time in his life, so far as Johnny’s knowledge of him went. -“He’s a little beggar whose grandmother or something died last -week, and the other people in the room kicked him out. You -see, your mother had just been reading us that piece about -neighbors—about that old fellow that picked up the one that -was robbed, and gave him a ride, and paid for him at the tavern,<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_114"></a>[114]</span> -and then she said it ought to be just the same way now—we -ought to be looking out for chances to be neighborly, and it just -happened—”</p> - -<p>Jim had grown quite red in the face, and now he stopped -abruptly.</p> - -<p>“I think that was jolly of you,” said Johnny, warmly, “how -near you did he live, before he was kicked out?”</p> - -<p>“About two miles off, I should say, if I was to survey it,” -and Jim grinned, recovering his composure as he did so.</p> - -<p>“I often wonder at you, Johnny Leslie,” he continued, “and -think maybe you came out of a penny paper story, and were -swapped off for another baby, when you were little!”</p> - -<p>“What on earth do you mean?” asked Johnny, impatiently. -He was somewhat afraid of Jim’s sharp eyes and tongue.</p> - -<p>“Oh, nothing much,” replied Jim, “it’s just my little lively -way, you know. But your mother don’t think neighbors need -to live next door to each other; you ask her if she does!”</p> - -<p>“Oh!” said Johnny, “why can’t you say what you mean -right out, Jim?”</p> - -<p>“Well, I might, possibly, I suppose,” and Jim looked thoughtful, -“but I’ve a general idea it wouldn’t always give satisfaction -all round, and I’m the last man to hurt a fellow-critter’s feelings, -as you ought to know by this time, Johnny!”</p> - -<p>“I must go home,” said Johnny, suddenly, “Goodbye, -Jim.”</p> - -<p>“Goodbye to you,” responded Jim, affably, “I’ll be along as -usual, if you’ve no previous engagement.”</p> - -<p>“All right—but look here, Jim,” and Johnny wheeled<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_115"></a>[115]</span> -abruptly round again, “why do you buy that little Taffy’s -papers for him?”</p> - -<p>“You’d better go home, Johnny—you might be late for -your tea, my dear boy!”</p> - -<p>“Now, Jim Brady, you tell me!”</p> - -<p>“Because the big boys hustle him, and he can’t fight his way -through because he’s lame. Now get out!”</p> - -<p>Johnny obeyed, but he was thinking harder than ever, now. -And a sort of refrain was running through his mind—a sentence -from the story Jim had recalled to him: “And who is my -neighbor?”</p> - -<p class="tb">“Do you know, Johnny,” said Tiny, a few days after Johnny -had met Jim, and heard about Taffy, “I don’t believe you mean -to—but you are growing rather cross. Perhaps you don’t feel -very well?”</p> - -<p>Johnny burst out laughing; Tiny’s manner, as she said this, -was so very funny. It was what her brother called her “school-marm -air.”</p> - -<p>“That’s much better!” said Tiny, nodding her head with a -satisfied look, “I was ’most afraid you’d forget how to laugh, -it’s so easy to forget things.”</p> - -<p>“Now Tiny!” said Johnny, with the fretful sound in his -voice which had struck her as a sign that he didn’t feel well, -“you say a thing like that, and you think you’re smart, but it -isn’t easy to forget things at all, some things, I mean. I do -believe folks forget all they want to remember, and remember all -they want to forget!”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_116"></a>[116]</span></p> - -<p>“I don’t know of anything <i>I</i> want to forget,” remarked Tiny, -“and I should not think you would either. Is it a bad dream?”</p> - -<p>“No,” replied Johnny, “I don’t suppose it is, though sometimes -it kind of seems to me as if it might be, and I’m a little in -hopes I’ll wake up and find it is, after all!”</p> - -<p>“But I do not wish to forget my bad dreams,” said Tiny, -“for after they’re over, they are very interesting to remember, -like that one about walking on the ceiling, you know, like a fly. -It was dreadful, while it lasted, but it pleases me to think of it -now. Aren’t you going to tell me what it is that you ’most -hope is a dream?”</p> - -<p>“I don’t know,” said Johnny, doubtfully, “you are a very -nice little girl, Tiny, <i>for</i> a girl, but you can’t be expected to -know about things that happen to boys. Though to be sure, -this sort of thing might happen to girls, I suppose, if they went -to school. You know that new boy I told you about?”</p> - -<p>Tiny nodded.</p> - -<p>“Well, he isn’t having much of a good time. The other -fellows plague him. But I don’t see that’s it’s any of my business, -now; do you?”</p> - -<p>“I’m afraid—” began Tiny, and then stopped short.</p> - -<p>“Out with it!” said Johnny, impatiently, “you’re afraid—what?”</p> - -<p>“I’m afraid that’s what the priest and the Levite said,” finished -Tiny, slowly.</p> - -<p>“What do you?—oh yes, I suppose you mean about the -Good Samaritan, and, ‘now which of these was neighbor?’ Is -that what you’re driving at?”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_117"></a>[117]</span></p> - -<p>Tiny nodded again, even more earnestly than before.</p> - -<p>“Now that’s very queer,” said Johnny, musingly, “but Jim -said almost exactly the same thing. He’s picked up a little lame -fellow—no relation to him at all, and no more his concern than -anybody’s else—and he’s keeping the boys off him, and behaving -as if he was the little chap’s grandmother, and I do believe -it is all because of things mamma has said to him. He doesn’t -know about Ned Owen; what he said was because I happened -to catch him grandmothering this little Taffy, as he calls him, -but it was just exactly as if he had known all about everything. -It’s very well for him; he isn’t all mixed up with the other -bootblacks, the way I am with the boys at school, and he can -do as he pleases, but don’t you see, Tiny, what a mess I should -get myself into, right away, if I began to -take up for that boy against all the -others?”</p> - -<div class="figleft" style="width: 175px;"> -<img src="images/illus49.jpg" width="175" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>Tiny replied with what Johnny considered -needless emphasis,—</p> - -<p>“I don’t see it at all, Johnny Leslie, -and what’s more, I don’t believe you do -either! The boys at school would only -laugh at you, if the worst came to the -worst, and I’m pretty sure, from things Jim has told mamma, -that the kind of boys he knows would just as lief kick him, or -knock him down, if they were big enough, as to look at him! -And if you’d stand up for that poor little boy, I think some -more of them would, too. Don’t you remember, papa said boys -were a good deal like sheep; that if one went over the fence,<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_118"></a>[118]</span> -the whole flock would come after him; sometimes, I wish I -could do something for that boy! I don’t see how you can bear -to let them all make fun of him, and never say a word, when it -made you so mad, that time, when those two dreadful boys tried -to hang my kitten. It seems to me it’s exactly the same -thing!”</p> - -<p>Tiny’s face was quite red by the time she had finished this -long speech, and Johnny’s, though for a very different reason, -was red too. He had been angry with Tiny, at first, but -before she stopped speaking, his anger had turned against himself. -She was a little frightened at her own daring in “speaking -up” to Johnny in this way, but she soon saw that her fright -was needless.</p> - -<p>“Tiny,” he said, solemnly, after a rather long pause, “you -can’t expect me to wish I was a girl, you know, they do have -such flat times, but I will say I think its easier for them to be -good than it is for boys,—in some ways, anyhow,—and I think -I must be the beginning of a snob! You didn’t even look -foolish the day mamma took Jim with us to see the pictures, and -we met pretty much everybody we knew, and my face felt red -all the time. I’m really very much obliged to you for shaking -me up. I shall talk it all out with mamma, now, and see if I -can’t settle myself. To think how much better a fellow Jim is -than I am, when I’ve had mamma and papa and you, and he -don’t even know whether he had any mother at all!” And -Johnny gave utterance to his feelings in something between a -howl and a groan. To his great consternation, Tiny burst into -a passion of crying, hugging him, and trying to talk as she<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_119"></a>[119]</span> -sobbed. When he at last made out what she was saying, it was -something like this,—</p> - -<p>“I thought you were going to be mean and horrid—and -you’re such a dear boy—and I couldn’t <i>bear</i> to have you like -that—and I love you so—oh, Johnny!”</p> - -<p>Johnny may live to be a very old man; I hope he will, for -good men are greatly needed, but no matter how long he lives, -he will never forget the feelings that surged through his heart -when he found how bitter it was to his little sister to be disappointed -in him. He hugged her with all his might, and in a -very choked voice he told her that he hoped she’d never have to -be ashamed of him again—that she shouldn’t if he could possibly -help it.</p> - -<p>And after the talk with his mother that night, he hunted up -the “silken sleeve,” which he had worn until it was threadbare, -and then put away so carefully that he had a hard time to find -it. It was too shabby to be put on his hat again, but somehow -he liked it better than a newer one, and he stuffed it into his -jacket, when he dressed the next morning, about where he supposed -his heart to be. He reached the schoolhouse a few minutes -before the bell rang, and found everybody but Ned Owen -laughing and talking. He was sitting at his desk with a -book, on which his eyes were intently fixed, held before him, -but his cheeks were flushed, and his lips pressed tightly -together.</p> - -<p>Johnny did not hear anything but a confusion of voices, but -he could easily guess what the talk had been about. He walked -straight to his desk, and, laying his hand with apparent carelessness<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_120"></a>[120]</span> -on Ned’s shoulder, he glanced down at the open history, -saying, in his friendliest manner, which was very friendly,—</p> - -<p>“It’s pretty stiff to-day, isn’t it? I wish I could reel off the -dates the way you do, but every one I learn seems to drive out -the one that went in before it!”</p> - -<p>The flush on Ned’s face deepened, and he looked up with an -expression of utter astonishment, which made Johnny tingle with -shame from the crown of his head to the soles of his feet. And -Johnny thought afterward how, if the case had been reversed, -he would have shaken off the tardy hand and given a rude -answer to the long-delayed civility.</p> - -<p>Ned replied, very quietly,—</p> - -<p>“It is a little hard to-day, but not half so hard as—some -other things!”</p> - -<p>And just then the laughing and talking suddenly stopped, -for Mr. Lennox opened the door, but Johnny had already heard -a subdued whistle from one quarter and a mocking “Since -when?” from another, and, what, was worse, he was sure Ned -had heard them too.</p> - -<p>To some boys it would have been nothing but a relief to find -that, as Tiny had suggested, Ned’s persecutors were very much -like sheep, and, with but few exceptions, followed Johnny’s lead -before long, and made themselves so friendly that only a very -vindictive person could have stood upon his dignity, and refused -to respond. Ned was not vindictive, but he was shy and reserved; -he had been hurt to the quick by the causeless cruelty -of his schoolmates, and it was many days before he was “hail -fellow well met” with them, although he tried hard not only to -forgive, but to do what is much more difficult—forget.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_121"></a>[121]</span></p> - -<p>As for Johnny, when he saw how, after a trifling hesitation, -a few meaningless jeers and taunts, the tide turned, and Ned -was taken into favor, his heart was full of remorse. It seemed -to him that he had never before so clearly understood the meaning -of the words, “Inasmuch as ye did it <i>not</i> to the least of -these My brethren, ye did it not to Me.”</p> - -<p>Some one has likened our life to a journey; we keep on, but -we can never go back, and, as “we shall pass this way but -once,” shall we not keep a bright lookout for the chances to -help, to comfort, to encourage? How many loads we might -lighten, how many rough places we might make smooth for tired -feet! Not a day passes without giving us opportunities. Think -how beautiful life might be made, and, then,—think what most -of us make of it! Travellers will wander fearlessly through -dark and winding ways with a torch to light their path, and a -slender thread as a clue to lead them back to sunlight and -safety. The Light of the World waits to “lighten our darkness, -that we sleep not in death.” If we “hold fast that which -is good,” we have the clue.</p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_122"></a>[122]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_XI">CHAPTER XI.<br /> -<span class="smaller">BATTLE AND VICTORY.</span></h2> - -</div> - -<div> -<img class="dropcap" src="images/dropcap-ch11.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p class="dropcap">“It’s a queer world, and no mistake.”</p> - -<p>Jim looked unusually grave, as he gave -Johnny the benefit of these words of wisdom. -Johnny was on his way home from -school, and he had stopped to show Jim a -certain knife, about which they had conversed -a good deal, at various times. It -had four blades, one of them a file-blade; it was strongly made, -but pretty too, with a nice smooth white handle, and a little -nickel plate on one side, for the fortunate owner’s name. -They had first made its acquaintance from the outside of a -shop-window, where it lay in a tray with -about a dozen others of various kinds, -all included in the wonderful statement,—</p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus50.jpg" width="200" height="125" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>“Your choice for fifty cents!”</p> - -<p>Johnny and Jim had both chosen immediately, -but as Johnny, who was beginning to take an interest -in politics, remarked, it was one thing to nominate a knife, -and quite another to elect it! A slight difficulty lay in the way -of their walking boldly into the store, and announcing their -choice; neither of them had, at that precise moment, floating -capital to the amount of fifty cents!</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_123"></a>[123]</span></p> - -<p>“And some fellow who <i>has</i> fifty cents will be sure to snap up -such a bargain before the day’s over,” said Johnny, mournfully. -“What fun it must be to be rich, Jim; just to walk into a store -when you see anything you like, and say, ‘I’ll take that,’ without -even stopping to ask how much it is.”</p> - -<p>“Yes, it sounds as if it would be,” said Jim, “but though I -can’t exactly say that I’m intimate with many of ’em, it does -seem to me, looking at it from the outside, as it were, that they -get less sugar for a cent than some of us ’umble sons of poverty -do!”</p> - -<p>And Jim winked in a manner which Johnny admired all the -more because he was unable to imitate it.</p> - -<p>“I don’t see how you can tell,” said Johnny, “and I think -you must be mistaken, Jim.”</p> - -<p>“Well now, for instance,” replied Jim, who delighted in an -argument, “I’m taking what the newspaper-poetry-man would -call an ever-fresh delight in those three jolly warm nightshirts -your mother had made for me. I’d never have saved the money -for ’em in the world, if she hadn’t kept me up to it, and I feel -as proud as Cuffee, every time I put one on, to think I paid for -every stitch of it—I can’t help feeling sort of sorry that it -wouldn’t be the correct thing to wear them on the street. Now -do you suppose your millionaire finds any fun in buying nightshirts? -I guess not! And that’s only one thing out of dozens -of the same sort. See?”</p> - -<p>“Yes,” answered Johnny, thoughtfully, “I see what you -mean; I didn’t think of it in that way, before. But, all the -same, I’d be willing to try being a millionaire for a day or two.<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_124"></a>[124]</span> -And I do wish the fellow in there would kind of pile up the -other knives over that white one till I can raise money enough -to buy it!”</p> - -<p>It is needless to say that the shopkeeper did not act upon -this suggestion—perhaps because he did not hear it; and yet, -by some singular chance, day after day passed, and still the -white-handled knife remained unsold. And then Johnny’s uncle -came to say goodbye, before going on a long business journey, -and just as he was leaving, he put a bright half dollar in his -nephew’s hand, saying,—</p> - -<p>“I’ll not be here to help keep your birthday this year, my -boy, so will you buy an appropriate present for a young man of -your age and inches, and give it to yourself, with my love?”</p> - -<p>Would he? Uncle Rob knew all about that knife, in less -than five minutes, and then, as soon as he was gone, Johnny -begged hard to be allowed to go out after dark, “just this once,” -to secure the knife; he felt so entirely sure that it would be -gone the next morning!</p> - -<p>But it was not. And its presence in his pocket, during school -hours, had a rather bad effect upon his pursuit of knowledge. -On his way home, as I have said, he stopped to show his newly-acquired -treasure to Jim, and he was a little disappointed that -Jim did not seem more sympathetic with his joy, but simply said, -thoughtfully,—</p> - -<p>“It’s a queer world, and no mistake!”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_125"></a>[125]</span></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;" id="fp3"> -<img src="images/fp3.jpg" width="500" height="700" alt="" /> -<p class="caption">THE NEW KNIFE.</p> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_126"></a>[126]</span></p> - -<p>“I don’t see anything so very queer about it, myself,” said -Johnny, contentedly, adding, with a little enjoyment of having -the best of it, for once, with Jim, “papa says, that if we think<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_127"></a>[127]</span> -more than two people are queer to us, we may be pretty sure -that we are the queer ones, and that the rest of the world is -about as usual—at least, that’s the sense of what he said; I -don’t remember the words exactly.”</p> - -<p>“I wasn’t thinking of myself just then, for a wonder!” said -Jim, with the slightly mocking expression on his face which -Johnny did not like. “It’s a good enough world for me, but -when I see a little chap like Taffy getting all the kicks and none -of the halfpence, I don’t know exactly what to think. He’s -taken a new turn, lately; twisted up with pain, half the time, -and as weak as a kitten, the other half.”</p> - -<p>“Where is he, anyhow?” asked Johnny.</p> - -<p>“Well,” said Jim, turning suddenly red under his coat of tan, -“I’ve got him round at my place. The fact is, it was too -unhandy for me to go and look after him at that other place; it -was noisy, too. He didn’t like it.”</p> - -<p>Several questions rose to Johnny’s lips, but he repressed -them; he had discovered that nothing so embarrassed Jim as -being caught in some good work. So he only asked,—</p> - -<p>“But how did my new knife make you think of Taffy?”</p> - -<p>“Oh, never mind!” and Jim began to walk away.</p> - -<p>“But I do mind!” said Johnny, following him and catching -his arm. “And I do wish you wouldn’t think it is smart to be -so dreadfully mysterious. Come, out with it!”</p> - -<p>“Very well, then,” said Jim, stopping suddenly, “if you -don’t like it, maybe you’ll know better another time. It made -me think of him because I have been meaning to buy him one of -those knives as soon as I could raise the cash, but I’ve had to<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_128"></a>[128]</span> -spend all I could make lately for other things. The little chap -keeps grunting about a knife he once found in the street, and -lost again; and he seems to fancy that when he’s doing something -with his hands he don’t feel the pain so much. He cuts -out pictures with an old pair of scissors I happened to have, -whenever I can get him any papers, but he likes best to whittle, -and he broke the last blade of that old knife of mine the other -day; he’s been fretting about it ever since. I’m glad you’ve -got the knife, Johnny, since you’re so pleased about it, and -wanted it so, but I couldn’t help thinking—” and here Jim -abruptly turned a corner, and was gone before Johnny could -stop him.</p> - -<p>“I should just like to know what he told me all that yarn -for!” said Johnny to himself; a little crossly. “He surely -doesn’t think I ought to give my knife, my new knife, that -uncle Rob gave me for a birthday present, to that little Taffy? -Why, I don’t even know him!”</p> - -<p>And Johnny tried to banish such a ridiculous idea from his -mind at once. But somehow it would not be banished. The -thought came back to him again and again; how many things -he had to make life sweet and pleasant to him; how few the -little lonely boy, shut up all day in Jim’s dingy bed room, the -window of which did not even look on a street, but on a -narrow back yard, where the sun never shone. The more he -thought of it, the more it appealed to his pity. And here was a -chance,—but no, surely people could not be expected to make -such sacrifices as that.</p> - -<p>He managed to shake off the troublesome thought for a few<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_129"></a>[129]</span> -minutes, when he showed the knife to his mother and Tiny. -They both admired it to his heart’s content, and said what a -bargain it was, and what a wonder that nobody had bought it -before, and what a suitable thing for him to buy for Uncle Rob’s -birthday present to him. But, when he went up to his room, -the question again forced itself upon him, and would not be -shaken off. Over and over again in his mind, as they had done -that other time, the words repeated themselves,—</p> - -<p>“And who is my neighbor?”</p> - -<p>He did not see Jim again for several days, and this made -him unreasonably angry. It seemed to him that Jim had taken -things for granted altogether too easily. How did Jim know -that he, Johnny, was not waiting for a chance to send the knife -to poor little Taffy?</p> - -<p>But was he? He really hardly knew himself until one day -when, by dint of hard running, he caught Jim, and asked him,—</p> - -<p>“See here! How’s that little chap, and what’s gone with -you lately?”</p> - -<p>“He’s worse,” said Jim, gruffly, “and I’m busy—that’s -what’s gone with me. I can’t stop, I’m in a hurry.”</p> - -<p>“Oh, very well!” said Johnny, in an offended tone. “I -thought we were friends, Jim Brady, but I’ll not bother you -any more. Goodbye.”</p> - -<p>“Johnny,” said Jim, putting his hand on Johnny’s shoulder -as he spoke, “can’t you make any allowance for a fellow’s being -in trouble? I can’t stop now, I really and truly can’t, but I’ll -be on the corner by the library this afternoon, and if you choose -to stop, I’ll talk all you want me to.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_130"></a>[130]</span></p> - -<p>“All right, I’ll come,” said Johnny, his wounded self-love -forgotten at sight of Jim’s troubled face.</p> - -<p>He hurried home, and, with the help of an old table knife, he -managed to work ten cents out of the jug that he had “set up” -for a Christmas present fund. With this he bought the largest -picture paper he could find for the money. Then he gathered -together a handful of pictures he had been saving for his scrap -book, wrapped the knife first in them, then in the large paper, -and then tied the whole up securely in a neat brown paper -parcel.</p> - -<p>When he saw Jim that afternoon he asked him as cautiously -as he could about Taffy’s needs, and at last he said,—</p> - -<p>“Jim, why haven’t you told mamma about him, and let her -help you?”</p> - -<p>“It seemed like begging. I didn’t like—” and Jim stopped, -looking very much embarrassed.</p> - -<p>“Well, I mean to tell her as soon as I go home,” said Johnny, -resolutely, “for I know she’ll go and see him, and have something -done to make him better, and—Jim, I must go now, but -will you please give this to Taffy, with my love?”</p> - -<p>And, putting the parcel in Jim’s hand, Johnny turned, and -ran home.</p> - -<p>But was he really the same Johnny? Had wings grown on -his feet? Had his heart been suddenly changed into a feather? -He whistled, he sang, he stopped to turn somersets on the -grass in the square. No one but his Captain had known of the -battle. None, but the Giver of it, knew of the victory.</p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_131"></a>[131]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_XII">CHAPTER XII.<br /> -<span class="smaller">FASTING.</span></h2> - -</div> - -<div> -<img class="dropcap" src="images/dropcap-ch12.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p class="dropcap">Johnny had been talking to his mother, -as he often talked, about a Bible verse -which he did not fully understand—</p> - -<p>“But thou, when thou fastest, anoint -thine head and wash thy face, that thou -appear not unto men to fast, but unto thy -Father which seeth in secret,”—and she -had told him that a sacrifice, to be real and whole-hearted, must -be made not only willingly, but cheerfully; “not grudgingly, -or of necessity, for God loveth a cheerful giver.”</p> - -<p>“I don’t wonder at all at that, mamma,” Johnny had replied, -“when you think how hateful it is to have people do things for -you as if they didn’t wish to. I’d rather go without a thing, -than take it when people are that way.”</p> - -<p>“Yes,” said Mrs. Leslie, “people do sometimes say ‘oh -bother’ when ‘certainly’ would be more appropriate,”—Johnny -laughed, but he blushed a little, too—“and ‘directly,’ -or ‘in a minute,’” continued his mother, “when it would be -more graceful, to say the least of it, to go at once, without any -words. We forget too often that ‘even Christ pleased not Himself,’ -and we fret over the disturbing of our own little plans and -arrangements, as if we were all Great Moguls.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_132"></a>[132]</span></p> - -<p>“You don’t, mammy,” and Johnny kissed his mother in the -particular spot, just under her chin, where he always kissed her -when he felt unusually affectionate.</p> - -<p>“Oh, yes I do, dear, oftener than you know,” said Mrs. Leslie, -“but I am trying all the time, and when I am nearly sure -that I am going to be cross, I go away by myself, if I can, for a -few minutes, where I can fight it out without punishing any one -else, and when I can’t do that, I ask for strength just to keep -perfectly still until pleasant words will come.”</p> - -<p>“You’ve been practising so long, mamma,” said Johnny, -wistfully, “that you’re just about perfect, I think; but I don’t -believe I will be, if I live to be as old as Methusaleh! I wish I -had some sort of an arrangement to clap on the outside of my -mouth, that would hold it shut for five minutes!”</p> - -<p>“But don’t you see, dear,”—and Mrs. Leslie laughed a little -at Johnny’s idea—“that if you had time to remember to clap -on your ‘arrangement,’ you would have time to stop yourself in -another and better way?”</p> - -<p>“Yes, mamma, I suppose I should,” admitted Johnny, “but -it somehow seems as if the other way would be easier, especially -if I had the ‘arrangement’ somewhere where I could always -see it.”</p> - -<p>“But don’t you remember, dear,” said his mother, “that -even after Moses lifted up the brazen serpent, the poor Israelites -were not saved by it unless they looked up at it? That -came into my mind the other day when we were playing the -new game—‘Hiding in plain sight,’ you know. Every time -we failed to find the thimble, it was in such ‘plain sight’ that<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_133"></a>[133]</span> -we laughed at ourselves for being so stupid, and then I thought -how exactly like that we are about ‘the ever-present help.’ -It is always ready for us, and then we go looking everywhere -else, and wonder that we fail! And I think you -would find it so with your ‘arrangement.’ You would see it -and use it, perhaps, for a day or two, and then you would -grow used to it, and it would be invisible to you half the time, -at least.”</p> - -<p>This game of “Hiding in plain sight” was one which Ned -Owen had recently taught them, and it was very popular both -at school and in the different homes. A thimble was the favorite -thing to hide; all but the hider either shut their eyes or -went out of the room, while he placed the thimble in some place -where it could be very plainly seen—if one only knew where to -look for it! Sometimes it would be on a little point of the gas -fixture; sometimes on top of a picture-frame or mantel-ornament, -and then the hider generally had the pleasure -of seeing the seekers stare about the -room with puzzled faces, and finally give it -up, when he would point it out triumphantly, -and they would all exclaim at their stupidity.</p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus51.jpg" width="200" height="150" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>The rule was, that if any one found it, he was merely to say -so, and not to point it out to the rest.</p> - -<p>Johnny was very much impressed with his mother’s comparison, -and resolved, as he said to himself, to “look sharper” for -the small chances of self-denial which come to all of us, while -large chances come but to few, or only at long intervals. There -was a poem of which Mrs. Leslie was very fond, and which<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_134"></a>[134]</span> -Tiny and Johnny had learned just to please her, which had -this verse in it:—</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"> -<div class="poetry"> - <div class="stanza"> - <div class="verse indent0">“I would not have the restless will</div> - <div class="verse indent2">That hurries to and fro,</div> - <div class="verse indent0">Seeking for some great thing to do,</div> - <div class="verse indent2">Or secret thing to know.</div> - <div class="verse indent0">I would be dealt with as a child,</div> - <div class="verse indent2">And guided where to go.”</div> - </div> -</div> -</div> - -<p>And another verse ended with,—</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"> -<div class="poetry"> - <div class="stanza"> - <div class="verse indent0">“More careful, than to serve Thee much,</div> - <div class="verse indent2">To please Thee perfectly.”</div> - </div> -</div> -</div> - -<p>Tiny and Johnny were given to “making believe” all sorts of -startling and thrilling adventures, in which they rescued people -from avalanches, and robbers, and railway-accidents; and, to do -Tiny justice, all this making -believe did not in -the least interfere with -the sweet obedience and -thoughtfulness for the -comfort of others which -marked her little life every day. She was much more practical -than Johnny was, and would never have thought of these wonderful -“pretends” by herself, but she was always ready to join -him in whatever he proposed, unless she knew it to be wrong, -and he was quite proud of the manner in which she had learned -from him to invent and suggest things in this endless game of -“pretending.”</p> - -<div class="figleft" style="width: 300px;"> -<img src="images/illus52.jpg" width="300" height="100" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>But while it did her no harm at all, I am afraid it sometimes<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_135"></a>[135]</span> -made Johnny feel that the small, everyday chances which came -in his way were not worth much, and this was why his mother -had made her little suggestions about self-denial. So, though -Johnny still hoped that he could think of, or discover, some -“great thing,” he resolved to be very earnest, meanwhile, in -looking out for the small ones.</p> - -<p>He had just begun to study Latin, and it was costing him -many groans, and a good deal of hard work. He did not -exactly rebel against it, for he knew how particularly his father -wished him to be a good Latin scholar, but he expressed to Tiny, -freely and often, his sincere wish that it had never been invented.</p> - -<p>He went back to school immediately after dinner, one day, in -order to “go over” his lesson once more. He had studied it -faithfully the afternoon before, but one great trouble with it was -that it did not seem to “stay in his head” as his other lessons -did when he learned them in good earnest.</p> - -<p>“It’s just like trying to hang your hat up on nothing, -mamma,” he said, mournfully, as he kissed his mother goodbye.</p> - -<p>He had counted on having the schoolroom entirely to himself, -so he felt a little vexed when he saw one of the smaller -boys already at his desk in a distant corner, and his “Hello, -Ted! What’s brought you back so early?” was not so cordial as -it was inquiring.</p> - -<p>He realized this, and felt a little ashamed of himself when -Ted answered, meekly,—</p> - -<p>“I didn’t think I’d be in anybody’s way, Johnny, and if I -don’t know my map questions this afternoon, I’ve got to go -down to the lower class!”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_136"></a>[136]</span></p> - -<p>The little boy’s face looked very doleful as he said this; it -would not be pleasant to have his stupidity proclaimed, as it -were, in this public manner. Not that his teacher was doing it -with any such motive as this. Teddy had missed that particular -lesson so frequently, of late, that Mr. Lennox was nearly sure it -was too hard for him, and that it would be only right, for -Teddy’s own sake, to put him in a lower class; and this was -why, if to-day’s lesson, which was unusually easy, proved too -hard for him, the change was to be made.</p> - -<p>“You’re not in my way a bit, Ted,” said Johnny, heartily, -“and this bothering old Latin is as hard for me as your map -questions are for you, so we’ll be miserable together—‘misery -loves company’ you know.”</p> - -<p>With that Johnny sat down and opened his book, but his -mind, instead of settling on the lesson, busied itself with the -unhappy little face in the corner.</p> - -<p>“But if I go over there and help him,” said Johnny, to himself, -almost speaking aloud in his earnestness, “I’ll miss my own -lesson, sure!”</p> - -<p>“And suppose you do,” said the other Johnny, “you will -only get a bad mark in a good cause, but if Teddy misses his, -he will be humiliated before the whole school.”</p> - -<p>“But papa doesn’t like me to have bad marks.”</p> - -<p>“Don’t be a mean little hypocrite, Johnny Leslie! If your -father knew all about it, which would he mind most, a bad -mark in your report, or a worse one in your heart? And -besides, you’ve twenty-five minutes, clear. You can do both, if -you’ll not be lazy.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_137"></a>[137]</span></p> - -<p>That settled it—that, and a sort of fancy that he heard his -mother saying,—</p> - -<p>“Even Christ pleased not Himself.”</p> - -<p>He sprang up so suddenly that Teddy fairly “jumped,” and -went straight over to the corner, saying, as he resolutely sat -down,—</p> - -<p>“Here, show me what’s bothering you, young man, and -perhaps I can help you. Don’t stop to palaver—there’s no -time!”</p> - -<p>But Teddy really couldn’t help saying,—</p> - -<p>“Oh, <i>thank</i> you, Johnny!” and then he went at once -to business.</p> - -<p>“It’s all the capitals,” he said, “I can learn them fast -enough, when I’ve found them, but it does seem to me that the -folks who make maps hide the capitals and rivers and mountains, -on purpose. Now, of course Maine has a capital, I s’pose, -but can you see it? I can’t, a bit.”</p> - -<p>“Why, here it is, as plain as the nose on your face,” said -Johnny, and put his finger on it without loss of time.</p> - -<p>Teddy screwed up his eyes and forehead as he looked at the -map, saying finally,—</p> - -<p>“So it is! I <i>saw</i> that, but it looked like ‘Atlanta,’ and I -didn’t see the star at all.”</p> - -<p>This was repeated with almost every one; Teddy was unusually -quick at committing to memory, but he made what at first -seemed to Johnny the most stupid blunders in seeing. However, -the lesson was learned, or rather, Teddy was in a fair way to -have it learned, and Johnny was back at his Latin, fifteen minutes<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_138"></a>[138]</span> -before the bell rang. And, to his astonishment, the Latin -no longer refused to be conquered. He had done good work at -it, the day before, better work than he knew, and now, feeling -how little time he had left, he studied with unusual spirit and -resolution. When the bell rang, he was quite ready for it, and -his recitation that afternoon was entirely perfect, for the first -time since he began that terrible study. He did not know how -much more he had gained in the conquest of his selfishness; but -all large victories are built upon many small ones, and the same -is, if possible, even truer of all large defeats. Habit is powerful, -to help or to hinder.</p> - -<p>And a most unexpected good to little Ted grew out of that -day’s experience; one of the things which prove, if it needs -proving, that we never can tell where the result of our smallest -words and deeds will stop. One of Johnny’s young cousins had -recently been suffering much from head-ache, which was at last -found to be caused wholly by a defect in her eyes. They saw -unequally, and a pair of spectacles remedied the defect and -stopped the head-ache, beside affording much enjoyment for the -cousinhood over her venerable appearance. Johnny was puzzling -over Teddy’s apparent stupidity in one way, and evident -brightness in another, when he suddenly remembered his cousin -Nanny, and clapped his hands, saying to himself as he did so,—</p> - -<p>“That’s it, I do believe! He can’t see straight!”</p> - -<p>Johnny lost no time in suggesting this to Teddy, who, in his -turn, spoke of it to his mother. She had already begun to -notice the strained look about his eyes, and she took him at once -to an oculist. The result was, that he shortly afterward<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_139"></a>[139]</span> -appeared in a pair of spectacles, and told Johnny with some -little pride,—</p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus53.jpg" width="200" height="75" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>“The eye doctor says that, as far as -seeing goes, one of my eyes might about -as well have been in the back of my head; -and it seems queer, but everything looks different—I didn’t -know so many things were straight! And you won’t catch me -missing my map questions any more! Why, the places seem -fairly to jump at me, now. And—and—I do hope I can do -something for you before long, Johnny, for it’s all your doing, -you know. If you hadn’t helped me that day, there’s no telling -when I’d have found it out.”</p> - -<p>“Don’t you worry about doing something for me, Ted,” said -Johnny, kindly. “You’ve done enough, just putting on those -spectacles. You look exactly like your grandfather seen through -the wrong end of a spyglass!”</p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_140"></a>[140]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_XIII">CHAPTER XIII.<br /> -<span class="smaller">A CHANCE FOR A KNIGHTLY DEED.</span></h2> - -</div> - -<div> -<img class="dropcap" src="images/dropcap-ch13.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p class="dropcap">After that first perfect Latin lesson, Johnny’s -road to success seemed in a measure -broken, and though he by no means -achieved perfection every time, his failures -were less total and humiliating, day by -day, and, to use his own beautiful simile -about the hat, he began to find “pegs” in -his head whereon he could hang his daily stint of Latin. But -it was still hard work; there was no denying that; and if his -affection for his father had not been very strong and true, the -task would have been still more difficult. But somehow, whenever -Mr. Leslie came home looking more tired than usual, or -turned into a joke one of the many little acts of self-denial and -unselfish courtesy which helped to make his home so bright, it -seemed to Johnny that it would be mean indeed to grumble -over this one thing, which he -was doing to please his father.</p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 300px;"> -<img src="images/illus54.jpg" width="300" height="75" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>He had been much impressed -by the manner in -which he had learned that first perfect lesson, for, on the previous -Sunday, when he had recited the verses which told how -the five barley loaves and two small fishes had fed the hungry<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_141"></a>[141]</span> -multitude in the wilderness, he had thought, and said, that it -must have been easier for those people who saw the Master perform -such miracles, to follow him, than it was now for those -who must “walk by faith” entirely, with no gracious face and -voice to draw them on.</p> - -<p>His mother did not contradict him, just then; she rarely did, -when he said anything like that; she preferred to wait, and let -him find out for himself, with more or less help from her. So -she only answered, this time,—</p> - -<p>“Was the thimble really hidden last night, Johnny? You -know I was called away before anybody found it, and you were -all declaring that this time, you were sure, it couldn’t be ‘in -plain sight.’”</p> - -<p>Johnny laughed, but he looked a little foolish, too, as he -answered,—</p> - -<p>“Why no, mamma—it was perched on the damper of the -stove. I declare, that game puzzles me more and more every -time we play it; I might as well be an idiot and be done with -it! But what made you think of that just now, mamma dear?”</p> - -<p>“I suppose it came into my mind because I want you to look -a little harder before you let yourself be quite certain about the -miracles,” replied his mother, “and I will give you a sort of -clue. You know papa’s business is a very absorbing one, and -you often hear people wondering how he finds time for all the -other things he does, but I never wonder; it seems to me that -he gives all his time to the Master, and that he is so free from -worrying care—so sure he will have time enough for all that is -really needful, that he loses none in fretting or hesitating; he<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_142"></a>[142]</span> -just goes right on. There is a dear old saying of the Friends -that I always like—‘Proceed as the way opens.’ Now if you -will think about it, and about how uses for money, and for all -our gifts and talents, come in some way to all who are in -earnest about using them rightly, perhaps you will see what I -mean. ‘A heart at leisure from itself’ can do a truly wonderful -amount of work for other people.”</p> - -<p>A dim idea of his mother’s meaning had come into Johnny’s -mind, even then, and suddenly, after he had done work which -he had thought would fill half an hour, in fifteen minutes, a -flash of light followed, and he “saw plainly.”</p> - -<p>I cannot tell you of all the small chances which came to him -daily, but many of them you can guess by looking for your own. -He tried hard to remember what his mother had said about -willing service and cheerful giving. “Oh bother!” was not -heard very often, now, and when it was, it was generally -followed speedily by some “little deed of kindness” which -showed that it had been repented of.</p> - -<p>He was rushing home from school one day in one of his -“cyclones,” as Tiny called the wild charges which he made upon -the house when he was really in a hurry. It was a half-holiday, -and most of the boys had agreed to go skating together, just as -soon as some ten or fifteen mothers could be brought within -shouting distance. The ice was lasting unusually late, and the -weather was delightfully clear and cold, but everybody knew -that a thaw must come before long, in the nature of things, and -everybody who skated felt that it really was a sort of duty to -make the most of the doomed ice, while it lasted.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_143"></a>[143]</span></p> - -<p>Johnny was like the Irishman’s gun in one respect—he could -“shoot round a corner;” but he did not always succeed in hitting -anything, as he did to-day. The anything, this time, -happened to be Jim Brady, and as Jim was going very nearly as -fast as Johnny was, neither had breath enough left, after the -collision, to say anything for at least a minute. Then Jim managed -to inquire, between his gasps,—</p> - -<p>“Any lives lost on your side, Johnny?”</p> - -<p>“No, I b’lieve not,” said Johnny, rather feebly, and then -they both leaned against the fence, and laughed.</p> - -<p>“I was coming after you, Johnny,” began Jim, and then he -stopped to breathe again.</p> - -<p>“Well, you found me!” said Johnny, who, being smaller and -lighter than Jim, was first to recover from the shock, “but tell -me what it is, please, quick, for I’m in a hurry!”</p> - -<p>And almost without knowing that he did so, he squared his -elbows to run on again. Jim saw the motion, and his face -clouded over.</p> - -<p>“I can’t tell you everything I had to say in half a second, so -I’ll not bother you; maybe, I can find somebody else,” and Jim -began to walk off.</p> - -<p>Johnny sprang after him, caught his arm, and gave him a -little shake, saying as he did so,—</p> - -<p>“See here, Jim Brady, if you don’t stop putting on airs at -me like this, I’ll—I’ll—” and he stopped for want of a threat -dire enough for the occasion.</p> - -<p>“I would,” said Jim, dryly, “but if I were you, I’d find out -first what airs was—were—and who was putting ’em on. I see<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_144"></a>[144]</span> -you’re in a hurry, and I’m sorry I stopped you. Let go of my -arm, will you?”</p> - -<p>“No, I won’t!” said Johnny, “so there now! And if you -won’t be decent, and turn ’round, and walk towards home with -me, why, I’ll walk along with you till you tell me what you -were going to say. I never <i>did</i> see such a—” and again Johnny -stopped for want of a word that suited him.</p> - -<p>Jim made no answer, and his face remained sullen, but he -turned at once, and the two walked on arm in arm, toward -Johnny’s home.</p> - -<p>“Well,” said Johnny, presently, “we’re ’most there. Are -you going to say anything?”</p> - -<p>“I wouldn’t, if it was for myself—not if you hung on to me -for a week!” and Jim’s face worked; Johnny even thought his -voice trembled a little.</p> - -<p>“Taffy’s sick,” continued Jim, “and I can’t find out what ails -him. He says he don’t hurt anywhere, but he won’t eat, and as -far as I can make out he don’t sleep much, and he feels as if he -was red hot. And all he cares for is when I am with him evenings, -and read to him. That old Turkess where I have the -room sort of looks after him; she knows I’ll look after her if -she doesn’t! But it must be lonesome for the little chap all -day, and yet I daresn’t lose any more time with him than I do -now, or I wouldn’t have the money—I mean—oh, I can’t -leave my business for anybody! And I thought, maybe, you’d -give him an hour two or three times a week, Johnny; so I set a -fellow to mind my stand, and if you <i>can</i> come, and your mother -doesn’t mind, I’ll show you the way.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_145"></a>[145]</span></p> - -<p>Johnny was silent a moment. How the sun shone, and how -the pond sparkled and glittered! Three or four of the boys, at -a distant street corner, beckoned frantically to him with their -skates, to hurry him.</p> - -<p>Perhaps you think Johnny must have been very selfish, to -hesitate even for a moment, but then, you know, you are looking -at him, and not at yourself! Before Jim’s sensitive pride had -time to take fire again, the answer was ready.</p> - -<p>“I’ll do it, Jim,” said Johnny, cordially, “if you’ll wait half -a second till I ask mamma—she always likes to know where -I am.”</p> - -<p>“Thank you,” said Jim, briefly, and then, with a sudden -thought, he asked,—</p> - -<p>“Have you had your dinner yet?”</p> - -<p>“Why no! I forgot all about it!” and Johnny suddenly -realized that he was alarmingly hungry.</p> - -<div class="figleft" style="width: 150px;"> -<img src="images/illus55.jpg" width="150" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>“You see,” he added, “I had a big -sandwich at recess, and somebody gave -me an apple, so I can just ask mamma -to save me something, and go right along -with you; you can’t be away from your -stand all the afternoon, I suppose.”</p> - -<p>“You’ll do nothing of the kind!” said -Jim, firmly, “I’ll wait for you out here, -so go in, and eat as much as you can -hold. I’m in no hurry whatsomever!”</p> - -<p>And Jim leaned against the fence with as much composure as -if the keen March wind had been a June zephyr.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_146"></a>[146]</span></p> - -<p>He felt a little surprise, however, when Johnny, without another -word, marched into the house and left him there; a surprise -which did not last long, for in less than five minutes, Mrs. -Leslie’s hand was on his shoulder, and she was gently pushing -him up the steps, and into the dining-room.</p> - -<p>“Oh please, Mrs. Leslie!” and Jim’s face grew suddenly red, -“I’m not fit. I didn’t wait to fix up—I’m not a bit hungry!”</p> - -<p>His distress was so evidently real, that Mrs. Leslie paused, -half way to the table.</p> - -<p>“I’ll compromise,” she said, laughing, “since you are too -proud to come in anything but full dress, you shall hide yourself -here, and we’ll pretend you didn’t come in at all!”</p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus56.jpg" width="200" height="175" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>She opened the door into the neat, cosey inner kitchen. No -one was there, and Jim sat down by the fire with a feeling of -great relief. For dinner had just been -put on table, in the dining-room; Tiny, -in spotless white apron and shining -yellow curls, stood by her chair, and he -murmured to himself,—</p> - -<p>“I’d ’a’ choked to death, first mouthful!”</p> - -<p>The dining-room door was not quite closed, and presently he -heard Tiny saying,—</p> - -<p>“Oh, please let me, mamma! I want to—please!”</p> - -<p>And then she came softly in with a tempting plate of dinner, -which she set upon the table.</p> - -<p>“There!” she said, “there’s some of everything there, except -the pudding, and I’ll bring you that when we have ours. I’m<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_147"></a>[147]</span> -so glad you came to-day, because there’s a Brown Betty. I -think you’d better sit this way, hadn’t you? Then you can look -at the fire; it looks nice, such a cold day.”</p> - -<p>It was all said and done with such simple sweetness and good-will, -that Jim’s defences gave way at once.</p> - -<p>“Thank you, Miss Tiny,” he said, with the grave politeness -which never failed him when he spoke either to her or to her -mother, and he sat down at once in the place she had chosen—for -worlds he would not have wounded that gentle spirit. And -he found it no hardship, after all, to eat the dinner she had -brought him; what “growing boy” could have resisted it?</p> - -<div class="figleft" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus57.jpg" width="200" height="175" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>After dinner, when the comforting food had done more than -he knew to put him in good-humor, Mrs. Leslie asked him many -questions about Taffy, filling a basket as she talked, with jelly and -delicate rusks and oranges. A few of the questions were by way -of making sure that the place was a safe -one for Johnny. She meant to go herself, -the next day, to see the little boy, -but she did not wish to interfere to-day -with the arrangement which Jim had -made. So the two boys went off together, -and Jim, sure now of Johnny’s -good-will, and a little ashamed of his own “cantankerousness,” -as he called it to himself, talked about Taffy all the way, but -only as they neared the door of the dreary lodging-house did Jim -succeed in saying what lay nearest his heart.</p> - -<p>“I haven’t told you the worst of it, Johnny,” he said, in a -troubled voice, from which all the usual mocking good-nature<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_148"></a>[148]</span> -was gone, “the little chap has somehow found out that he’s -dying, and—he’s afraid!”</p> - -<p>There was no time for more; they were already on the stairs, -and Johnny gave a sort of groan; who was he to comfort that -little trembling soul?</p> - -<p>“Oh,” he thought, “if mamma were only here!”</p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_149"></a>[149]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_XIV">CHAPTER XIV.<br /> -<span class="smaller">THE VALLEY OF THE SHADOW.</span></h2> - -</div> - -<div> -<img class="dropcap" src="images/dropcap-ch14.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p class="dropcap">The room they entered was much more -neat and clean than Johnny had expected -to find it, and there was even -some attempt at decoration, in the way -of picture cards and show bills tacked -upon the dingy walls. A stove, whose -old age and infirmities were concealed -by much stove-blacking, held a cheerful -little fire, and the panes of the one window were bright and -clear. The bed, which looked unpleasantly hard, and was -scantily furnished, had been pulled to a place between the fire -and the window, and Taffy, sitting -up against a skilfully arranged -chair-back and two thin -pillows, looked eagerly towards -the door as it opened. The -sharp, thin little face brightened -with a smile, as he saw Jim, but -he did not speak.</p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus58.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>“Taffy,” said Jim, gently, -“here’s Johnny Leslie. He’s -come to see you, and read to you a little bit. He’s Miss Tiny’s<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_150"></a>[150]</span> -brother, you know, and Mrs. Leslie’s son. Won’t you shake -hands with him?”</p> - -<p>Taffy held out his hand, nodding to Johnny with much -friendliness.</p> - -<p>“Oh, yes,” he said, in a voice so low and hoarse that Johnny -bent nearer to catch his meaning. “I’ll shake hands with him; -I thought it was some strange boy, but that’s different.”</p> - -<div class="figleft" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus59.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>“And see,” continued Jim, opening the basket, and setting -out the things upon a rough pine table, which held a pitcher -of water and a tumbler, two or -three medicine bottles, a very -small orange, and a big red -apple, which Johnny recognized; -he had given it to Jim a day or -two ago. The little fellow’s -eyes sparkled as he saw the -pretty eatables come out of the -basket, one after another, and -he stroked the glass which held -the bright-colored jelly, saying hoarsely,—</p> - -<p>“That’s pretty, that is. His folks must be rich,” and he -nodded toward Johnny.</p> - -<p>“I must go now,” Jim said, not noticing this last remark of -Taffy’s, “but Johnny will stay awhile, and after that it won’t -be long till I’m home. Be a good boy, and don’t bother Johnny; -he’s not used to you like I am.”</p> - -<p>Jim went, with a very friendly goodbye; and Johnny was -left alone with Taffy, who eyed him shyly, but did not speak.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_151"></a>[151]</span></p> - -<p>“Wouldn’t you like some of this jelly?” asked Johnny, hastily; -“I can put some in this empty tumbler for you, you know, -so as not to muss it all up at once.”</p> - -<p>Taffy shook his head.</p> - -<p>“Well, then, an orange?” went on Johnny. “I know a first-rate -way to fix an orange, the way they do ’em in Havana, -where they grow. Papa showed me, the winter he went there. -Shall I do one for you? I don’t believe you ever ate one that -way.”</p> - -<p>Taffy nodded eagerly, opening his parched lips, but still not -speaking. So Johnny hunted up a fork, and then, with Taffy’s -knife, cut a round, thick slice of skin, about the size of a half-dollar, -off the stem and blossom ends of the orange. These -pieces of skin he put together, and stuck the fork through them. -Then he peeled half the orange, cutting off all the white skin, -as well as the yellow, then he stuck it on the fork, at the peeled -end, finished peeling it, and handed it to Taffy, who had been -looking on with breathless interest.</p> - -<p>“There!” said Johnny, “you just hold on to the fork, and -bite, and you’ll get all the good part of the orange, and none of -the bad.”</p> - -<p>“Now wasn’t that first-rate?” he asked, as Taffy handed -him back the fork, with the “bad” of the orange on it.</p> - -<p>Taffy laughed delightedly. His shyness was quite gone, but -Johnny saw that his breath came with difficulty, and that it cost -him an effort to speak.</p> - -<p>“When I get well, and go sellin’ papers again,” he said, “I’ll -fix up oranges that way on sticks. Folks would buy ’em, hot -days; now don’t you think they would?”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_152"></a>[152]</span></p> - -<p>“Why, yes,” said Johnny, seeing he was expected to answer, -“I daresay they would.”</p> - -<p>“The old woman down there,” and Taffy pointed to the -floor, “<i>she</i> says I’m dyin’. Don’t you think she’s just tryin’ to -scare me? Now <i>don’t</i> you, Johnny Leslie?”</p> - -<p>Johnny was dismayed. What should he say? He sent up a -swift, silent prayer for help, then he spoke, very gently.</p> - -<p>“Taffy, you’ve heard Jim tell about my mother, haven’t -you?”</p> - -<p>Taffy silently nodded.</p> - -<p>“Well, suppose, while I’m here, my sister Tiny was to come, -to say mother wanted me to go home; do you think I’d be -afraid to go—home, to mother and father, you know?”</p> - -<p>Taffy shook his head.</p> - -<p>“Then, don’t you see,” pursued Johnny, and in his earnestness -he took the little hot hands, and held them fast. “That -when our Father in Heaven says He wants us, we needn’t be -afraid to go? Mother says we oughtn’t to be—not if we love -Him.”</p> - -<p>Johnny was afraid that Taffy would not understand, but he -did. Since Jim had taken charge of him, he had begun to go to -Sunday-school, and having quick ears and a good memory, he -had learned fast.</p> - -<p>“But s’pos’n we ain’t minded him?” and the feverish grasp -on Johnny’s hands grew tighter.</p> - -<p>“We <i>haven’t</i> minded Him, any of us,” said Johnny, softly, -“and that’s why our Saviour died for us. Now see here, Taffy; -if a big boy was going to whip you, because you’d taken something<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_153"></a>[153]</span> -of his, and Jim stepped up, and said, ‘Here, I’ll take the -whipping, if you’ll let him go,’ then you wouldn’t be whipped -at all. Don’t you see?”</p> - -<p>“I didn’t know it meant just that,” said Taffy, “what made -Him do it, anyhow, if He didn’t have to?”</p> - -<p>“Because He loved us—because He was so sorry for us!” -Johnny’s voice trembled as he said this; it seemed to him that -he had never before fully realized what the Saviour had done for -the world. “He wanted to have us all safe and happy with -Him in Heaven, after we die, and it’ll be only our own fault, if -we don’t get there—just the same as if a wonderful doctor was -to come in, right now, and tell you to take his medicine, and -he’d make you well, and then you wouldn’t take the medicine.”</p> - -<p>“But I would, though!” said Taffy, eagerly, and as if he half -believed it would happen. “I’d take it, if it was ever so nasty, -but the doctor Jim fetched, he said he couldn’t do nothing for -me, only make me a little easier. Do you s’pose he knew?”</p> - -<p>“Yes,” said Johnny, gravely, “I’m afraid he did, Taffy; but -we needn’t be afraid, either of us. The Saviour is stronger, and -cares more about us, than all the doctors in the world.”</p> - -<p>Taffy did not answer; he lay back, looking up through the -window at the little patch of blue sky that showed between the -tops of the tall houses. Johnny could not tell whether or not -his words had given any comfort. He read a little story from a -paper Tiny had sent, and Taffy listened with eager interest; -then a distant clock struck four, and Johnny rose to go. Taffy -made no objection to being left alone, but when Johnny took -his hand for goodbye, he said,—</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_154"></a>[154]</span></p> - -<p>“Come to-morrow. I want to hear more about Him.”</p> - -<p>“I will if I can,” said Johnny, “but I go to school, you -know. To-day was a half holiday.”</p> - -<p>Taffy made no answer to this, but he nodded and smiled, as -Johnny backed out of the door.</p> - -<p>Mrs. Leslie went the next day to see the poor little boy, and -many times after that; Tiny was allowed to go once or twice, -but she was not so strong as Johnny was, and felt everything -more keenly, so her mother did not think it best to let her -go often.</p> - -<p>And now Johnny had a full chance to test his desire for self-denial. -Taffy could not himself have told why he preferred -Johnny to every one else, but so it was, and many were the hidden -battles which Johnny fought with self-love, not always coming -off conqueror, but struggling up again, after each defeat, with a -fresh sense of his own helplessness, and a stronger dependence -on the “One who is mighty.”</p> - -<p>It was hard to tell just when Taffy passed out from under the -cloud of fear into the full sunshine of the “knowledge and love -of God,” but, as his poor little body grew weaker, the eager soul -seemed to strengthen, and be filled with love and joy. Then he -began to express his wish that “everybody” might be told -about the Saviour, and he lost no chance of telling, himself, -when kind-hearted neighbors came in to help Jim with him.</p> - -<p>The words “obedient unto death” having once been read and -explained to him, seemed constantly in his mind, and once, after -lying still for a long while, he said,—</p> - -<p>“They killed Him—cruel! cruel!—and He never stopped<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_155"></a>[155]</span> -’em, and now see how nice and easy He lets me lie here and die -in my bed!”</p> - -<p>It was the evening before Easter Sunday, that lovely festival -which is finding its way into all hearts and churches; the last -bell was ringing for evening service, and Johnny had just taken -his seat, with his mother and Tiny, in the church which they -attended, when, to his great surprise, -Jim stepped quietly in, and -sat down beside him. Jim was very -neatly dressed in his Sunday suit, -but the flaming necktie which he -usually wore was replaced by a -small bow of black ribbon. His face -had a gentle and subdued expression -quite unusual to it, and Johnny felt -sure, at once, that Taffy was gone.</p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus60.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>As the boys knelt side by side in the closing prayer, their -hands met in a warm, close grasp, and a smothered sob from -Jim told how deeply his heart was touched.</p> - -<p>Taffy had died that evening, very peacefully, in his sleep, a -few minutes after Jim came home from his work.</p> - -<p>“And I somehow felt as if, maybe, I’d get a little nearer to -him, if I was to come to church,” said Jim, in a subdued voice, -as he walked part of the way home with Mrs. Leslie, “and I -thought, maybe, you wouldn’t mind if I came to your pew, it -seemed sort of lonesome everywhere.”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Leslie made him very sure that she did not “mind,” -and would not, no matter how often he came there.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_156"></a>[156]</span></p> - -<p>And he came regularly, after that. At first he sat with his -friends; then he chose a sitting among the free seats in the -church, and sat there, but he found that, in this way, he was apt -to have a different place every Sunday, and this he did not like. -It made him feel as if he did not “belong anywhere,” he told -Johnny; so, as soon as he could command the money, he rented -half a pew for himself, and after that he nearly always brought -some one with him. Once or twice it was the old woman who -kept the eating-stand where he usually bought his lunch; sometimes -it was a wild, rather frightened-looking street Arab, sometimes -a fellow bootblack.</p> - -<p>He evidently enjoyed doing the honors of his half pew, but -there was a deeper and better motive under that; the soul that -has heard its own “call” is eager that other souls should -hear, too.</p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_157"></a>[157]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_XV">CHAPTER XV.<br /> -<span class="smaller">MORE CHANCES.</span></h2> - -</div> - -<div> -<img class="dropcap" src="images/dropcap-ch15.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p class="dropcap">Perhaps, if you had seen Johnny starting -for school on a certain Thursday of which -I mean to tell you, you would have -thought that somebody was imposing on -his good nature, for he carried in his book-strap -a very large bundle, so large, that -there was scarcely room enough left in the -strap for his geography and arithmetic. But a glance at his -face would have told you that he did not feel in the least “put -upon,” for he looked very well satisfied, and ran back, when he -reached the gate, to give his mother an extra kiss.</p> - -<p>The bundle contained a great deal of sewing for a woman in -whom Mrs. Leslie was interested, and it meant that Johnny was -to be trusted to go quite alone to this woman’s home, which was -a long way from his own, and near the park. He was to go -after school, and when he had done his errand, he was to be -allowed to go to the park, and watch a base-ball match which -was to take place that afternoon, until it should be time to come -home to tea. And this was not all. By way of saving precious -time, he was to take his dinner to school with him, and eat it at -the noon recess, and there it was in Tiny’s new straw basket—three -sandwiches, two hard-boiled eggs, with a little paper of salt,<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_158"></a>[158]</span> -a very large and a middling-sized piece of gingerbread, and a -slice of yesterday’s “queen of puddings.”</p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus61.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>“You’d better save a sandwich and the gingerbread to eat at -the park,” said Mrs. Leslie, as she packed this delightful dinner, -“you can wrap them in this nice piece of paper—see, it is that -large brown envelope in which -my handkerchiefs came—for it -will not be best to take Tiny’s -basket with you, you might so -easily lose it. You can leave it -in your desk, and bring it home -to-morrow. And be sure to ask -somebody what time it is, as -soon as the sun is down to the -tops of the trees in the park—you -can see them quite well from the base-ball ground, you -know—and don’t stay later than half past five, dear.</p> - -<p>“All right, mamma,” said Johnny, cheerfully, “what a jolly -dinner! I hope I shan’t be too hungry at twelve to save the -cake and sandwich, but I don’t know!”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Leslie laughed, but she made another sandwich, and cut -another slice of cake, and perhaps it was the recollection of this -generous deed which sent Johnny back for one more kiss.</p> - -<p>He had hard work to keep his thoughts where they belonged -during school hours, but he succeeded pretty well, for he thought -it would be “mean” not to behave at least as well as usual, with -such a treat in prospect. He also succeeded in saving the cake -and sandwich. “But I couldn’t have done it,” he thought, as<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_159"></a>[159]</span> -he wrapped them in the nice brown envelope, ready for an immediate -start, when school should be out, “if mamma hadn’t put in -that last sandwich and piece of cake!”</p> - -<p>Some proverb maker has said that “chosen burdens are -light,” and Johnny certainly did not seem weighed down by his -burden, as he hailed a horse car, and stepped gayly on board. -When they came to the “up-grade” he felt like shaking hands -with the patient extra horse, and telling him how many good -thoughts he had caused. And then he resolved to be more on -the lookout for chances to help the heavily-laden; perhaps he -had kept too near home with his efforts; he would try to -do more.</p> - -<p>He did not put into words, in his mind, the feeling that he -had so many things to make him happy, that he ought to hand -some of his happiness on to less favored people, but it was some -such feeling as this which prompted his resolve, and made him -shyly offer his envelope-full of lunch to a very ragged and dirty -little newsboy, who was being hustled out of the car by the conductor. -It was accepted without the least shyness, and also without -any very special thanks; but Johnny, craning his neck -backward as the car moved on, saw the delighted face of the -little fellow, as he opened the envelope, and was more than satisfied. -It set him thinking of Taffy, and that was a thought -which always filled his heart with a sort of quiet Sunday -happiness.</p> - -<p>He found the house where he was to leave the bundle, -without any trouble, and his knock was answered by the -woman for whom it was intended. She was a gentle-faced,<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_160"></a>[160]</span> -tired-looking little woman, and she held on one arm a sturdy -baby-boy, who seemed trying to make himself heavier by -kicking and struggling. She attempted to -take the bundle with her free hand, but -Johnny held it fast, saying pleasantly,—</p> - -<div class="figleft" style="width: 125px;"> -<img src="images/illus62.jpg" width="125" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>“If you’ll tell me where you want it -put, Mrs. Waring, I’ll take it in for you.”</p> - -<p>“Oh, thank you,” she answered, “you’re -very kind—right in here, please,” and she -led the way to a room which would have -been quite pretty and attractive, if it had -been in order, but it was evident that -Master Baby had had everything his own way, at least for the -past few hours.</p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus63.jpg" width="200" height="225" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>“I can’t keep things straight five minutes,” said his mother, -wearily, “as fast as I get settled with my work at the machine, -he’s into something, and I have to -jump up and take it away from him. -Some of the kind ladies I sew for -have given him nice playthings, but -no—he just wants everything he -can’t have, and he’s got so heavy, -lately, that I can’t take him about -with me as I did. There’s a parcel -of work that I promised to take home -this afternoon, and I don’t see how -I’m going to do it, for the neighbor that offered to mind him -had to leave home unexpectedly, and it isn’t safe to trust him -for five minutes, let alone two hours!”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_161"></a>[161]</span></p> - -<p>“Maybe I could leave it on my way home,” said Johnny, -“where’s it to go?”</p> - -<p>“You’re very kind,”—she said, gratefully, “but it’s quite the -other way from your house, and besides, I’ve forgotten the -number, though I know the house when I come to it. No, I’ll -just have to wait till to-morrow, but I did want the money to-night.”</p> - -<p>Johnny stood irresolute for a minute or two; could he give -up his chance to watch that game of base-ball? But was not -this another chance? Yes, he would do it!</p> - -<p>“See here, Mrs. Waring,” he said, earnestly, “if it’s only to -watch the little chap, and keep him out of mischief, I could do -that, as well as anybody. He doesn’t seem afraid of me, and he -has lots of things here to play with. You just go, and I’ll stay -here till you come back—I suppose you’ll be back by five?”</p> - -<p>“Oh yes, easily,” she replied, “and I’d trust you with the -baby quick enough, for there’s not many boys would offer, but -I’m afraid your mother will worry about you if you stay so long. -And besides, I’d hate to keep you in the house such a nice, -bright afternoon.”</p> - -<p>“Mamma wouldn’t worry,” said Johnny. “She doesn’t -expect me home till tea time; and you needn’t mind keeping me -in, just for once.”</p> - -<p>There was a little more talk about it, and then Mrs. Waring -consented to go, and Johnny was left alone with the baby, whose -name, as he had ascertained, was Phil, and who seemed quite -pleased with his new nurse. He was a good-natured, rollicking -baby, and he pulled Johnny about the room, talking in his own<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_162"></a>[162]</span> -fashion, and trying one sort of mischief after another, looking -up with roguish laughter as Johnny gently stopped him. But -at last his fat legs seemed to grow tired, and he subsided on -the floor, where he actually remained quiet for five minutes, -trying to make his wooden horse -“eat” a large India-rubber ball. -Johnny found he was tired, too, -and he sat down on the sofa, where, -unfortunately, he had thrown his -school books. He picked up his -mental arithmetic.</p> - -<div class="figleft" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus64.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>“I’ll not study,” he said, as if -he were answering some one, “but -I just want to see if to-morrow’s lesson is hard.”</p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus65.jpg" width="200" height="175" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>It began with,—</p> - -<p>“If it takes four men three days to build five miles of stone -wall, how much can one man -build in a day?”</p> - -<p>What a question! Johnny’s -forehead puckered, he grasped -the book as if he would pinch -the answer out, and gradually -slipped down on the sofa, until -he came near joining the baby -on the floor. Meanwhile, -Master Phil, tired of feeding a horse who would not eat, began -to wrestle with the table-cover, and a large Bible, which lay -near the edge of the table, fell to the floor with a bang, narrowly -missing the baby’s head.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_163"></a>[163]</span></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;" id="fp4"> -<img src="images/fp4.jpg" width="500" height="700" alt="" /> -<p class="caption">MINDING THE BABY.</p> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_164"></a>[164]</span></p> - -<p>Johnny sprang to his feet, thoroughly roused and frightened, -for Phil, startled by the crash, and also expecting the -“Naughty baby!” and little slap on his hands which always followed -any unusual piece of mischief, burst into a roar, although -he was quite unable to squeeze out a single tear.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_165"></a>[165]</span></p> - -<p>But this Johnny was too much alarmed to notice, and, picking -up the offender as if he had been made of glass, the amateur -nurse felt him very carefully all over, to find out if any bones -were broken!</p> - -<p>When he came to the little sinner’s ribs, Phil made up his -baby mind that he was being tickled instead of scolded, and -roared again, but this time with laughter, in which Johnny could -not help joining, though he was provoked both with his interesting -charge and himself.</p> - -<p>“You little rascal!” he said, catching Phil up, and rolling -him on the sofa; “don’t you dare to wriggle off there till I -straighten up the muss you’ve made—do you hear me?”</p> - -<p>“Phil vely good boy now!” saying which, the baby folded -his fat hands together, and actually sat still until the table was -restored to order.</p> - -<p>Johnny gave the whole of his mind to his business, after this, -and when Mrs. Waring came back, she paused outside the window -to look and listen, and she laughed as she had not laughed -for many a day. For there was her “troublesome comfort,” on -Johnny’s back, shouting and shrieking with laughter, while -Johnny cantered up and down the room, rearing, bolting, plunging, -and whinnying.</p> - -<p>“I don’t know how to thank you enough, dear,” she said,<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_166"></a>[166]</span> -gratefully, when she at last opened the door. “I’ve got my -money, and bought all I shall need for three or four days, and -the walk’s done me good, and you’ve given baby such a game of -romps as he hasn’t had in a month of Sundays. Poor little soul, -it goes to my heart to pen him up so, but how am I to help it? -He’ll sleep like a top to-night, and so shall I. You tell your -dear mother that I say she has a son to be proud of.”</p> - -<p>Johnny colored high with pleasure, and plans for missionary -work among unplayed-with babies began to flock into his mind. -He said nothing of them, however, remembering, just in time, -one of his father’s rules,—</p> - -<p>“Never promise the smallest thing which you are not sure of -being able to perform.”</p> - -<p>So he only said, heartily,—</p> - -<p>“I’m very glad if I’ve helped you, Mrs. Waring; he’s a jolly -little chap, and it has really been good fun for both of us. But -I ought to tell you—I began to study a little, when he seemed -busy with his toys, and next thing I knew, he pulled off the -table-cover and that large Bible, and it wasn’t my doings that it -didn’t smash him!”</p> - -<p>“Oh well, it didn’t! And a miss is as good as a mile,” said -Mrs. Waring, cheerfully. She was so used to Phil’s hair-breadth -escapes, that this one did not seem worth mentioning.</p> - -<p>But Johnny went home, thinking at a great rate. Learning -lessons was not wrong, nobody could say that it was. But it -seemed that a thing good in itself could be made wrong, by -being allowed to get out of place.</p> - -<p>“It’s like what mamma said about ‘watching,’” he thought;<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_167"></a>[167]</span> -“it isn’t that we must not ever do anything besides, but we -mustn’t let anything ‘come between.’ If that little scamp had -gone to sleep, now, it would have been no harm at all to pull -my chair up to the sofa, so that he couldn’t roll off, and study -till he woke. But he didn’t go to sleep!”</p> - -<p>He had almost forgotten the base-ball match, and his brief, -but very sharp feeling of disappointment. The “reward” is -sure; not praise and petting, not the giving back to you that -which you have foregone, but “the answer of a good conscience,” -the “peace which the world cannot give,” the fresh strength -which comes with every victory, however small, and which may, -by God’s grace, be wrested even from defeat, when defeat is -made the stepping-stone to conquest.</p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_168"></a>[168]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_XVI">CHAPTER XVI.<br /> -<span class="smaller">ENLISTING.</span></h2> - -</div> - -<div> -<img class="dropcap" src="images/dropcap-ch16.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p class="dropcap">It was Sunday, and Jim was walking home -from church with the Leslies. A gradual, -but very great change had come over him -since Taffy’s death. He had grown nearly -as cheerful as he was before it happened, -and did not seem to be exactly unhappy, -but only the day before, Johnny had said -to his mother,—</p> - -<p>“I don’t think Jim can be well, mamma; he let slip the best -kind of a chance for taking me off, the way he’s so fond of -doing, this morning, and when I come to think of it, he hasn’t -said any of those things for a good while.”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Leslie smiled at Johnny’s conclusion; she did not think -that was the reason, and she said,—</p> - -<p>“He looks perfectly well, dear. He is growing fast, and -so getting thinner, but I don’t see any signs of ill health -about him.”</p> - -<p>“There’s something about him,” said Johnny, in puzzled -tones, “I never knew him to miss a chance of saying one of his -sharp things, till lately; in fact, I used to think he was watching -out for them!”</p> - -<p>Johnny had not been mistaken in thinking so. Somebody has<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_169"></a>[169]</span> -said that if we look to the very root of our ill-will against anyone, -we shall find that it is envy; and though this does not, -perhaps, always hold good, it certainly does in many instances. -Ever since Jim had known Johnny, there had been in his heart -an unacknowledged feeling of envy, of which he was himself -only dimly aware. Why should Johnny have been given that -safe, pleasant home, with a father and mother and sister of -whom he could be both fond and proud, while he, Jim, was left -to fight for even his daily bread, with no ready-made home and -friends, such as most people had? For even among the boys -with whom he was chiefly thrown, many had some place which -they called home, and somebody who cared, were it ever so little, -whether they lived or died. He persuaded himself that it was -because Johnny was “foolish,” and “needed taking down” that -he said disagreeable things to him, but, since Taffy died, he had, -as he expressed it to himself, been “sorting himself out, and -didn’t think much of the stock.”</p> - -<p>His face, this morning, wore a troubled look, which Mrs. -Leslie was quick to notice, but she had learned that, in dealing -with Jim, she must use very much the same tactics that one uses -in trying to tame some little wild creature of the woods—a -sudden attack, or even approach, scared him off effectually; and -although now he no longer ran, literally, as he had done at first, -he would take refuge in silence, or an awkward changing of the -subject.</p> - -<p>She had stopped asking him to take meals with them, when -she saw how it distressed him. He was painfully conscious of -his want of training, and shrank from exposing it, and he was<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_170"></a>[170]</span> -shrewd enough to know that there is no surer test of “manners” -than behavior at the table.</p> - -<p>But the evening visits, begun with the making of the gardens, -and the reading and singing lessons, she had managed to have -continued after the gardens were frostbitten, and the early -nightfall made the evenings long. Yet even about this she had -been obliged to exercise a great deal of tact and care. Jim had -announced that the lessons were to end the moment there was -no more work for him to do, and she knew that he meant what -he said, so, after thinking a good deal, she appealed to Mr. -Leslie for help.</p> - -<p>“You don’t happen to want kindling-wood just now, perhaps?” -he asked, after thinking a little.</p> - -<p>“Don’t I?” she replied. “Why, we <i>always</i> want kindling-wood! -I believe that fair kitchen-maid could burn ‘the full of -the cellar,’ as she would put it, in a week, if she could get that -much to burn.”</p> - -<p>“Oh, well then,” said Mr. Leslie, cheerfully, “It’s all right. -I happen to know where I can get a wagon load of pine logs -and stumps, in comparison with which a ram’s horn is a ruler! -I should think half a stump, or one log, an evening might be -considered a fair allowance, and you shall have them before the -gardens are done for, to make sure. You can explain to your -muscular scholar that, by having a few days’ allowance chopped -at a time, the reckless maiden can be kept within bounds. But -Jim will have my sympathy when he comes to those stumps!”</p> - -<p>“He will like it all the better for being so hard, I do believe,” -replied Mrs. Leslie, and this proved to be true. When<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_171"></a>[171]</span> -Jim had wrestled for half an hour with a stump which looked -like a collection of buffaloes’ heads, he sat down to his lesson -with calm satisfaction; no one could say that he had not -earned it.</p> - -<p>Mrs. Leslie had been very much pleased by his consent to -share the Sunday evening talk—for it could scarcely be called -a lesson—without offering to do anything in return, and, -although he had always been respectfully attentive, she had -noticed a growing interest and earnestness, since Taffy’s death, -which made her feel very glad and hopeful.</p> - -<p>She could not help thinking, to-day, as she glanced at Jim, of -the great change in his appearance. He had bought a cheap, -but neat and well-fitting suit of dark clothes, and he still wore -the little black necktie. This suit he kept strictly for Sundays, -except that he always brought the coat on his lesson evenings, -and put it on when his chopping was done. He was very careful, -now, to be clean and neat, even when he wore his old -clothes.</p> - -<p>Extraordinary patches and darns had taken the place of rents -and holes, about which, formerly, he had neither thought nor -cared. His face had always been honest and cheerful, and a -new gentleness made it, now, very pleasant to look at. And he -was growing tall. He had always been somewhat taller than -Johnny, and now he overtopped him by a head, a fact which -gave Johnny no satisfaction whatever. Mrs. Leslie bade Jim -goodbye at the gate, with an allusion to their meeting in the -evening, and he assured her that he was coming.</p> - -<p>“Something is troubling Jim,” she said to the children, as<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_172"></a>[172]</span> -they all went upstairs, “and I want very much, if I can do it -without asking impertinent questions, to find out what it is. -Perhaps we could help him.”</p> - -<p>“<i>You</i> could, mamma dear,” said Johnny, “even if Tiny and I -couldn’t. Jim’s queer; he doesn’t like to talk things out, the way -I do—and I’ll tell you what, Tiny, I think you and I had better -leave Jim alone with mamma a little while, when we’ve finished -talking about our verses. He’d be much more apt to tell her if -there were nobody else there.”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Leslie kissed her boy very lovingly. He was growing in -the grace of unselfishness and thoughtfulness for others, in a way -that warmed her heart.</p> - -<p>Jim brought a great bunch of wild roses to Mrs. Leslie, when -he came that evening, and she -thanked him warmly.</p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 150px;"> -<img src="images/illus66.jpg" width="150" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>“I did not think they had come -yet,” she said, “and I never feel as -if summer were really here to stay -until the roses come. Where did -you find them, dear?”</p> - -<p>Jim’s heavy face brightened for -a moment. He saw that Mrs. -Leslie had called him “dear” without -knowing it—just as naturally -as she said it to Johnny, and a wave of happy feeling went -over his heart.</p> - -<p>“Away out in the country, down a lane,” he said, “but I -don’t know just where. I walked further than I’ve ever gone<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_173"></a>[173]</span> -yet, this afternoon, straight out into the fields. I meant to go -to church, but I felt full of walk, somehow, and as if my legs -wouldn’t keep still, and I got to thinking, as I went along, and -first thing I knew, I was about half a mile beyond the church! -So I just kept right on, and I -don’t see what folks live in cities -for, anyhow—even little cities -like this. I was under a big -tree, lying on the grass, for an -hour or so, and—”</p> - -<div class="figleft" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus67.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>Jim stopped suddenly, for want -of words that exactly suited him.</p> - -<p>Mrs. Leslie thanked him again -for the roses, and Tiny ran to -fill the “very prettiest” vase with -water. And then they settled down to their talk about the Sunday-school -lesson which they had all recited that morning. It -was the story of Nicodemus; his “coming -by night” to the Saviour, and hearing about -the “new birth unto righteousness.”</p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 125px;"> -<img src="images/illus68.jpg" width="125" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>For these Sunday evening talks, they -always sat in the library, and, unless the -evening was quite too warm, a little wood -fire sparkled on the hearth, and no other -light disputed its right to make the room -cheerful. Tiny and Johnny had become -skilful in building these little fires, in a way -to make them give light, rather than warmth, so to-night,<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_174"></a>[174]</span> -although the windows were open to the soft summer-twilight air, -three or four pine-knots blazed -upon the hearth, and sent dancing -shadows about the room. Mrs. -Leslie had noticed that, in this -close companionship and half light, -the reserve and restraint which -sometimes tied Jim’s tongue seemed -taken away.</p> - -<div class="figleft" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus69.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>The cause of the trouble which -showed so plainly in his face came -out by degrees, as the lesson was discussed.</p> - -<p>“I felt somehow, when Taffy died,” he said, “as if I’d been -walking the other way, and I’ve been trying to turn ’round, and -travel towards where I hope he is. And I don’t mean, either, -that I’ve been trying just by myself; I’ve been asking, you -know, for help, and it seemed to me I got it, whenever I asked -in dead earnest. And then, when I was going over the lesson -for to-day, it seemed to mean that people who got religion got it -all of a sudden, and didn’t want to do, or say, or think any of -the bad things they’d been full of, any more, and down I went, -right there, for no matter how I try, and ask, and mean, to keep -straight, I don’t do it; in fact, it’s seemed to me lately, that the -more I try the more I don’t, and—and—if it wasn’t for Taffy, -and all of you, Mrs. Leslie, I’d just give the whole thing up, and -try to forget it, and be comfortable! It’s too much to ask of -anybody, if it’s that way!”</p> - -<p>He spoke with increasing warmth, and in a curiously injured -tone, almost as if he thought he had been deceived.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_175"></a>[175]</span></p> - -<p>Mrs. Leslie laid her hand gently on his, saying,—</p> - -<p>“Dear Jim, God never asks impossibilities. The new birth -is the giving ourselves wholly to Him, the full surrender, keeping -back nothing from His service. The other part, the making -into His likeness, is always the work of a lifetime. And He -knows that; He knows all we have to contend with. Don’t -you remember—‘He knoweth whereof we are made, He remembereth -that we are but dust’—so, while we must not make -excuses for ourselves, beforehand, we may be very sure that, -after every unwilling fall, He will help us up again, and freely -forgive us.”</p> - -<p>“But there’s something else”—and Jim’s face still looked -cloudy—“I don’t see how it is, anyhow, that after we say we’ll -be His, and try to do what we think He would like, He <i>lets</i> us -fall. Couldn’t He keep us up, and keep us going, in spite of -ourselves?”</p> - -<p>“My dear,” said Mrs. Leslie, very solemnly, “that is the -question which has puzzled and staggered God’s people for ages, -or rather, the people who are only partly His. And there is no -answer for it. All we know is just this, that there are two -great powers abroad in the world, the power of God, and that of -the devil; that if we choose God’s service and protection, He -will join His mighty will to our weak ones, and that then we -can be ‘more than conquerors,’ but that if we let go this stronghold, -we are at the mercy of every sinful impulse and wicked -desire. With His help, we may attain to strength, and victory, -and peace, and if we do not, it is simply because we refuse this -‘ever-present help.’ And when we turn away from Him, when<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_176"></a>[176]</span> -we withhold our allegiance, we never know how many others -will be turned away by our example, nor how terribly we may -be hindering the coming of God’s kingdom. Questioning and -doubting are worse than useless; we are told that we shall -‘know hereafter,’ and where we place our love we may well -place our trust. Now, I wish you to do something for me. I -wish you to notice how those who are really, with heart and soul, -following the Master are held above the things which other -people count troubles and trials. There are too many who are -only half-heartedly following, and how can these expect more -than half a blessing? And one more thing; you have not yet -confessed your allegiance. If you wished to be a soldier in -your country’s army, what would be the very first thing for -you to do?”</p> - -<p>“Go to headquarters, and say so, and have my name put -down,” said Jim, slowly and reluctantly.</p> - -<p>“Yes. And that is the first thing, now. Own to the world -that you are His, that you mean, with his help, to ‘fight manfully -under his banner,’ and then He will ‘surely fulfil’ His part -of the contract. Will you do this, dear?”</p> - -<p>There was a breathless pause. Tiny’s hand stole into Jim’s -on one side, Johnny’s on the other; Mrs. Leslie’s motherly hand -was pressed lightly on his head. With a sudden burst of tears, -he said, brokenly,—</p> - -<p>“I will! I will! I knew I ought to, but the devil’s been -putting me off with all this—this—” he stopped as suddenly -as he had begun.</p> - -<p>Mrs. Leslie rose and knelt, and the others knelt with her.<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_177"></a>[177]</span> -Briefly and fervently she prayed for a blessing upon Jim’s -resolve, and that he might be “strengthened with all might” to -carry it out.</p> - -<p>“Nothing is so dreadful as the want of love and faith,” she -said, presently, “and against this you must fight and pray. -Times will come to you, as they come to all of us, dear, when it -must be just a sheer holding on to that which you have proved; -but never, never listen to those who would take away your -stronghold, and who offer less than nothing in exchange.”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Leslie’s good-night kiss when he rose to go—the first -kiss he could remember having received—seemed to him like a -seal upon all that she had said. He felt brave, and strong, and -free; the fears which had held him down were gone, and when, -on the following Sunday afternoon, he took the vows of allegiance -to the great Captain of our salvation, there was a ring of -glad triumph in his strong young voice, as if, at the beginning -of the battle, he saw the victor’s crown.</p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_178"></a>[178]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_XVII">CHAPTER XVII.<br /> -<span class="smaller">THE WRONG END.</span></h2> - -</div> - -<div> -<img class="dropcap" src="images/dropcap-ch17.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p class="dropcap">There was no doubt about it—Johnny -had, to use one of his own expressions, -“got up wrong end foremost,” that morning. -Not that he had really and literally -come out of bed upon his head instead of -his feet; that would not have mattered at -all, for he would have been right end up -again in a minute. No, it was much worse than that, for the -plain English of it was, that he was in a very bad humor, and -did not know it!</p> - -<p>What he thought he knew was, that everything went wrong. -The fire had gone out in the furnace, the night before, and his -room, although by no means freezing cold, was uncomfortably -chilly. A button snapped off his new school jacket as he was -dressing; the bell rang before he was quite ready, and he had -intended, lately, to be punctual at every meal, “really and -truly”; it was one of the ways in which, without saying anything -about it, he was trying to do right.</p> - -<p>He was only a moment or two late, after all; the rest of the -family had only just sat down, and he was in time for grace, but -he felt “flustered.” He was ashamed to grumble aloud when -he found the smoking brown batter-cakes were “only flannel-cakes,”<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_179"></a>[179]</span> -instead of his favorite buckwheats, but his face certainly -grumbled.</p> - -<p>He strapped his books together, after breakfast, with a good -deal of needless force; the strap suddenly gave way, and the -books flew about the floor in various directions.</p> - -<p>“Bother the old strap!” said Johnny, savagely, as he gathered -up his books.</p> - -<p>“I think the old strap has bothered you!” said Tiny, merrily, -as she stooped to help him.</p> - -<p>“I wouldn’t be so silly, if I were you, Tiny!” and Johnny -turned his nose up, and the corners of his mouth down, all -at once.</p> - -<p>“Oh yes you would, don’t you see, Johnny, if you <i>were</i> me!” -and Tiny laughed again. She thought Johnny was being solemn -“for fun,” or she would not have laughed.</p> - -<p>Johnny grunted something which sounded a little like “thank -you,” as she handed him the last book, and a nice strong piece -of twine, which was conveniently lying in a little coil on the -table. The strap had broken in the middle, so there was no use -in trying to do anything with it, and he discontentedly used the -twine instead. His mother passed through the hall just as he -was tying up his books, and, seeing the broken strap, said -pleasantly,—</p> - -<p>“So the new jacket must needs have a new strap to keep it -company? How much will it be? Fifteen cents? Well, here -it is—you can buy one as you come home from school, I am -afraid you would hardly have time before.”</p> - -<p>Johnny thanked his mother, and kissed her goodbye, with a -pretty good grace; he even said, of his own accord,—</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_180"></a>[180]</span></p> - -<p>“I’m afraid I pulled a little harder than I needed to, mamma, -but the old thing couldn’t have been good for much, anyway, to -break just for that!”</p> - -<p>“It will make lovely trunk-straps; and a shawl-strap too. -May I have it, Johnny?” and Tiny measured the pieces approvingly -on her finger, as she spoke. It is needless to say that the -articles she mentioned were for the latest addition to her doll -family.</p> - -<p>“Oh yes, you may have it, but how girls can be so foolish -about dolls—!” and Johnny marched off, leaving Tiny to make -the most of this gracious permission.</p> - -<p>“I was afraid he would want it for a sling or something,” -she said, contentedly. “<i>You</i> don’t think dolls are foolish, do -you, mamma?”</p> - -<p>“No, darling, or I wouldn’t have helped papa to give you -that beauty for Christmas. I cared more for my dolls than for -all the rest of my toys put together, and while you are such a -good mother to your family, and make such neat clothes for it, -and at the same time are such a good little daughter to me, I -shall find no fault with either the dolls or their mamma.”</p> - -<p>Tiny looked very much pleased, and went, in her usual orderly -manner, to put the strap away, until she could coax Johnny into -cutting it up for her. It was remarkable, considering his contempt -for the whole doll race, how much he had done to better -its condition! Trunks and furniture, vehicles of various sorts, -and even a complete summer residence, had in turn been coaxed -from him, and not a few of Tiny’s small playmates openly -expressed the wish that they had brothers “just like Johnny -Leslie.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_181"></a>[181]</span></p> - -<p>Though the cloud had lifted for a moment, it lowered again -as Johnny walked to school. The twine cut his hand, the wind -blew his hat off, as he was passing Jim’s stand, and I am afraid -that Jim’s kindness in picking up and restoring the wanderer, -just before it reached the gutter, was quite lost sight of because -Jim clapped it on Johnny’s head with rather more force than -was strictly necessary.</p> - -<p>“Got the toothache?” asked Jim, sympathizingly, as he -caught sight of Johnny’s glum face.</p> - -<p>“No; what makes you think I have?” and Johnny -“bristled”; he was not a little afraid of Jim’s sharp tongue.</p> - -<p>“Oh, I thought I saw a sort of a swelled-out look around -your mouth,” said Jim, very gravely, “and you don’t look happy; -and those two things are what I heard a big doctor call symptom-atic!”</p> - -<p>Johnny’s face cleared a little.</p> - -<p>“Look out you don’t choke, Jim,” he said, briskly, and, with -a nod by way of good morning, began to run, to make up for -lost time.</p> - -<p>He barely did it, and he felt that he was looking red and -breathless, while everybody else had a particularly cool and comfortable -expression—“as if they’d been here a week!” he -grumbled to himself.</p> - -<p>Things went on in this style all day. He nearly quarrelled -with one of his best friends, at recess, about such a mere trifle -that he was ashamed to remember it, afterward. His sums -“came wrong”; he lost a place in one of his classes; he tripped -and tumbled, scattering his books again, just as he was starting<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_182"></a>[182]</span> -for home; the stationery store was entirely out of book straps, -and although the polite stationer promised to have a very superior -one, direct from the saddle-and-harness-maker’s, by the next -afternoon, at latest, Johnny was not consoled.</p> - -<p>So, altogether, he came home in a rather worse humor than -that in which he had gone away, and although, fortunately, -nothing happened to cause an explosion, he certainly did not -add to the general happiness at the tea table. He studied his -lessons in silence, for the half hour after tea which was all the -evening time he was allowed for study, and then took up a book -in which he had been very much interested, but it seemed suddenly -to have turned dull, and he rose with unusual promptness, -when the clock struck nine, and bade his father good night. -His good night to his mother came later, when he was snugly -in bed.</p> - -<p>“Don’t you feel well to-night, my boy?” asked Mr. Leslie, -laying a kind hand on Johnny’s head, as he spoke.</p> - -<p>“Oh, yes, papa, I’m all right, I suppose,” replied Johnny, -soberly, “but it just seems as if everything had gone sort of -upside down, to-day, somehow!”</p> - -<p>“Will you allow me to try a simple and comparatively painless -experiment upon you, John?”</p> - -<p>Mr. Leslie spoke very seriously, but there was a twinkle in -his eye which Johnny well knew meant mischief. It meant fun, -too, though, and Johnny replied with equal gravity,—</p> - -<p>“Certainly, papa, unless it is very painful.”</p> - -<p>He had hardly finished speaking when, with alarming suddenness, -he found himself standing on his head, his feet held<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_183"></a>[183]</span> -firmly up in the air by his father’s strong hands. He was -reversed, immediately, and Mr. Leslie inquired,—</p> - -<p>“How did the world—or what you saw of it—look to you -while you were standing on your head, my son?”</p> - -<p>“Why, upside down, papa, of course!” said Johnny, laughing -in spite of himself as he recalled the queer effect which had -come from seeing everything, apparently, hanging from the ceiling, -“without visible means of support.”</p> - -<p>“Do you believe,” continued Mr. Leslie, “that the world -really <i>was</i> upside down for a moment?”</p> - -<p>“Why no, papa; I’m not such a goose as all that, I hope!”</p> - -<p>“And yet,” said Mr. Leslie, thoughtfully, “I think you remarked, -a while ago, that it seemed as if everything had sort of -gone upside down to-day.”</p> - -<p>“But that’s quite different, papa,” said Johnny, hastily.</p> - -<p>“Oh!” said Mr. Leslie, “When mamma comes to tuck you -up, suppose you ask her to tell you the story of The Little Boy -and the Field Glass. Good night, my dear little son, and pleasant, -right-side-up dreams to you!”</p> - -<p>Johnny went off, almost in a good humor. It was not the -first time he had taken what his father called “an order for -a story” to his mother, and he knew he should hear something -entertaining, even though, as his heart misgave him, he should -also be made to feel the point of the story a little.</p> - -<p>His mother laughed when she, heard the “order.”</p> - -<p>“I must make haste,” she said, “or you’ll lose your beauty -sleep; but, fortunately, it is not a long story.”</p> - -<p>“Once upon a time there was a little boy about five years<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_184"></a>[184]</span> -old, who had been very ill indeed, and, when he grew well -enough to be up and dressed, the doctor said he must be taken -to the sea-side. So his mother took -him for two weeks to a beautiful -rocky place on the New England -coast.”</p> - -<div class="figleft" style="width: 175px;"> -<img src="images/illus70.jpg" width="175" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus71.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>“Like Prout’s Neck, mamma?”</p> - -<p>“Very much like Prout’s Neck, -dear. And she put a little blue -flannel suit, and a big hat on him, -and tried to keep him out in the -salt air and the sunshine all day. -But he was weak, and grew tired very soon, and did not seem to -feel able to play with the healthy, strong little children, of -whom there were plenty about, and -he used to beg to go indoors, and -be read to, so that his mother was -very glad when the kind-hearted -old sailor, whose wife kept the -boarding-house, offered them the -use of a fine field-glass.</p> - -<p>“‘The little man can lie on the -rocks and watch the ships go by,’ -said the captain, ‘and he’ll soon -lose that peak-ed look he has, and be as brown as a berry.’</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_185"></a>[185]</span></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;" id="fp5"> -<img src="images/fp5.jpg" width="500" height="700" alt="" /> -<p class="caption">THE FIELD-GLASS.</p> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_186"></a>[186]</span></p> - -<p>“And sure enough, the boy was quite willing, now, to go out -and sit on the rocks, for he was eager to use the wonderful glass, -which was to make the great ships seem almost within reach of<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_187"></a>[187]</span> -his hand. He took the glass, and when his mother had screwed -it to the right length, he put it to his eyes, and slowly turned -about, first toward the sea, then toward the house where they -were lodging, and last to his mother; then he let the glass -drop, with a puzzled, almost frightened look on his little face.</p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus72.jpg" width="200" height="150" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>“‘Why, mamma!’ he said, ‘the ships look miles and miles -and miles farther away, and the captain’s house looks like -a pigeon-house, and -you look like a little -bit of a girl at the -end of a great long -lane. And the captain -said it would -make everything -look large and -near.’” Johnny began -to laugh.</p> - -<p>“What a little goose!” he said. “He’d turned the -wrong end foremost, hadn’t he, mamma?”</p> - -<p>“That was just what he had done,” said Mrs. Leslie, smiling, -“and you should have seen his face clear, and have heard his -exclamations of delight, when his mother showed him how to -use the glass, and he turned it the right way. There was no -more trouble about keeping him out of doors, after that. And -now, perhaps you’d like to know who he was. His name was -Johnny Leslie, and he had just had measles.”</p> - -<p>“Oh, mamma! Really and truly? I remember all about the -sea and the rocks, but I’d forgotten about the glass. What a<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_188"></a>[188]</span> -little simpleton I must have been! And I do believe I’ve been -growing into a bigger one ever since! I see what papa meant, -now. But just look here, mamma—how <i>could</i> things have -seemed right to-day, any way I looked at them?”</p> - -<p>And Johnny gave a rapid sketch of his various annoyances -and misfortunes.</p> - -<p>“It’s too late to settle all that to-night,” said his mother, -“and besides, I’d rather have you think it all out for yourself, -first, so we will postpone the ‘how’ till to-morrow night. Can -you say ‘Let me with light and truth be blest,’ for me, before -I go?”</p> - -<p>It was the psalm Johnny had learned for the previous Sunday, -and he said it very perfectly, for he had liked it, and so -remembered it better than he did some things. His mother -tucked him up, and kissed him, and left him with his heart full -of love and repentance, and a determination to “begin all over -again” the next morning.</p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_189"></a>[189]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_XVIII">CHAPTER XVIII.<br /> -<span class="smaller">TURNING THE GLASS.</span></h2> - -</div> - -<div> -<img class="dropcap" src="images/dropcap-ch18.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p class="dropcap">Johnny did a good deal of thinking, at -odd times, the next day, and the more he -thought, the more he saw why his mother -had wanted him to think, before their -next talk. As he picked up his injuries, -and looked at them one by one, trying to -do it as if he had been somebody else, -they looked so very different, that he wondered how he could -have been so blind, and when his mother came, as usual, for the -talk, he was inclined to beg off from going into particulars. -But he decided not to, for he was very certain that he had never -yet been sorry for talking things out with his mother. So he -faced the music, and declared himself ready to “begin at the -beginning and go on to the end.”</p> - -<p>“What was the first thing that went wrong?” inquired Mrs. -Leslie, as she touched up Johnny’s hair with her nice soft fingers, -adding, before he could answer, “You shall tell me how the -things looked to you yesterday, and then I will turn the glass -for you.”</p> - -<p>“The first thing,” said Johnny, “was, that when I got up -my room was cold—or no, not exactly cold, perhaps, but sort of -chilly and uncomfortable, and when I opened the register, only<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_190"></a>[190]</span> -cold, cellar-y air came up; and you know, mamma, that generally, -when I turn on the heat, it’s warm in five minutes.”</p> - -<p>“What a comfortable state of things!” said his mother, “to -have, always, a nice warm room in which to wash and dress, and -what a good thing it was that on the very night when, for the -first time in weeks, the furnace fire went out, the weather was -so mild that the house was only chilly, not really cold. Next!”</p> - -<p>“A button came off my new jacket, and though it was the -last one, and didn’t matter much, just for one day, it provoked -me to have it come off then, when I was in a hurry.”</p> - -<p>“It was such a good thing that it wasn’t the top button!” -said his mother, brightly, “and that I had a new jacket at all, -at all! Next!”</p> - -<p>“I said my prayers too fast, mamma, and I’m afraid I didn’t -think them much.”</p> - -<p>“There is nothing to make up for that, dear,” said his -mother, gravely and sadly; “but the ‘hearty repentance,’ and -‘steadfast purpose’ can follow even that downfall, as I think -you know.”</p> - -<p>“I’d be in a bad way if I didn’t, mamma, for it does seem to -me that I go down just as fast as I get up! Then I was provoked -that I came so near being late for breakfast; I was only -just in time, you know, for all I’d got up when I was called.”</p> - -<p>“But you were in time, dear, and it was not your fault that -the button came off your jacket, and delayed you, so that should -not have worried you. Well, what came next?”</p> - -<p>“Oh mamma, you’ll think I’m only a baby!” and Johnny -hid his face in his mother’s neck. “I was vexed because<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_191"></a>[191]</span> -we had flannel cakes for breakfast, instead of buckwheat -cakes!”</p> - -<p>“But they were such very good flannel cakes. And that new -maple syrup would almost have made them seem good, even if -they had been poor.”</p> - -<p>“I know—it was only because I was in such a bad humor. -The next was my book strap; I suppose I did pull too hard, for -I felt like pulling something. But it was such a nice strap, -when it was new, and such a bother to carry my books in a piece -of twine! And the ridiculous things went flying all over the -entry—or ’most all over.”</p> - -<p>“And a kind little sister flew to the rescue, and was too -loving even to know that she was growled at,” answered Mrs. -Leslie, “and a dear old mother came forward in the handsomest -manner, without even waiting to be asked, and subscribed the -price of a new strap for the sufferer.”</p> - -<p>“A dear young, lovely, beautiful mother!” and Johnny gave -her a hug which made her beg for mercy. Then he went on.</p> - -<p>“My hat blew off just as I was passing Jim’s place, and he -clapped it on my head about five times as hard as he needed to, -but you’ll have to let me tell the other end of that, mamma. It -was nearly in the gutter when he caught it, and the gutter was -full of dirty water and mud, and I never half thanked him, -because I was afraid he was making fun of me. Then I had to -run to make up the time I had lost talking to Jim, and I just -saved my distance—the bell rang before I was fairly in my seat.”</p> - -<p>“Then you were in time to answer to your name, and didn’t -get a bad mark. That was a comfort. Next!”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_192"></a>[192]</span></p> - -<p>“I was ’most ready to fight Ned, because he said he was -taller than I am, and he walked off and left me, and didn’t come -near me all the rest of the day.”</p> - -<p>“And so avoided having a quarrel with you, for I suppose he -saw that if you stayed together you would be very apt to quarrel. -I think that was sensible.”</p> - -<p>“Yes, I know it was, now, and I’m very glad he did it, but -it only made me more provoked, then. The next was, I had to -do all my sums over twice, and some of them three times, and I -missed a question, and lost my place in the mental arithmetic -class—my place that I’ve kept all this term, next but one to -the head, and ’most all the boys in the class are older than I am.”</p> - -<p>“I have noticed that you were careless about your arithmetic -lessons lately,” said his mother, “I think you have depended too -much upon your natural quickness, and not enough upon study, -and I hope that these two little defeats will be the cause of far -greater victories.”</p> - -<p>“Yes, mamma, I think they will. I didn’t think it was -worth while to study that lesson much, but I know it is, now. -Then I had a most ridiculous tumble, just as I was leaving the -playground, and my books went flying again. I was glad there -was nobody by but one of the little fellows, and he didn’t laugh -a bit. He asked me if I was hurt, as if he’d been my grandfather, -and helped me pick up my books, too; he’s a good little -chap; so that’s the other end of that! Then they hadn’t any -book straps left at the store, and Mr. Dutton couldn’t promise -me one for certain till this afternoon, because he had to have it -made at Skilley’s.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_193"></a>[193]</span></p> - -<p>“Then you will be sure of a good strong, well-made one, for -all the work they do at Skilley’s seems to be well done. It was -worth waiting, to have a better strap, wasn’t it?”</p> - -<p>“Yes, mamma, such a little wait as that. I got it this afternoon, -and it is a beauty—nearly twice as long as the old one, -and with such a nice strong buckle. And he didn’t charge a bit -more, either. Yes, I see it, now; I was looking through the -wrong end of the spyglass, all yesterday. But how can anybody -see a thing when he doesn’t see it, mamma? I couldn’t have -seen everything this way yesterday, no matter how hard I might -have tried.”</p> - -<p>“Are you quite sure about that, dear?” asked Mrs. Leslie. -“If you had tried <i>very</i> hard, from the beginning, don’t you -think you could have turned your spyglass, by school time at -latest? When things seem to be going wrong, we have only to -behave as we should do if we had lost some earthly possession, -that we valued very much,—look carefully back to where the -trouble seemed to begin, and then, if we can, set straight whatever -went wrong there. You may be very sure, always, when -you feel as you felt yesterday morning, that you are the one -chiefly, if not wholly, in fault, and you should lose no time in -arresting yourself, and pronouncing sentence.</p> - -<p>“And another thing; you had far better accuse yourself -wrongly a dozen times, than anybody else once. Few things -grow upon people so fast as complaining, and suspecting, and -fault-finding do; and few faults cause more unhappiness to the -people who commit them, for to anybody on the look out for -slights and disagreeable things, they are to be found everywhere,<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_194"></a>[194]</span> -and all the time. So watch the beginnings, dear. There is the -whole thing, in two words, ‘Watch and pray.’”</p> - -<p>“I hope I’m not going to be one of those dreadful people!” -and Johnny sighed. The “Hill Difficulty” looked rather long -and steep, just then.</p> - -<p>“I don’t think you are, my darling,” said his mother, cheerfully. -“Knowing the danger is half the battle, and I think you -are awake to it, now. If you wish to think kindly of people, -make them think kindly of you; lose no opportunity to help, -and comfort, and do good, and you will find it more and more -easy to believe in the good-will of every one around you.”</p> - -<p>“You’ve turned the field-glass around for me again, mamma. -What a poor concern I’d be if it wasn’t for you! But as long -as you don’t give up, I’ll try not to, though it’s pretty discouraging -sometimes; now isn’t it?”</p> - -<p>“It would be,” said his mother, with another loving kiss, “if -we did not so well ‘know in whom we have believed.’ He -lets us cast <i>all</i> our care on Him, for He is ‘mighty to save.’ -Now good-night, darling. It is high time you were asleep. -To-morrow will be a bright, brand-new day!”</p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_195"></a>[195]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_XIX">CHAPTER XIX.<br /> -<span class="smaller">AT THE FARM.</span></h2> - -</div> - -<div> -<img class="dropcap" src="images/dropcap-ch19.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p class="dropcap">When Tiny and Johnny had measles, as -they had so many things, together, one -spring, they were both left rather weak -and good-for-nothing, so Mr. Leslie, after -a good deal of hunting, found a farmhouse -which seemed to him about what -he wanted, and took board there for the -whole summer, and the whole family. -He meant to arrange his work so that he could often take a -two-or-three-days’ holiday, beside going home every evening, for -he was never so busy -in the summer as he -was in the winter, and -he felt the need of rest -and change.</p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus73.jpg" width="200" height="150" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>It was a “really and -truly farmhouse,” as -Tiny said, standing -back from the road, at -the end of a long green -lane, shaded by tall, -thick pine trees. And, better still, the nearest railway station<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_196"></a>[196]</span> -was five miles away, and a large, old-fashioned stage, drawn by -two tall, thin horses, met the morning and evening trains.</p> - -<div class="figleft" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus74.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>The farmhouse was long and low, with a gambrel roof and -great dormer windows, and what -garrets that combination makes! -It was whitewashed all over the -outside—and the inside, too, -for that matter—and had faded -green shutters. There was a -large porch at the front door, -with benches at each side, and -a small one at the back door, -and a wide hall ran straight -through the middle of the house, from one porch to the other.</p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus75.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>The farm was no make-believe affair of a few acres, with -only two or three horses and -cows, and a flock of chickens. -Orchards and grain fields, -meadows and “truck-patches,” -stretched away on all sides, -almost as far as one could see. -Twenty sleek cows came meekly -every morning and evening to -be milked; six horses were to -be watered three times a day; -at least a hundred solemn black -chickens, with white topknots, scratched about the great barn. -Turkeys strutted, ducks and geese quacked, and there was<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_197"></a>[197]</span> -even a pair of proud peacocks. In short, Johnny informed -Tiny, before they had been there a day, that it was exactly the -sort of farm he meant to have -when he was grown up; the -only difference he should make -would be to have the slide down -the side of the haymow a little -higher, and to turn half the farmhouse -into a gymnasium.</p> - -<div class="figleft" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus76.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>Mr. and Mrs. Allen, who -owned this land of enchantment, -and let people live in it for six -dollars a week, apiece, were kind, comfortable people, who liked -to see their boarders eat heartily, and drink plenty of milk.</p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 175px;"> -<img src="images/illus77.jpg" width="175" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>They had two tall sunburnt “boys,” who did most of the -farm work, except in the very busy -season, when three or four “hired -men” helped them. And they had -two daughters, one a fine, handsome -girl, twenty years old, and the other -three or four years older, and with no -beauty in her face but that of a very -sweet and pleasant expression. It -was this one, whose name was Ann, -who showed the tired travellers to -their rooms, on the evening of their -arrival, and waited on them while they ate their supper, and -brought a pitcher of fresh water and a lighted lamp, when she<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_198"></a>[198]</span> -heard Mrs. Leslie tell the children it was bedtime. She seemed -surprised, they thought, when Mrs. Leslie gently thanked her.</p> - -<div class="figleft" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus78.jpg" width="200" height="150" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>They found, the next day, that the other daughter was -named Julia, and as time went on, and they saw more and more -of the daily life on the farm, they could not help noticing that, -while Julia did her share of the general work cheerfully and -well, it was always Ann -who seemed to think of -little uncalled-for kindnesses -and helps, although -she did this so quietly and -unobtrusively, that it was -some time before they observed -it.</p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 175px;"> -<img src="images/illus79.jpg" width="175" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>Her mother and sister -were in the habit of asking her to “just” do this or that, to run -upstairs or “down-cellar” for something; her father and the -boys nearly always came to her for -any chance bit of sewing they wanted -done, and even the great watch dog -and the sober old yellow cat seemed -to take for granted that she should -be the one to feed them. And the -children saw that to all these calls -upon her time and attention she -responded not only willingly, but -gladly.</p> - -<p>Mrs. Allen, good-tempered as she usually was, was sometimes<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_199"></a>[199]</span> -“tried,” as she expressed it, when things “went contrary,” and -Julia, although generally in a good humor, and sometimes -even frolicsome, was inclined to be fretful if her wishes and -plans were crossed; but the pleasant serenity of Ann’s face was -seldom ruffled, and before long the children found themselves -going to her for help and sympathy in their plans and arrangements, -just as her own family did.</p> - -<p>“And I tell you, Tiny, she’s first rate!” said Johnny, warmly, -one day, when “Miss Ann” had left her sewing to help him find -his knife, and had found it, too. “Mrs. Allen’s very kind and -nice, and Miss Julia’s thundering—I mean very—pretty, but I -do think Miss Ann has one of the pleasantest faces I ever saw, -and I’d be willing to lose my knife, and have it stay lost, if I -could find out how she manages always to know just what -everybody wants, and to do it as if it was what she wanted -herself. I’ve three quarters of a mind to ask her. Would -you?”</p> - -<p>“Why, yes, I don’t see why you shouldn’t,” said Tiny, after -thinking a minute; “only I would put in, to please not tell -unless she really and truly didn’t mind, for you know she might -not like to tell, and yet not like to say so. I’d make her -promise that first, before you say what it is.”</p> - -<p>“I sometimes think you have more sense than I have, Tiny—about -some things, that is,” said Johnny, nodding his head -approvingly. “I’ll fix her that way; and if you see her off in -the orchard, or anywhere where it would be a good chance, -I wish you’d tell me.”</p> - -<p>To this Tiny agreed, and for several days she and Johnny<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_200"></a>[200]</span> -kept watch over their unconscious victim, hoping for a chance to -see her alone, growing quite impatient, at last, and declaring -that they didn’t believe she ever did sit down!</p> - -<p>“Except to eat her breakfast and dinner and supper,” amended -Johnny.</p> - -<p>“And to put on and take off her shoes and stockings,” -added Tiny; “though you can do even that sort of hopping -about on one foot, for I’ve tried it.”</p> - -<p>“Well, I should think she would be just about tired to death, -every night of her life,” said Johnny; “and yet she’s every bit -as nice and pleasant when she says good night, as she is when -we go down to breakfast in the morning. I tell you what it is, -Tiny Leslie, I’m tired of waiting for her just to happen to sit -down where we can catch her. I mean to write her a note, and -ask her to meet us in the haymow, and fix her own time!”</p> - -<p>“Why, yes,” said Tiny, joyfully; “that’s the very thing. -Why didn’t we think of it sooner, I wonder? Will you write it -right away, Johnny, or wait till after dinner?”</p> - -<p>“Oh, right away,” said Johnny; “dinner won’t be ready for -an hour and more.”</p> - -<p>So Johnny asked his mother for a sheet of paper and an -envelope, and wrote very carefully,—</p> - -<div class="blockquote"> - -<p>“<span class="smcap">Dear Miss Ann</span>:—We want to speak to you about something, -but you don’t ever sit down, or at least we never see you. -Can you meet us in the haymow this afternoon, at four o’clock? -If you haven’t time, we will do something to help you, if you -will let us.</p> - -<p class="center">“Very respectfully yours,</p> - -<p class="right">“<span class="smcap">John Leslie</span>.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_201"></a>[201]</span></p> - -<p>“P. S. If you can come, please let us know at dinner time. -Any other time would do.</p> - -<p class="right">“J. L.”</p> - -</div> - -<p>The note was duly delivered across the ironing-board, and -when they went to dinner Miss Ann smiled, and nodded mysteriously -at Johnny, to his great delight, and whispered to him, as -she handed him his plate,—</p> - -<p>“I’ll be there, and you needn’t help me, dear; but I’m just -as much obliged to you as if you did.”</p> - -<p>But when she said this, she did not know that a carriage-load -of cousins would arrive that afternoon at half past three, -and respond to the very first cordial request to “Take off your -things, now do, and stay to tea?”</p> - -<div class="figleft" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus80.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>So four o’clock found Miss Ann in the kitchen, not by any -means eating bread and honey, -but mixing light biscuit for tea; -and when Johnny and Tiny, -having waited impatiently in the -haymow for fully five minutes, -went to hunt her up, they found -her so engaged, and she said, -pleasantly,—</p> - -<p>“I hope it’ll keep till to-morrow, -dear, for I shall be busy -right on from now till bedtime, -I’m afraid. Cousin Samuel’s folks don’t come here often, and -mother’s set her heart on giving them a real good tea.”</p> - -<p>“But where’s Miss Julia?” asked Johnny, without stopping<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_202"></a>[202]</span> -to think that he had no right to ask this question; for he was -very much disappointed.</p> - -<p>“Oh, she’d just dressed herself all clean for the afternoon,” -said Miss Ann, cheerfully; “so I told her to go along in and -talk to ’em, while mother fixed up. I’d rather cook than talk -to a lot of folks, any day in the year!” And she laughed so -contentedly that Tiny and Johnny found themselves laughing -too.</p> - -<p>Two or three more days passed, and still Miss Ann was hindered -from keeping her mysterious appointment, until Tiny -and Johnny, growing desperate, marched into the kitchen one -afternoon, at four o’clock, and appealed to Mrs. Allen, who was -sitting in the old green rocking-chair, knitting a stocking, -while Miss Ann, her round face flushed with heat, stood by the -stove, waiting for her third and last kettleful of blackberries to -be ready to go into the jars.</p> - -<p>“Mrs. Allen,” said Johnny, solemnly, “we’ve been trying for -one week to catch Miss Ann; we want her up in the haymow -for something <i>very particular</i>, and every day something happens, -and we’ve never seen her sit down once since we’ve been here, -and you’re her mother, and we thought perhaps you’d not mind -telling her she must come!”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Allen laughed heartily, but she did something better, -too; she put down her knitting, and, marching up to Miss Ann, -took the spoon out of her hand, saying with good-natured -authority,—</p> - -<p>“There! you go right along with the children, and don’t -show your head in this kitchen till tea’s ready! Because you’re<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_203"></a>[203]</span> -a willing horse, is no reason you should be drove to death, and -I’m quite as able to finish up these blackberries as you are!”</p> - -<p>So, in spite of her laughing protests, the children dragged -their victim off in triumph, and never let go of her until they -had throned her in state upon a pile of hay.</p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_204"></a>[204]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_XX">CHAPTER XX.<br /> -<span class="smaller">THE TIN MUG.</span></h2> - -</div> - -<div> -<img class="dropcap" src="images/dropcap-ch20.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p class="dropcap">“Now, Miss Ann,” said Johnny, taking -charge of the meeting, and quite forgetting -to ask “if she would mind telling,” -“we want you to please tell us -how you manage always to seem to like -what you are doing, and to want to do -what everybody wants you to do and -not to—not have any <i>yourself</i> at all!”</p> - -<p>Miss Ann’s pleasant round face turned even redder than it -had been as she bent over the blackberries, and she seemed too -astonished to speak, for a moment; then she put an arm about -each of the children, and gave each a hearty kiss, and somehow, -although Johnny had begun to think he was too old to be kissed, -he did not mind it at all.</p> - -<p>“You dear little souls!” said Miss Ann, and Tiny thought -there was a sort of quaver in her voice, “it’s only your own -good-nature that makes you feel that way. Why, I’ve never -been able to hold a candle to mother for work, nor to father and -Julia and the boys for smartness, and there was a time, five or -six years ago, when I felt sort of all discouraged. They couldn’t -help laughing at me when I said silly things, and made stupid -blunders, and my ugly face worried me every time I looked in -the glass.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_205"></a>[205]</span></p> - -<p>“But you’re not ugly at all!” burst in both the children, -indignantly.</p> - -<p>Again the color swept over Miss Ann’s face, but she laughed -in a pleased, childlike way, as she said,—</p> - -<p>“There you go, again! What sweet little souls you are. -I’m real glad you feel that way, dears, but I know too well it’s -only your kind hearts that make you think so. And it seemed -to me that I might about as well give up, I couldn’t make -myself pretty, no matter how hard I tried, nor how I fixed my -molasses-candy-colored hair—every way seemed to make me a -little uglier than the last. And I was so slow,—I was always -thinking about that poor man in the Bible, that wanted so to -get into the pool, and while he was coming somebody else would -step down before him. Mother would lose her patience, and -Julia and the boys would laugh, a dozen times a day, and then -I would get all of a tremble with nervousness, and like as not -say something I’d be sorry for the minute it was said, and maybe -wind up with a crying spell. They didn’t any of them know -how I really felt, or they wouldn’t have laughed and joked about -it, for kinder folks than mine you couldn’t find in a day’s walk, -and somehow, though it sounds crooked to say so, that very -thing made it hurt all the more. And when mother said she -calculated to take boarders that summer, for we’d had two or -three bad years, and things were getting behindhand, I came -near running away, and taking a service place where nobody -knew me. But I couldn’t quite bring myself to that, and I can’t -tell you how thankful I’ve been ever since, that I couldn’t, for -I’d have missed the best thing that ever happened to me, besides<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_206"></a>[206]</span> -shirking a plain duty, like a coward. The first boarders that -came that season were a dear old lady and her husband. He -was real nice, and not a bit of trouble, but she! I lost my -heart to her the first time I saw her, and I kept losing it more -and more all the time she stayed. She hadn’t very good health, -but most well people will give twice the trouble she did, and -never stop to think of it. She was going to stay all summer, -and the way I came to begin waiting on her was a sort of an -accident. Julia made me take up the pail of fresh water to fill -her pitcher, just to plague me, and I found her with her trunk -and the top bureau drawer open, and she sitting down between -them, looking very white and weak.</p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus81.jpg" width="200" height="175" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>“‘I’m not good for much, my dear, you see,’ she said, with -that sweet, gentle smile I grew to love so, ‘I thought I would -begin to unpack and settle -things a little, but it’s too -soon after the journey; I -must have patience for a -day or two—there is nothing -here that will not keep.’</p> - -<p>“I wouldn’t have believed -it, if anybody’d told me beforehand -that I would do it, -but I said, just as free as if -I’d known her all my life, -‘If you don’t mind my big rough hands, ma’am, I’ll take out -your things for you. There’s a real nice closet, and your dresses -will be all creased if they stay too long in the trunk.’</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_207"></a>[207]</span></p> - -<p>“She looked as if I’d given her a gold mine, and thanked me, -and said she wasn’t a bit afraid of my hands, but could I be -spared? Wasn’t I busy downstairs? Now I’d only just broke -one of the best dishes, and mother’d told me my room was -better than my company, so I said, sort of ugly, that she needn’t -worry; nobody wanted me downstairs, nor anywhere else.</p> - -<p>“She put her little soft, thin hand on my great big red one, -and said, so nice and quietly,—</p> - -<p>“‘I want you, dear. Will you begin with the tray, and put -the things in the top drawer. There are a few that I want -put on that convenient shelf, and that pretty corner-bracket, but -I’ll tell you as you go along.’</p> - -<p>“Now most folks would just have said ‘bracket’ and ‘shelf,’ -but that was her, all over! She never missed a chance to say a -pleasant word, I do believe—any more than she ever took one -to say anything ugly—and yet you didn’t feel as if it was all -soft-sawder, and just to your face, the way you do with some -people. It seems to me—though I’ve a poor memory, in common—that -I can remember almost every word that was said -that first day, for I turned a corner then, if ever anybody did.</p> - -<p>“I’ve wondered, ever since, if it was just one of those blessed -chances, as we call them, for want of a better word, that the -Lord sends to help us along, or whether she’d seen, already, just -how things were, and meant to help me, without letting on she -saw—which, as far as I’ve seen, is the best sort of help, by a -long shot! Anyhow, she made some little pleasant talk about -almost everything I took out, a little history of where it came -from, or something like that, and every other thing, it seemed<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_208"></a>[208]</span> -to me, of her books and pretty nick-nacks, was given to her by -her grandson or granddaughter. In the middle of the tray was -a little bundle of raw cotton, as I thought, but she smiled, and -said to please unwrap it, and I found it was only cotton wrapped, -of all things, round an old tin mug. I’ve such a foolish face, it -always shows what I’m thinking, and she answered, just as if I’d -spoke,—</p> - -<p>“‘It doesn’t look worth all that tender care, my dear, does -it? But look inside, and see what it is guarding.’</p> - -<div class="figleft" style="width: 175px;"> -<img src="images/illus82.jpg" width="175" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>“And then I saw, wrapped in tissue-paper, and just fitting -nicely into the old mug, a little tumbler, and when I unwrapped -it, it was so thin, I was ’most afraid -to touch it, and it looked just like -the soap-bubbles Julie and I used to -blow, all the colors of the rainbow, -when the light caught it.</p> - -<p>“‘I was puzzling myself how to -carry my precious little tumbler,’ she -said, ‘when Nelly—my granddaughter—came -in, and she thought -of the mug; it was one she had bought -for five cents of a tin-pedler, thinking -it was silver, dear little soul! She had played with it till it was -tarnished, and then put it away in the nursery till she should go -to the country; it would do so nicely for picnics, she said. I -did not like to take it, at first, but I want them to learn to give, -so I tried the tumbler in it, and was surprised to find that it -fitted very well, with a little paper put in between, so I thanked<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_209"></a>[209]</span> -her, and kissed her, and she was more pleased, I really believe, -than she was when she thought her mug was made of silver.’</p> - -<p>“Mrs. Anstiss—her name was Anstiss—didn’t say any -more just then, but after a little she took up the mug, and put -it on the shelf in the little chimney closet. ‘I must take care of -it,’ she said, ‘for I feel now that it is the safekeeper of my dear -little tumbler, as well as my Nelly’s gift. We can’t all be’—I -didn’t catch the name she called the glass, it was some great long -word—‘but if we feel like being discouraged because we are -not, why then our best plan is to try to do something for our -superiors. That we <i>can</i> all do; the weakest and humblest of us -can help to clear the way, to make straight paths, and remove -stumbling-blocks for the strong and the capable, and the dear -Father will look upon this work, done for His, as done for Him.’</p> - -<p>“She never said another word about the glass all the time -she stayed, and somehow I do believe that was one thing made -me remember and treasure up what she did say. I turned it -over and over and over in my slow mind, and the more I thought -of it, the more it seemed to me I’d been too foolish to live! I’d -just been thinking of nobody at all but my stupid self, instead -of trying to help on the smart ones all I could. And now I’d -once begun, you’d be surprised to know how soon things began -to come easy. I couldn’t be thinking of my own awkwardness -when I was looking out for chances to help the others along, -and the more I forgot about myself and my ways, the happier I -seemed to get. And before long, for once that they’d laugh at -me and tell me I was clumsy, there’d be twice that one of them -would say, ‘Where’s Ann?’ or ‘Here, Ann, will you just do this?<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_210"></a>[210]</span> -You did it so well last time.’ And I do believe”—and the -plain, broad face, without one really pretty feature, grew radiant -and almost beautiful with the light of love—“I do believe -there isn’t one of them, now, that wouldn’t miss me like everything, -if I was to die!”</p> - -<p>“I should rather <i>think</i>!” said Johnny, and found himself -unable to say anything more, just because there were so many -things he wished to say.</p> - -<p>“Oh, please don’t stop!” said Tiny, breathlessly, “it’s such -a lovely, lovely story.”</p> - -<p>Miss Ann laughed heartily now.</p> - -<p>“Well, of all things!” she said, “I never thought I’d live to -tell a story! Who knows but I’ll be writing one, next? I don’t -see how I’ve come to say all this, only you’ve made so much of -me, and sort of flattered me on with your sweet little loving -faces, but I’ve talked quite enough for all summer; only I would -like to say to you a little bit out of a hymn that Mrs. Anstiss -sent me after she went away. I’ve tried to learn it all, over and -over, but I’ve such a poor memory, and I don’t get much time to -sit down, but I did like this verse best of all, and perhaps that’s -one reason why it stayed in my head, though I mayn’t have it -quite straight as to all the words,—</p> - -<div class="poetry-container"> -<div class="poetry"> - <div class="stanza"> - <div class="verse indent0">“‘I ask Thee for a thankful love,</div> - <div class="verse indent0">Through constant watching, wise,</div> - <div class="verse indent2">To meet the glad with joyful smiles,</div> - <div class="verse indent0">And to wipe the weeping eyes;</div> - <div class="verse indent2">And a <i>heart at leisure from itself</i>,</div> - <div class="verse indent0">To soothe and sympathize.’</div> - </div> -</div> -</div> - -<p class="noindent">I do think that’s lovely, now; don’t you?”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_211"></a>[211]</span></p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 100px;"> -<img src="images/illus83.jpg" width="100" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>“Yes, indeed!” cried the children, both together, and Tiny -added, warmly,—</p> - -<p>“It’s all lovely, as lovely as it can be, and that hymn is one -of mamma’s favoritest hymns—aren’t you glad of that? Dear -Miss Ann, I wonder if we can grow up like you, if we begin to -try right away?”</p> - -<p>Miss Ann looked absolutely startled.</p> - -<p>“Oh, my dears!” she said, softly, “like me! You don’t -know what you’re saying. When I think of the Perfect Pattern, -and my poor blundering—” she stopped, and hid her face in her -hands, and they both fell upon her and hugged her so hard that -it was a good thing that the distant sound of the tea bell made -her spring up and rush to the house, saying, in -conscience-stricken tones,—</p> - -<p>“I declare! While I’ve been sitting here, -chattering like a magpie, mother and Julie have -been doing all my work! I ought to be ashamed -of myself.”</p> - -<p>“Umph?” grunted Johnny, as Tiny and he -followed her more slowly. “<i>She</i> ought to be -ashamed of herself! I wonder what we ought to be? Tiny, -let’s begin right straight off. I kept the best whistle myself, -when I made those two to-day; here it is, and you needn’t say a -word—you must just swap with me right away, whether you -want to or not.”</p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_212"></a>[212]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_XXI">CHAPTER XXI.<br /> -<span class="smaller">SEEING WHY.</span></h2> - -</div> - -<div> -<img class="dropcap" src="images/dropcap-ch21.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p class="dropcap">It was a bright, fresh Saturday afternoon -in October, and Johnny, who had found -it a little hard to settle down into school -habits again, after the boundless freedom -of the vacation at the farm, remarked at -the dinner-table that he knew just how -the horses felt when they went kicking -up their heels all over the pasture, after having been in harness -all day.</p> - -<p>“And where do you propose to kick up your heels this afternoon?” -inquired Mrs. Leslie, as she filled Johnny’s plate for the -second time with Indian pudding.</p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus84.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>“That’s just what I wanted -to consult with you about, -mamma,” said Johnny, “there’s -a base-ball match over at the -south ground, and a tennis match -at the new court; it’s just the -same to get in for either. I’ve -enough of my birthday money -left, and I thought if Tiny’d like to go, I’d take her to see the -tennis, I mean, of course, if you’re willing—but if she couldn’t -go, I’d go to see the base-ball match.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_213"></a>[213]</span></p> - -<p>Now Tiny, although she was only a small girl, had that -treasure which Miss Ann considered so desirable—“a heart at -leisure from itself,” and she felt very sure that Johnny would -rather help do the hurrahing at one base-ball match, than watch -a dozen games of tennis, so she said at once,—</p> - -<p>“Oh thank you, Johnny, you’re <i>very</i> kind, but if mamma -will let me, I’m going to ask Kitty to come this afternoon, -and help me dress my new doll, and cover the sofa you made me.”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Leslie understood quite well the little sudden sacrifice -which Tiny had made, but she was not going to spoil it by talking -about it, so she only said,—</p> - -<p>“Yes indeed—I always like you to play with Kitty. Ask -her to come to tea, and then Johnny will have a share of her -too. And if you’ll ‘fly ’round,’ you and I can make some ginger -snaps, first, and then, with the cold chicken and some dressed -celery, we shall have quite a company tea.”</p> - -<p>Tiny’s face fairly shone. Of all things, she enjoyed helping -her mother make cake, and it would be especially nice to-day, -because the maid-of-all-work was going out for the afternoon, -and they would have the kitchen quite to themselves. And -Johnny, who really did prefer the base-ball match very much, was -entirely satisfied. He could take his fun without feeling that he -was taking it selfishly. It was only one o’clock, and the match -did not begin until two, so Johnny sprang up, saying,—</p> - -<p>“I’ll help you ‘fly ’round’! Load me up for the cellar, Tiny.”</p> - -<p>Two loadings up cleared the table of all the eatables, and a -race, which was a little dangerous to the dishes, was just beginning, -when Mrs. Leslie said,—</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_214"></a>[214]</span></p> - -<p>“If you’ll do an errand for me, Johnny, I can take a nice -little nap, after Tiny and I have finished. I don’t think it will -make you late for your base-ball match, if you start at once, for -you need not come home again before you go to the ground.”</p> - -<p>“Now, mamma!” and Johnny’s tone was slightly injured as -he spoke, “don’t you suppose I’d do it for <i>you</i>, and like to do it, -even if it made me late? You shouldn’t say ‘if’ at all! -Waiting orders!”</p> - -<p>And he stood up stiffly, drawing his heels together, and -touching his cap.</p> - -<p>Mrs. Leslie laughed, but she kissed him, too.</p> - -<p>“There’s a bundle in it,” she said, “quite a large bundle—some -work to be taken to your friend Mrs. Waring, upon whom -you have called so many times at my invitation. I’m afraid, -from what one of her neighbors told me yesterday, that the poor -woman has had very little work lately, and less than very little -money; so I have hunted up all I could for her. And please -tell her, Johnny, that I have some things for Phil, which I will -give her when she brings the work home; and to please bring -it as soon as she can. She will find two car tickets in the -bundle.”</p> - -<p>“Couldn’t you roll ’em up with the work, and let me take -’em to her now, mamma?” asked Johnny.</p> - -<p>“Why, yes,” said Mrs. Leslie, “if it would not be too heavy -for you; but the other bundle is quite as large as this, dear. Do -you think you can manage so much?”</p> - -<p>Johnny lifted Tiny, swung her round once, and set her down -with a triumphant “There!”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_215"></a>[215]</span></p> - -<p>“The double load would certainly not be so heavy as Tiny,” -said Mrs. Leslie, “so I will tie them together at once.”</p> - -<p>While his mother did this, Johnny marched up and down, -whistling, with Polly on his shoulder. Then a bright idea struck -him: he put Polly down, ran for his shinny stick, thrust it -through the twine, and slung the bundle over the shoulder -where Polly had just been.</p> - -<p>“I’ll pretend I’m an emigrant, starting for the ‘Far West,’” -he said. “Goodbye, my dear mother, my <i>dear</i> sisters!” and, -with a heart-rending sob, followed by a wild prance down the -walk, Johnny was gone.</p> - -<p>Now the particular horse car which he was to take only came -along every half-hour. He saw one as he walked up the cross -street, about a block away, and was just going to shout, when he -heard a crack and a “flop”; the shinny stick flew up in the air, -and, turning round, he saw his bundle, a bundle no longer, but a -confused heap. The twine, worn through by the stick, had -given way, and the paper had been burst by the fall.</p> - -<p>Johnny gathered up the things as best he could, and was -vainly trying to put them once more into portable shape, when -a shop door opened, and a good-natured voice called,—</p> - -<p>“Fetch them in here, sonny, and I’ll tie them up in a strong -paper for you.”</p> - -<p>He was only too glad to accept this good offer, and the -pleasant-faced woman who had called him made a very neat -parcel out of the wreck which he had brought her, and tied it -with a stout string. He thanked her very heartily, afraid -of offending her if he offered to pay for the paper and<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_216"></a>[216]</span> -string and looking about the little shop for something he -could buy.</p> - -<p>A soft ball of bright-colored worsted caught his eye, and -when he found the price of it was only ten cents, he quickly -decided to buy it for Phil. He had missed his car, and had -nearly half an hour to wait. He would be late for the match, -but—</p> - -<p>“Never mind,” he thought, “here’s a first-rate chance to keep -from getting mad!”</p> - -<p>So he talked cheerfully with the woman as she wrapped up -the ball, and before the car appeared they were on very friendly -terms, and parted with cordial goodbyes.</p> - -<p>But his troubles were not over yet. He had not gone half a -mile, when a “block” took place on the car track, and it was -another half-hour before they were free to move on. But for -the bundle, Johnny would have jumped out and walked, and as -it was he started up once or twice, but each time the driver -announced that they were “’most through,” and he sat down -again.</p> - -<p>He reached the house at last, and knocked vigorously; he felt -that he had no time to lose. There was no answer, and he -knocked again, and then again, until he was satisfied that anybody, -no matter how sound asleep she might have been, in that -house, could not have failed to hear him. He was strongly -tempted to leave the bundle on the step, and run; but he -resisted the temptation, and at last, tired of knocking, sat down -on the step, saying doggedly to himself,—</p> - -<p>“She’ll <i>have</i> to come home to her supper!”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_217"></a>[217]</span></p> - -<p>And as he said it, she turned the corner of the nearest street, -in a provokingly leisurely manner, leading her baby boy by the -hand. Johnny dropped the bundle and ball on the step, rushed -to meet her, poured out his message, and was gone before the -bewildered little woman quite realized who he was. On he sped, -as if he had wings on his heels, to be suddenly and most unexpectedly -stopped by a violent collision with a very small girl, -who had toddled across his path just in time to be knocked down.</p> - -<p>Very much frightened—for, “Suppose anybody did that to -Polly!” he thought—he picked up the baby girl, petted, coaxed -and cuddled her, until she laughed before her tears were dry. -He found, to his great relief, that she was much more frightened -than hurt, and was trying to make her tell him where she lived -when her mother appeared, and carried her off, scolding and -kissing her all at once.</p> - -<p>“I declare,” thought Johnny, “those old fellows who talked -about the Fates would say I’d better give up this base-ball business! -It’s a little too provoking! I wonder what kind of a -trap I’ll find in this field.”</p> - -<p>For he had at last come to the open space from which the -base-ball ground had been fenced off; one of those left-out regions -consisting of several fields, which one often finds on the edge of -a town or city. It was covered with high grass and coarse weeds, -and in a far distant corner two or three cows were feeding.</p> - -<p>But, as Johnny neared the high fence, thinking that his -troubles were certainly over now, and wondering why he had -never before taken this short cut, something bright caught his eye; -a little scarlet hood, not so very much above the tops of the rank<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_218"></a>[218]</span> -grasses and weeds, and there was another baby! One hand was -full of the ragged purple asters, which grew among the grass, -and her little face was grave and intent. Nobody else was near, -and once more Johnny thought, “Suppose it was Polly!”</p> - -<p>The child looked fearlessly up at him as he advanced, and -nodded.</p> - -<p>“What are you doing, baby, all by yourself, in this big -field?” asked Johnny, in the kind, hearty voice which made him -more friends than he knew of, and the baby answered, gravely,—</p> - -<p>“Picking f’owers for my mamma! And <i>I’m</i> not baby. -Baby at home.”</p> - -<p>“Come on, then, let’s go see him;” and Johnny took the -little hand, groaning to himself,—</p> - -<p>“I can’t leave this mite all alone in a field with cows,—suppose -it was Polly!”</p> - -<div class="figleft" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus85.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>At that moment a wild shout went up from the base-ball -ground. The quiet cows in the -corner raised their heads; one -stepped forward, caught sight of -the scarlet hood, gave a vicious -bellow, and began to run straight -for the baby; and when Johnny, -breathless and almost exhausted, -scrambled over the rail fence, -which ran around three sides of -the field, with the baby in his -arms, he was only just in time—the sharp horns struck the fence -as he and his charge struck the ground, and the enraged cow<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_219"></a>[219]</span> -stood there, bellowing and “charging,” as long as the hood -remained in sight.</p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 175px;"> -<img src="images/illus86.jpg" width="175" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>The little girl, quite unconscious of her narrow escape, took -Johnny’s hand once more, and led -him gravely on for nearly a block; -then she pointed out a pretty little -frame house, standing in a small -lawn, and said, in a satisfied voice, -“There!” He rang the bell, and -was almost angry to find that the -child had not even been missed.</p> - -<p>“Sure,” said the Irish nursemaid, -“I tould her to play in the -front yard a bit, and I thought she -was there.”</p> - -<p>“There’s a cross cow in that field where she was,” said -Johnny, briefly. “You’d better not let her out by herself again, -I should think.”</p> - -<p>He turned away without stopping for farther explanation. -But he did not go to the ball ground; he walked slowly home, -with his mind full of confused thoughts, eager to pour it all out -to his mother. How vexed he had been at the various delays! -How needless, how troublesome they had seemed! And yet, if -that shout had risen five minutes sooner—he shuddered, and -left the picture unfinished. Dear little girl, with her innocent -hands full of “f’owers for mamma!”</p> - -<p>Kitty was there when he reached home, and she and Tiny -were merrily setting the table. They were full of sympathy<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_220"></a>[220]</span> -when they found he had not seen the match, and Tiny’s face -glowed with joyful pride in him, when he told about the baby’s -narrow escape.</p> - -<p>But the real talk was when his mother came for her last kiss, -after he was in bed; and it was a talk that he never forgot. -“This time, dear,” Mrs. Leslie said, “you can see and understand -the great good which came of the hindrances and -interruptions of your plan, and I love to think that the -dear Father has sent you this lesson so early in your life, just to -make you trust him hereafter, when you cannot see. You know -what the loving Saviour said to his weak and doubting disciple: -‘Thomas, because thou hast seen, thou hast believed. Blessed -are they who have not seen, and yet have believed.’</p> - -<p>“I do not mean that we are to excuse ourselves, and give up -weakly, for every small hindrance, but that, when honest effort -fails to overcome the barriers in our path, we are to believe, -with all our hearts, that it is because the dear Father wishes us -to go some other way. That is all, Johnny, darling, ‘the conclusion -of the whole matter,’—just to rest on His love.”</p> - -<p>“Mamma,” said Johnny, holding his mother fast in a long, -close hug, “I don’t think I ever loved Him so much as I -do to-night; and I don’t think I’ll ever be really worried, or not -long, anyhow, when things seem to go crosswise again.”</p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_221"></a>[221]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_XXII">CHAPTER XXII.<br /> -<span class="smaller">THE WAY OF ESCAPE.</span></h2> - -</div> - -<div> -<img class="dropcap" src="images/dropcap-ch22.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p class="dropcap">“It must have been most beautiful,” said -Tiny, “I wonder if it looked at all like -that?” and she pointed to a large, bright -star, which seemed quite alone in the sky, -for the sun had only just set, and no other -star could yet be seen near this one.</p> - -<p>“I think it was much larger, Tiny,” -said Johnny, who was standing close beside her. “You know -if it hadn’t been quite different from the other stars, no one -would have thought it was anything in particular, and the wise -men said, quite positively, ‘We <i>have seen</i> His star in the east, -and are come to worship Him.’ So you see, it must have been -different.”</p> - -<p>“Yes,” said Tiny, “I didn’t think of that. And how glad -they must have been to see it, for they seemed perfectly certain -about what it meant. They didn’t ask if He really had come, -or if the people at Jerusalem thought He had, but just ‘Where is -He?’ And then they found out right away; I don’t believe -they would, if they hadn’t been so certain.”</p> - -<p>“And just think,” said Johnny, “how splendid it must have -been for them to be the first ones to tell the people about it, -when they got back to their ‘own country.’ That was even<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_222"></a>[222]</span> -better than it is to be a missionary now. I wonder if any of -the people they told it to laughed at them, and didn’t believe -them.”</p> - -<p>“I don’t see how they could,” said Tiny. “Why, you know -everybody was looking for the Saviour, then; and so when the -wise men told them how He had been born just where the -prophets had said He would be, and that they had really seen -Him, how could anybody not believe them?”</p> - -<p>Tiny and Johnny were standing by the library window, waiting -for their mother and Jim, for it was Sunday evening, and -time for the “talk.” The lesson was about the leading of the -star, and it seemed to the children unusually beautiful, although -there was never any lack of interest in these talks. They were -growing impatient, when Jim came in sight, walking fast, as if -he were afraid of being late, but they hastily agreed not to question -him; for Johnny had found that this always annoyed him -as nothing else did. He had a keen eye for “chances” to help -his less fortunate neighbors, and more than once, Johnny had -accidentally caught him giving time, and thought, and even -money, although, industrious as he was, he seldom made more -in a day than sufficed his actual needs. But he seemed so -thoroughly disconcerted when anything of this kind was discovered, -that Johnny tried hard to resist the temptation to tease -him which was offered by his sensitiveness on this point.</p> - -<p>Mrs. Leslie came down a few minutes after Jim arrived, and -a beautiful talk followed. She had brought an old book about -the Holy Land, which she had recently found at a second-hand -book store, and it described in such good, clear language the<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_223"></a>[223]</span> -state of affairs throughout the world, and the manners and customs -of the people at the time of the birth of our Saviour, that -the children, deeply interested, felt as if they had never before -so clearly realized it all.</p> - -<p>And Johnny spoke once more of the happiness of the wise -men, in being the bearers of this great news back to their own -country.</p> - -<p>“I think it must have been much more interesting to be alive -then, than it is now,” he said, with a little discontent in his -voice, “for don’t you believe, mamma, that it seemed a great -deal more wonderful about the Saviour then, when it was all -happening, than it seems now, after so many, many years?”</p> - -<p>“Perhaps it did,” said Mrs. Leslie, “but you know how it -was when the apostles began to tell the good news. Besides -being disbelieved, and persecuted, and imprisoned, and banished, -they had to endure something which, to some people, would be -hardest of all—we are told that they were ‘mocked’; that is -what you would call at school, being made fun of.”</p> - -<p>“I never thought of that before,” said Johnny, “I do believe -that must have been the hardest of all! You see, a person can -screw himself up to something pretty bad, like having a tooth -out, or being killed, or anything; but to see a whole lot of -people making faces and laughing at you—do you believe you -could ever stand that, mamma?”</p> - -<p>“It would be very hard, and yet it is part of their daily work -for some of our missionaries, at this very day,” said Mrs. Leslie, -“I have heard a missionary who had been preaching and teaching -in India say that nothing delighted some of the natives more<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_224"></a>[224]</span> -than to bait and worry a teacher until it was next to impossible -for him to keep his temper. And no doubt the wise men had -that very thing to contend with, when they went back to their -own country. I think every one has, at some time or other. -And then is, above all other times, the time to ‘let our light so -shine before men that they may glorify our Father which is in -Heaven.’ When people see that the power of God <i>is</i> a power, it -nearly always makes some impression on them. So here is a -chance for every one to ‘make manifest,’ and how beautiful the -blessing is! ‘That which doth make manifest is light.’ We are -allowed to carry to others the Light of the World.”</p> - -<p>This was the end of the talk, for that time, and it made more -impression upon Jim and Johnny than it did upon Tiny, for Jim, -as we have said, carried his sensitiveness too far, often—as in -the case of little Taffy—allowing it to hinder him from asking -for help for others, when he had come to the end of his own -ability, but not the needs of the case, and when such help would -have been most gladly and efficiently given; as for Johnny, he -was foolishly alive to ridicule, and many of the slips of temper -which he afterwards lamented were due solely to this cause. A -jeering laugh or a mocking speech always had power to make -his face flush and his hands clinch, and the effect did not always -stop there—he often said things for which he was bitterly sorry -as soon as the rush of angry feeling was past. And somehow it -seemed to him that the attacks upon his temper always took -place when he was unusually off his guard, and open to them.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_225"></a>[225]</span></p> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;" id="fp6"> -<img src="images/fp6.jpg" width="500" height="700" alt="" /> -<p class="caption">POOR KATY.</p> -</div> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_226"></a>[226]</span></p> - -<p>The effect of this talk upon Jim was very marked. He -began, from that time, shyly to take Mrs. Leslie into his confidence,<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_227"></a>[227]</span> -whenever he felt that she could help him, and he schooled -himself to bear, without wincing, any and all allusions to the -various and unobtrusive acts of kindness which he was able to -perform. And he very soon had the encouragement of finding -his usefulness greatly increased, while he still had the satisfaction -of doing many things which were known only to himself -and those whom he helped. To his firm and resolute character, -the plan of the campaign was more than half the battle, while -Johnny, who was naturally more heedless and forgetful, found -great difficulty in keeping his good resolutions where he could -find them in a hurry.</p> - -<p>He had, for the time being, quite forgotten this talk about -the wise men, when, one day during the following week, as he -was playing with the boys at recess, a -little girl strayed into the playground, -with a basket of apples and cakes, hoping -to sell some of her wares to the schoolboys. -Johnny remembered her at once, -for she was one of the many people whom -Mrs. Leslie had helped and befriended; -she had found the poor child in great -trouble and destitution, a few months -before, and had put her to board with an -old woman who only demanded a very -moderate amount of work in payment for the care which she -gave the little girl.</p> - -<div class="figleft" style="width: 150px;"> -<img src="images/illus87.jpg" width="150" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>Katy employed her spare time in trying to sell whatever she -could pick up most cheaply, whenever she had a few cents at her<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_228"></a>[228]</span> -command; matches, sometimes, and what Tiny called “dreadful” -cakes of soap; very thick china buttons, blunt pins, or, -when she had not enough even for these investments, a few -apples or oranges, and unpleasant-looking cakes.</p> - -<p>She was a solemn and anxious-looking child, and although, -through Mrs. Leslie’s care and teaching, her clothes were nearly -always whole and clean, they had a look of not belonging to -her, and Tiny and Johnny, while they pitied her very much, and -were always willing to help her in any way they could, did not -admire her.</p> - -<p>It had never before occurred to her to visit the playground -with her basket, a fact over which Johnny had secretly rejoiced, -and it was with a feeling of dismay quite beyond the occasion -that he saw her come in at the gate. She did not see him, just -at first, and he was attacked, as he afterward told Tiny, with a -mean desire to “cut and run.” Before he could make up his -mind to do this, however, she recognized him, and a smile broke -over her solemn countenance.</p> - -<p>“Why!” she said, in the drawl which always “aggravated” -Johnny, “I didn’t know you went to school here, Johnny Leslie! -I’m right glad I came in. Don’t you want to buy an apple? -And don’t some of these other boys want to? They’re real nice—I -tried one.”</p> - -<p>“I haven’t any money here, Katy,” said Johnny, briefly, -“and I don’t believe the other boys have, either. And I -wouldn’t come here, again, if I were you; it’s not a good place -to sell things <i>at all</i>—at least, some things,” he added hastily, -as he remembered how a basketful of pop-corn candy had vanished -in that very yard, a few days before.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_229"></a>[229]</span></p> - -<p>Katy’s face grew solemn again, and she was turning to go, -with the meekness which, to Johnny, was another of her offences. -But a few of the boys who were standing near, and who had -heard the conversation, saw how anxious Johnny was to get rid -of her, and one of them called out mockingly, loud enough to be -heard all over the playground,—</p> - -<p>“Boys! Here’s a young lady friend of Johnny Leslie’s, with -some wittles to sell! His friends in this crowd ought to patronize -her!”</p> - -<p>The mischief was done, now; the boys flocked around Katy, -and being, most of them, good-natured fellows, as boys go, they -said nothing unmannerly to her, but they contrived, in their -politely worded remarks, which she did not in the least understand, -to sting Johnny to the verge of desperation. And yet, -when he thought it over afterwards, nothing had been said which -was really worth minding; it was the manner, not the matter, -and the mocking laughter, which had roused him.</p> - -<p>“I think your friends are real nice, Johnny Leslie,” said -Katy, as she turned, with her empty basket, and her hand full -of small coins, to leave the yard, “and I won’t come back, if you -don’t like me to, but I don’t see <i>why</i> you don’t!” and she -walked dejectedly away.</p> - -<p>But before she reached the gate, Johnny had fought his battle—and -won it. He sprang after her, and held open the gate, as -he would have done for his mother, saying, loud enough for -every one to hear him,—</p> - -<p>“I’m glad you’ve had such good luck, Katy! Come back -every day, if you like, and you wait for me here after school,<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_230"></a>[230]</span> -and I’ll show you a first-rate place to buy things, where the man -won’t cheat you!”</p> - -<p>She thanked him all too profusely, as she went slowly -through the gate, and then he turned, feeling that his face was -fiery red, to receive the volley which he fully expected, and had -braced himself to bear. But it was not exactly the sort of volley -for which he was prepared.</p> - -<p>“Hurrah for Johnny Leslie!” called one of the little boys; -the others caught it up with a deafening cheer, and an unusual -amount of “tiger,” and Johnny saw that they were quite in -earnest.</p> - -<p>And then came back to his mind once more the words which -had so often come there, since he had read the quaint and beautiful -story of “The Pilgrim’s Progress from this world to a -better,”—“The lions were chained.”</p> - -<p>The fact was, several of the boys had heard about Katy -through Tiny and their sisters, but they could not, or rather -would not, resist the temptation to tease Johnny, when they saw -the foolish annoyance which her coming had caused him. It -has often been noticed how a word, or even a look, will turn the -tide, in affairs like this, and even in much larger ones, and -Johnny’s bold championship of Katy had done this at once.</p> - -<p>It was a good day for her when she invaded the playground, -for Johnny kept his word about showing her where to buy, and, -knowing as he did the things which would be most likely to sell -well, the result was that, after a few lessons, poor little Katy, -who was slow rather than stupid, began to show real judgment -in her purchases. She was always modest and quiet in her<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_231"></a>[231]</span> -manner to the boys, and the result of this was that their chaffing -never passed the bounds of harmless fun. They called her “The -Daughter of the Regiment,” and threatened her with dire penalties, -should she not always come “first and foremost” to their -playground with her new stock.</p> - -<p>“I’ve often thought, Tiny,” said Johnny, long afterward, -when Katy had made and saved enough to buy a second-hand -counter, have shelves put in the front room of the two which -she and the old woman occupied, and start a small but promising -business. “I’ve often thought of how it would have been if I -<i>had</i> cut and run. And it seems to me that the ‘way of -escape’—about temptations, you know—is right straight -ahead!”</p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_232"></a>[232]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_XXIII">CHAPTER XXIII.<br /> -<span class="smaller">THE CIRCULAR CITY.</span></h2> - -</div> - -<div> -<img class="dropcap" src="images/dropcap-ch23.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p class="dropcap">Mr. Leslie made a discovery.</p> - -<p>He had remarked, early in the spring, -that when he was really rich, when he -had five or six millions of dollars, he -was going to build a city in the form of -a very large circle, only two streets -deep, and inside of this circle was -to be an immense farm.</p> - -<p>“I shall begin,” he said, “by finding and buying a ready-made -farm, for the farmhouse and barns and orchard and garden -must all be old. I shall put all this in perfect order, without -making it look new. Then I shall build twenty-five Swiss -cottages, each with three rooms and a great deal of veranda. I -shall buy twenty-five excellent tents, and hide them about in the -orchard and shrubberies, and I shall invite my friends, fifty -families at a time, to come and stay a month with me on my -farm; and if my friends should all be used up before the summer -is over, I will ask some of them to nominate some of their -friends. And in the meantime,” he added, dropping his millionaire -tone of voice suddenly, “if we can find the farm and the -farmhouse, we will make a beginning by going there for the -summer, and planning the rest out.”</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_233"></a>[233]</span></p> - -<p>The others laughed at this dreadful coming down, but after -that it became a favorite amusement to make additions to the -“circular city,” and I could not begin to tell you all the plans -which were made for the comfort and happiness and goodness of -the “circular citizens,” as one thought of one thing, and one of -another. And the best of this popular “pretend” was, that it -set everybody thinking, and it was surprising to find how many -of the plans for the dream-city might, in much smaller ways, of -course, be carried out without waiting for all the rest.</p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 100px;"> -<img src="images/illus88.jpg" width="100" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>For instance, when Tiny said that all the little girls should -have dolls, her mother reminded her that she knew how to make -very nicely those rag dolls which one makes by -rolling up white muslin—a thick roll for the -body, and a thin one for the arms; coarse -thread sewed round where the neck ought to be, -the top of the head “gathered” and covered -with a little cap, eyes and nose and mouth -inked, or worked in colored thread, upon the face, -and the fact that the infant has only one leg -concealed by a nice long petticoat and frock.</p> - -<p>Mrs. Leslie promised to supply as many “rags” as Tiny -would use, in the making and dressing of these dolls, and it -became the little girl’s delight to carry one of them in her -pocket, when she was going for a walk, and to give it to the -poorest, most unhappy-looking child she could find. There are -very few small girls who do not love to mother dolls, and Tiny’s -heart would feel warm all day, remembering the joyful change -in some little pinched face, and the astonished,—</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_234"></a>[234]</span></p> - -<p>“For me? For my own to keep?”</p> - -<p>And when Johnny said that all the sick people should have -flowers every day, his mother reminded him that the “can’t-get-aways” -were glad even of such common things as daisies and -buttercups and clover blossoms. And after that he took many a -long walk to the fields outside the town, where these could -be found.</p> - -<p>They had all hoped to go back to Mr. Allen’s for the summer, -but when Mrs. Leslie wrote to ask Mrs. Allen if they could be -received, Mrs. Allen replied, that since Ann had married and -left them, half the house seemed gone, and she really didn’t -think she could take any boarders this summer.</p> - -<div class="figleft" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus89.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>“Perhaps you did not hear that Ann was married,” she -wrote; “but I miss her so, -all the time, that I feel as if -everybody must know it. She’s -married a widower with two -little children,—a nice, quiet, -pleasant sort of a man,—but -we all told Ann she only took -him because she fell in love -with the children! And she -does seem as happy as a queen, -and, for that matter, so does -he; but it provokes me to think how little we set by her, considering -what she was worth, till after we’d lost her.”</p> - -<p>It was a week or two after this letter was received, that Mr. -Leslie made his discovery. He found the farmhouse, the “very<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_235"></a>[235]</span> -identical” farmhouse, for which he was longing, and he found -it when he was not looking for it, as he was riding a horse -which a friend had lent him.</p> - -<p>The gate of the long lane which led up to the house was only -half a mile from the railway station, and only eight miles from -the town where the Leslies lived, and two dear old Quaker -people, who “liked children,” lived there all alone, save for their -few servants.</p> - -<p>“No, they had never taken boarders,” Friend Mercy said, -“and she was afraid the children—her married boys and girls—might -not quite like it.”</p> - -<p>But Mr. Leslie, at her hospitable invitation, dismounted, and -tied his horse and sat down on the “settee,” under the lilac -bushes, and drank buttermilk and ate gingerbread, and I am -afraid he talked a good deal, and the result of it all was, that, -just as he was going away, Friend Mercy said,—</p> - -<p>“Well, thee bring thy wife and little ones to-morrow afternoon, -Friend Leslie, and have a sociable cup of tea with us. I -will talk with Isaac in the meantime, and with thy wife when -she comes, and—we’ll see.”</p> - -<p>Mr. Leslie had no desire to break his children’s hearts, so, -although it was hard work not to, he did not tell them all -that Friend Mercy and he had said to each other, for fear -she should not “see her way clear” to take them; so he only -told of his pleasant call, and of this magnificent invitation -to a real country tea, in the “inner circle”; and they were -so nearly wild over that, that it was a very good thing he -stopped there!</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_236"></a>[236]</span></p> - -<p>Friend Mercy had suggested the four o’clock train, which -would give the children time for -“a good run” before the six -o’clock tea. So, while Tiny and -Johnny played in the hay, and -sailed boats on the brook, the -older people talked; and the -result was, that the Leslies were -to be permitted to come and -board in the “inner circle,” until -the end of September.</p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus90.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>A little talk which Friend -Mercy had with her husband -that evening, after the guests were gone, and when he said he -was “afraid it wouldn’t work,” will explain this.</p> - -<div class="figleft" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus91.jpg" width="200" height="150" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>“Thee sees, Isaac,” she said, “those two dear little things -have played here half the -afternoon, and there was -no quarrelling, or tale-bearing, -or cruelty. They -did not stone the chickens -and geese, nor tease -Bowser and the cat; and -when I asked John to -drive the cows to the -spring—which, I will confess, -I did with a purpose—he used neither stick nor stone. I -would not have any children brought here who would teach bad<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_237"></a>[237]</span> -tricks to Joseph’s and Hannah’s children, for the world; but -with these I think we should -be quite safe. Did thee notice -how they put down the -kittens, and came at once, -when their father called them -to go to the train? When -they obey so implicitly such -parents as these seem to be, -there is nothing to fear.”</p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus92.jpg" width="200" height="150" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>“Thee has had thy own way too long for me to begin to cross -thee now, I’m afraid, mother,” said Friend Gray, with an indulgent -smile. “So, if thy heart is really set upon it, let them -come! The trouble of it will fall chiefly on thee, I fear.”</p> - -<p>It did not seem to fall very heavily. The one strong, willing -maid-of-all-work declared she could “do for a dozen like them.”</p> - -<p>Mrs. Leslie and Tiny made the three extra beds, and dusted -the rooms every morning; and both Tiny and Johnny found -various delightful ways of helping “Aunt Mercy and Uncle -Isaac,” as the dear old host and hostess were called by everybody, -before a week was out.</p> - -<p>The days went by on swift, sunny wings, and everybody was -growing agreeably fat and brown. But, when they stopped to -think of it, there was a shadow over the children’s joy.</p> - -<p>They were in the “inner circle”—even the five or six millions, -they thought, could do no more for them; but, oh, the -hundreds and hundreds who were hopelessly outside!</p> - -<p>It was not very long, you may be sure, before Aunt Mercy<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_238"></a>[238]</span> -heard all about the “circular city”; and although at first she -treated the whole matter as a joke, she soon caught herself making -valuable suggestions. And then, when Tiny and Johnny -began to lament to her about all the “outsiders,” she began to -think in good earnest, and the day before the next market day -she spoke, and this is what she said,—</p> - -<div class="figleft" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus93.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>“Father is going to take some chickens to town, to-morrow, -and there will be a good deal of spare room in the wagon. -That’s half. He passes right -by the house where a good -city missionary lives. That’s -the other half. And the whole -is, that if two little people I -know would pick up all those -early apples that the wind -blew down last night, in the -orchard, and make some nice -big bunches of daisies and -clover, with a sweet-william -or a marigold in the middle of each, father would leave -them at Mr. Thorpe’s door, to be given round to the poor -people.”</p> - -<p>Tiny and Johnny went nearly as wild over this announcement -as they had gone over the news that they were to spend -the summer in the inner circle—and then they went to work. -By great good fortune, two of the grand-children came that very -day, and asked nothing better than to help; and when, the next -morning, at the appointed hour, which was five o’clock, these<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_239"></a>[239]</span> -four conspirators brought out their treasures, there was a barrel -of apples, and another barrel of bouquets.</p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 125px;"> -<img src="images/illus94.jpg" width="125" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>Uncle Isaac laughed, and said he had -no idea what a “fix” he was getting himself -into, when he let Mercy make that -speech, but he took the fruit and flowers, -all the same. And after that, it was really -surprising to see the number of things -which, it was found, “might as well go to -those poor little ones as to the pigs.”</p> - -<p>Wild raspberries, dewberries, blackberries, -whortleberries, were all to be had -for the picking; Johnny was told that it -was only fair for him to keep one egg out of every dozen for -which he had hunted, and these eggs, which he at first refused -to take, and afterward, when he found that Aunt Mercy was -“tried” about it, accepted, were -very carefully packed, and plainly -labelled, “For the sickest children.” -Then a very brilliant idea -occurred to Tiny.</p> - -<div class="figleft" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus95.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>“Do the pigs have to eat all -that bonny-clabber, Aunt Mercy?” -she asked, one morning, as David, -the “hired man,” picked up two -buckets full of the nice white curds, and started for the -pig-pen.</p> - -<p>“Why no, deary,” Aunt Mercy replied, “I was saying to<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_240"></a>[240]</span> -father, only yesterday, that I was afraid we were over-feeding -them, but we don’t know what else to do with it. Had thee -thought of anything, dear?”</p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus96.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>“If you <i>really</i> don’t need it,” said Tiny, hesitating a little, -“I’ve watched thee make cottage cheese till I’m sure I could do -it; and I wouldn’t be in the way—I’d -be ever so careful, and -clear up everything when I was -done. And I thought dear little -round white cheeses, tied up in -clean cloths, would be such lovely -things to send! Don’t thee think -so, Aunt Mercy?”</p> - -<p>Tiny was trying very hard to -learn the “plain language”; -she thought it was so pretty.</p> - -<p>“Yes, indeed!” said Aunt Mercy, “and of course thee shall! -That’s one of the best things thee’s thought of, dear. Father -shall buy us plenty of that thin cotton cloth I use for my cheese -and butter rags, the very next time he goes to town, and thee -shall have all the spare clabber, after this.”</p> - -<p>“But you must let Johnny and me pay for the cotton cloth, -Aunt Mercy,” said Tiny, earnestly. “We’ve been saving up -for the next thing we could think of, and we’ve forty-five -cents.”</p> - -<p>Aunt Mercy had her mouth open to say “No indeed!” but -she shut it suddenly, and when it opened again, the words which -came out were,—</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_241"></a>[241]</span></p> - -<p>“Very well, deary.”</p> - -<p>So Johnny cut squares of cheese cloth, which was three cents -a yard at the wholesale place where Uncle Isaac bought it, and -Tiny scalded and squeezed and molded the white curd into -delightful little round cheeses, and then Johnny tied them up in -the cloths.</p> - -<p>“And the cloths will be beautiful for dumplings, afterward!” -said Tiny.</p> - -<p>“Yes, if they can get the dumplings, poor things!” answered -Johnny, soberly.</p> - -<p>“There’s a way to make a crust, if the poor souls only knew -it,” said Aunt Mercy, “that’s real wholesome and good for <i>boiled</i> -crust and very cheap. It’s just to scald the flour till it’s soft -enough to roll out, and put in a little salt. And another way, -that’s most as cheap, and better, is to work flour into hot mashed -potatoes, till it makes a crust that will roll out.”</p> - -<p>The next time there was a barrel of “windfall” apples to go, -Tiny and Johnny came to Aunt Mercy, each with a sheet of -foolscap paper and a sharp lead pencil, and Tiny said, “Aunt -Mercy, will thee please tell us, quite slowly, those two cheap -ways to make apple-dumpling crust?”</p> - -<p>So Aunt Mercy gave out the recipes as if they were a school -dictation, and each of her scholars made twelve copies. It took -a long time, and was a tiresome piece of work, but it was a fine -thing when it was done!</p> - -<p>The twenty-four copies were put in a large yellow envelope, -addressed to “Mr. Thorpe,” and Johnny added a note, in the -best hand he had left, after all that writing,—</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_242"></a>[242]</span></p> - -<div class="blockquote"> - -<p>“<span class="smcap">Dear Mr. Thorpe</span>,—Will you please put one of these -recipe papers with each batch of apples you give away? They -are all right.</p> - -<p class="center">“Very respectfully,</p> - -<p class="right">“T. & J.”</p> - -</div> - -<p>This was the beginning of a most interesting correspondence. -When Uncle Isaac came home the next evening, he brought an -envelope addressed to “T. and J.,” and inside was a card, with -“John Thorpe” on one side of it, and on the other, in a clear, -firm hand,—</p> - -<p>“God bless you both, my dear T. and J. You will never -know how many sad lives you have gladdened, this summer. Is -there any moss in your land of plenty? Have any of your wild-flowers -roots? And may I not know your names?”</p> - -<p>Now this was, as Tiny said, “Too beautiful for anything!” -especially as the early apples and all the berries were about gone, -and the children were beginning to wonder what they could find -to send next.</p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="chapter"> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_243"></a>[243]</span></p> - -<h2 class="nobreak" id="CHAPTER_XXIV">CHAPTER XXIV.<br /> -<span class="smaller">THE CIRCULAR CITY, CONTINUED.</span></h2> - -</div> - -<div> -<img class="dropcap" src="images/dropcap-ch24.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p class="dropcap">They wrote to Mr. Thorpe. Of course -they did! They promised the moss and -roots, and told him how glad they were -that the people had been pleased with -what they sent, and would he be so <i>very</i> -kind as to write and tell them whether -he had heard of anybody who had tried -the apple dumplings?</p> - -<p>“And if any of your people are ill, dear Mr. Thorpe,” wrote -Tiny, in her share of the letter, “and there is anything particular -that you would like for them, will you please tell us, and perhaps -it will be something we can send you.”</p> - -<p>The answer to this letter was delightfully prompt. Yes, several -of the women who had shared the apples had “tried” the -dumplings, and been much pleased with them. Were there any -more nice cheap dishes? And would it be too much trouble to -print the recipes in large, clear letters? Some of the poor -people who could read print quite easily could not read writing -at all. And there was “something particular.” It was almost -impossible for any of “his people” to buy pure milk, and he felt -sure that many little children were suffering and dying for want -of proper food. If he might have only two or three quarts a<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_244"></a>[244]</span> -week of really pure, sweet milk, he would give it to those who -most needed it.</p> - -<p>“But perhaps,” he wrote, “it is not in your power to supply -this want, and if it is not, you must not be troubled. God never -asks for any service which we cannot, with His help, render to -Him, and the knowledge of this should keep us from fretting -when we cannot carry out all our wishes and plans.”</p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus97.jpg" width="200" height="150" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>Tiny and Johnny each received ten cents a week for spending -money, and it did not take them long to decide that, if Uncle -Isaac would sell them three quarts -of milk a week, and lend them a -milk can, they would send that -milk, if it took every cent of -their allowance. Uncle Isaac entered -into the plan with spirit; -if they took three quarts of milk -a week “straight along,” he said, -it would only be four cents a -quart, and he would lend them a can, and deliver it, with -pleasure.</p> - -<p>“But that would be skimmed milk, wouldn’t it, Uncle -Isaac?” asked Tiny, doubtfully.</p> - -<p>“Oh no,” he answered, “not at all! It shall either be from -the milking over night, with all the cream on it, or, if Johnny -chooses, I’ll call him in time to milk the three quarts that very -morning—perhaps that would be best, for then some of it would -keep till next day, if Mr. Thorpe could find a cold place for it.”</p> - -<p>The children were jubilant. There would still be eight cents<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_245"></a>[245]</span> -a week left, and they admitted to each other that it would have -been “very bad” to be reduced to “nothing at all a week!” -And Johnny agreed at once to do the milking. He had been -learning to milk “for fun,” and could do it quite nicely.</p> - -<p>“And that’s a real blessing, Tiny,” he said, “for the milk -will be so nice and fresh, as Uncle Isaac says, that Mr. Thorpe -can keep some till next day. I do hope he has a refrigerator.”</p> - -<div class="figleft" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus98.jpg" width="200" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>You will begin to see, by this time, that the things which -these little people were doing by way of sharing their happiness, -were not by any means all play, and that some of them were -very downright work. Picking berries in the hot sun, or even -flowers, when one picks them -by the bushel, is not amusing. -It always seemed to -Johnny, on the milking -mornings, that he had only -just fallen asleep when Uncle -Isaac gave him the gentle -shaking which had been -agreed upon, because a -knock or call would wake -the rest of the family needlessly -early. Very often -most interesting things, such as building a dam, or digging a -pond, or making a house of fence rails, had to be put aside for -hours, that the “consignment,” whatever it happened to be that -time, might be ready for Uncle Isaac over night. But how -sweet and happy was the play which followed their labors of<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_246"></a>[246]</span> -love, and how small their sacrifices seemed, when they thought -of the little children, crowded, packed, into narrow, foul-smelling -courts and alleys, and, inside of these again, into stifling -rooms!</p> - -<p>The long rambles, in which Mrs. Leslie always, and Mr. Leslie -sometimes, joined, in search of mosses and wild-flower roots, -were only a delight, and quite paid for the work of printing the -simple rules for cheap cookery, which Aunt Mercy told them -from time to time, as she could remember.</p> - -<p>They caught Uncle Isaac, nearly every time that he took one -of their cargoes, slipping in something on his own account—vegetables, -or fruit, or eggs, and even, sometimes, a piece of -fresh meat, when one of his own sheep had been killed to supply -the table.</p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 200px;"> -<img src="images/illus99.jpg" width="200" height="125" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>“That’s a first-rate way to make a stew, that thy Aunt Mercy -gave thee yesterday,” -he said, gravely, to -Tiny, on one of these -occasions; “but I -thought if I took the -mutton, and a few -carrots and potatoes, -along with it, it would -stand a good deal -better chance of getting made than if I didn’t!”</p> - -<p>And Tiny and Johnny delightedly agreed that it would.</p> - -<p>Mr. Leslie came home, one evening, looking a little troubled.</p> - -<p>“I haven’t seen Jim at his usual place for two or three<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_247"></a>[247]</span> -days,” he said; “and if I could only have remembered the street -and number of his lodgings, I would have made time to go and -ask after him. Please write the address on a card for me, dear, -and I’ll go to-morrow, or send if I can’t go.”</p> - -<p>The happy days in the country had by no means made Tiny -and Johnny forget Jim, in the hot and weary city; and, as Mr. -Leslie often saw him at his stand, messages were exchanged, and -gifts of fruit and flowers sent, which cheered his loneliness not -a little, for he missed them more than even they could guess. -Aunt Mercy and Uncle Isaac had heard a good deal about him, -too, by this time; and it so happened that they had come to a -decision concerning him that very day.</p> - -<p>So now Aunt Mercy said,—</p> - -<p>“I was going to speak to thee of that lad this very evening, -Friend Leslie. Our hired man, David, is obliged to leave us next -month, and I have taken a notion to ask thy young friend to -take his place. The work will not be heavy through the winter, -and by spring, with good care and good food in the meantime, he -might well be strong enough to keep on with David’s work, until -our time for hiring extra help comes. And we think it would -be well if he could come at once, while David is still here to -instruct him, and we would pay him half wages until David -leaves. Would thee object to laying our proposal before him, if -thee sees him to-morrow?”</p> - -<p>The applause which followed this speech quite embarrassed -Aunt Mercy; but she was made to understand very clearly that -Mr. Leslie would not have the slightest objection to undertaking -her mission.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_248"></a>[248]</span></p> - -<p>Tiny and Johnny were confident that Jim would come the -very next day; and when Mr. Leslie saw the blank faces which -greeted him as he returned, the next evening, alone, he pretended -that he meant to go back to the office immediately.</p> - -<p>“For the office cat is always glad to see me,” he said, “and -especially so when I come alone!”</p> - -<p>He received, immediately, an overwhelming apology and -testimonial, all in one. But when it was over, Tiny asked,—</p> - -<p>“Why didn’t Jim come with you, papa, really and truly?”</p> - -<p>“Jim is slightly ill at his lodging,” said Mr. Leslie. “It is -nothing serious,” he hastened to add, as he saw the anxious -faces. “I took the doctor to see him, and he says Jim has -a slight touch of bilious fever. He is wretchedly uncomfortable, -of course, for the old woman of the house does as little for him -as she decently can; but I gave her a talking to, and the -doctor says, he hopes to have Jim on his legs again in two -or three days, though, of course, he will be rather weak for -a while.”</p> - -<p>This news caused much lamentation, which was instantly -changed to joy, when Uncle Isaac said, quietly, and as if it were -the only thing to be said under the circumstances,—</p> - -<p>“If thee will give me the address, Friend Leslie, I will drive -in for the lad to-morrow. Mercy can arrange a bed in the bottom -of the spring wagon, and I think the slight risk we shall cause -him to run will be justifiable, under the circumstances. The -kitchen-chamber is vacant, and he can sleep there, until David -goes.”</p> - -<p>Mr. Leslie clasped the old man’s hand with affectionate<span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_249"></a>[249]</span> -warmth, nor could he help saying softly, so that only Uncle -Isaac heard,—</p> - -<p>“‘I was a stranger, and ye took Me in; sick, and in prison, -and ye visited Me.’”</p> - -<p>Aunt Mercy asked Tiny and Johnny to help her make ready -the kitchen chamber, the next day, and Johnny will never receive -any more delightful flattery than her gentle,—</p> - -<p>“Thee is such a carpenter, Johnny, and so handy, that I -thought perhaps thee could bore a gimlet-hole in the floor, here -by the bed, and then fix a piece of twine along one of the rafters -in the kitchen, till it reached the -door-bell—no one-ever rings that, -thee knows, and that poor boy may -want something, and be too weak to -call.”</p> - -<div class="figleft" style="width: 175px;"> -<img src="images/illus100.jpg" width="175" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>So Johnny arranged the bell-pull, -while Aunt Mercy and Tiny tacked -up green paper shades, and white -muslin curtains, to the two windows -and spread the straw mattress, first -with three or four folded “comfortables,” -and then with lavender-scented sheets and a white bed-spread, -and put a clean cover on the bureau, and on the little one-legged -and three-footed table which was to stand by the bed. -Two or three braided rugs were laid upon the floor, and then, -when Tiny had decorated the bureau with a bunch of the brightest -flowers she could find, the room was all ready, “and too -lovely for anything,” as Tiny said.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_250"></a>[250]</span></p> - -<div class="figright" style="width: 125px;"> -<img src="images/illus101.jpg" width="125" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>Jim was afraid, at first, that his new -friends would not understand why he could -not, try as he might, find voice to say anything, -when Uncle Isaac and David carried -him upstairs, and gently placed him on the -white bed. There was a lump in his throat -which would not let any words pass it, but -he raised his eyes to Aunt Mercy’s face, with -a look which somehow made her stroke his -hot forehead with her soft, cool hands, and -say tenderly,—</p> - -<p>“There, my dear, thee is safe and at home, and all thee has -to do is to lie here and get well as fast as thee can!”</p> - -<p>He did it, and with everything to help forward his recovery, -his strong young frame soon shook off disease and languor.</p> - -<div class="figleft" style="width: 175px;"> -<img src="images/illus102.jpg" width="175" height="200" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p>Three weeks after he came -to the farm, he was “all about -again,” as Aunt Mercy said, and -so eager for work, that he soon -left David little to do. And -what famous help he was about -the “mission!” He seemed to -have an especial faculty for finding -the places where shy mosses -and delicate wild-flowers hid; he -had “spotted” every nut tree -within five miles before the nuts -were ripe, and he packed their various findings in a way which -excited wonder and admiration.</p> - -<p><span class="pagenum"><a id="Page_251"></a>[251]</span></p> - -<p>The “beautiful time” in the inner circle came to an end at -last, or rather, to a pause; nobody was willing to believe it the -end. There were plans and hopes for next year, and for the -winter which must come first, but, in spite of all the hopes, -nobody looked very cheerful when the last evening came, and if -Mrs. Leslie and Aunt Mercy did not mingle their tears with -those of Tiny and Johnny, the next morning, it was only because -they felt that they must set a good example even if nobody were -able to follow it!</p> - -<p>And you, who are reading this? Are you trying, ever so -little, to share your happiness? Think about it. No one is too -poor to do this. Those of you who enjoy, every summer, a free, -happy holiday in the country, can be “faithful in much,” and -those who are themselves suffering privation can give, always, -love and sympathy, and often the “helping hand” which does -so much beside the actual help it gives. And remember, dear -children who are listening to me, that with the “Inasmuch as -ye did,” comes the far more solemn “Inasmuch as ye did it <i>not</i>, -unto the least of these My brethren, ye did it not to Me.”</p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;"> -<img src="images/ad1.jpg" width="500" height="325" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p class="center larger">THE DEAD DOLL<br /> -<span class="smaller smcap">And Other Verses.</span></p> - -<p class="center"><span class="smcap">By MARGARET VANDEGRIFT.</span></p> - -<p class="center smaller">Author of “Little Helpers,” etc.</p> - -<p class="center">1 Vol. Square 8vo. Fully illustrated. Uniform with “Davy -and the Goblin,” etc. $1.50.</p> - -<p>A charming collection of wise and witty verses for children, many of -which, like “THE DEAD DOLL,” “THE FATE OF A FACE-MAKER,” etc., are very -popular, and have been copied all over the country; and are household -words in thousands of families, where this complete and beautiful edition -will be eagerly welcomed. Among the other poems are</p> - -<ul> -<li>THE GALLEY CAT.</li> -<li>SLUMBER-LAND.</li> -<li>AT SUNSET.</li> -<li>WINNING A PRINCESS.</li> -<li>THE CAT AND THE FIDDLE.</li> -<li>A DREAM OF LITTLE WOMEN.</li> -<li>THE CLOWN’S BABY.</li> -<li>THE KING’S DAUGHTER.</li> -</ul> - -<p>These poems are not only very attractive and interesting to children, but -they also have a great fascination for all who care for children, and for -sweetness and innocence of life.</p> - -<p class="center"><i>Sent, postpaid, on receipt of price, by the publishers</i>,<br /> -<span class="smcap">TICKNOR & CO., Boston.</span></p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;"> -<img src="images/ad2.jpg" width="500" height="400" alt="" /> -<p class="caption">AT CLOSE QUARTERS THE FIRST DAY AT GETTYSBURG.</p> -</div> - -<p class="center larger">The Recollections of a Drummer Boy.</p> - -<p class="center"><span class="smcap">By Rev. HARRY M. KIEFFER,<br /> -<span class="smaller">Late of the 150th Pennsylvania Volunteers.</span></span></p> - -<p class="center">Copiously illustrated with scenes in camp and field. 1 vol. Square 8vo. -Revised and enlarged, and printed from entirely new plates. $1.50.</p> - -<p>A new and enlarged edition of this admirable book, which is particularly -adapted for youths, and should be placed in the hands of every lad in the -country, to impart a knowledge of the old war days.</p> - -<p>The position of the author, as a clergyman of the Reformed Church, -gives the book a certain value to all persons interested in true and -pure literature, which is also of the greatest power of attraction. -“The Recollections of a Drummer Boy” has become a very popular book for -Sunday-school libraries; and should be read by all old soldiers and their -children. The great demand for the book has compelled the publishers to -issue this enlarged and beautified new edition.</p> - -<p>“The author describes the war fever and enlistment, the advance to -Virginia, the battles of Chancellorsville, Gettysburg, the Wilderness, -Petersburg, and the end, with a simplicity and straightforwardness that -are full of pathos. The evening camps, the frugal ‘hard tack,’ the long -marches over ‘the sacred soil,’ the Bucktail cantonments under the -dark Virginia pines, the whir of the long roll, the silent watch of -midnight pickets, the songs of the camp, the moans of the hospital, the -white tents on Maryland hills, the joyous rush of artillery coming into -action, the imposing splendors of Presidential reviews—all these and -a thousand other phases of that exciting era are reproduced here with -picturesque fidelity; and once more its readers are ‘Tenting on the old -Camp-ground.’”—<i>Washington Herald.</i></p> - -<p class="center"><i>Sent, postpaid, on receipt of price, by the Publishers</i>,<br /> -<span class="smcap">TICKNOR & CO., Boston.</span></p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;"> -<img src="images/ad3.jpg" width="500" height="400" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p class="center larger"><span class="smcap">JUAN and JUANITA.</span></p> - -<p class="center">By FRANCES COURTENAY BAYLOR.</p> - -<p class="center smaller">Author of “On Both Sides,” etc.</p> - -<p class="center">1 vol. Square 4to. With many illustrations $1.50.</p> - -<p>Miss Baylor’s charming and “ower true” tale has formed (<i>though only -given in part</i>) the chief attraction of the “St. Nicholas” for a year, -and in its present and complete form will be heartily welcomed, most -of all by those who have already learned to love its little hero and -heroine, and will eagerly look for the full story of their adventures.</p> - -<p>The <i>locale</i> of these events, amid the romantic scenery of Northern -Mexico and Western Texas, is brilliantly and accurately described, with -the ways and habits of the Texans, Mexicans, and Indians. With these -are the records of the young hero and heroine, in and beyond the Cañon -of Roses, and their numerous strange and diverting adventures, making a -volume of rare and permanent interest for young or old.</p> - -<hr /> - -<div class="figcenter" style="width: 500px;"> -<img src="images/ad4.jpg" width="500" height="325" alt="" /> -</div> - -<p class="center larger">THREE GOOD GIANTS.</p> - -<p class="center larger"><span class="smcap">By FRANÇOIS RABELAIS.</span></p> - -<p class="center"><b><i>Translated by John Dimitry. With 175 Pictures by Gustave Doré -and Anton Robida.</i></b></p> - -<p class="center">$1.50. Uniform with “Davy and the Goblin,” etc.</p> - -<p>“The present beautiful edition of an amusing book cannot fail to amuse -thousands of little ones, who perhaps in these days are growing tired of -‘Gulliver’s Travels,’ ‘Robinson Crusoe,’ ‘Alice in Wonderland,’ and ‘The -Arabian Nights.’”—<i>The Week.</i></p> - -<p>“Coleridge classes Rabelais with ‘the great creative minds, Shakspeare, -Dante, and Cervantes.’ In ‘Three Good Giants,’ children, young and -old, will find a story which will vie in delightful interest with -‘Robinson Crusoe.’ The adventures of the hearty, good-natured old king -Grandgousier, his son Gargantua, and his grandson Pantagruel, all of them -mighty heroes and doers of wonderful deeds, will be read and re-read with -ever-increasing enjoyment. In paper, printing, and binding, ‘Three Good -Giants’ is everything that a choice holiday hook should be.”—<i>Washington -Transcript.</i></p> - -<p class="center"><i>Sent, postpaid, on receipt of price by the publishers</i>,<br /> -TICKNOR & CO., BOSTON.</p> - - - - - - - - -<pre> - - - - - -End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Little Helpers, by Margaret Vandegrift - -*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK LITTLE HELPERS *** - -***** This file should be named 63793-h.htm or 63793-h.zip ***** -This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: - http://www.gutenberg.org/6/3/7/9/63793/ - -Produced by MFR and the Online Distributed Proofreading -Team at https://www.pgdp.net (This file was produced from -images generously made available by The Internet Archive) - -Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions will -be renamed. - -Creating the works from print editions not protected by U.S. copyright -law means that no one owns a United States copyright in these works, -so the Foundation (and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United -States without permission and without paying copyright -royalties. 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