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Title: The school-girls' treasury
or, Stories for thoughtful girls.
Author: Lucy Ellen Guernsey
Release date: March 29, 2024 [eBook #73286]
Language: English
Original publication: New York: Protestant Episcopal Society for the Promotion of Evangelical Knowledge, 1870
*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE SCHOOL-GIRLS' TREASURY ***
Transcriber's note: Unusual and inconsistent spelling is as printed.
THE
SCHOOL-GIRLS'
TREASURY
OR,
STORIES FOR THOUGHTFUL GIRLS.
BY
LUCY ELLEN GUERNSEY
PROTESTANT EPISCOPAL SOCIETY FOR THE PROMOTION
OF EVANGELICAL KNOWLEDGE,
NO. 2, BIBLE HOUSE, NEW YORK.
1870.
Entered according to Act of Congress, in the year 1870,
BY "THE PROTESTANT EPISCOPAL SOCIETY FOR THE
PROMOTION OF EVANGELICAL KNOWLEDGE,"
In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of the
United States for the Southern District of New York.
ST. JOHNLAND STEREOTYPE FOUNDRY, SUFFOLK CO., N. Y.
THIS VOLUME
IS PUBLISHED BY SPECIAL CONTRIBUTION
OF THE
SUNDAY-SCHOOL OF THE CHURCH OF
THE INCARNATION,
NEW YORK.
[Illustration]
CONTENTS.
ANNA, OR, "MAKE THE BEST OF IT"
DORA, OR, "WON'T YOU EVER TELL?"
ESTHER'S BAD DAY, OR, "I COULDN'T HELP IT"
MARTHA, OR, "CHARITY THINKETH NO EVIL"
MARY, OR, "SHE MADE ME DO IT"
LOUISA, OR, "JUST ONE MINUTE"
THE
SCHOOL-GIRLS'
TREASURY
[Illustration: ANNA, OR, "MAKE THE BEST OF IT." Frontispiece.]
[Illustration]
ANNA,
OR,
MAKE THE BEST OF IT.
YOU would not oftener see a pleasanter parlor than the one where Anna
was sitting. It was handsomely and tastefully furnished, with abundance
of pictures and prints on the walls. There were pretty chintz curtains
to the one large window, and the couches and chairs were covered with
the same material. There was a bright blazing fire burning in the
grate, and a pretty kitten sat purring on the rug before it. The gas
was lighted, and a table at Anna's elbow was strewn with books and
magazines.
Yet Anna sat in her comfortable chair before the fire, looking very
doleful indeed, and she had been sitting so for a whole hour. She had
a book in her hand, but she was not reading: her eyes were apparently
fixed on the kitten before the fire, and it was easy to see that a very
little would make them overflow with tears. In fact, Anna felt very
unhappy, and—in spite of her long frocks which she had worn for a full
half year—very babyish indeed.
Anna had been left at home to keep house for a week, while her father
and mother and the two younger children went to visit her grandfather.
Anna had expected a very dear friend to stay with her while her father
and mother were gone. Lillie Adams was to have come by the evening
train, and Anna had caused a dainty hot supper to be prepared for her;
but instead of her friend, the postman brought a hurried letter from
Lillie Adams, saying that her father had been suddenly called abroad
on business and wished her to go with him: so she was going to Germany
upon three days' notice, instead of coming to visit Anna.
This was a grievous disappointment, no doubt, and it was no wonder that
Anna felt it; but she was not going to work to meet it in the right way.
She was making the worst instead of the best of the case. She would not
eat a mouthful of the supper which had been prepared for her friend;
she betook herself to none of her usual evening employments, but sat
moodily before the fire, picturing to herself the merry group which
would be assembled at her grandfather's fireside, and the delightful
bustle in which Lillie Adams was engaged preparing to go abroad. And
contrasting these things with her own lonely condition and the long
tiresome week of solitude which was before her. There was great danger
of the eyes overflowing, after all: when the opening of the door and
the entrance of the cook made a moment's diversion.
Caroline Davis was a colored woman who had lived with Mrs. Grey ever
since her marriage, and was regarded as a friend and counsellor
by all the family, from the oldest to the youngest, especially by
the children. She was apt to "speak her mind," as she said, on all
occasions, especially when she thought she saw any of the children
going wrong, and she had come to speak her mind now to her favorite,
Miss Anna.
"Miss Anna!" said she, planting herself in front of her. "Ain't you
going to eat any supper?"
"I don't want anything, thank you, Caroline," said Anna, in a doleful
tone.
"You'd better have something," persisted Caroline. "I've got some
splendid batter cakes, just baked, and a chocolate cake such as you
like; and I'll make you a famous cup of coffee."
"I don't think I want any, thank you, Caroline," repeated Anna, still
more dolefully, though she was conscious of certain stirrings within at
the mention of the chocolate cake and other dainties.
Caroline took a step forward, and placed her arms a-kimbo, as she was
apt to do when disposed for an argument. "Look here, honey," said she.
"Do you calculate to go on this way all the time your pa and ma are
away? Because, if you do, I think I'd better write to them to come home
again."
Anna smiled, in spite of herself. "I hav'n't made any calculations
about the matter, Caroline. My calculations have not turned out so well
that I should want to make any more," she added, rather bitterly.
"Just so, honey. You've been disappointed, I don't deny it; and no
wonder you feel bad. But the question is, are you going to feel as bad
as you can, or are you going to make the best of it? You know what the
Bible says about taking up the cross, Miss Anna, my dear. Now this
disappointment is a cross that He has sent you, and the question is
whether you are going to take it up and bear it like a Christian or sit
down on the ground and fret under it, like a baby?"
Anna seemed a good deal interested by this view of the case. "But it
hardly seems right to call such a thing as this a cross," said she.
Caroline smiled. "Well, I don't call it the biggest kind of a cross,"
said she, "that is compared to what some folks have to carry—old Mrs.
Williams, for instance, with her bad leg and her rheumatic shoulders
and her poor consumptive daughter. Still it is a cross for you to be
disappointed of your friend's visit, and to have to stay alone all the
week; but I would not make it any worse than it is, if I were you. Now
I shall go and get your supper and bring it to you in here, and I guess
you'll find you want some, after all."
Anna sat thinking, after Caroline left the room, but it was with quite
a different expression of face.
"How silly I am!" she was saying to herself. "Only yesterday I was
reading the lives of Margaret Rogers and Lady Jane Gray, and wishing I
had lived in times when there were some great things to do; and hear
I am actually crying like a baby over the very first thing that comes
to try my strength, and sitting down as though them were no more to be
done in the world, because Lillie Adams is going to Europe. I won't be
such a fool, and that is all about it. Come, Pussy, get up and make
yourself agreeable!"
Pussy was very ready to exert herself for Anna's benefit and her own,
and the two were in the midst of a famous romp, when Caroline entered
with her dainty tray of provisions.
"There, now! I call that something like!" said she, much pleased with
the change. "Come and eat your supper, honey, while it is hot."
Anna disposed of her batter-puffs and other good things in a way which
showed that her trouble had not entirely destroyed her appetite, and
she could not deny that she enjoyed her supper.
"Caroline," said she, "you know that breakfast shawl Aunt Anna left
here? It is rather faded, but not at all worn out. I have been thinking
that I might ravel it out and make it over with some stripes of a new
bright color. That would make it quite pretty again, and it would be
nice and warm for Mrs. Williams' lame shoulders."
"That is an excellent notion of yours, my dear. The old lady needs a
shawl, I know, and she likes bright colors, too: and she will think all
the more of the shawl if it is your own work."
Anna was one of those people who, when they think of a project for
the benefit of another, like to set about it directly; so she went
up-stairs and brought down the old shawl and a large basket of
bright-colored worsteds, of many different shades.
The rest of the evening quickly passed away in ravelling out the shawl
and contriving the best way of making it over so as to be better than
before. And Anna was surprised when Caroline came in and said it was
nine o'clock.
"Are you going to have prayers to-night, Miss Anna?"
Anna hesitated. She felt very shy about reading and praying before the
servants.
"I would, if I were you," said Caroline. "You see you are the head of
the house, now that your father and mother are away."
"And I am sure we need to ask God's protection all the more when we are
separated one from the other," thought Anna. "No, I will not give way
to false shame. I may as well begin now as any time. Yes, Caroline, we
will have prayers, if you will tell Jane and Albert to come in."
Anna's heart beat fast when she began to read, but she tried to fix her
mind upon the sacred words, and by the time she came to the prayers,
she was ready to pray with all her heart.
"Well, I didn't believe Miss Anna would read prayers!" she heard Jane
say, after the servants had left the room. "She is such a shy young
lady, generally. You know for all she plays so well, how she hates to
play before company."
"She is her father's own daughter," replied Caroline. "When she knows
she ought to do a thing she does it; I tell you she isn't ashamed to
confess her Lord before men, and He won't be ashamed to confess her in
the great day!"
"Was that confessing Christ, I wonder?" thought Anna. "I suppose it
was, in one way, though I did not think of it at the time. I am glad I
did read, at any rate."
Some of Anna's unpleasant feelings returned when she found herself in
her own room up-stairs. It seemed so very lonely without papa and mamma
in the next room and the boys overhead, and she began to wonder whether
she was going to be afraid.
"But, after all, what is there to be afraid of?" she said to herself.
"The bell-rope hangs close to my head and I have only to pull it to
call Caroline and Albert in a minute. Besides it is God who takes care
of me when my father and mother are here, and He can do it just as well
when they are away!"
So Anna read her chapters and said her prayers, and learned her two
verses to repeat in the morning, as was the custom of the family; and
then went bravely to bed without even looking under the bed, as she did
sometimes when her parents were at home. She had thought she should lie
awake and listen for suspicious noises; but, as it happened, the first
noise she heard was the ringing of the first bell in the morning.
"Now, what had I better do to-day?" she said to herself, as she was
dressing. "I have no particular work, and there is nothing to be done
about the house. O dear, I wish it was not vacation and all the girls I
care about were not away. But then if it is vacation, that is no reason
why I should be idle; I mean to practise two hours instead of one, and
try to get those waltzes perfectly that papa likes so much."
"And what else shall I do? I believe I will try painting a picture all
by myself, and see what I can make of it. Miss Jeffrey says I ought to
be able to work by myself now, and I am sure she will be pleased if I
have something pretty to show her when school begins again. I will copy
that chromo which Aunt Anna gave mamma; and if it turns out nicely, it
will be a pretty present for one of the old ladies at the Home."
Anna read prayers after breakfast, and then, after dusting the
drawing-room, she sat down for two hours of vigorous practise. Then she
began her picture, and by dinnertime she had her paper prepared, her
outline drawn, and her first tints washed in.
"There! I have made a good beginning!" said she, looking at her work
with great satisfaction. "And if nothing happens, I shall have finished
it before mamma comes home, and before school begins again. I mean
to work at music and painting in the morning and take a good long
walk every afternoon. Then I will work at Mrs. Williams' shawl in the
evening, and that will use up my time nicely."
Something was destined to happen, however, which sadly interfered
with all these calculations. When Anna returned from her walk that
afternoon, she saw that the blinds of the front bed-room were opened.
"I wonder if Lillie can have come, after all!" she said to herself, as
she quickened her steps.
She was met at the door by Caroline with a face which promised no good
news.
"Has any one come?" she asked.
"Well, yes, honey, somebody has come, though I'm afraid it isn't any
one you want to see very bad."
"Not Aunt Dorinda!" exclaimed Anna, rather more loudly than was
prudent, considering the tone in which she spoke.
"Hush, my dear! She will hear you! Yes, it is Aunt Dorinda, sure
enough! Never mind, honey, we can't help it now. We must only make the
best of it, that's all."
"Aunt Dorinda, of all people!" thought Anna, as she went to her room to
take off her hat. "Well, there is an end to all my fine plans. However,
as Caroline says, there is no help for it now. Poor thing, I suppose I
may as well have her for a little while as anybody else. I must just
leave off studying painting and study patience, that is all."
Poor Aunt Dorinda! She was a woman of a good deal of talent. She was
tolerably rich, and decidedly well educated; and she fully intended to
be a Christian, and to do a great deal of good in the world; and yet
there was not one of all the families she visited who did not dread to
see her come into the house, or who did not feel relieved when she went
away.
All this inconsistency is easily explained. Aunt Dorinda never did
or could mind her own business, and let the affairs of other people
alone. She was possessed with a great desire to do good, and she was
always making presents; but she wished always to do good exactly in her
own way; and her presents were generally accompanied with remarks and
admonitions which rendered them bitter pills to those who were obliged
to accept them.
"So it seems I have come just in the nick of time!" said she to her
niece, after the first greeting. "I do wonder your mother should have
you to keep house alone. I don't suppose you know anything about it."
"I don't have very much housekeeping to do, Aunt Dorinda," replied
Anna. "Caroline is the housekeeper when mamma is away. And I did not
expect to be alone either, for Lillie Adams was coming to stay with me,
only she was obliged to go away unexpectedly."
"Worse and worse! Two giddy heads are worse than one. I am surprised
that your mother should think of leaving you alone with such a vain
worldly girl as Lillie Adams."
"Lillie is neither vain nor worldly, Aunt Dorinda!" said Anna, with
spirit. "She was confirmed last Easter, and the is a good Christian
girl, if ever there was one."
"Don't tell me that, Anna Grey!" returned Aunt Dorinda, angrily.
"Haven't I seen her with my own eyes with three ruffles on the lower
skirt of her dress and as many on the upper? Do you call that being a
Christian?"
"Lillie does not follow her own taste in dress," said Anna, smiling in
spite of herself. "Her stepmother dresses her. Lillie said to me that
she preferred to dress more plainly; but Mrs. Adams had always been
so kind and good to her, that she did not like to contradict her on a
matter of no great importance. You know, Aunt Dorinda, how devotedly
Mrs. Adams nursed Lillie through her long illness, after she had that
dreadful accident. Papa himself said that Lillie owed her life and
health more to her stepmother's nursing than to his skill. Mrs. Adams
gave up everything to her."
"O yes, I know!" said Aunt Dorinda, scornfully. "I heard all that when
I talked to Lillie as I did about her dress."
"'What of that?' said I. 'You ought to follow your own convictions of
duty, whatever your stepmother may say.'"
"And all Lillie did was to toss head and say that 'her convictions of
duty led her to honor her father and mother.'"
"What time do you have tea?"
"At seven-o'clock, aunt, because it is more convenient to papa: but I
will order it earlier, if you are hungry, after your ride."
"Well, I am surprised!" This was Aunt Dorinda's favorite phrase. "I
should think your father, being a physician, would know better than to
eat so late in the evening. Half-past five is the very latest hour that
any one ought to eat."
Anna could not help thinking that her father, being a physician, would
be likely to know what was good for himself and his family; but she
said nothing, and ordered tea at half-past five, thinking that at least
she would have a good long evening to work.
Aunt Dorinda, came down at tea-time, bringing a very large work-basket
with her. She shook her head at the biscuits, declaring them very
unwholesome, but managed to eat a fair share of them nevertheless, with
a due proportion of stewed oysters and other good things.
Anna tried to keep her entertained by asking questions about different
relatives and family friends; but she found there was not one of them
all who had not displeased Aunt Dorinda in some way or other, generally
by having opinions of their own about the management of their private
affairs. Aunt Dorinda was one of those people who think that they are
always right, and therefore always entitled to find fault with others.
She had, as it were, cut out a pattern of Christian character according
to her own notions of perfection, and she went about the world trying
this pattern upon all her acquaintances, and endeavoring to pare and
prune them or else to stretch them to fit it. She frowned and shook her
head when Anna brought out her crochet work, after tea.
"Always at that useless fancy work!" said she. "Why do you not do
something useful? How much better to be working for some poor person
or for the missionaries, than to be spending your time in such idle
pursuits!"
"But this is for a poor person, aunt," said Anna, determined not to be
vexed. "It is for old Mrs. Williams, at the Home."
"How absurd, Anna! Making such a fanciful thing for a poor woman who is
dependent for her daily bread! You might buy a woollen shawl for half
the money, which would do her just as much good and save your time and
your funds."
"I don't think so, aunt! You see this shawl did not cost me any money,
except twenty-five cents for some scarlet-shaded wool. Aunt Anna left
it here when she went away and told me to give it to some poor person.
And almost all the new wool I am using is made up of odds and ends left
from different pieces of work."
"Then why not give her the shawl just as your aunt left it?"
"Because it would not be as acceptable, aunt. Mrs. Williams loves
pretty things and colors, and she will like the shawl all the better if
it is my own work."
"Humph! I suppose you flatter yourself that you are doing all that work
for Mrs. Williams and not for your own amusement?"
"Yes, aunt, I think so," said Anna, simply.
"Well, here is the proof. I have in this basket some shirts to be made
up for a missionary at the west. Let me see you put away that senseless
worsted, and stitch one of these bosoms."
"I cannot do it this evening, aunt, because papa does not like to have
me do fine work in the evening," said Anna, speaking pleasantly, though
she felt annoyed. "But I will stitch it to-morrow, with pleasure."
"We shall see when to-morrow comes!" said Aunt Dorinda, rather
ungraciously. "I hope no new excuse will turn up in the meantime. There
now, child, you need not color so and look so vexed. I mean all for
your good, and you know I always say just what I think to everybody."
"But you don't like it one bit, when people say what they think to
you!" thought Anna, but she did not say so.
She began asking about the missionary to whom the shirts were to be
sent, and about other missionaries; and the rest of the evening passed
over very comfortably.
"We have prayers at nine o'clock, Aunt Dorinda," said Anna, when the
clock struck the hour.
"Indeed!" said Aunt Dorinda. "Who conducts them, now that your father
is away?"
"I did last night and this morning," replied Anna. "I thought perhaps
you would do so to-night."
"You had better do just as you would if I were not here," said Aunt
Dorinda. "I will see how you manage, and tell you if there is room for
improvement."
Anna did not feel any more devotional for the thought that Aunt Dorinda
was criticising her; but she tried to collect herself and to think of
nothing but the solemn duty in which she was engaged; and she succeeded
better than she expected.
"Why don't you pray in your own words?" was Aunt Dorinda's first
question.
"Because, aunt, I think that the words in the book are better than any
I could use. And besides," added Anna, rather, timidly; "if I were to
try to pray in my own words before others, I am afraid I should be
thinking more of the words and of how to express myself than of the
sense."
"Do you think then that all those who pray in their own words before
others are thinking more of the words than of the sense?" asked Aunt
Dorinda, sharply.
"No, aunt, not at all. I was only speaking of myself. And I don't see
either why I should use my own words when I have such good and suitable
words all ready for me."
"I am afraid you have no proper spirit of devotion," said Aunt Dorinda,
severely. "I am afraid you have never learned to pray in the true
spirit of prayer."
Anna was too much hurt to reply, and perhaps it was as well she did not
do so. She went to her room feeling tired, discouraged and unhappy. Was
it really tree that she had never learned to pray, and had none of the
true spirit of devotion? Had all her enjoyments in the Church services
and in her private devotions been a delusion? Had she done wrong,
after all, in performing the duty which it had been so hard for her to
undertake? And if she had been wrong so far, how was she to set herself
right?
"Oh, how I do wish mamma was at home!" said she, sighing. "She would
tell me what I ought to do. And how am I to get on with Aunt Dorinda,
all alone, for a week?"
Anna took up her little book of texts for every day in the year. It had
been given her by her Sunday-school teacher with the advice that she
should learn the text for every day, and keep it in mind as a topic for
meditation. She opened to the day of the month, and her eyes fell on
the words:
"All things work together for good to them that love God."
"'All things,'" she thought. "And 'to them that love God.' Do I love
Him? Yes, I am sure I do. Aunt Dorinda says it is very hard to tell
whether we love God or not; but I don't see why it should be so. I
don't find it hard to tell whether I love my other friends or not. Yes,
I am sure I love Him, and if so, this promise is for me."
"Then there must be some way in which Aunt Dorinda's visit may do me
good. I do not see how, unless in teaching me to be patient at being
contradicted and put out of my way. Mamma says of me sometimes that I
am very pleasant when I am pleased. Well, I must learn to be pleasant
when I am not pleased. I know that Aunt Dorinda, does really mean to be
good and kind, and I must try to remember that and have patience with
the rest. I suppose I shall have to give up my painting and work at
those shirt-bosoms, but that is no great sacrifice, after all, and the
shirts will do somebody good. It isn't the heaviest kind of a cross, as
Caroline says, after all."
By the time Anna had finished her prayers and reading, she felt once
more contented and happy. She went to sleep with the words of praise
upon her lips and in her heart, and awoke feeling cheerful and brave,
and ready to "make the best of anything that should happen."
That day Anna not only stitched the shirt-bosom, putting aside her
painting for the purpose, but she nearly finished the garment. She
did not, however, think it necessary to give up Mrs. Williams' shawl,
though her aunt went out in the afternoon and bought some marvellously
coarse yarn expressly that Anna might, as she said, have no excuse for
that senseless fancywork: thinking that her poor old friend had quite
as much claims upon her as a person she had never seen, and whom even
her aunt did not know.
Aunt Dorinda stayed three days, and then received a letter which
decided her to go back directly. Anna helped her to pack with a right
good will, and she drew a long breath of relief as Aunt Dorinda drove
away.
"Well, she's gone!" said Caroline. "She means to be a good woman, I
don't doubt, but she is a trial. There's one thing I must say, Miss
Anna, my dear, that you might learn from your aunt, and that is to mind
your own business, and not interfere with other folks, even when you
think you know more than they do. It is just that which makes her so
disagreeable, and makes her do harm where she wants and means to do
good. And you know, honey, you do interfere sometimes, even with your
mother."
Anna blushed. "I know it. I was thinking of that very thing last night."
"Well, then, that is one way to make the best of Aunt Dorinda. Try to
be like her in wishing to do good and to help others; and learn from
her, not to spoil all the good you do by dictating and interfering so
as to make people dislike you. I tell you, honey, these disagreeable
Christians have a great deal to answer for."
The remaining days of the week passed pleasantly and quickly to Anna;
but she was a good deal disappointed when, on Saturday, she received
a letter from her father, saying that they should not be at home for
three days longer.
"Three more days!" she thought. "But then I shall have time to finish
my picture and my shawl; and I am sure mamma will be pleased with them."
Thus you have seen how by a brave and cheerful spirit Anna was enabled
to enjoy the time which at first seemed likely to pass so heavily; and
how by a spirit of Christian gentleness and humility she contrived to
extract real good out of what might have made her only fretful and
unhappy.
Try, my dear girls, to do likewise. Try to make the best of whatever
happens, and when, as it seems, there is no best to be made, try to
receive your trouble as a cross from the hand of your kind and loving
Heavenly Father, and pray for His grace to sanctify your affliction,
and be assured He will teach you to "make the best of it."
[Illustration]
[Illustration: DORA, OR, "WON'T YOU EVER TELL?" Frontispiece.]
[Illustration]
DORA,
OR,
"WON'T YOU EVER TELL?"
"WON'T you ever tell as long as you live and breathe?" said Dora Hayes
to Eva Morrison.
"No," replied Eva, thoughtlessly.
"Just as true as you live?" repeated Dora.
"I don't know," said Eva, taking a second thought. "I always do tell
mother everything."
"Then I shall not tell you!" returned Dora, tossing her head. "If you
are such a baby as that, I shall never tell you anything. I should
think you would be ashamed to run and tell m—a—a everything you hear."
And Dora tossed her head and laughed in a very ill-bred, disagreeable
manner.
"Well, I am not ashamed, and I don't want any of your secrets, Dora
Hayes," said Eva, coloring, but speaking very decidedly. "My mother is
the best friend I have in the world, and I love her dearly, and I don't
know who I should tell things to, if not to her. So you may keep your
great secret to yourself."
"But this is something that somebody said about you," said Dora, seeing
that she had made a mistake in laughing at Eva.
"So much the worse," returned Eva, boldly, though she felt her
curiosity excited. "I don't want to know what people say about me, and
you ought never to repeat conversation either. You know what the doctor
said about that in catechism class only yesterday."
And Eva turned away, and sitting down at a distance, she occupied
herself in learning her lesson till school began. A good many times in
the course of the day, she found herself wondering what it was that
Dora wanted to tell her; but she put the thought resolutely away. And
by the next morning, she had almost forgotten the matter.
Eva's parents were among the richest people in the place. Eva herself
was always prettily and fashionably dressed: she had plenty of
pocket-money to spend, and she had been in vacation to Saratoga and
Newport, and even to London and Paris with her parents.
According to the usual course of story-books, Eva ought, I suppose, to
be represented as proud, and haughty, and vain. I am glad to say that
she was nothing of the sort. She was a kindhearted, truthful, good
girl, always ready to help her school-mates in their lessons and to
amuse them with telling stories of what she had seen. She was, for that
matter, not nearly so proud as her classmate and most particular friend
Amy Preston.
Amy was the daughter of a widow lady, who kept a fancy-store in the
place where Eva lived. Mrs. Preston was the widow of an artist. She
might have had a home with her husband's relatives, but like a good
and sensible woman as she was, she preferred supporting herself by the
beautiful work she had learned to do abroad, and by selling materials
for embroidery and other fancywork; and this she did with an honesty
and energy which made her very much respected. Mrs. Preston had only
one child, and she wished to give her such an education as would enable
her to support herself if it became necessary. Her own business was
prosperous enough to enable her to afford it: so she kept Amy at the
best school in the place and allowed her to take music lessons of the
same master who taught Eva Morrison.
Eva had "taken," as the girls say, to Amy Preston from the very first;
but it was a good while before Amy responded to her advances. For
Amy was proud, as perhaps was only natural, and she was afraid that
people would say she flattered and courted the heiress. She persisted
for a good while in being very cool to Eva, but at last Eva's loving
frankness and persevering kindness won the day, and the two girls were
now the best friends in the world.
Mrs. Morrison entirely approved of this friendship. She had known Mrs.
Preston for years, and she did not believe that Eva was likely to
learn anything bad from Amy. Besides, Amy was a good scholar and very
industrious; and Mrs. Morrison thought she might have a good influence
over Eva, who was inclined to be rather lazy over all her lessons but
music and drawing.
We have said that Amy was proud, and that it was only natural that she
should be so. There is a certain sort of pride, if pride it can be
called, which is very proper. I mean the feeling which makes people
prefer helping themselves, when they are able, to being helped by
others; and causes them to be cautious and delicate about receiving
expensive presents, and the like.
But this very proper feeling may be carried too far, and too far Amy
certainly did carry it. She would walk home from school in the rain
rather than ride in the carriage which Mr. Morrison sent for Eva. She
would not receive the smallest present from Eva without making her one
in return; and it was a long time before she would consent to borrow
from Eva's large library of story-books.
In fact, Amy was jealous of her friend's wealth and so-called station.
It often happens that we go on indulging very serious faults, just
because we will not allow ourselves to call these faults by their right
names. Thus we call anger just resentment, and pride self-respect, and
blunt rudeness sincerity, and so on.
If Amy had really become aware that she was cherishing envy and
jealousy, she would have been shocked, for she was trying very hard
to be a Christian. But she christened her fault by the pretty name of
self-respect. When the cow-bird lays her egg in the sparrow's nest, the
sparrow cherishes it and brings up the intruder as her own; but the
cow-bird hatches sooner, and grows faster than the young sparrows, and
very soon turns them all out of the nest. So this intruder, which Amy
called self-respect, was rapidly outgrowing all the gentle virtues of
charity, humility and love in Amy's heart, and was getting ready, when
occasion served, to turn them all out and keep the nest to itself.
The occasion was not very far off. There was one girl in the school who
entirely disapproved of the warm friendship which existed between Eva
and Amy, and that was Dora Hayes. Dora was a far-away cousin of Eva's
and would have liked to be very intimate with her. Dora had no pride
to prevent her from accepting any amount of obligations from her rich
relations, and she would have boarded, and lodged, and dressed at Mr.
Morrison's expense the year round without having her feelings hurt or
her gratitude excited in the least degree.
Dora was always hanging about Eva, contriving to sit next to her, and
fishing for invitations to visit her. But Eva, though she was, or meant
to be, kind to Dora, did not like her. She thought her both mean and
deceitful, as indeed she was. And while she sometimes made her presents
and lent her books, she would never encourage Dora's attempts at
intimacy.
This was very vexatious to Dora. She laid it all to Eva's friendship
with "that Preston girl," as she called her, and this friendship she
determined somehow or other to break up. She had begun upon Eva, but,
as we have seen, with little success. Eva would not promise not to
tell, and would not hear her wonderful secret at any price. Dora was
very much vexed, but she was not one to give up easily any point she
had set her heart upon. She determined to try and see what she could do
with Amy.
Amy frequently staid in the store and attended to customers when her
mother was obliged to be out. Dora knew this, and that very afternoon,
finding Amy alone, she pretended to want to select a worsted pattern,
and began upon Amy while she was looking over Mrs. Preston's large
stock of patterns.
"You and Eva Morrison are great friends," said she.
"Yes," answered Amy, rather shortly, as if she would add, "what is that
to you?"
"Eva is a good girl," continued Dora. "She is very generous, at least
of things which don't cost her anything; but she is queer about some
things. I wish she would not act as she does, but there is no use in my
saying anything to her, and I shall not try again. Eva has never been
kind to me," added Dora, with a sigh; "but still she is my cousin, and
I love her, though I do see her faults. Poor thing, every one flatters
her, so it is no great wonder if she does think she does anybody a
great favor by noticing them."
"That is a pretty pattern for your cushion!" said Amy, who was
beginning to feel uncomfortable, and to wish Dora would go away. "And
it is easy to work. Why don't you take that?"
"There is not enough variety about it," answered Dora, delighted to
perceive the effect of her words. "I want something prettier. As I was
saying, it is no wonder that Eva is set up to think that she does you a
great honor by noticing you, though I must say I think you do as much
for her as she does for you."
"I don't know—" Amy began.
".Of course you don't know—how should you?" interrupted Dora. "Nobody
likes to make mischief, and so nobody tells you what Eva says. I think
myself it is a shame that you should not hear it, because people know
how Eva goes on; and, of course, they think you know it too, and just
keep on with her for what you get out of her."
"I don't get anything out of her!" said Amy, coloring.
"I know you don't, really, and that is just why I say it is a shame for
Eva to say so!"
"To say what?" asked Amy, in a tone of irritation. "If you have
anything to tell me, Dora, I wish you would speak it out, and have done
with it!"
"Oh, well, if you want me to tell you, of course I can. Well, a certain
person said to Eva the other day, 'I do wonder how you can make a
friend of Amy Preston!' 'Oh!' said Miss Eva, contemptuously. 'Amy is a
very cheap friend. She does not want as much as some people to keep her
friendship!'"
"What did she mean by that?" asked Amy.
"Why, I suppose she meant that you, being poor, would be thankful for
small favors. And then she laughed and said: 'We know what we are
about. Amy gets what she wants, and I got what I want!' I suppose she
gives you a great many presents, doesn't she?"
"No, indeed, she does not, because I will not take them!" replied Amy.
"Well, I am surprised!" said Dora. "I thought from what I have heard
Eva say, that she more than half-clothed you. She gave you the dress
you have on, didn't she? I understood her so."
"She never gave me a dress in the world!" exclaimed Amy, vehemently.
"Nor anything else to wear. It is a likely story, indeed, that I should
accept such presents from anybody."
"Well there, I didn't believe it!" said Dora. "I said all the time
I didn't; but you see your dress being just like the one Eva wore
last winter, people naturally believe the story. I don't see why Eva
should tell every one, if she did give you an old dress. I always
thought we were not to let our left hand know what our right hand did.
Eva pretends to be such a Christian, too! I don't see how she can do
so; though, for my part, I never can see that people who make great
pretensions to religion air better than any one else."
If it had not been for that little imp of envy and jealousy which Amy
had been nursing and potting under the pretty name of self-respect,
she would never have given credit to a story so entirely inconsistent
with what she had known of her friend's character. She would have seen
through Dora at once, and treated her insinuations and stories with the
contempt they deserved. But the jealous spirit was whispering in her
ear that it was no more than was to be expected, or than she deserved
for running after a girl so much richer than herself. She therefore
answered angrily:
"If Eva Morrison says she ever gave me a dress, or anything of the
kind, she tells a lie, and you may tell her I say so! I should think
she would be ashamed of herself to be such a hypocrite—pretending to be
so fond of me and then telling such falsehoods about me. I have a great
mind to say I will never speak to her again!"
"I wouldn't, if I were you," said Dora, delighted with her success.
"But, Amy, don't you ever tell Eva that I told you. It would make no
end of trouble in the family, if you should, because my father and Mr.
Morrison are in business together. By the way, it is not true, is it,
that Mr. Morrison set your mother up in business?"
"Of course not! Mother had money enough from the sale of my father's
pictures to set herself up in business, and have something to spare!"
"There, I didn't believe it when she said so. Well, Amy, I don't like
any of these patterns. I think I will go down to Mrs. Mercer's and see
if she has anything prettier."
Dora went away very much delighted with the success of her scheme, and
leaving Amy feeling more unhappy than she had ever done in all her
life before. She loved Eva dearly, and was deeply grieved that her
friend should have been so treacherous toward her. But her pride was
also wounded, and she listened to the counsels of pride rather than to
those of affection. The latter advised her to go at once to Eva, tell
her what she had heard, and ask an explanation; but pride told her that
such a course would be mean and degrading, and would show her to be
wanting in self-respect. It would have been well for Amy if, like Eva,
she had been in the habit of telling everything to her mother; but she
was very reserved by nature, and rarely spoke to any one of her own
feelings.
She brooded over what she had heard all that day and the next, and by
the time she was ready to go to school on Monday morning, she had fully
made up her mind never to have any more to do with Eva Morrison.
Consequently, when Eva came to meet her with outstretched hands, as
usual, Amy met her with averted eyes, and the coolest of nods, and
going directly to her place, she began to study with all her might.
"What in the world ails Amy?" asked one of the girls, who had seen the
meeting.
"Oh, nothing I guess!" replied Eva, though she wondered at her friend's
manner. "People don't always feel alike, you know!"
"There is more about it than that," said Dora, who had been watching
the meeting. "Only you never will listen to anything, I could tell you
all about the matter."
"Well, what can you tell!" asked Eva, carelessly.
"I shall not say anything unless you promise not to tell, you know."
"I shall not promise, Dora, though it is not likely that I shall tell.
I am not apt to repeat things."
"Well, then, Amy says you are a regular little liar and hypocrite,
and she won't have any more to do with you. She says she has been
patronized by you long enough."
"I did not know that I had patronized her at all," said Eva. "I am sure
I never meant to do so."
"Yes, but then you see Amy is of such a jealous disposition that she
thinks you mean to patronize her, whether you do or not!"
"She is naturally rather jealous, I think," said Eva; "but I can hardly
believe that she called me a liar or a hypocrite!"
"She did, for I heard her!" said Dora. "I was in the store, picking out
a pattern."
Eva might have asked who Amy was talking to, but she did not think of
that.
"Well, all I can say is, that I am sorry!" said she, sighing. "But I
hope Amy will think better of it. I am sure she will if she knows what
is good for herself, for I know she cannot be happy while she is doing
me such an injustice."
"So you really didn't speak to Eva this morning!" said Dora, joining
Amy as she was walking homeward. "I did not bellow you would keep your
resolution, but I was glad you did, especially after what Eva said."
"What did she say?" asked Amy, feeling rather ashamed as she spoke.
"Oh, she tossed her head, and said you had got a jealous fit; but she
guessed you would get over it. You knew what was good for yourself
too well to quarrel with her, and if you did you would get the worst
of it—that was one comfort. You see, she thinks she has you under her
thumb, so she can do as she pleases with you."
"She will find herself mistaken!" said Amy, proudly. "I am not
dependent upon her, I am thankful to say."
"But, after all, Amy, when you are under so many obligations to her—"
"Under what obligations, I should like to know?"
"Why, doesn't she pay your school bills? I understood so."
"Of course not! My mother pays my school bills! What do you mean?"
"Well, Amy, you need not bite my head off. I don't wonder you are
angry. I am sure I should be, but you needn't blame me. Anyhow, if I
were you, I would show that I did not mean to be domineered over, or
coaxed either. 'But Amy has such a way with her—she can twist any one
round her finger,' as she says."
"She will not twist me round her finger," said Amy. "I am not such a
fool as she takes me for."
Eva went home that night very much grieved. She had made many advances
to Amy during the day, but they had all been repelled, and with so much
coldness and rudeness that she did not know how to go any farther. She
did not more than half believe what Dora had told her, and yet the
words were not without their influence upon her mind.
"Amy must know she is wrong," she argued, "and that is what makes her
so unwilling to make up. O dear! I don't know what to do! I believe I
will tell mother all about it, and see what she says."
"How many times have you sighed during the last half hour, Eva?" asked
Mrs. Morrison that evening, as she and Eva were sitting together
knitting by the firelight.
The evenings were growing long and cool, and the open fire seemed very
pleasant and cheerful.
"What is the matter?"
"I don't know, mamma—yes, I do know, too, I suppose!" answered Eva,
rousing herself. "I did not know that I sighed, though."
"Has anything unpleasant happened in school?" asked Mrs. Morrison.
"Yes, mamma—that is, not exactly in school; but something very
unpleasant has happened, and the worst of it is, I don't know what to
do about it."
"Suppose you tell me the story," said Mrs. Morrison. "Perhaps I shall
be able to advise you."
Eva sat down at her mother's feet on the rug, and told her the whole
story as far as she knew it.
"Somebody has been making mischief," was Mrs. Morrison's comment.
"That is what I suppose, mamma, and I think I know who the somebody is.
I believe it is Dora Hayes."
"You should not say so unless you have good reasons," said her mother.
"Why do you think so?"
Eva told her reasons.
"It looks so, certainly," remarked Mrs. Morrison. "Well, Eva, it is
always a great comfort when we can find a plain Scripture rule to guide
our conduct in difficult places, and I think there is one which applies
exactly to such cases as this."
"What do you mean, mamma?"
"'If thy brother trespass against thee go and tell him his fault
between him and thee alone,'" repeated Mrs. Morrison. "Does not that
rule seem to throw some light upon your path?"
"I don't know—yes, I suppose it does. And yet—after the way Amy has
treated me to-day, I do not feel very much like going to her!"
"Take care, Eva! Don't listen to the whispers of pride. Remember you do
not know what provocation Amy may think she has had."
"If she thought I had done wrong, why did not she come and tell me so,
instead of sulking and refusing to speak to me?" said Eva.
"Perhaps she did not feel like it, after the way she thought you had
treated her," said Mrs. Morrison, smiling. "At any rate, Eva, her
conduct is not the rule for yours."
Eva sat silent for a few minutes. She had her pride as well as Amy, and
she had been deeply mortified at the way in which Amy had repelled her
really generous advances.
But Eva had this advantage over her friend, that she called her faults
by their right names and combatted them as faults, instead of coaxing
and nursing them as virtues.
"Well, mamma, I will do as you say," said she, at last. "I believe it
will be the best way. I don't think Amy will refuse to hear me, and if
she does, I shall be no worse off than I am now."
"That is right, my dear," said her mother. "But, Eva, don't forget to
ask for grace to be gentle and humble. Remember 'Charity suffereth long
and is kind.' Even if Amy is unreasonable, do not get out of patience
with her. You do not know what provocation she may think she has
received."
As soon as breakfast was over, Eva put on her hat, and set out to find
Amy. Mrs. Preston lived in a pretty house in the suburbs, and Eva was
tolerably sure of finding Amy at work in her flower-garden, where even
at this late season she always found something to do.
Amy was busy among her flowers, as Eva expected, and just as Eva came
up, Amy opened the side gate to throw some dry stems into the street.
She started when she saw Eva, and seemed about to turn away, but Eva
gave her no time. She walked up to her friend, and holding out both
hands, said, with her usual frank manner: "Now, Amy, I want to have you
tell me what all this trouble is about."
Amy colored. "Surely you know as well as I do!" said she, trying to
speak coldly.
"I know nothing at all!" replied Eva. "Only that Dora Hayes says that
you called me a liar and a hypocrite, and, as she has told me such a
story about you, I think it very likely that she has told you something
about me."
"It was what she told me you said that made me call you so!" said Amy,
just ready to cry.
"So I supposed, and therefore I want to know what it was. Now let us
sit down on the stops and have it all out. What did she say?"
Amy began to feel a little ashamed of herself, by this time, and to see
that she had been hasty to believe evil of her friend. She began at the
beginning and told Eva all that Dora had said about her.
"I thought she had had a hand in it," said Eva, when the story was
finished. "She came to me in the first place and wanted to tell me
something that I was never to tell—something somebody had said about
me; but I told her that I always told mother everything, and that I
never wanted to hear what people said about me, so she subsided. The
truth of the matter is this. Dora was teasing me one day to give her my
amber necklace, which I would not do."
"'You would give it to Amy Preston in a minute, if she asked you,' said
she; 'you think more of that shop-girl than you do of me, though I am
your cousin.'"
"'Well,' said I, half laughing, 'you see, Dora, Amy is a cheaper friend
than you are. She never wants anything and you want everything.'"
"So much for that! As for the dress story, there is a little foundation
for that, too. Dora asked me a few days ago if that was my old dress
you were wearing."
"'Of course,' said I. 'Amy wears all my dresses and I wear hers. That
is the way we show our regard for each other.'"
"'But don't you really give her dresses?' she asked."
"All the girls laughed, for every one knows how proud you are about
receiving presents, Amy."
"And I said, to carry on the joke, 'To be sure I do! I buy all her
clothes and books, and my father pays her school bills.'"
"You see, Amy—though you must not tell any one—papa really does pay
Dora's school bills, and mamma gives her a great many things; and I
thought perhaps by giving her such a hint, I would make her hold her
peace, and so I did. As for the rest, it is a sheer manufacture out of
whole cloth. I should think you ought to have known me better, Amy."
Amy colored scarlet. "Well, Eva, I suppose I ought, but then you
see—there is such a difference—in short you are rich and I am poor, and
if you were in my place, you would see how natural it is to be jealous."
"It may be natural, but I cannot think it's right," said Eva. "I don't
think poor people ought to be jealous of rich people, any more than
rich people ought to despise poor people. Besides, Amy, I should never
think of calling you poor. But did Dora say anything else?"
"Never mind what she said," replied Amy. "I ought never to have
listened to her. But it was not so much what she said as what she
insinuated. However, I was a fool to mind her, for I know of old just
what a mischievous thing she is. She has tried it upon me before. When
I first came to school, she told me some of the girls made a fuss
because I was a shop-girl, and I don't suppose there was any truth in
that either."
"Not one word, I dare say. But now, Amy, promise me one thing. If ever
you think I have done wrong, just come to me as I have come to you and
ask me about it. If we do so, we shall never have any lasting quarrels,
I am sure, and no tattler can make mischief between us. Isn't it almost
time to go to school? I will wait for you and we will go together."
Amy kept Eva waiting while she went up to her own little room, and
there in a short but earnest prayer, asked God's forgiveness for her
jealousy and unkindness and begged Him to pour into her heart "that
most excellent gift of charity, the very bond of peace and of all
virtue, without which whosoever liveth is counted dead before Him."
Dora stared in wonder when she saw Amy and Eva enter the school-room in
their old fashion, with their arms round each other's waists.
"So you two have made up your quarrel," she said, in recess, with her
disagreeable laugh. "Well, it is a fine thing to have a forgiving
temper, especially when it is so much to one's own advantage as it is
to Amy's, in this case."
"There is nothing to forgive, as it happens," answered Eva, coolly.
"Somebody told Amy a set of stories about me which were either entirely
false or else misrepresented, but when she came to hear the truth it
was all right again."
"Amy Preston, you are as mean as you can be," exclaimed Dora. "You
promised not to tell."
"I did not promise not to tell," said Amy. "However, I did not tell."
"How did Eva find out then, I should like to know?"
"Because," said Eva, answering for her friend; "you came to me and told
what Amy said about me. And I remember what I heard an old Scotch woman
say about talebearers, that a dog which would fetch a bone would carry
a bone."
Depend upon it, girls, the old Scotch woman's proverb speaks the truth.
A person who will come and tell you a story about what somebody has
said of you, will tell that person what you have said about them; and
in neither case will the story be the exact truth. Never listen for
a moment to such tales, if you can help it; and if you cannot help
listening, let the words go "in at one ear and out at the other."
If, however, you think your friend has offended you, go and ask her
about it kindly and frankly; and two to one the offence will vanish
into thin air.
But again, I say, never listen to talebearers, for "the words of a
talebearer are as wounds."
"Where no wood is, there the fire goeth out: so where there is no
talebearer the strife ceaseth."—(Prov. xxvi. 20.)
[Illustration]
[Illustration: ESTHER'S BAD DAY, OR, "I COULDN'T HELP IT."
Frontispiece.]
[Illustration]
ESTHER'S BAD DAY,
OR,
"I COULDN'T HELP IT."
IT was a good while after six and a very bright sunny spring morning,
yet Esther was not yet out of bed, when somebody knocked at her door.
"O dear!" said she, in a sleepy, pettish tone, "I wish people would
only let me alone a minute. Come in!"
The last words were spoken aloud, and a very pretty girl, some years
older than Esther, opened the door. She was partly dressed and had her
comb and brush in her hand.
"Why, Etty, not up yet!" she exclaimed. "I thought you would be nearly
dressed. I came to ask if I might finish my dressing by your glass, for
papa wants the painters to begin on my room as soon as they come."
"Of course you can," replied Etty, not very graciously, however. "What
time is it?"
"About half-past six. You ought to be up, Etty."
"Oh, there is plenty of time."
"I don't know. Time slips away very fast in the morning."
Eleanor went back to her roam to look for something she wanted. When
she came back, Etty had scrambled up to the end of the bed next the
window, and, still in her night-gown, and with her hair hanging over
her shoulders, was reading a story-book, which she had drawn from under
her pillow. In the book, perhaps, might be found the cause of her
morning sleepiness. When a little girl reads in bed till her candle
burns out, she is apt to be rather heavy-headed next morning.
"You will be late for breakfast," said Eleanor. "I fear I shall be
late myself, I have been so hindered; but, Etty, I am sure you will be
behindhand."
"O no, I sha'n't. I can dress in ten minutes, easily."
"You cannot dress properly in ten minutes," said Eleanor, busily tying
up her hair; "and, Etty, there is something else besides dressing to be
done before you go down-stairs."
Etty shrugged her shoulders impatiently but made no answer.
Eleanor went on with her dressing, and said no more till she had
finished. Then turning to, Etty, who was still reading, she said,
seriously:
"Now, Etty, you have only fifteen minutes left. You may get ready for
breakfast, perhaps, if you lose no more time."
"Do let me be, Eleanor!" answered Etty, angrily. "I know what I am
about! I wish you would go away and mind your own business!"
"Very well," said Eleanor, and quietly gathering up her dressing things
she left the room without another word.
Etty looked at the clock and then at her book.
"I will only read to the end of this paragraph," said she. "That will
not take long, and I can easily get ready after that."
But it is not always easy to stop at the end of a paragraph, and Etty
read on till she was startled by hearing the church clock strike seven,
followed by the energetic ringing of the breakfast-bell at the foot of
the stairs.
"O dear!" exclaimed Etty, throwing down her book and scrambling out of
bed. "Now I shall be late again; that will be the third time this week,
and uncle will be angry. It is all Eleanor's fault. She ought to have
made me got up."
Etty hastened to dress, but as usually happens at such times, she
found that the more she hurried, the less she got on. She broke her
boot-lacing and could not find another. She had been in such a hurry to
get to her story-book the night before, that she had neglected to braid
up her hair, and it was all hanging in what nurses call "witch-knots,"
and the more she pulled at it, the worse it snarled.
"Now where is that ribbon! I am sure it was here last night. I suppose
Eleanor has put it out of place. O dear, I do wish people would keep
out of my room and let my things alone!" snapped Etty, tumbling over
the things on the dressing-table.
"There, now!" As she spoke, she overturned a tall bottle of cologne,
which, with its pretty bronze holder, had been one of her birthday
presents. She had often been told never to set the bottle down out of
the holder, but she had a trick of leaning it against the side of the
glass.
The tall bottle fell on a pretty hand-mirror with a carved frame, and
both were broken to pieces. At this new calamity, Etty burst into
tears, and throwing her brush to the farther end of the room, she flung
herself down on the floor and cried so as to be heard all over the
house.
The family were becoming tolerably well used to Etty's "tantrums," and
as they were at prayers, nobody moved till the prayer was finished.
"Please, aunt, may I go and see what ails Etty?" said Stella. She was
Etty's younger sister, but as she slept with Eleanor, she had not seen
Etty that morning.
"No, my dear, I will go myself," said Mrs. Grey.
Stella said no more, but she looked very uncomfortable, not to say
distressed.
"You need not look so unhappy, my dear Stella," said Eleanor. "You
don't think mamma will be unkind to Etty, do you?"
"No," said Stella, "aunt is never unkind to any one; but Etty does go
on so when she gets one of her bad days. Aunt is not used to her, and I
am afraid she will be very much displeased."
When Mrs. Grey went up-stairs, she found Etty still lying on the floor,
crying and sobbing.
"What is the matter now?" asked Mrs. Grey. "Why are you not ready for
breakfast?"
"O dear, I wish I was dead! I wish I was dead!" sobbed Etty.
"Etty, if I ever hear you say that again, I shall punish you!" said
Mrs. Grey. "Stop crying directly, and tell me what all this is about.
How came this bottle broken, and the mirror, too? And here is the
cologne running all over the bureau. What have you been about?"
"It is all Eleanor's fault," sobbed Etty, getting up from the floor.
"She came in here to dress, and she has put all my things out of
place so that I cannot find anything; and looking for my hair ribbon,
I knocked down the bottle and broke it and—" Etty was going to wish
herself dead again, but she stopped just in time.
"Is not this your ribbon?" asked Mrs. Grey, taking up one which was
hanging on the glass in plain sight.
"I don't care, I could not find it," Etty was beginning, but her aunt
stopped her.
"I do not want to hear any more now. Dress yourself and come
down-stairs as quickly as you can?"
Esther and Stella Grey were orphan children, who had come to live with
their uncle and aunt. Mr. and Mrs. Grey had adopted the children as
their own, and treated them kindly in every respect.
Stella was very happy in her new home—happier in fact than she had ever
been before. She was a quiet little thing, very gentle and good; but
not at all pretty, and not particularly bright.
Etty, on the contrary, was both pretty and intelligent; but she was far
from being as pleasant a child to live with as her sister. Esther had
always been the favorite with her mother, who was not by any means a
sensible woman. Ever since she could remember she had been petted and
indulged, and talked about before her face as "a very peculiar nervous
child," "a child requiring very delicate management," till she had
learned to think that she was really something remarkable; whereas she
was only a passionate little girl, whose health had been injured by
over indulgence, and whose disposition had been almost spoiled by her
being permitted to tyrannize over her younger sister as much as she
pleased, and to indulge in such fits of passion as we have seen, on the
least provocation.
Mrs. Grey soon found out that she had undertaken a very troublesome
task; but she was a kind good woman and used to children, and she was
determined to do the best she could by the poor spoiled child.
When Etty came down at last, she found breakfast over. Her uncle was
reading the paper, Eleanor was washing the breakfast dishes, and Stella
dusting the room.
"Come, Etty, eat your breakfast," said her aunt, kindly, but decidedly.
"Eleanor wants to put away the table."
Etty took her seat with a very dissatisfied face. "Everything is as
cold as it can be!" said she, pettishly. "And I can't bear fish-balls."
"Well, there are plenty of nice potatoes, and bread and butter."
"I hate—" Etty was beginning, but Mr. Grey stopped her.
"Eat your breakfast and say no more about it, Esther!" said he,
sharply. For he had nerves as well as his niece, and her whining grated
upon them sadly. "You have made quite disturbance enough for one
morning."
Etty shrugged her shoulders and made up a face, but she was afraid of
her uncle and said nothing more. She drank two cups of coffee and was
just about pouring out a third, when her aunt stopped her.
"No more, Etty! Two of those cups are quite enough for any little girl."
Etty rose from the table with a flounce, and gave the coffee pot a push
which sent it off the table. Stella was close by and caught it, but not
in time to save Etty's dress from a deluge.
"There now, see what you made me do, you awkward little toad!"
exclaimed Etty, angrily, giving her sister a push. "I wish you were
a thousand miles off, Stella Grey. You are always getting me into
trouble."
Stella, who was used to her sister's hasty speeches, did not reply; but
Eleanor answered for her. She was very fond of Stella, and did not like
to hear her falsely accused. "Why, Etty, Stella did not touch you. She
caught the pot and risked her own hands to save you from being scalded.
You ought to be ashamed to speak so to your sister!"
"Never mind," whispered Stella. "Don't say anything to her, you only
make her worse."
"Etty," said Mr. Grey, "go up and change your dress, and don't come
down again till you are in a good humor. Let me hear no crying, or
slamming of doors, either," he added, sharply. "We have had quite
enough for once. I begin to wish that child had never come into the
house," he said to Mrs. Grey, as Etty left the room, followed presently
by Stella. "She destroys the whole comfort of the family."
"She is certainly very troublesome," replied Mrs. Grey, sighing.
"However, we must have patience. I really think she is improving. She
has not had one of these bad days in some time."
"Since when?" asked Mr. Grey.
"Since last week," answered his wife, smiling. "She used to have them
every other day when she first came. But I begin to think with you that
we shall have to be more decided with her. However, we will try to get
on quietly to-day, so that the pleasure of the excursion may not be
spoiled for poor Stella."
Meantime Stella was up-stairs coaxing Etty to stop crying and change
her dress so as to be ready for their lessons at nine o'clock.
"Come, Etty, do," she urged. "You will not be ready when Miss Beach
comes, and then you will have a bad mark again. Do put on your other
dress."
"I won't!" said Etty, passionately. "I wish I was dead! They would
never dare to treat me so if my own mother was alive, but because I am
an orphan they think they can abuse me as they please."
"Oh, Etty, how can you say so? I think they are so kind."
"They may be kind enough to you, but they are not kind to me," retorted
Etty. "You know they are not, but you don't care what becomes of me. If
you had loved mamma, you would not be so contented here. But you never
did. I do really believe you are glad she is dead, because you know she
always loved me the best."
Stella could bear a good deal from Etty, but this was too much. She
burst into tears, and ran out of the room.
Etty, having succeeded in hurting somebody's feelings, began to feel
better herself. She knew that she had uttered a wicked falsehood, but
she did not mind what she said at such times. She grew quite cheerful
over the wound she had inflicted on her unoffending sister, and by
the time Miss Beach rang the bell, she was ready to come down-stairs
singing and as pleasant as possible, her face making a great contrast
to poor Stella's red eyes and trembling lips.
But cheerfulness which is built on the suffering of others is not
likely to be very lasting, and a new cause of trouble soon appeared.
Notwithstanding, Etty's so-called talents, she was backward in her
lessons; and reading till twelve o'clock the night before did not tend
to make her head clear. She found her sums in arithmetic unusually
puzzling, and made so many mistakes in her Latin rules that she had to
study them over again. She could not make sense of her reading lesson,
and declared there was no meaning in it, and she was all the more cross
that Stella's Latin lesson was unusually good. By the end of the school
hours, she was once more in a thoroughly bad humor.
"Well, are the lessons finished?" asked Mrs. Grey, entering the
school-room at twelve o'clock. "Come then, girls, hurry and dress
yourselves, that you may be ready when the carriage comes."
"Where are we going, aunt?" asked Stella.
"Wait patiently, and you will see," replied Mrs. Grey, smiling. "Only
be sure you are ready by one o'clock, for there will be no time to lose
in waiting. Put on your gray skirts, and dresses that can be easily
washed. Your ginghams will be the best."
"I shall not wear my gingham dress—so!" said Etty, as they went
up-stairs. "I shall wear my new muslin."
"I am afraid aunt will not like it," replied Stella. "She said anything
that would wash."
"Well, and won't the muslins wash, stupid?"
"Yes, I suppose so, but you would hardly want to have your new dress
done up so soon. I shall put on the gingham."
"I declare, I won't go with you, if you do, Stella Grey," said Etty,
stamping her foot.
"You will not look fit to be seen."
But Stella was learning to have her own way, when she knew she was in
the right. She said no more but went to her room and dressed herself as
her aunt had directed.
Etty, meantime, was fretting and fuming over her toilet as usual,
because she could not make up her mind what to wear. She would not
wear the gingham—that was all about it. The muslin was pretty enough
for anything, but Etty had forgotten to sew on certain hooks and eyes
without which the sash could not be worn, and the dress without the
sash could not be thought of.
Finally she pitched upon the most unsuitable thing of all—a black
barege, her very best summer dress, which she had not yet worn. She was
just fastening it, when her aunt called to her from the stairs: "Be
sure you put on your thickest boots, Etty!"
"Those thick leather boots with this thin dress—how they will look!"
said Etty. "I am sure my cloth boots will be thick enough this dry day.
It has not rained for a week."
Etty had lost so much time in making up her mind that she was not ready
when the carriage came to the door.
"Come, children, we have no time to lose!" called out Mr. Grey. "Are
you ready?"
"I am ready," said Stella, entering Etty's room. "Shall I help you,
Etty? But what made you put on that dress?"
"Because I don't want to look like a charity school-girl, as you do!"
was Etty's snappish reply. "Every one will think you are a servant!"
"No, indeed! I am not half fine enough for a servant," said Stella,
shrewdly. "But come, Etty; do hurry. What hat are you going to wear?
Let me get it for you."
"Do go along and leave me alone!" said Etty, crossly. "You are trying
to hinder me on purpose to get me found fault with."
"Come, children," again called Mr. Grey. "We cannot wait for you any
longer."
Stella ran down-stairs to say that Etty would be ready in a minute.
When all were in the carriage, Etty came down. In the bustle of getting
settled and driving off, Mrs. Grey did not notice her dress, and it was
not till they had gone several squares that she observed how Etty had
disobeyed her orders.
"Why, Etty!" she exclaimed. "What made you put on that dress, of all
others? You will have it utterly spoiled."
"There is no help for it now," said Mr. Grey. "If Etty spoils her
dress, she must take the consequences. She will not have another new
one at her disposal to spoil this summer."
Etty flounced and frowned, but said nothing till they came to the
steamboat, which was just ready to leave the dock. Then a new trouble
came up. She declared that she could not and would not go on board the
boat—that she knew she should be drowned, and that Stella should not go
either.
"Very well," said Mr. Grey. "Then, get into the carriage and go home,
but Stella shall go, if she chooses. Come, make up your mind one way
or the other; but do not stand there making yourself ridiculous any
longer."
This was new treatment to Etty, who was used to being soothed, and
petted, and admired for her weak nerves and delicate sensibilities. But
she had no notion of being left behind, and finally went on board the
boat, just the moment before the plank was taken away.
The party were to proceed to a rocky point some miles off, spend
the afternoon in exploring it, and return in the evening, when the
steamboat would call for them. The place was beautiful and the weather
lovely—the luncheon was very nice.
And all might have been pleasant only for Etty.
She spoiled every one's comfort. She would go nowhere where the
rest wanted to go: she persisted in being afraid where there was no
danger, and in being foolhardy in dangerous places, and she cried five
different times in three hours. Her dress was torn in a dozen different
places before the day was over, and her thin boots cut to pieces so
that she could hardly walk, and the stones hurt her at every stop.
"Now I am going to rest a while and then we will go and see the cave,"
said Mr. Grey, when they had finished their lunch; "but none of you
must venture on the rocks without me. They are dangerous in many
places."
Stella was searching for shells on the sandy beach, near the place
where they had lunched, when Etty joined her.
"I am going up there to get some of those wild-flowers, instead of
poking about here," said she, pointing to some flowering shrubs which
grew at a little distance, "and I want you to go with me."
"Uncle said we must not go on the rocks without him, you know," said
Stella.
"He did not say on these rocks: he said on the rocks by the cave."
"He said on the rocks," persisted Stella; "and I know we ought not to
go."
"Of course you won't go if I want you to," said Etty. "It is enough for
you to know that I wish to do anything to set you against it. I don't
care, I shall go alone."
"Please don't," pleaded Stella, but Etty was already on the rocks.
In a few minutes Mr. Grey, who was taking a little nap, was startled by
a cry of distress.
There stood Etty on a narrow ledge, over a deep pool, clinging to a
small, slender bush, and screaming with all her might; while Stella,
with a pale face but steady step; was walking along the dangerous path
towards her sister.
"Stop, Stella, I command you!" called Mr. Grey. "Etty, keep still and
be quiet. I will see what can be done."
But Etty was past hearing reason. As Stella drew near her, she threw
herself forward and seized hold of her sister. Stella tottered, lost
her balance, and both the children fell into the pool below. When Etty
came to herself she was lying on the bed, in a room of the fisherman's
little house on the point, with Eleanor and the fisherman's wife
attending upon her, but Stella was not to be seen.
"Keep still, Etty," said Eleanor, as Etty tried to rise.
"But where is Stella? I want Stella!" cried Etty.
"Stella cannot come to you, and you must not go to her," said Eleanor,
seeing that Etty was determined to get up. "You have done terrible
mischief by your perverseness and folly, Esther, and the only amends
you can make is to try and do no more."
There was something in Eleanor's tone which quieted Etty at once.
"Is Stella dead?" she asked, in an awestruck whisper.
"No—at least we hope not—but she has not revived yet, and we fear
that her head is hurt. Be quiet now, and drink the tea Mrs. Fiske is
bringing you."
It was a long time before Stella came to herself, and when she did, she
knew no one. She was carried on board the steamer and laid on one sofa
and Etty on another. As the boat drew near to the wharf, Stella opened
her eyes, and seeing her aunt bending over her, she said, feebly:
"Please, aunt, don't scold Etty."
Etty hid her face and cried bitterly but silently, as she remembered
all her unkind speeches to Stella. She was put to bed in her own room,
and left alone for what seemed an age. At last Mrs. Grey came in and
sat down by her bed.
"Oh, aunt, how is Stella?" exclaimed Etty, starting up.
"She is better," replied her aunt. "The doctor hopes she will live. You
ought to be very thankful." Mrs. Grey paused a little and then said:
"Etty, what has been the matter to-day? What has made you behave so
badly?"
"I don't know, aunt," replied Etty. "It has been one of my bad days."
"What do you suppose makes you have bad days, Etty?"
"I don't know, aunt," repeated Etty. "I can't help them."
"Are you sure of that, Etty? I am not so, by any means."
Etty looked surprised.
"Let us go over the day's history and see if it could not be helped.
What was the first trouble?"
"Being late for breakfast, aunt—no, breaking the cologne bottle was the
first trouble."
"Well, both of these troubles came from the same source—not getting up
in time. How did that happen?"
"I was so sleepy, aunt."
"You should not have been sleepy. From half-past nine till six is long
enough for any little girl to sleep. Did you go to bed as soon as you
came up-stairs?"
Etty hesitated.
"I know you did not," continued Mrs. Grey. "Your candle was new last
night and it was more than half burned out this morning. What were you
doing?"
"Reading, aunt."
"Then the first trouble came from your disobeying my direct commands.
Could you not help that?"
"Yes, aunt, I suppose so."
"And could you not have got up when Eleanor called you?"
"Yes, aunt."
"Then here were two troubles which certainly could have been helped,
and which being helped would have prevented most of the others. I will
pass over your conduct at the breakfast-table and at your lessons; but
could you not have dressed yourself as I told you instead of following
your own perverse fancy?"
"I did not want to wear that dress," murmured Etty.
"That was no reason at all, Etty. When you are commanded to do a thing
by those who stand in the place of your parents, your liking or not
liking is no excuse for disobeying. Now, to go on to the great trouble
of all. Did you not hear your uncle tell you not to go upon the rocks?"
"Yes, aunt."
"And could you not have helped going where you were told not to go?"
Etty was ashamed to excuse herself by saying that she wanted the
flowers, so she said nothing. She was beginning to see that her
troubles had been of her own making.
"In every one of these cases you could have 'helped it,' as you say,
by merely doing your duty," continued Mrs. Grey. "If you had risen in
time, you would not have been hurried and fretted in getting ready for
breakfast. You would not have broken your bottle, and spoiled my table,
and lost your own temper, and put yourself out of tune for the whole
day. If you had trusted your uncle as you ought, you would not have
made yourself ridiculous on the wharf as you did. If you had not been
so perverse and unreasonable you would not have spoiled your best dress
and your own temper as well as that of every one else. To conclude, if
you had obeyed your uncle to-day, you would not have run heedlessly
into danger, and thus have sacrificed perhaps the life of your poor
little sister."
"Do you think Stella will die, aunt?" asked Etty.
"I cannot tell. She is very dangerously hurt, and even if she should
live, it may be months before she can walk. Now tell me, Etty, could
you not have helped all these things?"
"Well, I cannot help crying when anything troubles me," said Etty. "I
have so much feeling."
"Feeling for yourself, Etty, not for other people. Selfish feeling,
which makes you hard-hearted and unkind even to your poor little
sister, who would do anything in the world for you. Selfish feeling,
which shows that you have never learned to love God or your neighbors,
but only to love and please yourself—which will and does make you a
torment to yourself and all about you."
"I shall say no more now, Etty, only to recommend you to ask God for
the light of His Holy Spirit to teach you to see yourself as you
really are. There is no use in trying to cure people unless they can
be convinced that they are sick, and there is no use in talking of
amendment to one who cannot see that she is to blame. I shall pray for
you, my child, and I shall continue to take care of you as well as I
can, but I do not know what is to become of you unless you learn to be
a better girl."
"Please don't go away, aunt," sobbed Etty: "don't leave me alone.
Indeed I will try to be a good girl, if you will forgive me."
"I forgive you, my dear Etty, but there is One whom you have offended
more than you have me, whose pardon you ought to ask."
"Please ask Him for me, aunt!" whispered Etty. "And ask Him to make
Stella well."
Mrs. Grey knelt by Etty's bedside, and prayed, and for the first time
in her life Etty really joined in a prayer.
She wanted very much to see Stella, but her aunt said no, and for once
Etty minded without a word.
When Mrs. Grey left her, Etty slipped out of bed, and kneeling down,
she prayed herself, with many tears, that her Father in Heaven would
spare her dear sister; and that she herself might have grace to be a
good girl. That prayer was the beginning of a new life to Etty.
Then feeling a little comforted she rose from her knees. As she did so
she felt a sharp pain in her foot, so sharp that she almost screamed.
She had felt a pain in the foot a good many times during the afternoon,
but her pride would not let her speak of it, lest her aunt should say
something about her thin boots.
"O dear, what a wicked little fool I have been!" said she to herself.
"Now I have hurt my foot and I dare say I shall have to sit still and
be waited on, instead of waiting on Stella."
So it turned out. The next day Etty's foot was found to be so bruised
and inflamed that she could not put it to the floor. Here was an end
to all her hopes of helping her aunt and waiting upon Stella. Instead
of that, she had to be carried up and down-stairs for a month, like a
baby, and all she could do for any one was to give as little trouble
as possible. She had taken a severe cold which settled in her eyes,
already weakened by reading at night, and she could hardly use them at
all.
This confinement was one of the best things that ever happened to Etty.
She learned for the first time to appreciate the kindness of those who
took care of her. She learned to be thoroughly weary of idleness, and
to find it a privilege to be employed. She found out too that much as
she might try, she could not be a good girl without help from above,
and she learned to pray earnestly for the help of God's Holy Spirit.
Her "bad days" became fewer and farther between, and at last ceased
entirely.
Stella, was ill for a long time, and has never been as well as she was
before her fall: but she is happier than ever before, for Etty is now
always kind and affectionate to her.
Dear girls, be careful how you excuse your faults by saying you "can't
help it!" Remember that you can always have God's help by asking for it
in faith and humility, and with Him on your side, you have no right to
say that you "cannot help" doing what is wrong.
[Illustration]
[Illustration: MARTHA, OR, "CHARITY THINKETH NO EVIL." Frontispiece.]
[Illustration]
MARTHA,
OR,
"CHARITY THINKETH NO EVIL."
"I HAVE just been to see Betty Allis," said Emily Dunbar to her cousin
Martha. "She is a great deal better, but she is not able to go to
school."
"Then she has really been sick!" said Martha.
Emily looked at her in surprise.
"What do you mean, Martha? Of course she has been sick. She would not
be very likely to stay out of school just now, unless she was obliged
to do so."
"I don't know that!" returned Martha.
"If a girl has been working for a prize, and finds out that she is not
likely to get it after all, it may be very convenient to stay out of
school a week or two, and then say, at last: 'Oh, of course, I had no
chance. I lost so much time by being sick.'"
"Martha, you have no business to say such things," said Emily. "Betty
is not that sort of girl at ell."
"I think she is exactly that sort of girl!" interrupted Martha.
"And besides," continued Emily, smiling, "I think it as likely as not
that Betty will gain the prize, after all. She was ever so far before
the rest of us, and she has only been out of school a week, you know."
"Very likely she will. She is a rich man's daughter, and I am a poor
man's child; though I dare say she is not so rich as she pretends."
"I don't see that Betty makes any pretence at all," said Emily. "She
seems to me as quiet and unpretending as any girl in school, and I
don't think you have any right to accuse Miss Lyman of partiality. The
fact is, Martha, you have taken such a dislike to Betty Allis, that it
makes no difference what she does."
"Well, I have a right to dislike her," replied Martha. "She has treated
me shamefully, and she is just as proud, and artful, and hateful, as
she can be."
"Who is so proud, and artful, and hateful, Martha?" asked Miss
Margaret, who had been sitting all the time behind the blinds of the
window which opened on the verandah where the girls were now talking.
"Those are hard words to apply to any one."
Martha did not answer, but Emily said:
"We were talking about Betty Allis, Aunt Margaret."
"I am surprised at that," replied Aunt Margaret. "I have always thought
her a very nice girl."
"And so does almost every one," said Emily; "but Martha does not like
her."
"Well, I do not, and I have good reasons for not liking her," said
Martha. "She never loses a chance of provoking and spiting me."
"How does she provoke you?" asked Aunt Margaret.
Martha did not reply.
"Come, Martha, if Betty has done so many bad things, you can surely
tell of some of them."
"Well, she puts on such airs, for one thing," said Martha. "You would
think she owned a whole gold mine, to hear her. The other day, several
of the girls were talking about examination dresses. Miss Lyman wants
all our class to wear white with black ribbons, on account of Annie
Grey's death, you know. Some one asked Betty who was going to make her
dress. 'Oh, I am not going to have a new dress made,' she answered,
with such an air. 'Mamma likes me to wear white, and I have plenty of
white dresses.'"
"I did not see that she put on any airs at all," remarked Emily. "She
just said it as a matter-of-course, and she does wear white a great
deal."
"Well, what else, Martha?" asked Aunt Margaret.
"Well, last March, when there was snow on the ground, I went over to
carry auntie something. I was in a hurry and did not stop to dress
myself, but just put on mother's plaid shawl, and tied my old worsted
scarf round my neck. I was hurrying along, for I did not want to meet
anybody, when I heard some one call me. I turned round, and there was
Miss Betty, dressed up in her blue plush frock, and her cape trimmed
with sable fur, holding up my old scarf as if it burned her fingers.
'Why, Martha, is it you?' said she, in a tone of affected surprise. 'I
did not know you. I found this scarf lying on the snow, and hurried to
come up with you, thinking it might be yours.' I could have boxed her
ears with a good will."
"But why? I do not see anything wrong in that."
"She did it just to mortify me!" said Martha. "She knew I should be
ashamed of such a dirty old thing."
"And so you ought to be," said Aunt Margaret. "I tell you, you will
meet with a great mortification some day if you are not more neat in
your dress and habits. But I do not see that Betty was to blame. From
what you say, it seems that she had not recognized you when she spoke.
I dare say she thought you were some poor body, to whom the scarf would
be a serious loss."
"I don't see what business she had in the lane," said Martha.
"Probably the same business that you had," replied Emily. "She goes
over to the Home two or three times a week to read to Mrs. Grimes, the
blind woman, and I suppose she has a right to take the shortest road,
if she pleases."
"That going over to the Home is just another specimen of her," said
Martha. "She likes to have the old ladies make a fuss over her, and to
have all the managers say what a charitable, amiable girl Betty Allis
is. You would not catch her doing any such thing unless she were sure
that people would hear of it."
"Martha, how can you say so?" interrupted Emily. "You know how she
helped poor Julia Curtis with her lessons, all the time her eyes were
weak, so that she might not lose her place in school. The girls all
wondered how Julia could keep up so well; but nobody would have known
it if little Fanny had not let out the secret: for Betty made Julia
promise not to tell."
"She knew it would come out somehow, or she would not have taken all
that trouble," said Martha. "Then her name sounds so silly for a girl
fifteen years old Belly Allis! Why does she not call herself Elizabeth?"
"Perhaps for the reason, amongst others, that it is not her name,"
replied Aunt Margaret, drily. "She was christened Betty at her
grandmother's special request."
"She likes the name, though, for she says so," persisted Martha. "Then
she makes such a parade of goodness. Miss Lyman said one day, last
Lent, that she wished the girls to use their prayer-books in church;
and the very next morning, Betty, instead of putting her head down, as
she had done before, kneeled down and kept her head up and her book
open before her all through the prayers and the Litany. Then she got up
with such an air, as if to say, 'Just see how good I am!'"
"I fancy the air was in your imagination," said Emily. "I sat by Betty
all through Lent and saw none of those airs that you speak of. Betty
is a great deal more serious than she used to be, and I think she is
trying hard to be a good Christian girl; but I am sure she makes no
parade of it."
"Pray, Martha, what were you doing all through the prayers that you had
so much time to observe Betty?" asked Aunt Margaret.
Martha blushed, but made no answer.
"I think you are cherishing a very wrong spirit," continued Aunt
Margaret, seriously; "a spirit which makes you see wrong in everything
which Betty does or leaves undone."
"That is just so, Aunt Margaret," said Emily. "I don't want to hurt
Martha's feelings, but I am sure she is wrong in that. One Sunday Betty
puts fifty cents into the collection and Martha thinks she does it to
make a display. Another day she puts in a five-cent piece, and Martha
thinks she might have saved something more than that out of all her
pocket-money. And that is just the way all the time."
"Such a spirit is a very dangerous one for anybody to cherish,"
continued Aunt Margaret. "It shows a great want of that charity,
without which all our doings are nothing worth:"
"I don't think it is fair to accuse me of want of charity, Aunt
Margaret, considering how I saved—"
"How you saved all your pocket-money to give away," said Aunt Margaret,
as Martha checked herself. "I am aware that you used a great deal of
self-denial in that matter, my dear. I was very glad to see it. But,
Martha, St. Paul says, 'though I give all my goods to feed the poor,
and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing.' So you see that it is
possible to be very liberal without being charitable at all."
"Charity means LOVE, does it not, Aunt Margaret?" asked Emily.
"Yes, my dear. St. Paul, in that beautiful thirteenth chapter of First
Corinthians, gives us a description of this greatest of graces. He
tells us both what it is, and what it is not, and assures us that
unless we have it, our greatest gifts and graces are as nothing—
"'Though I speak with the tongues of men and of angels, though I have
faith so that I could remove mountains, though I bestow all my goods to
food the poor, or give my body to be burned, and have not charity, it
profiteth me nothing.'"
"I advise you to examine your feelings toward Betty by the aid of this
chapter, and see if it does not throw some light upon them."
"If she had not served me such a mean trick, I should not care so
much!" said Martha. "But it was so shameful in her to go and tell Miss
Lyman and get me into disgrace. I don't believe there is another girl
in the school who would have done such a thing."
"What did she do?"
"She went and told Miss Lyman of something I did, and got me into
disgrace," said Martha.
"You don't know that it was Betty," said Emily.
"I do know!" returned Martha, angrily. "There was not another person
who could have seen me."
"You do not know for certain that any one told," persisted Emily. "Miss
Lyman never said so, and you have no proof against Betty except your
own fancy."
"Of course you will take her part against me," said Martha. "All I have
to say is that I can't bear her, and never shall."
"You are wrong, Martha, and you must know that you are wrong," said
Aunt Margaret, gravely. "If you examine your own conscience you will
see that it is so."
Martha did not reply. She was not without religious principle, and
lately she had been feeling very anxious to become a true Christian.
She had tried to give herself to her Saviour, but something seemed to
hold back. She had no comfort in prayer, she did not feel as if God
heard her, and all her efforts to do good and to love Him seemed hard,
up-hill work. Now, as she thought over what her aunt had said to her,
she began to wonder whether she had not found out her real hindrance,
in the spirit which she had allowed herself to cherish toward Betty
Allis.
Martha was a truthful girl. She was very much in earnest, and disposed
to be honest in her self-examination. As she read over the description
of Charity, she paused at every verse, and compared herself with the
words.
"Charity suffereth long and is kind." Kind she certainly had not been.
She had never lost an opportunity of saying and doing unkind things
where Betty was concerned.
"Charity envieth not." It was rather hard for the naturally proud
girl to admit to herself that she had envied her rich school-mate, that
a great part of her dislike to Betty arose from the expensive furs,
from those same fine white dresses, and the carriage, and the
man-servant that called for Betty on rainy days; but One was dealing
with Martha who would not let her deceive herself. Yes, it was even so.
"Charity thinketh no evil." She had thought of nothing else. She had
put an evil construction on every act of Betty's, however simple, and
she was always looking out for bad motives in all she said or did.
"Rejoiceth not in iniquity." Had she not been secretly glad that
unlucky day when Betty was surprised into laughing aloud in church, and
was afterwards reproved by the clergyman? Had she not rejoiced openly
whenever Betty gained a bad mark, or had an imperfect lesson?
There is no use in our going over the whole chapter, though Martha
did so to the very end. Then she closed the book and knelt down. She
shed many tears as she prayed, but when she rose, her face was full
of quiet peace. She had overcome her hindrance for that time. She had
acknowledged her sins, and prayed for forgiveness, and for grace to
resist her besetting sin, and something in her heart told her that her
prayer was granted.
"You were right about Betty Allis and me, Aunt Margaret, and I see I
have been wrong all through!" said Martha, after breakfast, when they
were alone together in the dining-room.
Martha was washing the breakfast things, which was a part of her
regular duty.
"I am very glad you do," replied Aunt Margaret. "To see when you are
wrong is more than half the battle. But, Martha, had you never known
before that you were wrong in cherishing such a spirit? Had not your
conscience told you so?"
"Yes, Aunt Margaret, but I would not listen. But I cannot think it was
right in Betty to tell Miss Lyman of me. It was none of her business
what I did."
"Perhaps not. Nevertheless, Martha, you must forgive, if you would be
forgiven."
"I hope I have done so, aunt. I could not help it," added Martha, in a
low tone; "when I thought how He forgave me. I would like to be friends
with Betty if I could, but I don't know how to set about it."
"Pray for guidance, and keep your eyes open," said Aunt Margaret.
"Depend upon it, your way will be made plain."
"Martha," said her mother, opening the door, "suppose you run over to
auntie's and carry her these fresh ducks' eggs. She likes them very
much, and they will just come in time for her breakfast, if you do not
stop to change your dress. You can go through the lane."
"Auntie," was a great-aunt of Martha's, a very old lady. She
breakfasted very late, and Martha often ran over to her house with a
plate of warm biscuits, a dish of freshly gathered berries, or some
other dainty which it was thought the old lady might fancy. She hastily
throw on her sunbonnet, and without even taking off her white apron she
went to carry the eggs. She staid nearly an hour, doing various little
services for auntie, and sharing her morning cup of coffee. As she was
returning, she overtook Betty Allis, who was walking slowly in the same
direction.
"Just like her!" was Martha's first hasty thought. "Sure to meet me if
I look like a fright!"
But she checked herself the next moment and gave Betty a cordial
greeting. "Why, Betty, I did not expect to see you out this morning."
"And I am not sure that I ought to be out," replied Betty: "but the
morning seemed so pleasant that I could not bear to stay in the house,
so I went round to the Home for a little while. Have you been to see
your aunt?"
Martha explained her errand.
"It must be nice to have an old lady of one's own to go and see!" said
Betty. "I wish you would take me to visit your aunt some day, Martha.
Do you think she would like to see me?"
The old feeling of jealousy rose in Martha's heart, but she put it down
by a brave effort, and answered cheerfully:
"I am sure she would like it very much. She is always fond of young
people. I think you must be fond of old people, Betty, you go to the
Home so much."
"I am," replied Betty. "I do love to hear the old ladies talk. One
learns so much from them. It must be strange," she added, thoughtfully,
"to look back upon such a long life."
"We shall know how it seems some time," observed Martha, "that is, if
we live."
"I shall not," said Betty, abruptly. "I shall never live to be old."
"How do you know?" asked Martha.
"I heard the doctor say so," answered Betty. "He told mother that I had
consumption, and that though, with good care, I might last on for a
year or two, I should never be well, and I might be taken worse at any
time."
"Why, Betty!" exclaimed Martha. "Do you believe it? Didn't it make you
feel dreadfully?"
"It did, just at first," said Betty; "but I don't mind it so much now,
only for mother's sake."
"I don't think the doctor ought to have said so!" said Martha. "He
cannot know for certain."
"I believe he feels quite sure," replied Betty. "You know they have
ways of finding out those things. He did not tell me, either. I only
heard it by accident; but after all I am glad I know the truth. Come
into our garden and let me give you some roses."
"I am not fit to be seen!" said Martha, glancing at her dress.
"I am sure you look very nice in that pretty calico dress and white
apron. Besides there is no one to see you. Do come in!"
Martha yielded, and Betty led her from walk to walk, culling roses and
other flowers with an unsparing hand. As Martha was going away, Betty
detained her.
"Martha, there is one thing I wish to say to you now,
because—because—something might happen that I should never see you
again." She paused a moment, and went on in a firmer voice: "Martha, I
know that you have never liked me, and that you think I do things to
spite and mortify you; but, indeed, indeed it is not so. I have always
wanted to be friends with you, for I liked you from the first, but if I
have ever done or said anything to hurt your feelings, I am sorry, and
I beg your pardon. I cannot afford to have any quarrels now, you know,"
she added, with a sad smile. "I must be in charity with all men."
"You never did, Betty—never but once," said Martha, as soon as she
could speak. "I mean when you told Miss Lyman about my walking in the
lane with my cousin instead of coming to school. I did wrong, I know,
but it did not seem fair that you should tell of me."
"But, Martha, I did not tell of you," said Bettie, earnestly. "What
made you think I did?"
"I thought you were the only one who could have seen me," replied
Martha, blushing. "There is no other house which overlooks the lane but
yours."
"Miss Lyman could have seen you herself from the recitation room when
the leaves were off the trees," said Betty. "At any rate, Martha, it
was not I who told. I never knew a word of the matter till I heard it
in school. Is there anything else?"
"Nothing!" replied Martha. "You have never done me an injury, that I
know of. The truth is," she added, coloring and looking down, "that I
have always been envious and jealous of you, Betty, and I have tried
to justify myself by making out that you were the one to blame. I have
been thinking over the matter, and I see how mean and wicked I have
been. It is I who ought to beg your pardon, and so I do."
"Don't say any more about it, but let us be friends, and love one
another!" said Betty, kissing her. "Come and see me, won't you? You
know I cannot go out a great deal now."
"Don't you mean to come to school any more?" asked Martha.
"No, I have done with school," replied Betty, sadly. "You will have the
prize after all, Martha, and without any trouble, for there is no one
else near you."
Martha burst into tears. "I don't care for the prize!" she sobbed. "I
would rather not have it."
"Oh, but you will not feel so by-and-by," replied Betty. "But, Martha,
just let me say one thing. Dear Martha, do try to be a true Christian.
Try to love God with all your heart, to please Him and to work for Him.
That is worth all the prizes in the world. Think how I should feel now
if I were not sure that He loved me and had forgiven all my sins for
His dear Son's sake!"
"Then you are not afraid to die?" said Martha.
"I cannot say that," honestly replied Betty. "When I think of dying, I
do feel afraid; but I try not to dwell upon that. I think about what
is beyond—about seeing my Saviour and all the saints in glory. Doctor
Courtland told me that was the best way, and I find it so. But I must
not stay out any longer. Do come and see me as soon as you can!"
Martha promised, and went slowly homeward, her heart very full of
prayers and resolutions.
"What kept you so long?" asked Aunt Margaret.
Martha told her the story of her meeting with Betty.
"I never was so ashamed in my life!" she concluded. "There, I have been
nursing that grudge against her for these two years, and then made up
my mind so grandly to forgive what never happened. I feel like a fool,
Aunt Margaret."
"Feeling like a fool is often the first step to wisdom, Martha."
Before another spring came round, Betty Allis was laid to sleep in the
grave, in the sure and certain hope of a joyful resurrection. Her fears
of death all passed away before the time of her summons came, and she
died in the utmost peace.
Martha spent much time with her during her last illness, and when at
last Betty was taken away, she looked back with wonder and shame to
the days when she could see nothing but evil in one so gentle and
kindhearted.
[Illustration: MARY, OR, "SHE MADE ME DO IT." Frontispiece.]
[Illustration]
MARY,
OR,
"SHE MADE ME DO IT."
"SEE that woman coming down the road!" said Mary Willis to her
companions. "Isn't she a funny-looking body?"
"She has just come off the cars, I suppose," said another girl. "Look
at her bonnet. I should think it had been made before the flood."
"Poor thing, she looks very tired," said Helen Arnold: "and see how
lame the little boy is. She seems to be a stranger in town."
"Go and make acquaintance with her, Helen," said Cora Hart, with a
sneer. "She is so fashionably dressed and so elegant looking, she would
be a nice companion for you."
"See, she is coming this way!" exclaimed Jane Marvin. "I do believe she
means to speak to us. Let us have some fun with her, girls!"
"I will have nothing to do with such fun as yours!" said Helen Arnold.
"I think it is downright mean and wicked to make sport of poor and old
people. Mary Willis, you had better come home with me and be out of
mischief."
"Oh, of course she will!" said Jane, scornfully. "I should like to know
why Mary Willis is to do as you say. You are neither her teacher nor
her mistress, if you are the teacher's niece, and the oldest girl in
the class. You stay here, Mary, and show her that you won't be ordered
about by her."
"Come, Mary," said Helen, again. "You had much better be going home
with me."
Helen spoke rather sharply, and Mary was vexed.
"I shall go home when I please, Miss Helen Arnold! I will thank you to
mind your own business and let me alone."
"Very well!" replied Helen, and she walked away, feeling both grieved
and angry.
She was very fond of Mary Willis, though Mary was much younger than
herself. She helped her in her lessons, dressed her dolls for her, and
taught her how to make pretty things for them; for Helen was very quick
and skilful in all sorts of work. She was anxious that Mary should be a
good girl and a good scholar, and she did keep her out of a great deal
of trouble which Mary's quick temper and readiness to be led away would
have brought upon her.
For a long time Mary had loved Helen more than any one else in the
world, except her own mother. But when Jane Marvin came to school,
she began, as she said, to put Mary up to be jealous of Helen. She
told Mary that Helen did not really care for her, and that she only
wished to govern and patronize her, and so show off her own goodness.
She laughed at Helen's plain cheap dress and what she called her
old-fashioned strict ways, and she told Mary that Helen was a regular
little Methodist, and wanted to make her so. Jenny had never been in a
Methodist church in her life, and knew nothing about them, but she had
heard her father call people Methodists who were religious and strict
in their conduct.
It may seem strange that Mary should listen to such talk against her
best friend; but Mary had a great idea of being independent and having
her own way: and like many other people of the same sort, she was ready
to be made a fool of by any one who would take the trouble to flatter
her. This Helen never did; nay, I am afraid that in her desire to be
honest, she sometimes went to the other extreme and found fault with
Mary when there was no reason for doing so.
If Mary had thought a little, she would have seen one great difference
between Helen and Jenny. Helen never asked her for anything, and if she
happened to borrow a sheet of paper or a steel pen from Mary's store,
she was always careful to return it. Mary's mother was rich and Mary
had a great abundance of pretty and useful things. She would often
have liked to divide with Helen, for she had a generous disposition:
but except at Christmas and on her birthday, Helen would never accept
presents.
Jenny was very different. She not only took all that was offered her,
but she had no scruple in begging for anything in Mary's desk or
play-room to which she took a fancy. Mary's paper and pens, Mary's
thread and needles, Mary's lunch basket, she used as if they were her
own, and she had already got possession of some of Mary's prettiest and
most expensive toys. Still Mary could see no fault in her new friend,
and she was very much vexed at her mother because she would hardly ever
ask Jenny to tea, and would never let her go to Mr. Marvin's to stay
all night.
Helen went away feeling very much hurt, and Mary stayed with Jenny and
the other girls. The poor woman walked slowly toward them, and when she
came opposite she crossed over the street to speak to them.
"Can any of you tell me where Mrs. Willis lives?" she asked, in a
sweet, pleasant voice. Her clothes were old-fashioned and worn but she
looked and spoke like a lady.
Mary was starting forward to answer her, when Cora Hart pulled her back
and at the same moment Jane answered, glibly:
"Mrs. Willis? Yes, ma'am, she lives in that white house up there on the
hill," pointing as she spoke to a farm-house which stood about half a
mile away upon the side of a steep hill.
"Does she live as far from the village as that?" asked the stranger. "I
thought her house was quite near the church."
"She did live near the church," said Jane; "but her house was burned
down, and she moved away up there. It is a beautiful place, but rather
far-away from the village, and the hill is pretty steep. If you go
round the corner by that yellow building with the stairs outside you
will be in the road."
The lady thanked her for her information and turned into the street
which Jenny had pointed out as leading up to the white house.
"There she goes, trudging along with her bundles," said Jenny, bursting
out laughing. "I hope she will find Mrs. Willis at home!"
"Mary was for telling her right away," said Cora. "She would have
spoiled all the fun, if I had not stopped her. What do you suppose she
wants with your mother, Mary?"
"I dare say she is some beggar woman," answered Mary. "We have heaps of
them coming to our house all the time."
"I should think you did!" said Jane, scornfully. "I don't see how your
mother can encourage them. I do despise beggars!"
"Two of a trade never agree, oh, Martha?" said Cora.
"What do you mean by that, Cora Hart?" asked Jane, angrily.
But Cora only laughed scornfully and did not answer.
"Well, for my part, I think it was a real mean trick!" said Julia
Davis. "Sending the poor woman all the way up that steep hill to an
empty house. I wish I had just told her the truth."
"Why didn't you, then?" asked Jane. "Nobody hindered you, Miss
Tell-tale; only just let me catch you getting me into a scrape, that's
all!"
Julia turned away and went into her own gate without saying a word.
She felt very much ashamed of herself, for she knew she had been a
coward—she had been afraid to do what she knew was right.
Mary also felt uneasy as she went home. She had been taught her duty
towards her neighbor, and she knew right from wrong. All the time she
was eating her nice supper, she thought of the poor woman with her
little lame boy toiling up the steep road only to find an empty house.
"Helen Arnold would never have done such a thing!" she said to herself,
and she wished over and over again that she had gone with Helen.
It was a pleasant, dry evening, and after tea, Mrs. Willis took her
work and sat down in a garden chair on the green lawn. Mary stood by
her with her doll, but she did not feel like playing or talking. Her
conscience troubled her more and more, and she felt very unhappy.
"I have some good news for you, Mary," said Mrs. Willis. "You have
often heard me talk of your godmother, your father's sister, who
married a missionary and went away to China."
"O yes, mamma!" replied Mary. "I have always wished to see her so much.
You know she sent me that beautiful box of shells and curiosities."
And then Mary sighed as she thought how Jenny had begged from her some
of the prettiest things, and rarest curiosities in the box.
"Well, my love, I think you will see her very soon. I had a letter from
her this afternoon, in which she says she expects to sail the next week
for America and will come directly to us. She has a little boy who is
lame, and she is bringing him home to see if he can be cured."
"How glad I am!" said Mary. "I have so often looked at her picture—the
one you said she painted herself, when she was teaching you to draw,
mamma—and wished she would come home."
Mrs. Willis smiled and sighed. "You must not expect to see Aunt Mary
looking like her picture," said she. "It was painted long ago, when we
were both young, and she has been through a great deal since then."
Mrs. Willis sighed, and looked down on the ground. She was thinking of
all that had happened since she had seen her dear sister—how she had
lost her husband and all her children but Mary. Mary stood leaning on
her mother's chair without speaking, till the sound of the opening gate
caused her to look up. There, coming in at the gate, was that very poor
woman and her little boy, whom Jane Marvin and her companions had sent
"on a fool's errand," as the saying is, to the empty farm-house on the
hill.
Before she could make up her mind what to do, Mrs. Willis looked up
also, and met the gaze of the stranger. With a scream of delight, she
started up and flew to meet her, kissing her and calling her, her dear,
precious sister, her darling sister Mary!
"Come here, Mary, and see your aunt," said her mother, turning round.
Mary came forward. She trembled so that she could hardly stand, and she
was very pale, but her mother did not notice her confusion.
"Now run into the house and tell Jane to get tea ready as quickly as
she can," said. Mrs. Willis. "And this is my nephew and god-son Willie.
But how lame he is, poor little fellow!"
"He is not always so lame," said Mrs. Lee. "But we have had a long and
hard walk and he is almost tired to death. I am afraid he will not be
able to stir to-morrow."
"I did not expect you till next week, at the earliest," said Mrs.
Willis. "But how do you come to arrive at this time of day? The train
has been in for two hours."
"I will tell you all about it, presently," replied Mrs. Lee. "Just
now I am anxious to find a resting-place for Willie, who, I fear, is
suffering very much from his knee."
"It does ache!" said poor Willie. "It always hurts me to go up-hill."
"Well, you shall soon rest it, my dear boy," said Mrs. Willis. "Where
are your trunks, Mary?"
"They will be here to-morrow, I suppose," replied her sister. "They
were left behind by some mistake, but I have telegraphed and heard that
they are safe and on the way. I must keep out of sight till they come,
for between dust and the long journey I look more like a beggar than a
lady."
The travellers were soon washed and brushed and sat down to a bountiful
meal.
"And now tell me how you came here at this time in the evening?" said
Mrs. Willis.
"The matter is easily enough explained," replied Mrs. Lee. "We sailed
a week sooner than we expected and had an uncommonly short voyage. We
came directly on from Boston, and arrived on the train at four o'clock."
"But where have you been since?" asked Mrs. Willis.
"I am sorry to say we have been made the victims of a most malicious
trick," replied Mrs. Lee. "There were no carriages at the station, and
I thought I could find your house easily enough. Meeting a party of
school-girls, I asked them the way, that I might be sure, and was told
by one of them that your house had been burned and that you had moved
into a house which she pointed out on the hill-side. If I had known how
far it was I should have gone to the hotel, where, of course, I should
have been set right."
"But as it was, Willie and I toiled all the way up the steep rough road
to find ourselves at an empty, deserted and half-ruined house. Poor
Willie broke down entirely, and I felt very much like doing the same,
for we had travelled all night and were tired out. I hardly know what
we should have done but for a good-natured teamster, who stopped to
water his horses at the trough by the gate. I made some inquiries of
him, and he not only set me right, but insisted on bringing me back to
the village. Poor Willie is quite discouraged at his first experience
in a Christian land, and wants to go back to China."
"I do not wonder!" said Mrs. Willis.
"I did not believe there was a girl in the village who would do such a
wicked thing. Who do you suppose it could have been, Mary?"
Mary, in her corner of the sofa, murmured something, she hardly knew
what. She was wishing that she were in China, or anywhere else out of
the sight of her mother and aunt. Oh, if she had only gone with Helen!
If she had only been brave enough to defy Jane, and set her aunt right!
But there was no use in wishing.
"She was a short and rather dark girl, with a great deal of curling
black hair, and bold black eyes," said Mrs. Lee. "There were several
others with her, but I did not notice them so as to be able to know
them again."
"It must have been Jane Marvin, I am sure," said Mrs. Willis.
She turned to Mary as she spoke, and observed her confusion. Could it
be that her daughter had been engaged in the trick? At that moment her
attention was diverted by poor Willie, who had been trying in vain to
eat, and who now, overcome by fatigue and pain, fainted away in his
chair. Mrs. Willis saw him carried up-stairs and made as comfortable as
he could be, and then returned to the parlor, where Mary was curled up
in the corner of the sofa, crying as if her heart would break.
"Now, Mary, I want to know all that you can tell me about this matter!"
said Mrs. Willis, seating herself by Mary. "Tell me the whole truth."
Sobbing so that she could hardly speak, Mary told her mother the story.
"It is one of the most shameful things I ever heard of!" said Mrs.
Willis. "How could you join in such a piece of wickedness?"
"I did not say anything, mamma," sobbed Mary.
"No, but by your silence, you consented to what Jane said, when you
might have prevented all this trouble by speaking."
"I was going to tell Aunt Mary at first, but the girls pulled me back
and would not let me," said Mary, hanging her head.
"Would not let you!" repeated Mrs. Willis. "How did they hinder you?"
Mary had no answer ready, and her mother continued:
"Where was Helen Arnold? I should have expected something better of
her."
"She was not there, mamma," replied Mary, eagerly. "She went away
before Jane began. She wanted me to go with her, but I was vexed and
would not. Oh, if I had only minded her!"
"If you had only minded your own conscience and your own sense of
what was right, you would not have needed Helen to keep you out or
mischief," said Mrs. Willis. "If you had had one thought of doing as
you would be done by, you would not have allowed a wicked, silly girl
to send your aunt and your poor lame cousin Willie on such an errand."
"I did not know she was my aunt," said Mary.
"That makes no difference, Mary. You knew she was a woman with a child,
and the fact that you thought you were playing a trick upon a poor
person makes your fault worse instead of better. Nor do I think you
mend the matter by saying that you did not speak a word. You ought to
have spoken, especially when the woman inquired for your own mother."
"I know it was wicked and mean, mamma," said Mary. "I have been sorry
ever since. I wish Jane Marvin had never come here!" she added,
bursting into tears again. "She is always making me do bad things and
leading me into mischief!"
"That is sheer nonsense, Mary. Jane could not make you do anything you
did not choose, nor lead you where you did not choose to go. If you had
been so very easily led, you would have been governed by Helen, whom
you have known three times as long as you have known Jane, and whom you
have every reason to love and trust."
"You have done very wrong, Mary—very wrong, indeed," continued Mrs.
Willis, after a moment's silence. "I cannot excuse what you have done
by throwing the blame on Jane. Every one of the party who allowed the
cruel imposition to go on was guilty of helping on the cheat. I shall
see that Miss Lyman is informed in the morning of the way in which her
pupils amuse themselves, and you must expect to take your share of the
blame. Now go to bed, and when you say your prayers, ask God to forgive
your mean and cruel conduct."
"Won't you forgive me, and kiss me, mamma?" sobbed Mary.
"When I see that you are sensible of your fault, Mary. At present you
seem inclined to throw the blame entirely upon somebody else, and to
think you are to be excused because 'somebody made you' do what you
knew was wicked and cruel."
Mary went away to bed crying bitterly. She had never been so miserable
in all her life. It was not the first time she had been "made" by Jane
to do wrong. She had done things in Jane's company which she was both
afraid and ashamed to have her mother know; but she had always excused
herself by thinking they were all Jane's faults.
Now, as she thought about the matter, she saw how useless and vain
were all such excuses. If she was so easily led, why had she not been
governed by Helen, whom she had known more years than she had known
Jane months, who was always ready to give up her own convenience for
her sake, and whom she had never known to do a mean action? Why was she
not as easily led to do right as to do wrong?
Mary learned more about herself that wretched night than she had ever
known before. She had always known that she was a sinner—now she felt
it, which is quite a different thing. She thought of all the wrong
things she had done lately—the whispering, and reading story-books in
prayer-time, the playing truant from school and lying to conceal it—the
mysterious private talks about things of which she ought never to have
thought; much less spoken—the secrets kept from her mother, to whom
she used to tell everything. Mary no longer tried to excuse herself.
She felt her own wickedness, and with real repentance asked her
Heavenly rather to forgive her for Christ's sake. Then feeling a little
comforted, she went to sleep.
She was awakened in the night by her mother sending for Doctor Arnold.
Poor Willie was very ill—so ill that for several days no one thought
he would live. Oh, how miserable Mary was! She could find no comfort
except in running up and down-stairs and waiting upon her aunt and
Willie. Dr. Arnold had been informed of the cause of Willie's illness,
and the next morning he came into school and told Miss Lyman the
whole story, before the minister and all the scholars. All the girls
concerned in the trick were obliged to beg Aunt Mary's pardon, and were
not allowed any recess for the rest of the term.
Mr. Marvin took Jane out of school, and every one was glad when she was
gone, for nobody loved her, not even those who had been the most ready
to be governed by her. I am glad to say, however, that Jane herself was
sorry when she found out how much harm she had done, and that she had
almost caused the death of poor Willie. She went of her own accord and
begged his pardon, when he was well enough to see her, and she gladly
spent hours in reading to him and amusing him.
But she could not undo the mischief she had done. The lame knee, which
might perhaps have been made well, was so strained and inflamed by the
long rough walk that it could not be cured, and Willie never walked
again without crutches.
Jane learned a great deal from the gentle little Christian boy and his
kind mother, and I hope she will grow up a good, useful woman. I think,
after all, there was more excuse for her than for Mary. Jane had never
known the care and teaching of a good mother. Her mother died when she
was a little baby, and she had been brought up by servants and by her
father, who was a foolish and bad man. She had always heard him laugh
at the Bible as an old book of fables, and at religious people as fools
or knaves, and she naturally took her notion from him.
Mary, on the contrary, had every pains taken with her. She had been
taught her duty towards God and her neighbor, she had the kindest of
mothers, of teachers, and friends, who all tried to influence her for
good.
Girls, when you are ready to excuse yourselves for doing wrong by
saying somebody "made you," think whether your words are true, and
whether if "somebody" had tried to "make you" do right, you would have
been as easily led. Remember that God sees your heart, and He will
accept no false excuses; and while He is always ready to give you His
Holy Spirit to guide you, you have no right to let any human being
"make you" do wrong.
"My son, if sinners entice thee, consent thou not."
[Illustration]
[Illustration: LOUISA, OR, "JUST ONE MINUTE." Frontispiece.]
[Illustration]
LOUISA,
OR,
"JUST ONE MINUTE!"
"COME, Louisa, are you ready? The car will be here directly."
"In just one minute," replied Louisa, throwing down the book she had
taken up for "just one minute," while she was getting ready for school,
and hastening to put on her hat and gloves.
But in that minute the street-car passed. There was not another car for
twelve minutes. Then the drawbridge was raised for the passage of a
ship, which made a delay of ten minutes more.
The consequence of all these delays was, that though they walked
themselves out of breath, Louisa and her little sister Anna were ten
minutes too late for school, and poor Anna got a bad mark for no fault
of her own except her good-nature in waiting for her sister.
Louisa was in many respects a good girl. She was amiable, truthful,
and very obliging, yet she made more trouble and caused more
disappointments than any other person in the family. She was much
brighter than her sister Anna, and yet she "missed" in school three
times to Anna's one. Louisa was truthful, and yet she was not to be
trusted: she was obliging, yet she often disobliged those whom she
tried to help, and if she was not fretful herself, she was very often
the cause of fretfulness in others. All these seeming contradictions
are easily explained. The answer to the riddle lay in Louisa's favorite
phrase, "just one minute."
For instance. An important message was to go to papa's office and there
was nobody to carry it but Louisa. Aunt Maria had written to say that
she was coming to make a visit and bring her baby; but the measles were
prevailing in D—, and as the baby was a delicate little thing it would
not do to have her exposed to the disease. Papa had gone to his office
in the city before Aunt Maria's letter came.
"I must write a note to papa and ask him to send a telegraphic dispatch
to auntie," said Mrs. Winter; "and you, Louisa, must carry it, for Anna
is not well enough to go out. Now, can I depend upon you to go straight
to papa's office?"
"Yes, mamma, of course I will!"
Louisa meant what she said, and for once she was ready for the car when
it came along. But, unluckily, to reach her father's office, she had
to pass a toy shop, the window of which almost always presented some
new attraction, and had many a time delayed Louisa. She did not mean to
stop this time, but only to look at the window in passing. But behold,
there was a grand new baby-house with the most wonderful rosewood
furniture, and such a kitchen as was never seen in a dolls' house
before; and there was her school-mate Jennie Atridge, looking through
the glass.
"Oh, Louisa, just look here!" she exclaimed, as she saw Louisa. "Just
see what a splendid doll's house! Mamma has promised me one for my
birthday. I wonder if she will buy this?"
"I have got a doll's house, but it is not furnished," said Louisa,
stopping "just a minute," to look in at the window. "We are going to
buy the furniture next week, if Anna gets well enough to come into
town. She has been sick two days with a bad cold. I wonder if we could
get such a stove as that?"
"I would rather have a range," said Jennie. "See, there is a nice one
over in that corner."
The "just a minute" lengthened out into ten, while the girls discussed
the furniture, and when Louisa reached the office she found her father
had gone out.
"He has gone over to the South End," said the office-boy, "and will not
be back till noon. It is a pity you did not come before, for he has not
been gone more than five minutes."
When Mr. Winter came back, he found his wife's note and sent a message
directly. But it was too late. Aunt Maria had started, and arrived
next day to find Anna broken out with the measles, and another of
the children coming down with the same disease. The baby took it, of
course, and was so ill that its life was despaired of for many days.
Louisa was very sorry, and would gladly have done anything for her aunt
or for baby, but she could not undo the mischief she had done by "just
one minute's" delay.
One would have expected such a severe lesson to do Louisa some good,
but it did not. The truth was that Louisa had not learned to see that
she was in fault. She was "unlucky," she thought: "it always happened
so." She was sure that she was always ready to do anything that was
wanted of her, and she could not understand why her mother should go
for baby's medicine herself, instead of sending her, and why Aunt Maria
would not let her put into the post-office box the letter which carried
the news that baby was at last out of danger.
"Miss Louisa, will you watch these cakes for me while I run out and
pick the beans for dinner?" said Mary the cook, one day.
The girls were going to have a party to celebrate Anna's birthday, and
Mary had been making and frosting some of the most wonderful cakes
in the world. The great table was covered with cocoanut cake, and
chocolate cake, and almond cake, and Mary had just put into the oven a
pan of macaroons.
"The oven is rather hot, and you must watch it, or the cakes will
burn," said Mary. "Just as soon as they begin to brown, open the oven
door and leave it."
Louisa promised, as usual. She had already looked at the cakes once or
twice, and was just going to look again, when she heard the express
man's wagon stop at the gate.
"I do wonder what he has brought this time?" said Louisa to herself.
"I mean to run to the front door and see. It will not take more than a
minute."
Away she ran, leaving the outside door open, and the oven door
shut. The express man had brought a number of parcels, some of them
containing presents for Anna from friends in the city, and of course,
Louisa had to stop "just a minute" to see them opened. Meantime a
beggar woman with a large basket came through the side gate and into
the kitchen. No one was there. Louis had deserted her post, and Mary,
supposing that she was watching the cakes, was looking over the bean
vines and gathering all the beans which were fit to pickle. It was the
work of a moment for the woman to slip the cakes into her big basket
and slip away herself. When Louisa and Mary came back, both at the same
moment, the table was bare and the kitchen full of smoke.
"There now, Miss Louisa, that comes of trusting you!" said Mary, very
much vexed. "I thought you promised to stay and see to my cakes?"
"I only went out just a minute," said Louisa.
"And what has become of all the other cakes?" exclaimed Mary, turning
to the table.
Louisa could only say that she did not know. The cakes were safe when
she went away.
"Who was that woman I saw going out just now?" asked Mrs. Winter, who
had come into the kitchen.
Louisa did not know. She had not seen any woman.
"It was one of those gypsies who are camped over beyond Savin Hill,
I'll be bound!" said Mary. "There is no use in running after her. I
don't see but poor Miss Anna must go without her birthday cake unless
we can send into town and buy some."
"You were very much to blame, Louisa," said Mrs. Winter.
"Why, mamma, I did not know that the woman was coming in."
"That makes no difference. You knew that you had promised to watch the
cakes while Mary was away, and you ought to have kept your word. You
have been guilty of a breach of trust!"
"But, mamma, I only meant to be gone a minute—" Louisa was beginning,
when her mother checked her sharply.
"Hush, Louisa! Don't let me hear that odious excuse again. Suppose
it was only for a minute. Have you any more right to do wrong for a
minute than for a day? You are always saying—'only a minute,' 'just a
minute,' but your minutes are very apt to lengthen into hours. It was
your stopping 'just a minute' when you were sent on an important errand
which almost cost the poor little baby its life, last summer. It is
your stopping 'just a minute' to read or play or do something else to
please yourself, which makes you late at breakfast, at school, and at
church; which makes it impossible to trust you to do the least thing or
to believe your most serious premises."
"Oh, mamma! I don't tell lies!" said Louisa, crying. "I am sure I never
do that."
"I call breaking a promise telling a lie, Louisa. Did you not tell Mary
you would stay in the kitchen till she came back?"
"Well, I meant to stay, mamma, only—" Louisa stopped.
She did not like to say again that she only went out a minute.
"Only you thought of something else you wanted to do, and so broke
your promise. The consequence is that all poor Anna's birthday cake
is stolen or burnt up. I shall have to leave my work, which is very
inconvenient for me, to go into town and buy more; and I shall have to
use for it the money I had set apart for another purpose. You can go
to your own room and stay there till four o'clock. If it were not for
grieving Anna still more, you should not come down again to-day; and
you must not ask me for any more pocket-money till after Thanksgiving."
Louisa went to her room crying bitterly, and feeling as though she had
been very hardly used.
"Why, Louisa, why are you sitting crying up here to-day, of all days in
the year?" asked Aunt Wentworth, Louisa's godmother, who had come out
to Anna's party, and had gone up to Louisa's room to arrange her dress
and cap. "What has happened to cause so much grief?"
"Mamma sent me up here!" sobbed Louisa. "She won't let me come down
till four o'clock, and she says I cannot have one bit of pocket-money
till after Thanksgiving—all of three months—only just because I went to
the door a minute to see what the expressman had brought for Anna."
"Are you sure that was all?" asked Aunt Wentworth, who, like all the
family, had had experience of Louisa's fault. "Was there no more than
that about it?"
"Well, I couldn't help it!" replied Louisa, blushing a little. "How
could I know that the beggar woman would come into the kitchen and
steal the cake, or that the other cakes would burn?"
"Oh!" said Aunt Wentworth. "I begin to understand. You were left in the
kitchen to take care of the cake, which was stolen. Is that it?"
"Mary did not say anything about the cakes on the table," persisted
Louisa, "she only told me to watch the cakes in the oven."
"Well, and what then?"
"I just went through to the front door a minute to see what the
expressman had brought for Anna, and while I was gone the cakes in the
oven burned up, and a woman came in and stole all the rest of them. I
am sure I could not help that!"
"But, Louisa, don't you see that if you had done your duty in watching
the cakes in the oven, the cakes on the table would not have been
stolen?"
Louisa did not know. She only knew it was very hard to be punished just
for running to the front door a minute.
"Louisa, you are very much in fault," said Aunt Wentworth, gravely.
"You know that you have done wrong, and yet, instead of being sorry,
you are trying to justify yourself and throw all the blame on somebody
else. Now, tell me, did you not promise to watch the cakes in the oven?
Answer yes or no. Don't begin 'I only.' Did you not promise?"
"Yes, I did, then," said Louisa, sullenly.
"And is it not wrong to break a promise."
"I didn't mean to break it."
"But you did break it," interrupted Aunt Wentworth; "so how can you say
you did not mean to? You did not certainly go away out of the kitchen
without meaning it. That is impossible. You promised to watch, and you
did not watch—that is, you broke a promise. Was not that wrong? Is not
breaking a promise without reason the same thing as telling a lie?"
Louisa writhed and fidgetted. "I only meant to be gone a minute. It was
not as if I had gone away to stay."
"That makes no difference, Louisa. You have no more right to sin for a
minute than you have to sin for an hour, or a day. Besides your minutes
never are minutes. I know how it was with your music when you used
to come to our house to practise. You would take up a story-book for
just a minute, and half your practise hour would be gone before you
had touched the piano. The fact is that you cannot wilfully do wrong
for 'just a minute.' You might just as well set the house on fire and
expect it to burn 'just a minute.' What would you think of a sentinel
in war time who should admit the enemy into the camp to stay 'just a
minute.' When you commit a wilful sin, you make yourself the servant of
sin."
"I don't see any great sin in just going to the door a minute!" said
Louisa.
"The sin was not in going to the door, but in breaking your promise, as
you know perfectly well," said Aunt Wentworth. "I do not at all wonder
that your mother is angry with you, Louisa. You not only do not try to
get the better of your fault, but you justify yourself in it: and I
tell you, in all seriousness, that it is a fault which will ruin your
character if you do not try to break yourself of it."
"It has come to that now that nobody can trust you to do the least
thing. If you are sent on an errand, there is no certainty of your
being in time. If you are set about any piece of work, however
necessary, you are more likely than not to neglect it and to disappoint
those who depend on you. You are losing your standing in school,
instead of gaining, and you are a perpetual worry and discomfort to
all around you: and all because of this miserable habit of indulging
yourself 'just a minute' in doing what you know to be wrong. As I said,
I do not wonder that your mother is displeased, or that she punishes
you. The matter is growing very serious, and I tell you, my child,
unless you repent and amend in time, your life will be a miserable
failure, not only in this world but in that which is to come."
Aunt Wentworth was a very old lady, and one to whom all the family
looked up with great respect. She very seldom reproved the children of
her nieces, for she was one who understood to perfection the difficult
art of minding her own business, and she was very indulgent and kind to
young people.
Louisa had been cherishing a secret hope that Aunt Wentworth would
intercede with her mother, and, as she said, "beg her off." But Aunt
Wentworth had no intention of doing anything of the kind. She knew
how serious Louisa's fault was, and that her mother would never have
treated her so severely for one single instance of forgetfulness.
For some time after the birthday party, Louisa was more careful. She
found it very unpleasant to be without spending money week after week,
especially as Aunt Wentworth did not fill up her purse, as sometimes
happened, when she went to visit the old lady.
There was another thing which annoyed her even more, and that was the
fact that nobody asked her to do anything or accepted her services
when offered. She felt that she was not trusted, and this was a worse
punishment even than the loss of her pocket-money. She really tried
hard to overcome her faults, and she succeeded so well that by-and-by
she found herself once more trusted to do errands and other services by
her mother and sisters.
But just here it was that Louisa made a great mistake. She thought
because she had gained a few victories over her enemy that she was
safe, and might relax her guard. She left off watching and praying
against her faults, and presently she began to indulge in those "just
a minute" readings of story-books and magazines when she ought to have
been dressing, or reading her Bible, or learning her lessons—those
"just a minute" loiterings, which made her late for school, and those
"just a minute" longer morning naps which left her no time to ask God's
blessing upon the duties and events of the day.
This was the state of the case when Louisa went to make a little visit
to her mother's cousin, Mrs. James Perceval. It was always a treat to
go and visit Cousin Frances, not only because she was a very lovely
woman, but because she lived in a beautiful old place in the country,
only a mile from a famous bathing beach. The house was, in fact, Aunt
Wentworth's country-house, but the old lady only went out there for
a few weeks in summer, and Cousin Frances kept the house open and in
order the rest of the year.
Cousin Frances had been very unfortunate with her children. Three or
four of them had died before reaching their third year, and one had
been killed by a terrible accident. She had now only two remaining—a
delicate, sweet little girl of four years old, and a baby not quite
two. Louisa was fond of all children and especially of Milly, and as
she was always ready to play with and amuse the little one in her own
fashion—to play with the dolls, give tea-parties, and "make believe,"
to any extent, it is no wonder that both Milly and Milly's mamma loved
her dearly.
It happened one day that Captain Perceval came with a carriage to ask
his wife to ride with him.
"I should like to go very much," said Cousin Frances, "but nurse has
gone into town for the day, and the other servants are busy, so I have
no one with whom to leave the children."
"You can take Frank with you," said her husband; "and I am sure Louisa
will take care of Milly."
"Of course I will!" said Louisa. "Do go, Cousin Frances; the ride will
do you so much good."
Cousin Frances still looked rather doubtful.
"I don't wonder that you are anxious about your children, my dear,"
said her husband; "but surely Louisa can take care of Milly for an
hour. Louisa is almost a woman now, and if she cannot be trusted for so
long a time as that, what will she ever be good for?"
At last Cousin Frances consented to go, but the gave Louisa many
charges about Milly.
"Be sure you keep her in sight all the time, and do not let her run
about the grounds. It rained hard last night and the grass is very wet."
Louisa promised, and Cousin Frances went away. For the first half hour
Milly played contentedly upon the veranda with her dolls and books and
her pet rabbits, while Louisa worked at the sofa cushion she was making
for Aunt Wentworth's birthday. Presently Louisa found she had mislaid
some of her wool.
"What have I done with those shades of gray? Oh, I know! I left them in
the summer-house last night. I hope they have not got wet. Now, Milly,
you stay here and play, and I will be back in a minute."
"Why can't I go?" asked Milly.
"Because it is too wet for you. Just stay here and I will be back
before you can count twenty."
Milly sat down very obediently and counted twenty two or three times,
and still Louisa did not come back. Then the rabbit escaped from her
and ran into the grass. Picture-book in hand, Milly pursued him, and
after quite a chase, in which her shoes and stockings were wet through,
she succeeded in capturing him. Then finding herself in a shady place
among the trees, she sat down on the ground, and began to turn over the
leaves of her picture-book, the rabbit sitting contentedly in her lap.
Meantime Louisa reached the pretty little Swiss cottage called the
summer-house, where she found her worsted uninjured. Unluckily she
also found something else—namely, a new book of travels with beautiful
wood-cuts, which had been left there the night before.
"There now!" said Louisa, in a tone of triumph. "If I had done that,
what a fuss there would have been! I mean to leave it here just to see
what a hunt there will be for it. I just want to look at that picture
of the leaf-butterfly a minute."
In looking for the leaf-butterfly, Louisa found many other wonderful
things, and she lingered, looking at picture after picture, till the
ringing of the noon-bell roused her. She hastened back to the house,
but Milly was nowhere to be seen. She was not in the house nor yet in
the garden. Louisa had not found her when Cousin Frances drove up.
"Where is Milly?" was of course the first question, and Louisa was
obliged to confess that she did not know.
She had left her safely seated on the steps while she went for some
worsted, and when she came back the child was gone.
"You were away more than a minute, Miss Louisa," said the housemaid,
"for I came out here twice and did not see you. I supposed you had
taken Milly up-stairs."
"I went to the summer-house for my wool," said Louisa. "I did not mean
to be gone more than a minute."
"But you were gone all of half an hour," said the housemaid.
"Surely it did not take all that time to find your worsted!" said
Cousin Frances.
"I took up a book just a minute," said Louisa, reluctantly.
"O yes, there it is!" said Cousin Frances. "But I cannot stop to talk
now. I must go and find Milly. I might have known better than to trust
your word, Louisa, but I was led to think you had improved."
After a long search, Milly was found where we left her. She had been
sitting on the damp grass for about an hour, with her shoes and
stockings wringing wet. She told her story very artlessly of how Cousin
Louisa did not come back, and she got tired of waiting, "and then the
rabbit ran away, and I ran after him, and when I caught him, I was
tired and sat down to rest. I did not mean to be naughty, mamma," said
the little girl, with a grieved face. "Mamma did not tell Milly not to
run after the rabbit."
"No, my darling," said Cousin Frances. "If I had told you, you would
have minded me. Louisa, did you not promise me not to leave the child?"
For once Louisa had nothing to say for herself, and did not try, even
in her own mind, to excuse her conduct.
Milly was undressed directly, but before she could be put into bed, she
complained of being very cold, and was presently attacked with a severe
chill and pains in her head and chest. Before night, it became plain
that Milly had inflammation of the lungs, and the next day her life was
despaired of.
Never was any one more wretched than Louisa. She went home the same
day, for though Captain Perceval was a Christian man and tried to
forgive as he would be forgiven, he could not bear the sight of one
who had, as it seemed, been the cause of his child's death. Of course
Louisa's father and mother had to hear the story—indeed Louisa herself
told her mother all about the matter, with many bitter tears.
"I shall always feel as if I had killed little Milly!" said she.
"Cousin James said my faithlessness had caused her death, and I believe
it is true."
"I am afraid so!" said Mrs. Grey, sadly. "I have always feared that
your besetting sin would lead to some terrible consequences. I hoped
you had seen it in its true light and were trying to conquer it."
"I thought I had conquered it, mamma," said Louisa. "I thought I had
got all over it!"
"And so you left off watching and praying against it, did you not?"
"Yes, mamma."
"Oh, Louisa, that was a great mistake! You ought never to leave off
watching and praying against your faults, for you can never be sure you
have quite conquered, especially when a bad habit has been indulged as
long as yours has been."
"But what shall I do now, mamma?" sobbed Louisa. "There is no use in
my trying any more, now that I have killed poor Milly. I am afraid God
will never forgive me."
"You must not think so, my poor child. I hope dear Milly may be spared
to our prayers, but even if she is not, you must not despair of God's
forgiveness. 'Though your sins be as scarlet they shall be white as
snow.'"
"But, mamma, I have been wicked so long! And I have done wrong on
purpose. I have always known it was wrong to waste my time so, and to
indulge myself in everything I wanted to do, excusing myself by saying
that it was only for a minute. I knew all the time it was wrong to
leave Milly alone so long, and yet I did it because I wanted to look at
the book."
"That is what I have always told you, Louisa—that you were indulging
in wilful sin. Now that you are sensible of your fault, I shall have
more hopes of you than ever before. Do not distrust God's mercy,
whatever you do, for that in itself is a great sin, but humbly ask His
forgiveness for Jesus Christ's sake. Ask that your sins may be washed
away in His blood, and that you may have the help of the Holy Spirit to
keep you from sinning again!"
"Do you think He really will hear me, mamma?"
"My dear, I have no more doubt of it than I have that I am alive," said
her mother.
"But even if He does, that will not bring poor Milly to life again!"
said Louisa, despairingly.
"Milly is not dead yet, my dear, and it may be that God will spare her
in answer to our prayers. But even if He does not see fit to do so, it
is no less your duty to ask His forgiveness and to trust in His mercy
for the future. You must not throw away the rest of your life, because
you have failed so far."
"Good news, good news, mamma! Good news, Louisa!" cried Anna, coming in
a few days after, with a beaming face. "Cousin James has just been at
the office to say that Milly is out of danger. The doctor says she will
get well. And oh, Louis, Milly begs to see you all the time, and Cousin
James wants you to comp out to L— this afternoon. He will meet you at
the station."
Louisa looked at her mother, and then rising, she went into her own
room and shut the door. She did not come out for an hour, and when she
did, her eyes were red with crying, but her face was calm and happy.
"Oh, mamma!" she whispered, as she was going away, "I have always heard
that God was good, but I never really felt it before!"
"We will say nothing about the past, Louisa," said Cousin James that
night, as Louisa, with trembling words, began to speak of the cause of
Milly's illness. "Let by-gones be by-gones; but let what has happened
be a lesson to you all your life. God has kindly spared us our little
darling, and saved you especially from a great sorrow. Show by your
actions that you are sensible of His goodness."
"Indeed, Cousin James, I hope I shall do so," said Louisa, with tears.
"I said this morning that if Milly only lived, I would try never even
for a moment to do what I knew to be wrong."
"That is an excellent resolution, Louisa. But you must remember that
you can never keep it in your own strength. You must constantly pray
for the help of the Holy Spirit, and you must constantly and faithfully
watch against the first beginning of temptation. You will no doubt find
the bad habit all the harder to break off because you have indulged it
so long; but you have every encouragement to persevere, and if you do
so, I have no doubt you will, in time, become a useful Christian woman."
[Illustration]
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