Imágenes de páginas
PDF
EPUB

not be the right place for Alice, if it made her so useless at home.

When he and Alice were alone after tea, he said:

"My girl, your mother is very badly, and you will be wanted at home for a bit to do for her and us too, I'm thinking."

[ocr errors]

"Would not Bessie do as well, or better, father? She is so backward at school it cannot matter to her to be away; but I shall lose so many places in my class." Ally, dear," said her father, "you think ever so much about your class and your learning, and I am very glad you are so clever at your books, if you make good use of them; but if being top at school makes you neglectful and saucy to that mother of yours lying up stairs, I had rather you had never known your letters. You have more to learn of such a mother, than you could teach her through a long summer's day, I can tell you. See how all her life she has thought nothing of herself, only to do her duty to God and man; and now I'll not see her neglected. So mind my words: the day may be coming when your heart will feel very sore if you let her want for anything that you can do for her." And then fear of the terrible calamity that he saw approaching, made him cry like a child.

Alice cried too, for many reasons; but she was touched and frightened, and really wished to do all she could; but she was beyond everything surprised to find, that, with all her endeavours, she was a wretchedly bad nurse, and little Bessie an excellent one. It was Bessie that, when once shown how to make a poultice, could always do it to perfection.

She had long ago made excellent gruel and broth. It was Bessie who knew on which shelf the medicine bottle stood. It was Bessie who always read and remembered the directions on the bottle. She was so quiet and gentle; never saying an unnecessary word, or asking an unnecessary question; never in the way, but never out of the way-all her thoughts fixed on her mother.

Alice could not understand how it all was, or why she was so unhandy and forgetful, while she could do long division sums, the whole length of her slate, without a mistake. But she was clever; and she was not an unfeeling or thoughtless girl; and at last the truth dawned upon her. She had all her life been selfish, and a selfish person never can be of the least use as a nurse. It was not so bad a sort of selfishness as love of eating, or dress, or any of the common forms of self-indulgence, but still it was of herself and her own advancement in the three R's, as they are called, that she thought from morning till night.

She never entered into other persons' feelings, or had any sympathy for those who lost the prizes that she won. It was not till she felt likely to lose her mother, that she found out how entirely the comfort and well-doing of the family depended upon that mother on whom she had looked down; and then, too, she discovered how much more able stupid slow Bessie would be to supply her place, than her clever self. She had time for all these thoughts for, during six weeks, Mrs. Wilson lay in almost a hopeless state, and the reflection of the share

Alice had had in bringing on her illness was almost more than she could bear. She recovered at last, to find her eldest daughter a different person, humble, and thoughtful, and affectionate, and though not neglecting her home lessons, always making much more effort to do her home duties.

THE WOMAN AND THE BIRD.

BY ONE OF THE AUTHORS OF

CHILD-WORLD."

I'LL tell you a story, children,-
A story you've never heard,-
Of a woman who lived in a hovel,
Whose life was saved by a bird ;-

A woman so poor and lonely,

With nothing to make life sweet,
Working, and toiling, and working,
And never enough to eat.

Walking for work to the village,
And wearily home again,
She saw a wicked boy-robber
Putting a bird to pain.
She had but a little sixpence

To get her dinner that day;
But she saved the bird from the robber,
And gave her one sixpence away.

And she made the bird her darling,She was so poor and alone,

That she thought it a lovely wonder
To have a bird of her own.

She hung the cage in her hovel,
And tended the bird with care;
Aud often when she was hungry

The bird had enough and to spare.

Weary and weary with walking,
Out of her way she would
go
To gather the fine fresh groundsel
Birds are so fond of, you know.
And, oh the poor little pennies,
That used to get her some bread,
Must go for the seed and sugar

With which her bird-king is fed

The bird sang out sweet and eager
Whenever he saw her come,
A beautiful song of welcome,
Making the hovel a home!

It flew around and about her;

It sang what it could not speak; It perched on her head and shoulder, Or laid on her lips its beak.

So the wind blew rather softly,

The sun shone rather more bright,

And love was the little secret

That gave to her life some light.

And you with whom love is plenty,
Oh, is not your pity stirr'd

For a woman made less unhappy
By only loving a bird?

And when she was faint with hunger,
Weary, and wasted, and ill,
And lay on the floor of the hovel,
Clay-cold, and white, and still,
And the bird was singing above her,
And flying about and around,
And perching on head and shoulder,
And hearing no loving sound ;-

O bird, of what were you thinking?
O bird, shall we never know?
You fluttered your wings in terror,
Your pretty eye glittered so!
You fluttered and ruffled your feathers,
And sang with a frightened cry,

And then you rushed through the window
Away between earth and sky.

And every creature that met you
You called with a piercing call,
And ruffled and fluttered your feathers,
And tried to appeal to them all.
But never a one would heed you,
For how could they guess or know
That the bird was asking their succour
For the woman who loved it so ?

« AnteriorContinuar »