by C. S. Guild
WHO ARE HAPPIEST.
Do you know, dear children, that as soon as people have grown up theybegin to wish they were young again, and had not troublesome servants tomanage, and great houses to take care of, and purses full of money tospend or to save, and, worst of all, whole troops of wicked fairies?_They_ call them habits; but fairies they are, for all that.
These spirits lead into so much mischief that there are very few men andwomen who don't sometimes fold their hands and say, "O, dear! if I couldgo back and be a little child once more!"
Ask your mother if she wouldn't give all her jewels away in exchange foras pure a heart as children have. Ask your father whether he wouldn'tgive all his bonds and railroad stocks if that would make him as merryand free from care as you are when you climb upon his knee to ask thequestion.
And if they say "No," ask them which fairy they would rather _you_ tookfor a friend--Pride or Truth.
Now, here you are, children still; and if I were you, I'd enjoy beingyoung while it lasts. I'd make friends with as many good fairies, andscare away as many bad ones, as I could find. Scare them away! Iwouldn't wait to look at them or hear them talk; for some have prettyfaces and sweet words, but they are dreadful cheats.
I would find out ever so many things,--and there's no end to the numberthere _are_,--ever so many things which are right, and good, andbeautiful. I wouldn't look for any thing else, but would be so happyamong these that other people would notice it, and look after them too;and then I would give them as many as they wanted of my treasures, andteach them where to find more; for fairy Love takes care that the morewe give the more we shall have; and even if we didn't, who wants to be amiser?
Think how much God has given us!--this whole great world, all the skyover your head, and the air, and sunshine, and woods, and gardens fullof flowers, and fathers and mothers to love and take care of us, and amillion other things.
And what do we give God? Every thing that we give away at all we give tohim just as much as if we laid it in his hand.
Don't you know that Christ called the poor and ignorant God's littlechildren, and declared he loved them all _better_ than your mother andfather love you?
And not only this, God cares when even a bird falls to the ground withhis wing broken, and is watching to see how much you are willing to dofor his creature.
CHAPTER XIII.
VIOLET BERRYING.
I called Violet a little berry girl, and I'll tell you why.
On the great hill above their hut, all over one side of it, wereblackberry vines; and in autumn, when the berries were ripe, Violet andher mother would spend hours and hours picking them.
The sun would be scorching hot sometimes, and the thorny vines wouldtangle into Violet's dress and tear her arms, and mosquitos would buzzaround her, until she was ready to cry or to declare she _could_ notpick any more.
Poor Violet! _You_ think, perhaps, that it is hard to walk to schoolunder your parasol these sunny days; and she had, day after day, tostand out there among the vines, picking, and picking, and picking, tillthe two great water pails were full of berries.
But when she grew tired, Love would point to her poor old mother workingso patiently, and looking so tired and warm; and when the fairywhispered, "Will you leave her here to finish the work _alone_?" Violetwould forget in a minute her own weariness, and sing and laugh somerrily, and tell so often how fast her pail was filling up, that themother would forget _her_ weariness too, and only think how fortunateand how rich she was to have such a good, bright child.
When she found a place where the berries grew thick and large, Violetwould call her mother to pick there; and old Mary, Reuben's wife, saidthat "somehow she never could find such splendid places as Violet did."
So, leaving her there, the little girl would move on; and no matter howlow she found the bushes, or how thinly covered with fruit, fairyContentment, hovering over her head, would sing, "Who cares? The fewer,the sweeter."
What with Contentment's singing, and that of Violet, and the cricketsand locusts, and the bees and bobolinks, there was music enough in theblackberry pasture; and it all chimed together just like the instrumentsin an orchestra.
CHAPTER XIV.
THE BIRDS' HARVEST TIME.
But I was telling you about Violet's birthday; so let us go back to thedoorstep of her father's little hut.
Narcissa called impatiently that she was tired of waiting; so herfather, bidding good by to his new acquaintance, sprang into thecarriage, and it rolled lightly through the green field once more.
Violet sat watching until it was out of sight, and she could no longersee Narcissa's feathers and flowers fluttering in the wind. Some how shenever thought of her afterwards, except as a whole bunch of lace andfinery, with a little girl inside of it.
Then she looked around for her violets; they were gone, and in theirplace lay the stranger's money.
But Toady hopped in sight just then, looking so brisk, and getting aboutso well on his three legs, she thought her flowers were little enough topay for so much good as he had received.
So, happy as ever, Violet took her pail and went towards the blackberryhill.
It seemed to her the berries were never so thick and large; she soon hadenough, and setting them in a shady place, she went to the brook to washher hands.
There were long, deep scratches on her arms. How they smarted when thewater touched them! but Violet only thought how much worse Toady'sscratches and bruises were; and then she loved to be clean, for she hadwatched how the birds wash in the brook a dozen times a day, and howsmooth the squirrels keep their fur, and how the flowers and leavesbathe their faces every morning in dew. She didn't want the leaves andbirds to be ashamed of her.
The little girl strolled on towards the wood, singing and laughing, andtalking to every thing she met, but most of all to kitty, who followedafter her; while whole troops of grasshoppers and little yellowbutterflies flew before, and settled in advance of Violet, and when shecame up, flew a little farther, as if they wanted to lead her on.
Then there were flocks and flocks of birds; the ground seemed alive withthem, for it was harvest time, and they came for the ripe grain whichhad fallen when the farmers cut their crops, and was scattered all overthe fields.
The thistle seeds were ripe too; and the birds, and butterflies, andbees seemed to love this best of all. Violet stood watching them eat,and laughed as she told puss that must be where she learned to be sogreedy.
The bees went buzzing down into the very heart of the purple flowers,and took such long, deep honey draughts, and went back again and again,as if they could never have enough, and hurried away to their hives, forthe sake of hurrying back for more.
The birds were not much better. They would hover an instant over thewhole thistle bed, and then, selecting a good large flower, they wouldfly at it, fanning away with their fluttering wings till they were lostin a cloud of down, and tear out the rich, ripe seeds, swallowing themso fast it seemed as if they were eating for all winter.
Violet was never tired of watching, for she loved to see every creaturehappy, and knew, besides, that the birds and bees only have so good achance to eat once in the year; and therefore, though she laughed at it,she couldn't blame them for their greediness.
There were such handsome yellow birds, with black spots and stripes overtheir bright breasts and wings. They buried their black and golden headsaway in among the thistle down, while they clung to the stem with clawsand wings, and were so busy eating that they did not see how near Violetcrept to them.
Then a beautiful great butterfly, its rich brown wings spotted with blueand orange, settled upon a flower, and sipped daintily, and flutteredaway again to take another sip somewhere else, and then went sailing offinto the sunshine. So she skipped along after it, kitty running closebehind her, until they came to a bank covered with white everlastingflowers--so many it looked a little way off like snow; and Violet, whosemother had told her that in heaven flowers did not fade, but were _all_everlasting, wonder
ed if the door of heaven had not been left ajar, someday, long enough for a whole shower of seed to blow down towards thishill, and planting itself, come up in these pearl-white flowers.
Ah, Violet! the commonest seeds sprang up into heavenly flowers if theyfell in _your_ pathway.
CHAPTER XV.
WHERE THE SQUIRREL LED VIOLET.
While Violet stood wondering thus, she saw a squirrel on the fence,nibbling upon a nut. As soon as she stirred, he darted along a rail ortwo, and then, waiting till she came up with him, went nibbling again.
"You needn't feel so grand with your spry legs. I guess I can run aswell as you," said Violet.
The squirrel tucked the nut under one arm, and with a whisk of his bushytail, darted like lightning along the rails, leaving Violet so farbehind she thought he had gone into the wood; but when she had reachedfar enough herself, there he sat, quietly nibbling at his nut again, andsoon as he saw her, whisked up into a tree, and from among the highboughs called, "Cheep, cheep, chip! Which beat, little girl?"
Violet could not see him, he went so fast and far; and as she looked upamong the leafy boughs, he dropped the nut right into her face, and ranround and round the limb, and called "Cheep, cheep, chip!" again, as ifhe were laughing at her.
Violet laughed too, and threw the nut back at him, looking first to seehow clean he had eaten out the meat.
Away darted squirrel, without waiting to chip this time, and Violetcalled, as he ran,--
"It's all very fine to whisk along so fast, mister; but I should like toknow how much good your travelling does. I know you can't _see_ a thing,any more than they can in the rail cars I've heard about. You're welcometo your legs so long as you leave the brook, and the flowers, and birdsfor puss and me."
But he only answered by dropping another nut from directly over herhead, and she followed him into the wood--the beautiful, cool, stillwood. Violet left off singing as she entered it; for she loved to hearthe rustle of the ripe leaves, and to watch the tiny fibres fallinglightly from the pines, and hear the nuts and acorns rattle down, and tosee the spider webs and insects glitter wherever a gleam of sunshine hadstolen through the boughs.
Her hands were full of flowers, which she had gathered on the way; forshe did not mean her new cup should be empty when the good parents camehome.
So she had picked such a splendid bunch!--bright red cardinal flowersfrom the swamp; and along by the brook side, where it was sunniest, shefound beautiful blue fringed gentians; and farther on branches of goldenrod, that looked like little elm trees changed to gold; and on fartherstill, by the edge of the wood, where, as they waved, they seemedbeckoning her, she found plenty of asters, white as snow, with littleyellow eyes twinkling out among the petals, or else rich purple withdeep gold inside; and she had some of the everlasting flowers too, likebunches of pure pearls.
Violet crept under the deep shade of the boughs, where the brook wasgurgling over its mossy stones, and laid the stems of her flowers thereto keep them fresh, making a wall of pebbles around them, so that thewater, which tripped along so fast, should not carry them away.
For once, when she forgot to do this, she had no sooner placed herflowers in the brook than off they sailed down stream, and scattered sofast and far she couldn't think of finding them all again.
Violet laughed when she remembered that day, and how the brook, full ofits mischief, had run away with her treasures, and scattered them anyand every where along its banks, setting some upright, as if they weregrowing again, and wedging some under the stones, and tangling someunder the fence, and floating some down the hill and through the sunnyfield, so fast they seemed chasing the little fish that made their homein the brook.
Even away down by Reuben's house a few had strayed, and reached home somuch before Violet that she began to think the waves had, after all, asspry feet as her own.
CHAPTER XVI.
ALONE IN THE WOOD.
Her flowers safe in the water, the little girl seated herself on a stonethat seemed made purposely for her, it was cushioned so softly withmoss; and overhead the boughs of the great trees bent towards her, andrustled and waved like so many fans, and shut her in so closely from therest of the wood that you might have passed close by, and never guessedshe was there.
The kitten went fast asleep in her lap, and Violet, folding her hands,looked up among the leaves, and across where the boughs parted a littleinto the wood, and down at her feet, where the grass grew so long andfine, and was sprinkled over with such pretty little leaves--as tiny,some of them, as Violet's finger nails, and yet as beautifully scollopedor pointed, and as perfectly finished, as the stoutest laurel orbroadest oak leaf in the wood; and, noticing this, Violet wondered ifGod, who had taken as much pains in making little leaves as big ones,had not taken as much pains with, and didn't care as much for, little_people_ as big ones.
Who knew but he loved her, in her ragged dress, just as well as Narcissain all her finery, or even the tall, rich doctor, who tried to mendToady's leg?
Then she listened, and felt how still it was there alone with the trees;and the sweet, low sounds that came through this stillness werebeautiful as music.
Far off she could hear the cool, sparkling brook foaming and hurryingover its stony bed; and then the air came breathing through the trees,as if they sighed for joy; and each leaf trembled, and seemed rising tomeet the air and fly away with it, and then, falling back again, nestledcloser to its neighbor leaves, and whispered softly, as if it weremaking love to them.
But there came a louder rustling among the boughs, and a flutter ofwings, and then burst forth a clear, wild song, so near that Violet heldher breath; for a golden oriole had alighted close beside her, andchirped, and twittered, and trilled, as if he meant to say aloud whatthe leaves and the brook had been whispering.
When he paused, the leaves all clapped their hands for more; and orioleunderstood them, for he gave another and another song, waiting betweeneach to wet his bill in some bunch of bright, juicy berries.
Violet did not suspect that the reason the sunshine looked so bright,and the shadows so cool and refreshing, and the leaves and brook so wideawake and so musical, was because the good fairies Love and Contentmentwere watching over her; and the beautiful purple light from Love'swings, and from Contentment's starry crown, and the fragrance from herlily urn, would make any, the dullest place, bright.
But as the bird flew away, Fairy Love whispered inside of Violet'sheart, "The bird has gone to her nest. Isn't it time for Violet to bethinking about _her_ nest, and the good mother, who will be there firstif she does not make haste and run home?"
Love's voice was lower than the whisper of the leaves or the far-offmurmur of the brook; but the little girl heard and obeyed it for allthat.
CHAPTER XVII.
THE KITTEN'S BATH.
Violet had picked a whole apron full of leaves, reaching up in the treesfor the largest and handsomest, and then, kneeling where they grew closeto the ground, had collected the lovely, delicate ones that were sosmall you would not notice unless you were looking for them--broad,shining oak leaves, long, graceful chestnut leaves, and some from thefluttering poplar, and some from the hemlocks and pines, tall ferns, andmaiden's-hair, and grass, clover, sorrel, ground pine, and hundredsmore.
Violet had been counting how many kinds there were; and as I haveforgotten, the first time you go into the woods you must try yourself,and lay them side by side, as she did, to see which is prettiest.
But away flew all the leaves, as, directly she heard Love's voice, thelittle girl sprang to her feet, waking puss out of her nap so suddenlythat she spit, and put up her back, and her hair stood all on end withfright.
Then you might have heard Violet's laughter ringing merrily enoughthrough the silent wood.
Such an unusual noise startled a whole flock of crows, where, hid in atall pine tree, they had, like pussy, been taking a nap, and scoldedwell because they were awakened.
Violet wondered if it would help the matter to mak
e such a noise aboutit with their hoarse voices, which sounded as if they were made onpurpose to scold--so grating and shrill.
She went to the brook for her flowers, while the kitten followed, gapingsuch great gapes that Violet told her she'd better take care, or shewouldn't be able to close her mouth again. And looking back among thetrees, as she climbed the stone wall and was going out into the sunshineagain, Violet wondered if God _could_ have made that beautiful place forno one but her; no one else entered it, she knew.
"I guess God thinks it's no matter how small I am, so long as I'm largeenough to love it all," she thought; and I don't believe Violet waswrong.
As they went home, a great cricket flew from under the kitten's feet andfrightened her again, for she was hardly awake. Away she sprang to catchit, and away sprang the cricket, while Violet had to run fast to keep upwith them, laughing to see how puzzled puss would be when the crickethid under the long grass; and while she was pawing, and purring, andlooking up to Violet as if she'd ask, "Where is he?" out he'd springagain, directly past her nose, and in among the grass would hide, andpeep at her, while she looked every where but in the right place.
At last, in her eagerness, the kitten jumped rather too far, and wentinto the brook; and in her fright I don't know what would have happenednext if Violet had not seized her just as, mewing and trembling, thewater was washing her down stream.
She lapped Violet's face and purred as the little girl tried to dry herfur and warm her again in her bosom; but she was a wilful puss, andpreferred creeping along in the sunshine, shaking each of her four pawsat every step in the drollest fashion. But she didn't chase any morecrickets _that_ day.
