UNCLE JERRY’S DREAM ABOUT THE BROWNIES.
I had just settled myself in my easy chair, to take my usual nap after dinner, when the door was suddenly opened, and my little son and daughter entered, all ready for school.
“Papa,” said little Tom, “won’t you please to give me a cent to buy a slate pencil?”
“Another slate pencil! Why, Tom, you’ll ruin me. How many have you had this week?”
“Only two, sir, and this is Thursday. My last I kept two days, and I should have had it yet, only yesterday I just laid it down a minute while I went out in recess time, and when I came in I couldn’t find it any where. Susy staid after school, and helped me look for it; but I think somebody must have taken it; and this morning I had to borrow a pencil and do my sum in recess. I didn’t get any time to play at all.”
“Good for you, you careless rogue. If I was your teacher, I’d make you lose your recess every time you lost your pencil.”
“Then I’m glad you are not my teacher,” said he, with a sly look, as he pocketed the cent, and slipped fairly out of my reach. “Papa, you wouldn’t really, would you?” said little Susan, who always took every thing in earnest.
“Well, I don’t know, pet,” said I “I guess I shouldn’t be a very cruel teacher.” Susan seemed satisfied, and followed her brother; and I, wondering what in the world became of slate pencils, pins, and needles, very soon found myself in the land of dreams. I seemed to be wandering about in a thick forest of pine trees; the sky was covered with clouds, the wind sang mournfully among the branches, and not a path or the slightest trace of human footsteps could be seen.
Suddenly I came to an open place, and there, in the space of twelve feet square, stood a whole village. Each little house was about two or three inches square, built in the form of a log cabin of slate pencils, the spaces between the pencils being filled with pieces of paper, one of which (having by some accident got loose) looked wonderfully like one of the missing leaves from Tom’s spelling book. The chimneys were little thimbles with the ends knocked out; the fences were all closely built with needles and pins, and over every little gateway, towering above the top of the house, stood, stretched wide open, a pair of scissors. I stood for some time in silent astonishment What in the world, thought I, is the meaning of all this? Why, there are wife’s scissors that I borrowed the other day to cut my hair with; and there is Susy’s little forget-me-not thimble, that she was so proud of, and there is — I was interrupted in my observations by a low, disagreeable, croaking sound, which seemed to proceed from behind a large pine tree near which I stood; and looking carefully round, I saw two such hateful, spiteful-looking creatures, that I thought their faces must ache, they were so very ugly. They were about an inch in height, and had each of them a little bag about twice as large as themselves, which appeared to be quite full of one thing and another, and yet they seemed to lift them about with perfect ease. They held in their hands a girdle which made them invisible whenever they wore it. I wondered that they didn’t wear it all the time.
“Well, Wormwood,” said the uglier of the two, “what have you been about since I saw you last? Have you had much fun?”
“Why, Nightshade, I can’t say that I have had a very jolly time. You see, I’m not much used to the ways of the world yet. I’ve only been here two weeks; and then those floating islanders, they do bother a fellow terribly, with their balsam, and their pencils, and all their hypocritical nonsense about being kind, and good, and honest, and true, and all that stuff that they are forever whispering to one child or another. I wish Rosa, and Lillian, and Viola, and the whole set of them — island and all — were at the bottom of the Red Sea; then one might have a chance to do something. The other day, I found a little fellow looking wistfully at a basket of ripe apples, which stood at the door of a store. ‘Take one,’ said I; ‘take it quick; the man is busy, and won’t see you. Pshaw, don’t be so particular; it’s only an apple.’ He reached forward, and had one in his hand, when, as ill luck would have it, Rosa; the fairy, came flying along, and just sung in his ear a part of a tune which his mother had taught him, and he dropped the apple as quick as he would a red-hot coal, and away he ran. I tell you, Nights shade, it’s hard work to make a boy steal when he is thinking of his mother. Well, I didn’t like to be cheated so, and I followed him home, and spent several days in the family; but it was in fact time wasted; for, although there were seven children, the mother was so watchful, and the children so particular about saying their prayers, and studying their Bible lessons, and singing their hymns, that I could get no power over them at all. One day, I found the youngest child alone, and I thought I would make him swear. Well, I whispered some words in his ear, very softly, but so distinctly that he didn’t know them from his own thoughts. ‘Now,’ said I, ‘say them; it will make you feel like a man, and it is just as bad to think wicked words as to say them, and you know you have thought them already.’”
“And did he say them?” asked Nightshade, with a malicious grin.
“Say them! no — he ran crying to his mother, and said, ‘O ma, I am so naughty, I have been thinking swear, like what that man said to his horses this morning. Are you afraid that I shall grow up like him, ma?’ She took the little fellow on her lap, and I cleared out; for I knew there was no chance for me that day.
“Next morning, I was delighted to find one of the little girls climbing up to get something off the mantel-piece — a thing that she had been forbidden to do. I saw what she did not — that the sleeve of her apron brushed against one of the flowers in her mother’s china vase, and I suddenly flew right in her face in the form of a dragon-fly, which frightened her, so that she started and knocked down the vase, which was broken into a dozen pieces. I was delighted, of course. ‘Now,’ said I, ‘you have got yourself into trouble; that is your mother’s favorite vase; she will be very much displeased, and will lose all confidence in you, because you know you promised never to try to get any thing off the mantel-piece; and now you have not only broken your mother’s favorite vase, but what is worse, you have broken your word. Your father, too, will know it, and all the family; and this afternoon, when they go to ride, you will be left at home. The best thing that you can do now is to go quietly out of the room, shut the door softly, and say nothing — you will never be suspected. If you are asked about it, you can say you don’t know who broke it.’
“‘Always tell the truth,’ said Lillian, the fairy; ‘remember what your teacher said about that last Sabbath. You have done wrong, but your mother is your best friend; you had better go tell her about it before it is too late.’”
“And did she go?”
“Yes, the little goose picked up the pieces, and went right to her mother and told her all about it; and I was so mad that I just gathered up a few pins and pencils and came away.”
“Ha, ha! but you are green,” said Nightshade; “to think of your spending your time in such a house as that. Now, let me give you a little piece of advice: Next time, go into a school, where one poor, bewildered teacher has forty or fifty wild, careless boys and girls to attend to. There you can play your tricks to any extent. You will always find a few bright ones, who are up to any thing that you can put into their heads, and not at all troubled with conscience. They will lead the rest, and there is no end to the mischief that you can make them do. As to lying, why, that’s nothing to some of them; and when a boy gets to be an expert liar, it is very easy to make him steal; I’ve got more such fellows into jail than you can count in a day; and as to pencils and paper, I know of a whole town, six times as big as Pinville here, that was built entirely from one district school. Or, if you are fond of private life, go into a family where the children all forget to say their prayers, and the mother forgets to attend to it; where they consider the Bible a very dull old book, and the Sabbath the most tedious day in the week; or where the father thinks of nothing but how he can make the most money, and the mother thinks only how she can spend it in the most fashionable and gente
el manner; where the children are all taught to look out for number one, and to care for nobody but themselves.
“If you want to make a boy swear, don’t frighten him, and make him run to his mother, as you did before; but first teach him to say, Confound it, or, By George, or, By jingo — just let him get in the habit of using such expressions whenever he is surprised or angry, and you will then find it an easy matter to make him swear. If you want him to steal, let him begin at home with a lump of sugar, a piece of cake, or a few raisins; and then, if you have taught him to lie easily, you will soon have him in the straight road to ruin.”
“Ah, well,” said Wormwood, “I’ll remember; but what is that red thing in your bag?”
“This,” said Nightshade, pulling out a beautiful coral necklace, “this is ‘Emily’s birthday present from uncle John.’ I borrowed it, Wormwood — just borrowed it, you know, to pave my yard with. Ha, ha! won’t these little beads make pretty paving stones? Little Miss Emily had been told often not to take it off her neck on any account, but I persuaded her one day just to try it on her little white kitten. By the way, Wormwood, that little word just is worth all the beads in creation to us — just this, and only just that. O, what a prime little word it is! Well, as I was saying, she just tried it on her kitten, and I, seeing that the door was open, just stuck a pin into kitty’s ear, and away she flew into the garden, through bushes and fences, and I after her, and Emily crying and chasing us both, until kit dropped her necklace, which I pocketed, or rather bagged, and left Miss Emily to make it up with her mother and uncle John the best way she could.”
“And what did you do next?” said Wormwood.
“Well, I amused myself in various ways. I found a little girl sewing; and as she seemed to be in a hurry to get through, I first knotted her thread, then twitched her needle away, and threw it as far as I could across the room; and while she was looking for it, I rolled her spool of thread under the stove, and blew a piece of paper over her scissors, which she had dropped in looking for her needle; and when she ran up stairs to get more thread, I followed her, and hung her nice new dress on a tack which her brother had just driven into the window sill; and as she was still in a hurry, she tore it across a whole breadth before she could stop. O, I’ve tom dozens of dresses in this manner, on nails and door-latches. Next, I went into the kitchen to help them take up dinner, as I knew they were going to have company. The first thing I did was to slip a large china dish out of the cook’s hands, which was of course broken all to pieces. Dinah rolled up her eyes, and ‘declar’d she didn’t know how dat ar dish cum to slip out of her hands — she spected Miss B. would be mighty mad, but she couldn’t help it no how.’ I then dropped a lump of fairy ice into the saucepan, and Dinah said she ‘bleeved it was bewitched — every thing was a waiten for that ar gravy, and it wouldn’t bile.’ By this time I was tired of staying in the house, and so, after cracking a tumbler with my bag of pencils, rolling two or three burning brands from the fire down on the new dining room carpet, and filling the room with smoke and smut, I flew away.
“My next visit was to a farm house. Here I had fine fun. I stuck pins into the cows, and made them kick over the milk pails, scared the setting hens, and sent them cackling off their nests, frightened the horses, and made them upset the wagon and throw all the farmer’s eggs and butter which he was carrying to market into the mud, and various other pleasant little tricks of the kind; but the best thing I did there was to gnaw the clothes line, and let down all the wet clothes on the ground, and then drive a few stray sheep right over them all. O Wormwood, if you had seen that old woman and her daughters, you would have laughed yourself all away to nothing — I thought they would be the death of me. They had just dressed themselves up in their new corn-colored dresses, and were going out to spend the afternoon, hoping to have an opportunity of saying that ‘they always made it a pint to get all their washin and cleanin done up before dinner’ — but just as they were starting, one of them happened to look round towards the clothes; and what a sight met their astonished eyes! I never heard women scold and storm quite as bad as they did. I thought in my heart they’d swear. I left them disputing as to who left the gate open, and let in them plaguy sheep, and went laughing off through the fields towards town.”
“And what did you do on the way?” said Wormwood.
“Well, I broke a few butterflies’ wings, pulled little birds’ feathers, stepped into a cottage now and then, tickled the babies’ noses, and pulled their hair to make them cross; stole little girls’ thimbles and needles whenever they ‘only laid them down just one minute,’ while they ran off to play or to look at something; jerked people in their sleep, and made them think they were falling; drew ugly pictures on their foreheads to make them have bad dreams; went to church on Sunday with other good people, and scattered here and there a pin or a straw for the little boys and girls to play with; whispered to the ladies to look at Mrs. A.’s new shawl, and Miss B.’s horrid ugly bonnet, &c.; fanned dull people with poppy leaves, and set them to bowing and bobbing to the minister and to each other; got several of the singers up in the gallery engaged in whispering and writing notes to each other; told the minister that it was of no use to preach to such sleepy, careless people — and the people that it did them no good to hear such dull, prosy sermons; and after I got them all thoroughly discontented, why, I came away, and left them to enjoy themselves.”
“Well, well,” said Wormwood, “I’ll take you for a pattern;” and here they both together set up such a horrid, discordant laugh, that I awoke.
“Wife,” said I, “do the children remember their prayers morning and evening? You needn’t look any more for those scissors; you’ll never see them again.”
“Why, my dear husband,” said she, laughing, and holding up the scissors, “what’s the matter now? How wild and queer you look! — you must have been dreaming.”
I was thoroughly awake by this time, and told my dream to Tom and Susan, who had just returned from school. “And now, children,” said I, “don’t let the wicked brownies tempt you to do any of their naughty tricks; always tell the truth, and don’t lay your things down, not a single minute, but always put them away when you have done using them.” They both promised to be very good, and Tom ran off to play; but little Susy climbed up in my lap, and said, —
“Papa, are there really any brownies? and is that story about Viola true, that you told us yesterday?”
“No, no, dear,” said I, “they are only made-up stories; but it is true that there are wicked spirits, always ready to tempt us to do wrong, and to feel discontented and unhappy; and it is also true that the Lord Jesus and his good angels watch over us, and are always ready to teach and help us to do right, and to be good and happy. If we listen to them, and love the Bible, and are willing to be led and guided by their kind precepts, they will never leave us to the power of the wicked ones, but will watch over us and take care of us as long as we live, help us through all our difficulties, and at last take us to their happy home, to live with them forever.”
TAKE CARE OF THE HOOK.
Charley’s mother would often sit with him by the fire, before the lamp was lighted in the evening, and repeat to him little pieces of poetry. This is one that Charley used to like particularly. It is written by Miss Jane Taylor.
THE STORY OF THE LITTLE FISH.
“Dear mother,” said a little fish,
“Pray is not that a fly?
I’m very hungry, and I wish
You’d let me go and try.”
“Sweet innocent,” the mother cried,
And started from her nook,
“That horrid fly is meant to hide
The sharpness of the hook!”
Now, as I’ve heard, this little trout
Was young and silly too;
And so he thought he’d venture out,
To see what he could do.
And round about the fly he played,
With many a longing look;
; And often to himself he said,
“I’m sure that’s not a hook.
“I can but give one little pluck
To try, and so I will.”
So on he went, and lo, it stuck
Quite through his little gill.
And as he faint and fainter grew,
With hollow voice he cried,
I “Dear mother, if I’d minded you, should not thus have died.”
After this was finished, Charley looked gravely into the fire, and began his remarks upon it. “What a silly fellow that little trout was! He might have known better.”
“Take care, Charley,” said his mamma; “there are a great many little boys just as silly as this trout. For instance, I knew a little boy, a while ago, whose mamma told him not to touch green apples or currants, because they would make him sick. He did not mean to touch them, for he knew that it is very disagreeable to be sick and take medicine, but yet he did the very same thing that this little trout did.
“Instead of keeping far away, he would walk about under the trees and pick up the green apples to look at, and feel of the green currants, just as the little fish would play round the hook. By and by he said, ‘I really don’t think they will hurt me; I will just take one little taste.’ And then he ate one, and then another, till finally he got very sick. Do you remember?”
“O mamma, that was me. Yes, I remember.”
“Now, Charley, hear what I tell you: nobody does very wrong things because they mean to at first. People begin by little and little, just tasting and trying what is wrong, like this little fish.
“Then there is George Jones, a very fine boy, a bright boy, and one who means to do right; but then George does not always keep away from the hook. You will see him sometimes standing round places where men are drinking and swearing. George does not mean ever to drink or to swear; he only stands there to hear these men sing their songs and tell their stories, and sometimes he will drink just a little sip of sugar and spirits out of the bottom of a tumbler; but George never means really to be a drunkard. Ah, take care, George; the little fish did not mean to be caught either, but he kept playing round and round and round the hook, and at last he was snapped up; and so you will be if you don’t take care.
Complete Works of Harriet Beecher Stowe Page 512
