“There, Eben,” she said, “I’ve kept her for you; now you’ll forgive my being cross to you.”
“Forgive you, my dear old soul! Why, that’s a pretty story! What have I to forgive? Weren’t you always the most painstaking creature that ever was? and I was enough to tire the patience of Job himself. My wife, there, will tell you what a fiery trial I am.”
“Oh papa, you are not!” said the little one.
“Shut up, Pussy; you mustn’t talk! You’ll get a relapse, or something. We ought not to have come in on you so suddenly; but there! it’s just like me. I couldn’t help it. I’m the same noisy, careless fellow.”
“Dear sister,” said the beautiful lady, her eyes filling with tears, “I don’t know what I can ever say to thank you!”
“Oh, don’t say anything,” said Miss Avery. “I did it because I wanted to. I loved her She’s the dearest little thing! and the Lord’s given her back. I felt when she was so low — that — if she died, I should die, too!”
“Well, well,” said Eben, “you shan’t either of you die now! and we’ll ail live together in peace, and plenty, and prosperity.”
The last scene in our story is a Thanksgiving dinner at the old Avery House.
There were present at table Mr. Eben Avery and his wife, our little Blue Eyes, Miss Avery, and Trip, — Trip, with a fine new collar, with a little silver bell upon it Miss Avery presided, attired in a new black India satin which Eben had brought to her from California, and a thread-lace cap which Eben’s wife had trimmed with her own fair hands.
“Now this seems like old times,” said Eben, looking cheerily round. “Nobody like you, Sister Zarviah, for getting up a Thanksgiving dinner!”
Miss Avery confessed that she had given her mind to this one, and that she was relieved that the turkey had “browned just right.” Perfection in one thing, at least, had been reached.
“And now, Zarviah, since this is the last of the old Avery House, let’s have a rousing good time in it,” said Eben.
“Give Trip all the turkey he wants, and Pussy all the pie, and jet me talk nonsense much as I’ve a mind to.”
“Yes,” said Miss Avery; “Trip ought to have his share of oar Thanksgiving, for he’s been a good Providence to me. I was getting crusty and cross, and frozen up, and didn’t care for anybody till Trip got me to caring for him.”
“And then, auntie, I came after Trip, and you got to loving me, didn’t you, auntie?”
“That I did,” said Miss Avery, heartily.
“I tell you what, wife,” said Eben, “I’m going to build the finest house in Hindford on this very spot, and I’m going to build Zarviah’s room just to suit her, with all sorts of cupboards and closets and squirrel-holes for her to put all her precious things in, and she shall have a keeping-room with all the old things in it that are here; and we’ll keep the old lilacs to look in at the chamber windows, and Zarviah won’t know but what she’s living in the old house, only there’ll be no leaks, and no rats, and no cockroaches; and Zarviah shall have it all her own way in her part of the house.”
“Well, I shall stay in auntie’s part; I know I shall like it best. She always lets me do just what I want to.”
“There, Zarviah, you’ll just spoil that child,” said Eben. “She can’t be spoiled,” said Miss Avery, sententiously.
“At any rate,” said the little lady, “Trip and I know we shall have good times with auntie, don’t we, Trippy?” Trip barked his assent; and so ends the story of a dog’s mission.
LULU’S PUPIL.
LITTLE Miss Lulu was tired of all her dolls, — and she had a good many dolls to be tired of. There was the big china doll with blue eyes and light flaxen hair; and there was the pink wax doll with a curly golden wig; and there was the little china doll dressed like a boy, and the black china doll with a red petticoat that waited on the white lady dolls; and there was the doll that could open and shut its eyes, and the doll that could say “Mamma;” in fact, there were about a dozen more that I cannot now enumerate, but Lulu had become tired of them all. “I want a real live doll,” she said.
So one day her mamma brought her home the pet that you see here represented in the picture. It was a little Spitz puppy named Muff. His hair was long and silvery white, he had bright black eyes, and the prettiest pink tongue in the world, and was about the jolliest little dog that could be bought for any money. He was called Muff because he looked, when set down upon the carpet, very much like a little white muff running about on four little white stumpy legs; and the moment he was put down in the parlor he trotted about smelling at every thing he could find. He smelt of the curtains, of the chairs, of the ottomans, and ran his nose all along the side of the room, which is a dog’s way of taking an observation.
Lulu was delighted. This was a pet worth having. Her dolls, she thought, were stupid. They never did anything; they never moved unless she moved them: the doll that could open and shut its eyes never did open or shut them except just while Lulu pulled the wire, and Lulu got tired of pulling the wire. But no sooner was Mr. Muff set down on his four paws in the corner than he began such a whisk and scamper that it made lively times for Lulu. Round and round he ran, snuffing at this thing and at that, and barking with a short, quick snap, like the letting off of a pistol.
“Mercy on us!” said Lulu’s mamma, “what shall we do if that dog is going to bark so? It goes through my head like a knife. Lulu, if you are going to have Muff for your dog, you must teach him not to bark.”
“O yes, indeed, mamma,” said Lulu, “I’ll teach him;” and so she sat down on the ottoman and took Muff in her lap to instruct him how to behave.
Muff had been racing, so that his little pink tongue hung like a ribbon out of his mouth, and Miss Lulu proceeded to fan him in order to cool him, as she said, “Now, Muffie dear, you must remember you are my dog now, and I must teach you exactly how to behave. You mustn’t bark out loud in the parlors, Muffie; do you hear?”
Just then the door-bell rang, and down jumped Muffie, and “whack, whack, whack” went his sharp little bark.
It was Miss Marabout and Miss Tulleport come in all their best flowers and feathers and silk dresses to call on mamma.
In vain did Lulu try to stop Muff; she could not catch him. He ran “whack, whack, whacking,” now here and now there, under Miss Marabout’s silk trail, and over Miss Tulleport’s new satin, and made such a din and confusion that nobody could hear anybody else speak.
“Jennie, you must take that dog and shut him up in the nursery,” said mamma; and away Muff was carried in deep disgrace, barking like a pocket-pistol all the way.
“O dear me, Muffie, what a bad dog you are!” said little Miss Lulu, who came trailing up-stairs after him, “to bark so just after I talked to you so nicely, and told you just how to behave.”
Well, that was not the worst scrape that Muff got his young mistress into. He was, to tell the truth, the most mischievous little wretch that ever wore dog-skin What do you think of this? One day it was decided that Lulu was to go with a whole party of children to a picnic in the country. Her mamma had just finished for her a smart little cambric dress to wear on the occasion, and when Lulu went to bed it was laid out on a chair that she might put it on in the morning.
But, alas! in the morning there was no dress to be seen, and after, great searching and wondering it was found under the bed in Mr. Muff’s possession. Muff was shaking it about in his mouth, and had torn and mangled it so that it was not fit to be seen. In fact, he had chewed up and swallowed half of the front breadth, so that there was no possibility of mending it.
Lulu wept bitterly over her spoiled dress, and all the more that it was spoiled by her new favorite. It was agreed that Muff should be put into solitary confinement while she went to the picnic. So Muff was locked into a closet, and Lulu went off with her tears dried, and an old dress in place of the new one she had expected to wear.
Arrived on the picnic ground, who should appear, fresh and noisy, but Ma
ster Muff? He had jumped out of the closet window and followed his mistress, determined to see some of the fun!
This is only one specimen of the mischief that Muff was always doing. He used to run away with Lulu’s shoes and stockings, and chew them to a paste; he used to tear her ribbons to shreds, and, when nothing else came to hand, would attack the books and newspapers, shaking and worrying them till they were all in tatters.
Every day Maggie or Susan came down to mamma with some new story of Muff’s naughty doings. He had torn the window-curtains, he had chewed off a corner of a sheet, he had scratched and pawed off the fringe from the ottoman. “What shall we do with the creature?” said mamma. “I’m sure I never would have bought him had I known what a trouble he would be.”
“He will have to be sent away if he don’t mind,” said papa. But the moment papa spoke of sending Muff away Lulu’s great blue eyes filled with tears, and her lips trembled, and she seemed so broken-hearted that papa said, “Well, well, we’ll try him a little longer.”
Then how hard Lulu tried to make Muffie comprehend the situation! She would take him into her lap and preach to him gravely: “Now you see, Muffie, I love you, and I don’t want you sent off; but if you go on so they will send you ‘way ‘way off, where you’ll never, never see me any more. Wouldn’t that make you feel bad, Muffie?”
Muffie would sit with his head very much on one side, and his tongue like a pink streamer hanging out of his mouth, and listen with a waggish air to all his mistress’s instructions, showing just about as much feeling as some little boys and girls do when their mammas tell them of what may happen to them when they grow up if they do not heed their counsel.
“The fact is,” Muff seemed to say, “I have always been a pretty lucky dog, and I don’t believe anything very bad will happen to me.”
Muff liked very much to trot about with his little mistress when she went out for a walk. Then he would cock his ears and tail, and pad along as important as possible. He would run and bark at every cat and dog or hen and chicken in his way, and seemed delighted to keep everything about him in a flutter.
People scolded a great deal, and some even threatened to shoot him; but when little Lulu came in sight with her blue eyes and golden hair they concluded to let him go for her sake.
Muff wanted very much to go to church Sundays. He went everywhere else with Lulu, and why he was shut up to private meditation on Sundays was a thing he could not understand. So he would watch his opportunity and slip out of a door or window, and trot off to church, and to Lulu’s astonishment appear suddenly in the broad aisle. Once he even went up and sat in the chancel as grave and innocent as possible. Lulu’s heart was in her mouth when the sexton put him out, and she had to leave church to go home with him.
“How often must I tell you, Muffie, church isn’t for dogs?” she said, when she got him safe home. “You may go everywhere else with me, but you mustn’t go to church!”
Muffie could not speak, but his eyes said, “Why mustn’t I?” as plainly as the thing could be spoken.
However, on reflection, Muff thought he had found out a way to manage the matter. He waited till everybody was in church one Sunday, and then jumped out of the pantry window and trotted off to meeting. He took possession of a deserted slip near the door, and mounting the seat sat up as grave as a judge, and seemed resolved to show that a dog could act like a good Christian.
For a while all went on very well, and nobody noticed that he was there; but at last a great bluebottle fly whizzed down into his face, when “whack” came out Muff’s short bark. Everybody looked round, and Muff barked again; then Lulu got up and ran down the aisle just as the sexton seized him.
“O, please don’t do anything to him!” said Lulu. “You know he’s only a dog; I try to teach him so hard, but he won’t learn.”
The sexton smiled on the little maiden, and she took her pet home.
“O Muffie, Muffie, what trouble you do make me!” she said; “but yet I love you, and I wouldn’t have you sent off for the world.”
Since then little Lulu has grown a bigger girl, and Muff has grown an older and a soberer dog. He no longer chews up her shoes and stockings, and he has learned to spend Sundays in private reflection, but he never will learn not to bark. Little by little, however, people have become used to his noise, and like him in spite of it.
THE DAISY’S FIRST WINTER.
SOMEWHERE in a garden of this earth, which the dear Lord has planted with many flowers of gladness, grew a fresh, bright little daisy.
The first this little daisy knew, she found herself growing in green pastures and beside the still waters where the Heavenly Shepherd was leading his sheep. And very beautiful did life look to her, as her bright little eyes, with their crimson lashes, opened and looked down into the deep crystal waters of the brook below, where the sunshine made every hour more sparkles, more rings of light, and more brilliant glances and changes of color, than all the jewellers in the world could imitate. She knew intimately all the yellow-birds, and meadow-larks, and bobolinks, and blackbirds, that sang, piped, whistled, or chattered among the hushes and trees in the pasture, and she was a prime favorite with them all.
Multitudes of beautiful flowers grew up in the water, or on the moist edges of the brook. There were green arrowheads, which in their time gave forth their white blossoms with a little gold ball in the centre of each; and the pickerel-weed, with its thick, sharp, green leaf, and its sturdy spike of blue blossoms; and the tall meadow-grass, with its graceful green tassels hanging down and making wavy reflections in the water; and there was the silver-weed, whose leaves as they dipped in the brook seemed to be of molten silver, and whose tall heads of fringy white blossoms sent forth a grateful perfume in the air; and there, too, were the pink and white azalias, full of sweetness and beauty, and close along in the green mosses of the banks grew blue and white violets, and blood-root, with its silvery stars of blossom; and the purple hepatica, with its quaint hairy leaves; and the slender wind-flower on its thread-like stem: and the crowfoot, with its dark bronze leaf and its half-shut flower, looking like the outside of a pink sea-shell.
These beautiful blooming things did not all blossom at once, but had their graceful changes; and there was always a pleasant flutter of expectation among them, — either a sending forth of leaves, or a making of buds, or a bursting out into blossoms; and when the blossoms passed away, there was a thoughtful, careful maturing of seeds, all packed away so snugly in their little coffers and caskets of seed-pods, which were of every quaint and dainty shape that ever could be fancied for a lady’s jewel-box. Overhead there grew a wide-spreading apple-tree, which in the month of June became a gigantic bouquet, holding up to the sun a million silvery opening flowers, and a million pink-tipped buds; and the little winds would come to play in its branches, and take the pink shells of the blossoms for their tiny air-boats, in which they would go floating round among the flowers, or sail on voyages of discovery down the stream; and when the time of its blossom was gone, the bountiful tree from year to year had matured fruits of golden ripeness which cheered the hearts of men.
Little Daisy’s life was only one varied delight from day to day. She had a hundred playmates among the light-winged winds, that came to her every hour to tell her what was going on all over the green pasture, and to bring her sweet perfumed messages from the violets and anemones of even the more distant regions.
There was not a ring of sunlight that danced in the golden network at the bottom of the brook that did not bring a thrill of gladness to her heart; not a tiny fish glided in his crystal paths, or played and frolicked under the water-lily shadows, that was not a well-known friend of hers, and whose pleasures she did not share. At night she held conferences with the dew-drops that stepped about among the flowers in their bright pearl slippers, and washed their leaves and faces before they went to rest. Nice little nurses and dressing-maids these dews! and they kept tender guard all night over the flowers, watching and blinking wakeful
ly to see that all was safe; but when the sun arose, each of them spread a pair of little rainbow wings, and was gone.
* To be sure, there were some reverses in her lot. Sometimes a great surly, ill-looking cloud would appear in the sky, like a cross schoolmaster, and sweep up all the sunbeams, and call in a gruff voice to the little winds, her playfellows, to come away from their nonsense; and then he would send a great strong wind down on them all, with a frightful noise, and roar, and sweep all the little flowers flat to the earth; and there would be a great rush and pattering of rain drops, anti bellowing of thunders, and sharp forked lightnings would quiver through the air as if the green pastures certainly were to be torn to pieces; but in about half an hour it would be all over, the sunbeams would all dance out from their hiding-places, just as good as if nothing had happened, and the little winds would come laughing back, and each little flower would lift itself up, and the winds would help them to shake off the wet and plume themselves as jauntily as if nothing had gone amiss. Daisy had the greatest pride and joy in her own pink blossoms, of which there seemed to be an inexhaustible store; for, as fast as one dropped its leaves, another was ready to open its eyes, and there were buds of every size, waiting still to come on, even down to little green cushions of buds that lay hidden away in the middle of the leaves down close to the root. “How favored I am!” said Daisy; “I never stop blossoming. The anemones and the liverwort and the blood-root have their time, but then they stop and have only leaves, while I go on blooming perpetually; how nice it is to be made as I am!”
“But you must remember,” said a great rough Burdock to her,—”you must remember that your winter must come at last, when all this fine blossoming will have to be done with.”
“What do you mean?” said Daisy, in a tone of pride, eying her rough neighbor with a glance of disgust. “You are a rough, ugly old thing, and that’s why you are cross. Pretty people like me can afford to be good-natured.”
Complete Works of Harriet Beecher Stowe Page 574
