Great Mysteries And Little Plagues Part 4

"If you should, my dear, you will wake in season; but take your choice."

"Thank you, mother, but I choose to stay here."

At these words the fairy vanished, and Rosebud was left alone, looking at the dear little flower, which seemed to grow fresher and fresher, and more and more beautiful every minute, and wondering whether it would be so with her dear mamma; and then she fell a-thinking about her home, and how much trouble she had given her mother, and how much better she would always be, after she had got back to her once more; and then she fell asleep, and slept so soundly that she did not wake till the sun was up, and it was time to water the flower.

At first she was terribly frightened; but when she remembered what the fairy told her, she began to feel comfortable, and, lest something might happen, she took a little sea-sh.e.l.l that lay there, and running down to the water, dipped it up full, and was on her way back, thinking how happy her poor dear mamma would feel if she could only know _what_ it was and _who_ it was that made her so much better, when she heard the strangest and sweetest noises all about her in the air, as if the whole sky were full of the happiest and merriest creatures! and when she looked up, lo! there was a broad glitter to be seen, as if the whole population of Fairy-land were pa.s.sing right over her head, making a sort of path like that you see at sunrise along the blue deep, when the waters are motionless, and smooth, and clear.

"Well," said she, looking up, "I _do_ wonder where they are going so fast"--and then she stopped--"and I do think they might be civil enough just to let a body know; I dare say 'tis the coronation, or the b.u.t.terfly hunt, or the tournament, or the--oh, how I should like to be there!"

No sooner was the wish uttered, than she found herself seated in a high gallery, as delicately carved as the ivory fans of the East; with diamonds and ostrich-feathers all about and below her, and a prodigious crowd a.s.sembled in the open air,--with the lists open--a trumpet sounding--and scores of knights armed cap-a-pie, and mounted on dragon-flies, waiting for the charge. All eyes were upon her, and everybody about was whispering her name, and she never felt half so happy in her life; and she was just beginning to compare the delicate embroidery of her wings with that of her next neighbor, a sweet little Fairy, who sat looking through her fingers at a youthful champion below, and pouting, and pouting, as if she wanted everybody to know that he had jilted her, when she happened to see a little forget-me-not embroidered on his beaver; and she instantly recollected her promise, and cried out, "Oh, mamma! mamma!" and wished herself back again, where she might sit by the flower and watch over it, and never leave it, never! till her three days of trial were ended.

In a moment, before she could speak a word, or even make a bow to the nice little boy-fairy, who had just handed her up her glove on the point of a lance like a sunbeam, she found herself seated by the flower. Poor little thing! It was too late! Every blossom had fallen off but one, and that looked unhealthy, and trembled when she breathed upon it. She thought of her mamma, and fancied she could see them carrying her up to bed, and all the doctors there, and n.o.body able to tell what ailed her; and she threw herself all along upon the gra.s.s, and wished all the fairies at the bottom of the Red Sea, and herself with them! And when she looked up, what do you think she saw? and where do you think she was? why, she was at the bottom of the Red Sea, and all the wonders of the Red Sea were about her,--chariots and chariot-wheels and the skeletons of war-horses, and mounted warriors, with heaps of glittering armor, and jewels of silver, and jewels of gold, and banner, and s.h.i.+eld, and spear, with millions and millions of little sea-fairies, and Robin Goodfellows, and giants and dwarfs, and the funniest looking monsters you ever did see; and the waters were all bright with fairy-lamps that were alive, and with ribbons that were alive, and with changeable flowers that swam about and whispered to each other in a language of their own; and there were great heaps of pearl washed up into drifts and ridges, and a pile of the strangest-looking old-fas.h.i.+oned furniture, of gold and ivory, and little mermaids with their dolls not longer than your finger, with live fishes for tails, jumping about and playing hide-and-seek with the sun-spots and star-fishes, and the striped water-snakes of the Indian seas--the most brilliant and beautiful of all the creatures that live there.

And while she was looking about her, and wondering at all she saw, she happened to think once more of the _forget-me-not_, and to wish herself back again! At that instant she heard a great heavy bell booming and tolling--she knew it was tolling--and she knew she was too late--and she knew that her mother was dead of a broken heart,--and she fell upon her face, and stretched forth her hands with a shriek, and prayed G.o.d to forgive her! and allow her to see her mother once more--only once more!

"Why, what ails the child?" whispered somebody that seemed to be stooping over her.

It was her mother's voice! and poor Ruth was afraid to look up, lest it should all vanish forever.

"Upon my word, Sarah," said another voice,--it was her father's; "upon my word, Sarah, I do not know; but the poor little creature's thoughts appear to have undergone another change. I have heard nothing to-day of the forget-me-not which troubled her so the first week, have you?"

"She has mentioned it but once to-day, and then she shuddered; but perhaps we had better keep it in the gla.s.s till we see whether it will bear to be transplanted, for she seems to have set her little heart upon having that flower live; I wish I knew why!"

"Do you, indeed, mamma?" whispered poor Ruth, still without looking up; "well, then, I will tell you. That flower was given me by a fairy to make me remember my promises to you, my poor, dear, dead mamma; and so long as I water that, every day at the same hour, so long I shall be growing better and better, and my poor dear mamma--boo-hoo! boo-hoo!"

and the little thing began to cry as if she would break her heart.

"Why, this is stranger than all," said the father. "I can't help thinking the poor child would be rational enough now, if she hadn't read so many Fairy-books; but what a mercy it was, my dear Sarah, and how shall we ever be thankful enough, that you happened to be down there when she fell into the water."

"Ah!" Ruth Page began to hold her breath, and listen with the strangest feeling.

"Yes, Robert; but I declare to you I am frightened whenever I think of the risk I ran by letting her fall in, head first, as I did."

Poor Ruth began lifting her head by little and little, and to feel about, and pinch herself, to see if she was really awake, or only dreaming.

"And then, too, just think of this terrible fever, and the strange, wild poetry she has been talking, day after day, about Fairy-land."

"Poetry! Fudge, Robert, fudge!"

Ruth looked up, full of amazement and joy, and whispered, "Fudge, father, fudge!" and the very next words that fell from her trembling lips as she sat looking at her mother, and pointing at a little bunch of forget-me-nots in full flower, that her mother had kept for her in a gla.s.s by the window, were these: "Oh, mother! dearest mother! what a terrible dream I have had!"

"Hush, my love, hus.h.!.+ and go to sleep, and we will talk this matter over when you are able to bear it."

"Goody gracious, mamma!"

"There she goes again!" cried the father; "now we shall have another fit!"

"Hush, hush, my love! you must go to sleep, now, and not talk any more."

"Well, kiss me, mamma, and let me have your hand to go to sleep with, and I'll try."

Her mother kissed the dear little thing, and took her hand in hers, and laid her cheek upon the pillow, and, in less than five minutes, she was sound asleep, and breathing as she hadn't breathed before, since she had been fished out of the water, nearly three weeks back, on her way to Fairy-land.

PICKINGS AND STEALINGS.

Troublesome comforts are they at best, these Little Plagues; and yet, how on earth should we get along without them? Mysterious and wonderful in their perturbations and irregularities, they are continually amazing the wisest by their questionings, and startling whole neighborhoods with their strange outbreaks of inner life, as you may see by what follows.

For a long while--many years, indeed--I have been in the habit of minuting down the stories that have come in my way about the little folks--the seedling cherubim--out of which, as the stars are smelted, the angels of G.o.d, who see His face forever, are to be recast and refas.h.i.+oned for the skies. Grains of gold are they, often gathered from street sweepings and rubbish; diamond-sparks which the great mult.i.tude, in their headlong hurry, overlook, but infinitely precious to the Philanthropist and the Philosopher. For example:--

No. 1. And this I had from the late John Pierpont, who related it of a grandchild, yet living, I hope.

"Aunt May-ee," said the little thing to her aunt, who was combing her hair, "I don't like Dod."

"Don't like G.o.d, Sissy! when He's so good to you, and gives you Aunt Mary and grandpa, and grandma, and ever so many friends to take care of you,--_why_, Sissy?"

"Well, but"--growing thoughtful and trying to escape--"well, but Sissy don't like black Dod."

"There isn't any black G.o.d, Sissy."

"_Then who made Chloe?_"

Did not that child reason?

No. 2. "'Top, mother!" said a little boy to his mother, who was reading to him about Abraham and Isaac, and had just come to the uplifted knife; "'top, mother! I don't want to hea any more. _I despise him._" Did not that child _feel_? and is it conceivable that he meant what he said?

Feeling his gorge rise, with abhorrence, it may be, and not understanding the awful significance of the threatened sacrifice, a type of what afterwards happened on Mount Moriah, where the Temple stands, he took that word which, in his little childish experience, best corresponded with his thought of horror and amazement that a father should put his child to death.

No. 3. And this reminds me of a little girl, who had never learned to read, but used to take her Bible and sit down by herself in the corner, as all children do at times, and make believe read. One day, when the mother was very busy, the child wanted to hear about Noah and the Ark.

The mother had read over certain pa.s.sages aloud so often, that the child had got them by heart. She opened at the place, and gave her little one the book in her lap. After awhile, the child began to murmur to herself--the mother listened--and the little thing read as follows, with the greatest possible seriousness and unction: "And the Lord said unto Noah, Come out, thou and thy wife, and thy sons' wives and thy daughters, and--_balancez_!"

The dear little puss had just begun to go to the dancing-school. What wonder that she didn't always know her head from her heels?

No. 4. Another little girl, who had been favored with glimpses of the upper sky, having been told by her mother that she was _always_ surrounded by guardian angels, grew very thoughtful, and, after drawing a long breath, looked up and said, "Mamma, do you mean _really_ that _all the whole time_ they are with me?" On receiving a solemn a.s.surance in the affirmative, she exclaimed with an impatient fling, "Well, really, I _should_ like to be alone a little while, _sometimes_."

What a lesson for the mother! If children are allowed to dabble with mysteries like these, without explanation, they cannot be otherwise than shocking sometimes, like a Leyden jar; and if they are, whose fault is it? Either more or less ought to have been told that dear little, honest baby.

No. 5. But children have wonderful foresight, and often reach conclusions by a sort of intuitive logic, as women do--flas.h.i.+ng the truth upon us without preparation, and forecasting the future, as if suddenly gifted with second sight. A little boy, having been told by his parents that he couldn't go to church because he was too small, answered with a toss of the head, "Well, you'd better take me now, for when I get bigger, I may not want to go!" To which I say, Bravo! my little man!

Such a reply ought to throw the doors of any church wide open to you, as to a glorified spirit--in embryo.

No. 6. A little girl knelt down by her mother's knee to say her prayers, before going to bed. After finis.h.i.+ng the Lord's Prayer, she went on to offer up her little pet.i.tions for every separate member of the family, and at last came to the youngest, who, having been rather naughty that day, was out of favor: "And please G.o.d make Lucy a good little girl, and make----" here she was suddenly interrupted by Lucy, who burst out with--"Here you! stop that! I'll do my own praying myself, I thank you!"

Who would not sympathize with such a child, under such circ.u.mstances, even though both were at an infant prayer-meeting? And who is there who would not shrink from being prayed for to his face anywhere, after such a fas.h.i.+on?

No. 7. Their notions of language, too, are sometimes of the drollest, as where the poor boy used that unfortunate word _despise_, when he meant only to express horror and astonishment. "How did you fall--_backward_?"

said a mother to a child who was just coming to herself and gasping for breath, after a heavy fall. "_Backward_, mamma! no indeed--I fell _accidentally_."

No. 8. A dear little boy, anything but pious, though happy and cheerful, and about as good as most boys of his age, had been listening patiently for a long while to his mother's account of heaven--likening it to a great everlasting Sabbath-school. At last he looked up, with a troubled countenance, and said in a whisper, "But mamma, don't you think G.o.d would let me have a little devil come up and play with me sometimes, when I have been very good?"