Read Ebook: The Pansy Magazine February 1886 by Various Pansy Editor

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Ebook has 410 lines and 30374 words, and 9 pages

THE ENGINE'S PUNISHMENT.

WE were driving along to town one day-- Papa and I, behind "Old Gray," And our little Fred was along beside, Looking out o'er the fields, enjoying the ride.

I was sitting back reading, contented and calm, While Fred had the whip held tight in his palm, And was snapping it round at urchins and dogs, And sometimes at only some old rotten logs.

We were crossing the track, when we heard such a shout That all of us jumped, and looked quickly about, When we saw the old flagman as frantic and wild As a pea on a shovel that's hot; and his child

Screamed out "Stop, O, stop! here comes the train!" Papa looked quickly out, then drew in the rein. I shut my eyes tight, and held to the seat, And I knew I could hear my frightened heart beat!

A rush and a roar, a sudden pull back, A "toot! toot! toot! toot!" and a terrible crack; And I heard papa say, "Cheer up, little maid, For here we are, safe, so don't be afraid!"

"But what was that crack?" when I'd quite got my breath, And all things around us were silent as death .

"Why, Katy, 'twas me!" and Fred turned in his place, "I whipped the old engine right in the face! I guess he won't scare us again so, do you? For I gave him a cut that just made him boo, hoo!"

Well, we laughed, and we laughed, till tears came in our eyes, At how little Fred did the engine chastise, Until over his face came a flush of bright red. "You are right; he won't scare us again," papa said. PARANETE.

REACHING OUT.

BY PANSY.

THAT was the way it came about that little Sate not only, but Susie and Nettie, went to the flower party.

They had not expected to do any such thing. The little girls, who were not used to going anywhere, had paid no attention to the announcements on Sunday, and Nettie had heard as one with whom such things had nothing in common. Her treatment in the Sabbath-school was not such as to make her long for the companionship of the girls of her age, and by this time she knew that her dress at the flower party would be sure to command more attention than was pleasant; so she had planned as a matter of course to stay away.

But the little old ladies in their caps and spectacles springing into active life, put a new face on the matter. Certainly no more astonished young person can be imagined than Nettie Decker was, the morning Miss Sherrill called on her, the one daisy she had begged still carefully preserved, and proposed her plan of partnership in the flower party.

"It will add ever so much to the fun," she explained, "besides bringing you a nice little sum for your spending money."

Did Miss Sherrill have any idea how far that argument would reach just now, Nettie wondered.

"We can dress the little girls in daisies," continued their teacher. "Little Sate will look like a flower herself, with daisies wreathed about her dress and hair."

"Little Sate will be afraid, I think," Nettie objected. "She is very timid, and not used to seeing many people."

"But with Susie she will not mind, will she? Susie has assurance enough to take her through anything. Oh, I wonder if little Sate would not recite a verse about the daisy grandmothers? I have such a cunning one for her. May I teach her, Mrs. Decker, and see if I can get her to learn it?"

But no, Mrs. Decker was resolved; she could not let them go unless Nettie would go with them and bring them home. "I let one child run the streets," she said with a heavy sigh, "and I have lived to most wish he had died when he was a baby, before I did it; and I said then I would never let another one go out of my sight as long as I had control; I can't go; but I would just as soon they would be with you as with me; and unless you go, they can't stir a step, and that's the whole of it." Mrs. Decker was a very determined woman when she set out to be; and Nettie looked the picture of dismay. It did not seem possible to her to go to a flower party; and on the other hand it seemed really dreadful to thwart Miss Sherrill. Jerry sat listening, saying little, but the word he put in now and then, was on Mrs. Decker's side; he owned to himself that he never so entirely approved of her as at that moment. He wanted Nettie to go to the flower party.

"But I have nothing to wear?" said Nettie, blushing, and almost weeping.

"Nothing to wear!" repeated Mrs. Decker in honest astonishment. "Why, what do you wear on Sundays, I should like to know? I'm sure you look as neat and nice as any girl I ever saw, in your gingham. I was watching you last Sunday and thinking how pretty it was."

"Yes; but, mother, they all wear white at such places; and I cut up my white dress, you know, for the little girls; it was rather short for me anyway; but I should feel queer in any other color."

"O, well," said Mrs. Decker in some irritation, "if they go to such places to show their clothes, why, I suppose you must stay at home, if you have none that you want to show. I thought, being it was a church, it didn't matter, so you were neat and clean; but churches are like everything else, it seems, places for show."

Jerry looked grave disapproval at Nettie, but she felt injured and could have cried. Was it fair to accuse her of going to church to show her clothes, or of being over-particular, when she went every Sunday in a blue and white gingham such as no other girl in her class would wear even to school? This was not church, it was a party. It was hard that she must be blamed for pride, when she was only too glad to stay at home from it.

"I can't go in my blue dress, and that is the whole of it," she said at last, a good deal of decision in her voice.

Jerry instinctively looked down at her foot as she spoke. It was a good-sized one, and looked as though it could set firmly on any question on which it was put. His heart began to fail him; the flower party and certain things which he hoped to accomplish thereby, were fading. He took refuge with Mrs. Smith to hide his disappointment, and also to learn wisdom about this matter of dress.

"Do clothes make such a very great difference to girls?" was his first question.

"Difference?" said Mrs. Smith inquiringly, rubbing a little more flour on her hands, and plunging them again into the sticky mass she was kneading.

"Yes'm. They seem to think of clothes the first thing, when there is any place to go to; boys aren't that way. I don't believe a boy knows whether his coat ought to be brown or green. What makes the difference?"

Mrs. Smith laughed a little. "Well," she said reflectively, "there is a difference, now that's a fact. I noticed it time and again when I was living with Mrs. Jennison. Dick would go off with whatever he happened to have on; and Florence was always in a flutter as to whether she looked as well as the rest. I've heard folks say that it is the fault of the mothers, because they make such a fuss over the girls' clothes, and keep rigging them up in something bright, just to make 'em look pretty, till they succeed in making them think there isn't anything quite so important in life as what they wear on their backs. It's all wrong, I believe. But then, Nettie ain't one of that kind. She hasn't had any mother to perk her up and make her vain. I shouldn't think she would be one to care about clothes much."

"She doesn't," said Jerry firmly. "I don't think she would care if other folks didn't. The girls in her class act hatefully to her; they don't speak, if they can help it. I suppose it's clothes; I don't know what else; they are always rigged out like hollyhocks or tulips; they make fun of her, I guess; and that isn't very pleasant."

"Is that the reason she won't go to the flower show next week?"

"Yes'm, that's the reason. All the girls are going to dress in white; I suppose she thinks she will look queerly, and be talked about. But I don't understand it. Seems to me if all the boys were going to wear blue coats, and I knew it, I'd just as soon wear my gray one if gray was respectable."

"She ought to have a white dress, now that's a fact," said Mrs. Smith with energy, patting her brown loaf, and tucking it down into the tin in a skilful way. "It isn't much for a girl like her to want; if her father was the kind of man he ought to be, she might have a white dress for best, as well as not; I've no patience with him."

"Her father hasn't drank a drop this week," said Jerry.

"Hasn't; well, I'm glad of it; but I'm thinking of what he has done, and what he will go and do, as likely as not, next week; they might be as forehanded as any folks I know of, if he was what he ought to be; there isn't a better workman in the town. Well, you don't care much about the flower party, I suppose?"

"I don't now," said Jerry, wearily. "When I thought the little girls were going, I had a plan. Sate is such a little thing, she would be sure to be half-asleep by eight o'clock; and I was going to coax Norm to come for her, and we carry her home between us. Norm won't go to a flower party, out and out; but he is good-natured, and was beginning to think a great deal of Sate; then I thought Mr. Sherrill would speak to him. The more we can get Norm to feeling he belongs in such places, the less he will feel like belonging to the corner groceries, and the streets."

"I see," said Mrs. Smith admiringly. "Well, I do say I didn't think Nettie was the kind of girl to put a white dress between her chances of helping folks. Sarah Ann thinks she's a real true Christian; but Satan does seem to be into the clothes business from beginning to end."

"I don't suppose it is any easier for a Christian to be laughed at and slighted, than it is for other people," said Jerry, inclined to resent the idea that Nettie was not showing the right spirit; although in his heart he was disappointed in her for caring so much about the color of her dress.

"Well, I don't know about that," said Mrs. Smith, stopping in the act of tucking her bread under the blankets, to look full at Jerry, "why, they even made fun of the Lord Jesus Christ; dressed him up in purple, like a king, and mocked at him! When it comes to remembering that, it would seem as if any common Christian might be almost glad of a chance to be made fun of, just to stand in the same lot with him."

It was a very gentle little girl who moved about the kitchen getting early tea; Mrs. Decker glanced at her from time to time in a bewildered way. The sort of girl with whom she was best acquainted would have slammed things about a little; both because she had not clothes to wear like other children, and because she had been blamed for not wanting to do what was expected of her. But Nettie's face had no trace of anger, her movements were gentleness itself; her voice when she spoke was low and sweet: "Mother, I will take the little girls, if you will let them go."

"Never mind," said Nettie, "I don't think I care anything about the dress now." She was thinking of that crown of thorns. So when Miss Sherrill called the way was plain and little Sate ready to be taught anything she would teach her.

They went away down to the pond under the clump of trees which formed such a pretty shade; and there Sate's slow sweet voice said over the lines as they were told to her, putting in many questions which the words suggested. "He makes the flowers blow," she repeated with thoughtful face, then: "What did He make them for?"

"I think it was because He loved them; and He likes to give you and me sweet and pleasant things to look at."

"Does He love flowers?"

"I think so, darling."

"And birds? See the birds!" For at that moment two beauties standing on the edge of their nest, looked down into the clear water, and seeing themselves reflected in its smoothness began to talk in low sweet chirps to their shadows.

"Oh, yes, He loves the birds, I am sure; think how many different kinds He has made, and how beautiful they are. Then He has given them sweet voices, and they are thanking Him as well as they know how, for all his goodness. Listen."

Sure enough, one of the birds hopped back a trifle, balanced himself well on the nest, and putting up his little throat trilled a lovely song.

"What does he say?" asked Sate.

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