MEADOW BROOK

MEADOW BROOK.

CHAPTER I.

CHILDHOOD.

Far away among the New England hills stands a large, old-fashioned farmhouse, around whose hearthstone not many years agone, a band of merry, noisy children played, myself the merriest, noisiest of them all. It stood upon an eminence overlooking a broad strip of rolling meadowland, at the extremity of which was the old gray rock, where the golden rod and sassafras grew, where the green ivy crept over the crumbling wall, and where, under the shadow of the thorn-apple tree, we built our play-houses, drinking our tea from the acorn saucers, and painting our dolls' faces with the red juice of the poke berries, which grew there in great abundance.

Just opposite our house, and across the green meadow, was a shady grove, where, in the spring-time, the singing birds made their nests, and where, when the breath of winter was on the snow-clad hills, Lizzie, Carrie, and I, and our taller, stronger brothers dragged our sleds, dashing swiftly down the steep hill, and away over the ice-covered valley below. Truly, ours was a joyous childhood, and ours a happy home; for never elsewhere fell the summer's golden sunlight so softly, and never was music sweeter than was the murmur of the dancing water-brook which ran past our door, and down the long green lane, losing itself at last in the dim old woods, which stretched away to the westward, seeming to my childish imagination the boundary line between this world and the next.

In the deep shadow of those woods I have sat alone for many an hour, watching the white, feathery clouds as they glimmered through the dense foliage which hung above my head, and musing, I scarcely knew of what. Strange fancies filled my brain and oftentimes, as I sat there in the hazy light of an autumnal afternoon, there came and talked with me myriads of little people, unseen, it is true, but still real to me, who knew and called them all by name. There, on a mossy bank, beneath the wide-spreading grapevine, with the running brook at my feet, I felt the first longings for fame, though I did not thus designate it then. I only knew that I wanted a name which should live when I was gone—a name of which my mother should be proud. It had been to me a day of peculiar trial. At school everything had gone wrong. Accidentally I had discovered that I possessed a talent for rhyming; and so, because I preferred filling my slate with verses, instead of proving on it that four times twenty were eighty, and that eighty, divided by twenty, equalled four, my teacher must needs find fault with me, calling me "lazy," and compelling me to sit between two hateful boys, with warty hands, who for the remainder of the afternoon amused themselves by sitting inconveniently near to me, and by telling me how big my eyes and feet were. I hardly think I should now mind that mode of punishment, provided I could choose the boys, but I did then, and in the worst of humors, I started for home, where other annoyances awaited me. Sally, the housemaid, scolded me for upsetting a pan of milk on her clean pantry shelf, calling me "the carelessest young one she ever saw," and predicting that "I'd one day come to the gallus if I didn't mend my ways."

Juliet, my oldest sister, scolded me for wearing without her consent her shell side-comb, which, in climbing through a hole in the plastering of the schoolhouse, I accidentally broke. Grandmother scolded me for mounting to the top of her high chest of drawers to see what was in them; and to crown all, when, towards sunset, I came in from a romp in the barn, with my yellow hair flying all over my face, my dress burst open, my pantalet split from the top downward, and my sunbonnet hanging down my back, my mother reproved me severely, telling me I was "a sight to behold." This was my usual style of dress, and I didn't think any one need interfere; so, when she wondered if there ever was another such child, and bade me look at myself in the glass, asking if "I didn't think I was a beautiful object," my heart came up in my throat, and with the angry response that "I couldn't help my looks—I didn't make myself," I started through the door, and running down the long lane to the grapevine, my favorite resort, I threw myself upon the ground, and burying my face in the tall grass, wept bitterly, wishing I had never been born, or, being born, that the ban of ugliness were not upon me.

Mother doesn't love me, I thought—nobody loves me; and then I wished that I could die, for I had heard that the first dead of a family, no matter how unprepossessing they had been in life, were sure to be the best beloved in the memory of the living. To die, then, that I might be loved, was all I asked for, as I lay there weeping alone, and thinking in my childish grief that never before was a girl, nine summers old, so wretched as myself. And then, in my imagination, I went through with a mental rehearsal of my own obsequies, fancying that I was dead, but still possessing the faculty of knowing all that passed around me.

With an involuntary shudder, I crossed my hands upon my bosom, stretched my feet upon the mossy bank, and closed my eyes to the fading sunlight, which I was never to see again. I knew they would lay me in the parlor, and on my forehead I felt the gentle breeze as it came through the open window, lifting the folds of the muslin curtain which shaded it. Throughout the house was a deep hush, and in my mother's voice there was a heart-broken tone, which I had never heard before, and which thrilled me with joy, for it said that I was loved at last. Then I thought how lonely they would be as day by day went and came, and I came no more among them. "They will miss the little ugly face," I said, and on my cheek my own hot tears fell as I thought how Lizzie would mourn for me in the dark night time, weeping that I was not by her side, but sleeping in a narrow coffin, which I hoped would be a handsome one with satin hangings, as I had seen at the funeral of a rich neighbor's fair young bride. I did not want them to strew my pillow with roses as they did hers—for I knew they would not accord with my thin, plain face. In the distance I heard the sound of the tolling bell, and I saw the subdued expression on the faces of my school companions as they listened breathlessly, counting at last the nine quick strokes, which would tell to a stranger that 'twas only a child who was gone.

Then came the funeral, the roll of wheels, the tread of many feet, the hum of voices, the prayer, the hymn, in which I longed to join, but dared not for appearances' sake, and then, one by one, they stole up for a last farewell, lifting my baby brother and bidding him look upon the sister he would never know save by the grassy mound where they would tell him she was buried. I knew when Lizzie bent over me by the convulsive sob and burning kiss which she pressed upon my lips, and divining her inmost thoughts, I fancied she was wishing that no harsh word had ever passed between us. In my heart I longed to tell her how freely I forgave her, but ere I had time to do so, she stepped aside, while an older, a wrinkled hand was laid upon my forehead, and my aged grandmother murmured, "Poor little Rosa, far better that I should die, than that she, so young, should be laid in the lonesome grave."

Instantly the dark grave loomed up before me, so dark and dreary that I shrank from being put there. I could not die; I was afraid to sleep with the silent dead. I would far rather live, even though I lived unloved forever. And then, softly in my ear, a spirit friend whispered, "Be great and good—get to yourself a name of which they shall be proud—make them love you for your deeds, rather than your looks, and when, in the future, strangers shall ask concerning you, 'Who is she?' let it be their pride to answer, 'My daughter,' or 'My sister.'" Older and wiser heads than mine would have said it was Ambition, which thus counseled with me, but I questioned her not of her name. I only knew that her words were sweet and soothing, and I treasured them in my heart, pondering upon them until I fell asleep, unconscious that the daylight was fast declining, and that the heavy dew was falling upon my uncovered head.

Meantime at home many inquiries were being made concerning my whereabouts, and when, at last, night came on, and I was still away, my oldest brother was sent in quest of me down the long lane where I was last seen by Lizzie, who had attempted to follow me, but had desisted through fear of being called a tag. I was just dreaming that the trumpet of fame was sounding forth my name, when, alas! I awoke to find it was only brother Charlie, making the woods resound with "Rosa Lee! Where are you? Why don't you answer?"

Of course I was disappointed,—who wouldn't be?—and in a fit of obstinacy I determined not to reply, but to make him think I was lost—then see how he'd feel! But on this point I was not to be gratified, for failing of finding me in the lane, he made straight for the grapevine, where he stumbled over me as I lay, this time feigning sleep, to see what he would do. Seizing me by the shoulder, he exclaimed, "You are a pretty bird, scaring us out of a year's growth. Mother'll scold you well for this."

But he was mistaken, for mother's manner towards me was greatly changed. The torn pantalet and the chewed bonnet-strings were all forgotten, and in the kindest tone she asked, "If I were not cold, and why I went to sleep on the grass." There were tears in my eyes, but I winked hard and forced them back, until Lizzie brought me a piece of custard pie (my special favorite) which, she said, "she had saved for me, because she knew how much I loved it."

This was too much, and sitting down in Carrie's little chair, I cried aloud, saying in reply to the oft-repeated question as to what ailed me, that "I didn't know, only I was so glad."

"Hystericky as a witch," was Sally's characteristic comment on my strange behavior, at the same time she suggested that I be put to bed.

To this I made no objection, and pushing aside the pie, which, to Lizzie's disappointment, I could not eat, I went to my room, a happier, and I believe, a better girl; so much influence has a kind word or deed upon a desponding, sensitive child. That night I was tired and restless, turning uneasily upon my pillow, pushing Lizzie's arm from my neck, because it kept me from breathing, and lying awake until I heard the long clock in grandma's room strike the hour of twelve. Then I slept, but dreamed there was a heavy pain in my head, which made me moan in my sleep, and that mother, attracted by the sound, came to my side feeling my pulse, and saying, "What ails you, Rosa?" "There was nothing ailed me," I said; but in the morning when I awoke, the pain was still there, though I would not acknowledge it, for scarcely anything could tempt me to stay away from school; so at the usual hour I started, but the road was long and wearisome, and twice I sat down to rest, leaning my forehead upon the handle of my dinner-basket, and wondering why the smell of its contents made me so sick. Arrived at school, everything seemed strange, and when Maria, the girl who shared my desk, produced a love-letter from Tom Jenkins, which she had found on my side of the desk, and in which he made a formal offer of himself, frecks and all, I did not even smile. Taking my book, I attempted to study, but the words ran together, the objects in the room chased each other in circles, the little Abecedarian, shouting the alphabet at the top of his voice, sounded like distant thunder, and when at last the teacher called for our class in "Colburn," she seemed to be a great way off, while between her and me was a gathering darkness which soon shut out every object from my view.

For a few moments all was confusion, and when at last my faculties returned I was lying on the recitation bench, my head resting in the teacher's lap, while my hair and dress were so wet that I fancied I'd been out in a drenching shower. Everybody was so kind and spoke so softly to me that, with a vague impression that something had happened, I began to cry. Just then, father, who had been sent for, appeared, and taking me in his arms, started for home, while Lizzie followed with the basket and my sunbonnet, which looked sorry and drooping like its owner. At the door father asked of mother, who met us, "Where shall I put her?" but ere she could reply, I said, "On grandmother's bed."

And there, among the soft pillows and snowy linen on which I had often looked with almost envious eyes, and which now seemed so much to rest me, I was laid. Of the weary weeks which followed, I have only a confused recollection. I know that the room was darkened as far as possible, and that before the window at the foot of the bed, grandma's black shawl was hung, one corner being occasionally pinned back when more light was needed. After a while it seemed to me that it was Lizzie, instead of myself who was sick, and the physician said she had a fever, which had been long coming on, but was undoubtedly hastened by her sleeping on the wet grass in the night. And so we all trod softly about the house, speaking in whispers, and lifting the door-latches carefully, while Lizzie, with my cap and night dress on, lay all day long in bed, never speaking, never moving, except when the long clock in the corner struck off the hour; then she would moan as if in pain, and once when somebody, who looked like Lizzie, but was still I, Rosa, stole on tiptoe to her side, with a bouquet of flowers, which Maria had brought, she put her arms around my neck, and pointing to the clock, whispered, "It keeps saying 'She's dead'!—'She's dead'!—'She's dead'! Won't you tell it to be still?"

Then we knew that it disturbed her, and so the old clock was stopped, a thing which grandma said "had not been in fifty odd years," except the time when grandpa died, and then, with the going out of his life, the clock itself ran down. All the night through the lamp burned upon the table where stood the vials, the Dover powders, and the cups, while Lizzie, with her great blue eyes so much like mine, wide open, lay watching the flickering shadows on the wall, counting the flowers on the paper bordering, wondering if there ever were blue roses, and thinking if there were that they must smell as the dinner did beneath the chestnut tree.

At last, when the family were wearied out with watching, the neighbors were called in, and among them our school-teacher, who seemed to tread on air, so light and noiseless were her footsteps; and Lizzie, when she saw how kind she was, wondered she had not loved her better. Then came other watchers equally kind with Miss Phillips, but possessing far less tact for nursing; and even now I have a vivid remembrance of their annoying attempts "to fix me so I'd be more comfortable." Was I lying in a position satisfactory to myself, I must be lifted up, my pillows shaken, turned over, and my head placed so high that my chin almost touched my chest. Did I fall into a little doze, I must rouse up to tell whether I were asleep or not, and did I get into a sound slumber I must surely wake enough to say whether I wanted anything.

Again, I fancied that another beside Lizzie was sick, for in mother's room, contiguous to mine, there was a low hum of voices, a going in and out, a careful shutting of the door, and gradually I got the impression that Jamie, my beautiful baby brother, was connected with all this, for I heard them talk of scarlet fever, and it's going hard with him. But I had no desire or power to ask the why or wherefore; and so time wore on, until there came a day when it seemed that the reverie beneath the grapevine was coming true. There was the same roll of wheels, the tread of many feet, and through the closed doors I heard a mournful strain, sung by trembling voices, while from afar, I caught the notes of a tolling bell. I was much alone that day, and once, for more than an hour, there was no one with me excepting grandma, who frequently removed her spectacles to wipe the moisture which gathered upon them.

From that day I grew worse, and they sent to Spencer for Dr. Lamb, who, together with Dr. Griffin, held a council over me, and said that I must die. I saw mother when they told her. She was standing by the window, from which the black shawl had been removed, for nothing disturbed the little girl now, and the window was wide open, so that the summer air might cool the burning head from which the matted yellow hair had all been shorn. She turned pale as death, and with a cry of anguish, pressed her hand upon her side; but she did not weep. I wondered at it then, and thought she cared less than Lizzie, who sat at the foot of the bed, sobbing so loudly that the fever burned more fiercely in my veins, and the physician said it must not be; she must leave the room, or keep quiet.

It was Monday, and a few hours afterward, as Sally was passing the door, grandma handed her my dirty, crumpled sunbonnet, bidding her wash it and put it away. Sally's voice trembled as she replied, "No, no, leave it as it is, for when's she's gone, nothing will look so much like her as that jammed bonnet with its chewed-up strings."

A gush of tears was grandma's only answer, and after I got well, I found the bonnet carefully rolled up in a sheet of clean white paper and laid away in Sally's drawer. There were days and nights of entire unconsciousness, and then with the vague, misty feeling of one awakening from a long, disturbed sleep, I awoke again to life and reason. The windows of my room were closed; but without, I heard the patter of the September rain, and the sound of the autumnal wind as it swept past the house. Gathered at my side were my father, mother, brothers, sisters, grandmother; and all, as my eye rested upon their faces, I thought, were paler and more careworn than when I last looked upon them. Something, too, in their dress disturbed me; but, before I could speak, a voice which I knew to be Dr. Griffin's said "She is better—she will live."

From my mother's lips there broke another cry—not like that which I had heard when they told her I must die—but a cry of joy, and then she fell fainting in my father's arms. I never doubted her love for me again, but in bitterness of spirit, I have many a time wept that I ever distrusted her, my blessed mother.

The fourth day after the crisis I was alone with Lizzie, whom, for a long time, I importuned to give me a mirror that I might see myself once more. Yielding at length to my entreaties, she handed me a small looking-glass, a wedding gift to my grandmother, and with the consoling remark, that "I wouldn't always look so," awaited the result. I am older than I was then, but even now I cannot repress a smile as I bring before my mind the shorn head, the wasted face with high cheek-bones, and the big blue eyes, in which there was a look of "crazy Sal," which met my view. With the angry exclamation, "They'll hate me worse than ever, I'm so ugly," I dashed the mirror upon the floor, breaking it in a thousand pieces. Lizzie knew what I meant, and twining her arms about my neck, she said, "Don't talk so, Rosa; we love you dearly, and it almost killed us when we thought you couldn't live. You know big men never cry, and pa the least of all. Why, he didn't shed a tear when lit-"——

Here she stopped suddenly, as if on a forbidden subject, but soon resuming the conversation, she continued, "But the day Dr. Lamb was here and told us you would die, he was out under the cherry tree by our play-house, and when Carrie asked him if you'd never play there any more, he didn't answer, but turned his face towards the barn, and cried so hard and so loud, that grandma came out and pitied him, smoothing his hair just like he was a little boy. Brother Charlie, too, lay right down in the grass, and said he'd give everything he'd got if he'd never called you 'bung-eyed,' nor made fun of you, for he loved you best of all. Then there was poor Jamie kept calling for 'Yosa'"——

Here Lizzie broke down entirely, saying, "I can't tell you any more, don't ask me."

Suddenly it occurred to me that I had neither seen nor heard little Jamie, the youngest of us all, the pet and darling of our household. Rapidly my thoughts traversed the past, and in a moment I saw it all. "Jamie was dead." I did not need that Lizzie should tell me so. I knew it was true, and when the first great shock was over, I questioned her of his death, how and when it occurred. It seems that I was at first taken with scarlet fever, which soon assumed another form, but not until it had communicated itself to Jamie, who, after a few days' suffering, had died. I had ever been his favorite, and to the last he had called for me to come; my grandmother, with the superstition natural to her age, construing it into an omen that I was soon to follow him.

Desolate and dreary seemed the house; and when I was able to go from room to room, oh! how my heart ached as I missed the prattle of our baby-boy. Away to the garret, where no one could see it, they had carried his empty cradle, but I sought it out; and as I thought of the soft, brown curls I had so often seen resting there, and would never see again, I sat down by its side and wept most bitterly. The withered, yellow leaves of autumn were falling upon his grave ere I was able to visit it, and at its head stood a simple stone, on which was inscribed, "Our Jamie." As I leaned against the cold marble, and in fancy saw by its side—what had well-nigh been—another mound, and another stone, bearing upon it the name of "Rosa," I involuntarily shuddered; while from my heart there went up a silent thanksgiving, that God, in his wise Providence, had ordered it otherwise.

From that sickness I date a more healthful state of mind and feeling, and though I still shrunk from any allusion to my personal appearance, I never again doubted the love of those who had manifested so much solicitude for me when ill, and who watched over me so tenderly during the period of my convalescence, which was long and wearisome, for the snows of an early winter lay upon the frozen ground, ere I was well enough to take my accustomed place in the old brown schoolhouse at the foot of the long hill.

CHAPTER II.

THANKSGIVING.

Thanksgiving! How many reminiscences of the olden time does that word call up, when sons and daughters, they who had wandered far and wide, whose locks, once brown and shining with the sunlight of youth, now give tokens that the autumnal frosts of life are falling slowly upon them, return once more to the old hearthstone, and, for a brief space, grow young again amid the festive scenes of Thanksgiving Day. To you, who, like me, drew your first breath among the New England hills, and who have strayed away from your early home, in the busy world in which you are now mingling, comes there not occasionally pleasant memories of the olden time, when with eager haste you hied you back to the roof-tree which sheltered your infancy? And though, perchance, the snows of many a winter may have drifted across the graves of the gray-haired man you called your father, and the mild-eyed woman who bore the blessed name of mother, can you not recall them to mind, as when with tears of joy and words of love, they welcomed their children home, thanking God that as yet not one of their household treasures was missing? And if, after the lapse of years, there came a time when the youngest of you all was gone, when the childish prattle you loved so well to hear was hushed, when through the house was no more heard the patter of little, busy feet, when there was naught left of the lost one, save a curl of golden hair, or a tiny shoe, soiled and bent, but looking still so much like him who wore it once, that you preserve it as your choicest treasure: if, I say, there came to you a time like this, do you not remember how, amid all the social cheer, there was still an aching void, which nothing around you could fill?

But, lest I make this chapter too sad, I shall not speak of our feelings as we missed our baby brother, for they who have lost from their fireside an active, playful child understand, far better than I can describe, the loneliness, the longing for something gone, which becomes almost a part of their being, although at times they may seem to forget. Children's grief is seldom as lasting as that of mature years; and hence it is not strange if I sometimes forgot my sorrow in the joyous anticipation of Thanksgiving Day, which was then to me but another name for plum puddings, chicken pies, meeting dresses, morocco shoes, city cousins, a fire in the parlor, and last, though not least, the privilege of sitting at the first table, and using grandma's six tiny silver spoons, with the initials of her maiden name, "P.S." marked upon them.

On such occasions my thoughts invariably took a leap backward, and looking at grandma's wrinkled face and white, shining hair, I would wonder if she ever were young like me; and if, being young, she swung on gates or climbed trees, and walked the great beams, as I did. Then, with another bound, my thoughts would penetrate the future, when I, a dignified grandmother, should recline in my armchair, stately and stiff, in my heavy satin and silver gray, while my oldest son, a man just my father's size, should render me all the homage and respect due to one of my age. By myself, too, I had several times tried on grandma's clothes, spectacles, cap and all; and then, seated in her chair, with the big Bible in my lap, I had expounded scripture to the imaginary children around me, frequently reprimanding Rosa for her inattention, asking her what "she thought would become of her, if she didn't stop wriggling so in her chair, and learn 'the chief end of man.'" Once, in the midst of my performance, grandma herself appeared, and as a natural consequence, I was divested of my fixings in a much shorter space of time than it had taken me to don them. From that day up to the period of my illness, I verily believe grandma looked upon me as "given over to hardness of heart and blindness of mind."

But I am wandering from my subject, which was, I believe, the Thanksgiving succeeding Jamie's death and my own recovery from sickness. For this occasion great preparations were made, it being confidently expected that my father's brother, who lived in Boston, would be with us together with his wife, a lady whose reputation for sociability and suavity of manners was, with us, rather below par. She was my uncle's second wife, and rumor said that neither himself nor his home were as comfortable as they once had been. From the same reliable source, too, we learned that she breakfasted in her own room at ten, dined at three, made or received calls until six, went to parties, soirées, or the theater in the evening, and seldom got to bed until two o'clock in the morning; a mode of living which was pronounced little better than heathenish by grandma, who had long been anxious for an opportunity of "giving Charlotte Ann a piece of her mind."

Mother, who was more discreet, very wisely advised her not to interfere with the arrangements of her daughter-in-law. "It would do no good," she said, "and might possibly make matters worse." Unlike most old people, grandma was not very much set in her own way, and to mother's suggestion, she replied that "Mebby she shouldn't say anything—'twould depend on how many airs Charlotte put on."

To me the expected visit was a sore trial; for, notwithstanding my cheeks and neck were rounder and fuller than they had ever been, my head, with its young crop of short, stiff hair, was a terrible annoyance, and more than once I had cried as I saw in fancy the derisive smile with which my dreaded Aunt Charlotte was sure to greet me. At last sister Anna, who possessed a great deal of taste in such matters, and who ought to have been a milliner, contrived for the "picked chicken," as she called me, a black lace cap, which fitted me so well, and was so vastly becoming, that I lost all my fears, and childlike, began to count the days which must elapse before I could wear it.

Meantime, in the kitchen there was a loud rattling of dishes, a beating of eggs, and calling for wood, with which to heat the great brick oven, grandma having pronounced the stove unfit for baking a Thanksgiving dinner. From the cornfield, behind the barn, a golden pumpkin, four times larger than my head and about the same color, was gathered, and after being brought to the house, was pared, cut open, scraped, and sliced into a little tin kettle with a copper bottom, where for hours it stewed and sputtered, filling the atmosphere with a faint, sickly odor, which I think was the main cause of the severe headache I took to bed with me. Mother, on the contrary, differed from me, she associated it in some way with the rapid disappearance of the raisins, cinnamon, sugar, and so forth, which in sundry brown papers, lay open upon the table. She was generally right when she made up her mind, so I shall not dispute the point, for, let the cause have been what it would, it was a very sick little girl which, the night before Thanksgiving, was put early to bed by Sally, who remarked as she undressed me, that "I was slimpsy as a rag, and she wouldn't wonder if I had a collapse," adding, as she tucked the clothes around me, that "if I did, it would be mighty apt to go hard with me."

The next morning, just as the first gray streaks of daylight were appearing in the east, I awoke, finding, to my great joy, that my headache was gone. Rising upon my elbow and leaning far out of bed, I pushed aside the striped curtain which shaded the window, and looking out upon the ground below, saw, to my utter dismay, that it was covered with snow. To me there is nothing pleasant in a snow storm, a snow bank, or a snow cloud; and when a child, I used to think that with the fall of the first flake, there came over my spirits a chill, which was not removed until the springtime, when, with its cause, it melted away: and even now, when, with my rubber boots, I dare brave any drift, not more than five feet four inches high, I cannot say that I have any particular love for snow; and as from my window I watch the descent of the feathery flakes, I always feel an irresistible desire to make at them wry faces, my favorite method of showing my dislike. On the morning of which I have spoken, I vented my displeasure in the usual way, and then I fell into a deep sleep, from which I was at last awakened by the loud shouts of my brothers, who, in the meadow across the road, were pelting each other with balls, occasionally rolling over in the pure, white snow, which they hailed as an old and well loved friend.

Not long after breakfast was over, Anna commenced dressing Lizzie and Carrie, and as she had herself to beautify before the arrival of the train which was to bring my uncle and aunt, it is not surprising that she hurried rather faster than was wholly agreeable to the little girls, who could see no good cause for such haste, even if Herbert Langley, my aunt's son and a youth of seventeen, was to accompany her. I, however, who was older, read things differently, and when Anna pulled Lizzie's curly hair, and washed Carrie's nose up instead of down, until they both cried, and when she herself stood before the glass a whole half hour arranging just in front of her ears two spit curls, sometimes called "beau catchers," I shrugged my shoulders, wondering if she thought a city boy would care for her.

The morning train from Boston was due about ten o'clock, and as Meadow Brook did not then boast a daily omnibus, it was necessary that some one should be at the dépôt in order to meet our expected guests. In New England it is almost an unheard-of thing for an entire family to remain away from church on Thanksgiving Day, but considering all the circumstances, it was, on this occasion, decided orthodox for us to do so, and accordingly at nine o'clock father and old sorrel started for the dépôt, which was distant about two and a half miles. Long and wearisome to us children was that waiting for his return; for stiff and prim, as starched white aprons, best gowns, and hemstitched pantalets could make us, we sat in a row like so many automatons, scarcely daring to move, lest we should displace some article of dress. In the best chamber, the room which Aunt Charlotte was to occupy, a cheerful wood fire was burning, and at least a dozen times did grandma go up there to see if all were right, now smoothing the clean, linen pillow-case, now moving the large easy-chair a little more to the center of the room, and again wiping from the mirror some imaginary specks of dust.

As she was coming down the twelfth time, the sound of sleigh-bells took us all to the window, where, instead of the costly furs and rich velvet wrappings of Aunt Charlotte, we saw the coarse plaid shawl and dark delaine hood of Aunt Betsey, while at her side was the shaggy overcoat and sealskin cap of her better half, Uncle Jason. This worthy couple, good enough in their way, lived in Union, about nine miles from Meadow Brook, where, for the last ten years, they had been in the habit of spending Thanksgiving, without ever seeming to think it possible for them to return the compliment. Although we had never seen Aunt Charlotte, we knew full well that there was nothing in common between her and Aunt Betsey, and after a long consultation it had been decided not to invite the latter, who, as it proved, did not deem an invitation necessary.

Uncle Jason was my father's half-brother, and the stepson of grandma, who, the moment she saw them was actually guilty of the exclamation, "Good Lord! what sent them here?" Before any of us could reply, the door burst open, and the loud, boisterous laugh of Uncle Jason greeted our ears, intermingled with the squeaky tones of Aunt Betsey, who, addressing my mother, said, "How d'ye dew, Fanny. You pretty well? I s'pose you're lookin' for us, though you didn't send us no invite? Jason kinder held off about comin', but I telled him 'twas enough sight easier to eat dinner here than to cook it to hum."

With as good a grace as she could possibly assume, mother returned her greeting, and then, taking her into her own bedroom, asked her to remove her bonnet, at the same time telling her she was expecting Uncle Joseph and Aunt Charlotte from Boston.

"Now, you don't 'say it," exclaimed Aunt Betsey, stopping for a moment in the adjustment of her cap, the fashion of which was wonderful, having been devised by herself, as were all her articles of dress. "Now, dew tell if that puckerin' thing is a comin'! How nipped up we shall have to be! I'm so glad I wore this gown!" she continued, looking complacently at her blue and white plaid, the skirt of which was very short and scanty, besides being trimmed at the bottom with two narrow ruffles.

With her other peculiarities Aunt Betsey united that of jealousy, and after getting herself warm, and looking round, as was her custom, she commenced with, "Now, if I won't give up—a fire in the parlor chamber. I s'pose Charlotte's too good to pull off her things in the bedroom, as I do. Wall, it's the luck of some to be born with a silver spoon in their mouth."

Grandma, who was the only person present except myself, made no answer, and after a moment Aunt Betsey continued, "Now I think on't, Miss Lee (she never addressed her as 'mother,' for, from the first, a mutual dislike had existed between them), now I think on't, Miss Lee, mebby Fanny meant to slight me."

"Fanny never slighted anybody," was grandma's reply, while her polished knitting-needles rattled with a vengeance.

"Wall, I guess she thought Jo's wife and I wouldn't hitch hosses exactly, but the land knows that I don't care the snap of my finger for her. I'm as good as anybody, if I don't keep a hired maid and have a carpet on every floor."

Here she was interrupted by the sound of horses' feet, and rising up, grandma said, "I guess they've come. Will you go and meet them?"

"Not I; I'm the last one to creep, I can tell you," was Aunt Betsey's reply, while grandma and I quitted the room, leaving her sitting bolt upright, with her feet on the fender and her lips pursed up as they always were when she was indignant.

Uncle Joseph, Aunt Charlotte, Herbert Langley, had all come, and as the latter leaped upon the ground and I caught a sight of his tall, slender figure, I involuntarily exclaimed, "Long-legs," a cognomen, which he ever after retained in our family. Shaking down his pants, he went through with a kind of shuffle not wholly unlike the Highland fling, ending his performance by kissing his hand to the group of noses pressed close against the window-pane.

"I shall like him," was my mental comment, as I turned from him towards the bundle of clothes which Uncle Joseph lifted from the sleigh and deposited upon the steps, and which we supposed to be our dreaded aunt.

"This is perfectly horrible," were the first words which issued from under the folds of her veil; but to what she referred I never knew.

We all knew and loved Uncle Joseph, and for his sake my mother conquered whatever of prejudice she felt towards his wife, who returned her cordial welcome with the extreme end of her forefinger, saying, when asked to sit down, "I'll go to my room immediately, if you please."

"Speak to the children first," suggested my uncle, and with a muttered, "It doesn't matter," the haughty lady bowed coldly to us, as one by one we were presented.

When it came my turn, her small, black eyes rested longer upon me, and the faintest derisive smile imaginable curled the corners of her mouth. I knew that either my cap or my face had provoked that smile, and with tears in my eyes I was turning away, when Herbert Langley caught me in his long arms, exclaiming, "And so, this is Rosa, the poetess. I mean to call you little 'Crop-head,' may I?"

He referred, I suppose, to a letter which I had once written in rhyme to my Uncle Joseph, but before I could frame any reply, his mother said scornfully, "Don't be flattered, child—Herbert calls everything poetry that rhymes. He'll learn to discriminate better as he grows older," and with a stately sweep she left the room, saying as she reached the rather steep and narrow staircase, "Dear me—how funny—it's like mounting a ladder."

While she was making her toilet we had an opportunity of learning something of Herbert, who, whether he were so or not, seemed much pleased with everything around him. Occasionally, however, I doubted his sincerity, for when Aunt Betsey was presented to him, he appeared quite as much delighted with her as with anything else, drawing his chair closely to her side, and asking her numberless questions about the best modes of making cheese and raising chickens, while all the time there was a peculiarly quizzical expression in his eyes, which were dark and very handsome, saving that the lids were too red to suit my ideas of beauty. To Anna and her spit-curls he took kindly, and ere his lady mother made her appearance a second time he had put his arm around her twice, telling her she should come to Boston sometime and go to school. A rustle of silk upon the stairs announced the descent of Aunt Charlotte, and with her nose slightly elevated, ready for any emergency, she entered the parlor, where she was introduced to Aunt Betsey, who, courtesying straight down, "hoped to see her well," adding, that she "s'posed she'd come to the country to see how poor folks lived."

Falling back into the rocking-chair which Anna brought for her, Aunt Charlotte made no particular reply, save an occasional attack upon her hartshorn. Aunt Betsey, however, nothing daunted, endeavored to engage her in conversation by asking if "she knew Liza Ann Willcott, a tailoress girl, that boarded with a Miss Johnson, who used to live in Union, but who now lived in Boston."

Frowning majestically, Aunt Charlotte replied that she had not the honor of Miss Willcott's acquaintance, whereupon Aunt Betsey advised her to make it by all means, assuring her that "Liza Ann was a first-rate girl, and that Miss Johnson was the best kind of a neighbor, always willin' to lend, or do a good turn"——

Here, with a haughty toss of her head, Aunt Charlotte turned away and began talking in a low tone to Herbert, he being the only one who, she seemed to think, was at all worth noticing. It is strange how much constraint one person can sometimes throw over a room full. On this occasion, had an ogress suddenly alighted in our midst, we could not have been more silent or less at ease than we were with that Boston lady, sitting there so starched and stiff, her fat hands folded one over the other, and the tips of her satin gaiters just visible from beneath the ample folds of her rich silk dress. Even Uncle Joseph, whose genial nature usually shed so much sunlight over our circle, was grave and reserved, rarely venturing a remark, or, if he did, glancing at his wife to see if she approved it. Uncle Jason, who painfully felt his own awkwardness, sat tipped back in his chair against the wall, with his feet on the rounds, while his fingers kept time to a tune, which he was evidently whistling to himself. Glad were we all when finally called to dinner, the savory smell of which had long been whetting our appetites.

"What! dinner so soon?" said Aunt Charlotte, consulting her gold watch, which pointed to half-past two. "I don't believe I can force down a mouthful."

But, spite of her belief, she did manage to make way with the contents of her well-filled plate, which was passed back a second time to be replenished. So eager were we all to serve her that we partially forgot Aunt Betsey, who, after waiting a while for a potato, at last arose, and reaching half-way across the table, secured one for herself; saying by way of apology, that "she believed in looking out for Number One, for if she didn't nobody else would."

So incensed was she with what she termed our neglect, that the moment dinner was over she insisted upon going home, saying, as she bade us good-by, that "when she went again where she wasn't wanted, she guessed she should know it;" and adding, while two big tears dropped from the end of her nose, that "she never s'posed she should be so misused by folks that she'd done so much for."

The sight of her tears brought forth answering ones from me, for, with all her peculiarities, I loved Aunt Betsey, and I remembered that when sickness and death were among us, she had left her own home to stay with us, ministering as far as she was able to our comfort. Many a night had she watched with me, and though she invariably placed the lamp so that its rays glared full in my face, though she slept three-fourths of the time, snoring so loudly as to keep me awake, and though at the slightest change for the worse in my symptoms she always routed the whole household, telling them, "Rosa was lyin' now, if she ever was," thereby almost frightening me to death, I knew that she meant well, and in my heart I liked her far better than I did my Boston aunt, who, after bidding her sister-in-law good-by, went back to the parlor, saying to her husband in a tone loud enough for us to hear, "What a vulgar creature! Did you notice her hands? Why, they are as coarse and black as a servant girl's."

"And she's none the worse for that," interposed grandma, warming up in the defense of her son's wife. "She has now and then an odd streak, but on the whole she's better than they'll average."

After this, Aunt Charlotte relapsed into silence, which she did not break until she overheard Herbert proposing to Anna a ride on the morrow. Then she roused up, and while her little black eyes snapped, she said, "I am going home to-morrow afternoon, and so are you. Consequently, there'll be no time for a ride."

In a twinkling, Herbert's thumb and finger went up to his nose, a gesture which I did not then understand, but it struck me disagreeably, and had also the effect of silencing Aunt Charlotte, who made no further remark on the subject until they chanced to be alone, when I, who was in the hall, heard her say, "What can induce you to talk so much with that raw country girl? Your city friends would laugh well if they knew it."

Consigning his "city friends" to the care of the old gentleman supposed to preside over the lower regions, Herbert walked off in quest of the "raw country girl," by whose side he sat the remainder of the evening, talking to her so low that Lizzie whispered to me her private opinion that "they were courting."

The next morning Aunt Charlotte did not appear at breakfast, it being so much earlier than her usual hour of rising that she felt wholly unequal to the task. Accordingly, though we did not wait, the table did until ten o'clock, when, pale and languid, she came down, seeming much disturbed to find that Herbert had coaxed Anna into going with him to call on Aunt Betsey, to whom he had taken quite a fancy, and who had asked him to visit her "if he didn't feel too smart."

Darting an angry glance at her husband, she said, "How could you suffer it?" asking at the same time if there was a hotel on the road. Being told that there was one at Union and another half-way between that and Meadow Brook, she seemed more disturbed than ever, eating little or no breakfast, and announcing her intention of staying over that day, or, at all events, until Herbert returned. Seating herself at the window, she watched and waited, while the hours crept on and the clock in grandma's room struck four ere the head of "old Sorrel" was visible far down the road. Then with an eagerness wholly incomprehensible to me, she started up, straining her eyes anxiously in the direction of the fast approaching cutter. As it came nearer we all observed something rather singular in the position of Herbert, who seemed lying almost across Anna's lap, while she was driving!

"Merciful Heavens! it's as I feared!" was Aunt Charlotte's exclamation, as she sank upon the lounge, moaning bitterly, and covering her face with the cushion, that she might not see the disgrace of her only son—for Herbert was drunk!

Lifting him out, my father and uncle laid him upon the settee in the sitting-room, just where little Jamie had been laid, and my mother, as she looked upon the senseless inebriate resting where once had lain the beautiful, inanimate form of her youngest born, thought how far less bitter was her cup of sorrow than was that of the half fainting woman, who would rather, far rather, her boy had died with the dew of babyhood upon his brow than to have seen him thus debased and fallen.

The story was soon told, my uncle supplying all points which Anna could not. It seems that early in life Herbert had acquired a love for the wine and porter which daily graced his mother's dinner-table. As he grew older his taste increased for something stronger, until now nothing save brandy could satisfy the cravings of his appetite. More than once had he been brought home in a state of entire unconsciousness, for he was easily intoxicated, it usually taking but one glass to render him perfectly foolish, while a second was generally sure to finish the work. These drunken fits were always followed by resolutions of amendment, and it was now so long since he had drank that his mother began to have strong hopes of his reform, but these, alas! were now dashed to the ground. Unfortunately, Uncle Jason had offered the young man a glass of cider, which immediately awoke in its full vigor his old love for ardent spirits. Just across the road, creaking in the November wind, hung the sign of the "Golden Fleece," and in that direction, soon after dinner, Herbert bent his steps, taking down at one time a tumbler two thirds full of raw brandy. This made him very talkative and very affectionate, insomuch that he kissed Aunt Betsey, who, as soon as she could, started him for home. When the half-way house, called in opposition to its neighbor "Silver Skin," was reached, Herbert insisted upon stopping and taking another glass, which ere long rendered him so helpless that Anna was obliged to take charge of Sorrel herself, while her companion fell asleep, leaning his head upon her shoulder and gradually sinking lower and lower until he rested in her lap.

All that night he remained in the sitting-room, which in the morning presented so sorry and disgusting an appearance that when Aunt Charlotte for the hundredth time wished she had never come to Meadow Brook, our whole family mentally responded a fervent Amen. Herbert, when fully restored to consciousness, seemed heartily ashamed of himself, crying like a girl, and winding his arms around his mother's neck so affectionately that I did not blame her when she forgave him and wiped away her tears.

She might not have had much faith in his sincerity could she have heard his conversation with Anna, whom he managed to withdraw from the family to the recess of a distant window. Alone with her, his manner changed, and with flashing eyes, he charged it to his mother, who, he said, first taught him to love it by allowing him, when a little boy, to drink the bottom of the wine glasses after dinner.

"And if I fill a drunkard's grave," said he, "she will be to blame; but," he added, as he saw Anna involuntarily shudder, "it shall not be. I can reform. I will reform, and you must help me do it."

Anna looked wonderingly at him, while he continued, taking her hand and removing from it a plain gold ring, which grandma had given her on her fifteenth birthday, "You must let me wear this as a talisman to protect me from evil. Whenever I am tempted I shall look at it and be saved."

Anna hesitated awhile, but the soft, handsome eyes of Herbert Langley had woven around her a spell she could not break, and at last she consented, receiving from him in return a diamond ring, which he told her was worth two hundred dollars. When this became known to mother she very wisely insisted on Anna's returning it, and together with the note explaining the why and the wherefore it went back to its owner, who immediately replied by a letter, the contents of which were carefully kept from us all. The effect, however, was plainly visible; for, from the time of its receipt we lost our merry, light-hearted sister, and in her place there moved among us a sober, listless girl, whom grandma called foolish, and whom Charlie pronounced "lovesick."

Herbert's letter was soon answered, but when Anna requested my father to put it in the P.O. he refused, telling her "she should not correspond with such a drunken dog." Possibly it was wrong in him thus to address her, for kind words and persuasive arguments might have won her to reason, but now a spirit of opposition was roused—"Herbert was wronged—misunderstood"—so Anna thought, and the letter which father refused to take, was conveyed by other hands, a postscript longer than the letter itself being first added.

After this there was no more trouble. Anna wrote regularly to Herbert, who promptly responded; his missives always being directed to one of Anna's schoolmates, who was just romantic enough to think her companion persecuted! Gradually I was let into the secret, and was occasionally employed to carry Anna's notes to and from the house of her friend. I did not then consider the great wrong I was doing, but since I have shed many a bitter tear to think that I in any way helped to work my sister's ruin.

CHAPTER III.

COUSIN WILL.

If so far as the golden Californian land this book of mine shall reach, it may, perchance, fall into the hands of some who, from their number, can select the veritable hero, the "Cousin Will" of my story. If so, I would ask them to think as leniently as possible of his faults, herein recorded, for the mustached Will of California, whose generous conduct wins the love of all, is hardly the same wild, mischievous boy, who once kept our home in a perpetual state of excitement.

The tears were scarcely yet dried, which he had shed over his mother's coffin, when he came to us, and in one corner of his green, oval trunk, there lay a tress of soft brown hair, which he had severed from that mother's head. He was the son of my mother's only sister, who, on her death-bed, had committed him to the guardianship of my father, asking him to deal gently with her wayward boy, for beneath his faulty exterior there lay a mine of excellence, which naught save words of love could fathom.

Without meaning to be so, perhaps, my father was a stern, reserved man, never seeking the confidence of his children, whose real characters he did not understand. It is true he loved us—provided for all our wants, and, as far as possible, strove to make us what the children of a New England Presbyterian deacon ought to be; but he seldom petted us, and if Carrie, with her sunny face and chestnut curls, sometimes stole up behind him and twined her chubby arms around his neck, he seemed ashamed to return her caress unless they were alone. Brother Charlie he looked upon as almost incorrigible, but if he found it hard to cope with his bold, fun-loving spirit, it was tenfold more difficult for him to tame the mischievous Will, whom scarcely any one could manage, but who, strange to say, was a general favorite.

It was night when he reached Meadow Brook, and I was in bed, but through the closed doors I caught the sound of his voice, and in an instant I experienced a sensation of delight, as if in him I should find a kindred spirit. I could not wait until morning before I saw him, and, rising softly, I groped my way down the dark stairway to a knot-hole, which had more than once done me service when sent from the room while my mother and her company told something I was not to hear! He was sitting so that the light of the lamp fell full upon his face, which, with its high, white brow, hazel eyes, and mass of wavy hair, seemed to me the most beautiful I had ever seen. Involuntarily I thought of my own plain features, and saying to myself, "He'll never like me, never," I crept back to bed, wondering if it were true that homely little girls made sometimes handsome women.

The next morning, wishing to produce as favorable an impression as possible, I was an unusually long time making my toilet—trying on one dress after another, and finally deciding upon a white cambric, which I never wore except to church, or on some similar occasion. Giving an extra brush to my hair, which had grown out darker and so very curly that Charley called me "Snarly-pate," I started for the breakfast-room, where the family were already assembled.

"What upon earth has the child got on?" was grandma's exclamation as she looked at me, both over and under her glasses, while mother bade me "go straight back and change my dress," asking "why I had put on my very best?"

"Settin' her cap for Bill, I guess," suggested Charlie, who, boylike, was already on terms of great intimacy with his cousin.

More angry than grieved, I went back to my room, where I pouted for half an hour or more. Then, selecting the worst looking dress I had, I again descended to the dining-room where Charlie presented me to Will, telling him at the same time "to spare all comments on my appearance, as it made me madder than a March hare to be called ugly."

"I don't think she's ugly. Anyway I like her looks," said Will, smiling down upon me with those eyes which have since made many a heart beat as mine did then, for 'twas the first compliment of the kind I had ever received.

Will had always lived in the city, and now, anxious to see the lions of the country at once, he proposed to Charlie a ramble over the farm, inviting me to accompany them, which I did willingly, notwithstanding that Charlie muttered something about "not wanting a gal stuck along."

In the pasture we came across "old Sorrel," whom Will said he would ride as they did in a circus, if Charlie would only catch him. This was an easy task, for Sorrel, suspecting no evil, came up to us quite readily, when Will, leaping upon his back, commenced whooping and hallooing so loudly that Sorrel's mettle was up, and for nearly an hour he ran quite as fast as his rider could wish. But circus riding was not Sorrel's forte, and he probably grew dizzy, for he at length stumbled and fell, injuring his fore foot in some way, so that, to our dismay, we found he was unable to walk without a great effort.

"Je-mi-my! Won't the old gentleman rare!" said Charlie, who was never very choice of his language.

Will, on the contrary, seemed more concerned for the horse, bringing water in his hat, and bathing the fast-swelling limb of the poor animal, who appeared to be grateful for the kindness. Charlie proposed that we should keep it a secret, but to this Will would not listen, and in a plain, straightforward way he confessed what he had done, and father, who saw that Sorrel was temporarily injured, forgave him, for he could not resist the pleading of Will's dark eyes.

This was his first day's adventure—the next one was a little different. Finding a cow in the lane, he tried the experiment of milking, succeeding so well that when at night Sally came in with her half-filled pail, she declared that "Line-back was drying up, for she'd only given a drop or so." For this and numerous other misdemeanors Will also received absolution, but when on the second Sabbath after his arrival he and Charlie both were missed from church, whither they had started a full half-hour before the rest of our family, father grew fidgety, holding his hymn-book wrong side up, and sitting, instead of standing, during the prayer, a thing he was never known to do before. He was very strict in the observance of the fourth commandment, as indeed were most of the citizens of Meadow Brook, it being an almost State Prison offense to stay away from church on the Sabbath, or speak above a whisper until after sunset.

By the way, I think it a mistake, this converting the Sabbath into a day so much to be dreaded by the youthful, fun-loving members of the family, who are not yet old enough to see the propriety of having in reserve a Sunday face, as well as a Sunday gown. I would not have that sacred day profaned, but I would have it divested of that gloom with which it is too often associated in the child's mind. I would have everything connected with it as cheerful and pleasant as possible, and in these days of Sabbath schools and Sabbath school-books, it seems an easy matter to make it "The day of all the week the best." I well remember one rainy Sunday, when the whole family were obliged to remain at home, the younger ones reciting the Catechism to grandma, committing to memory and repeating to mother ten verses of the fifth chapter of Matthew, and then being compelled to sit up stiff and straight while father read to us a long metaphysical sermon, which he interspersed and lengthened out with remarks of his own, among which was the consoling one that "Heaven was one eternal Sabbath."

This was too much for Charlie, whose mind, instead of dwelling on the words of the good divine, was sadly wandering towards a nest of young white pigs, only that morning born. Turning towards me with a most rueful face, he whispered, "Darned if I'll go there. I'll run away first."

Of course I laughed aloud—how could I help it; and on my saying that "Charlie made me," we were both ordered from the room in disgrace, which latter we bore manfully—Charlie going straight to his pigs, while I stole up garret to a big candle-box, where, on one of my old dresses, lay sleeping six beautiful kittens.

But I am wandering from my subject, which was the time when Will and Charlie were missing from church, and, when, to his utter astonishment, father learned that they had gone to the consecration of a Roman Catholic church, which had recently been erected a little out of the village, on an eminence, where its white cross could be seen from every point.

Against the Catholics as a religious denomination my father was prejudiced, and when he ascertained that his son, born of orthodox parents and baptized in the orthodox faith, had not only run away to their church, but had also paid twenty-five cents, the price of admission, he was a good deal excited, and for a deacon showed considerable temper. It was, of course, Will's doings, he having coaxed Charlie to go by telling him of the wonderful sights there were to be seen.

At a late hour they came home, loitering around the barn a long time before they ventured into the presence of my father, whom my grandmother had somewhat appeased by telling him that "boys must sow their wild oats sometime, and it wasn't best to be too strict with 'em, for it only made 'em act worse," adding that "the Catholics were not the worst folks in the world, and they had just as much right to their form of worship as we had to ours." This in a measure mollified him, and consequently the two boys only received a long lecture, and were debarred the privilege of going to the village, except on Sundays, for three weeks, a punishment which annoyed Will exceedingly. But nothing could subdue him, and the moment the three weeks had expired he was as ready for mischief as ever. For a long time the coming of a circus had been heralded by flaming handbills in red and yellow, one of which Will plastered on to our great barn door, from which conspicuous post it was removed by my father, who conscientiously turned his back upon men and women riding on their heads, declaring it an outrage upon all rules of propriety, and denouncing circuses and circus-going people as utterly low and vulgar. Thus from my earliest remembrance had I been taught, and still my heart would throb faster, whenever, with the beat of the drum and the sound of the bugle, the long procession swept past our door, and more than once had I stolen to the top of the hill, whence could be seen the floating banner and swaying canvas, watching from afar the evil I dared not approach.

Great, then, was my surprise, when, on the morning of the eventful day, Will suggested that Charlie, John, Lizzie, and I should run away in the evening and visit the "doings," as he called it. I was shocked that he should propose my going to such a place. "It was low and vulgar," I told him, "and no one went there but loafers and rowdies."

But he assured me that I was mistaken, saying that "some of our most respectable people attended;" and then he wondered "how I was ever to know anything unless I once in a while went to a circus, or a theater, or something. It was perfectly ridiculous," he said, "for father to keep us so cooped up at home. Nobody else did so. There was Lawyer Smith's daughter, and Judge Brown's niece in Albany, who always went, and if it didn't hurt them, it wouldn't me."

Thus Will reasoned, persuading me at last; and just at dark, Lizzie and I, on pretense of going to bed early, went to our room, dressed ourselves in our best, I donning the white cambric, which I had worn on the first day of Will's arrival, and then when we were ready, got out upon the roof of the woodshed, which came up under our window, descending thence by means of a ladder which Will and Charlie brought from the barn. I had the utmost confidence in Will, and yet as I drew near the tent, and saw the rabble, whose appearance fully equaled my father's description, I wished myself away. Just then the band inside struck up, and giving my fears to the winds, I pressed forward, once involuntarily turning my head aside, as I heard a man near the door exclaim, "Deacon Lee's children, as I live! Is the world coming to an end?"

Instantly my face flushed, for I felt that injustice was done to my father, and my first impulse was to exonerate him from all blame by explaining that we had run away; but ere I could do so Will pulled me along, and in a moment we were in the close, heated atmosphere of the vast arena, where were congregated more than a thousand people, of all ages and conditions. I was confounded, for it seemed to me that each and every one was pointing towards us the finger of scorn, and never since have I felt so wholly degraded and ashamed as I did at the moment of my first entrance to a circus!

We had been but a short time seated, when Will, who had divined my feelings, nudged my elbow, and pointing towards a group just entering, said, "See, there's 'Squire Talbot, his wife and daughter, Dr. Griffin, and lots more of Meadow Brook aristocracy. Now, ain't you glad you came?"

It was as he said, and as I saw the above mentioned individuals, some of them professors of religion, and all of them people of the first standing in town, I can scarcely tell how I felt. It was a sensation of mingled pleasure, bewilderment, and perplexity. Could it be that, after all, my father was wrong, that he was too strict with us, debarring us from innocent amusements, for if it were proper for members of the church to frequent such places, why was it not for me? Now, I can answer promptly that my father was right, wholly right, but I was puzzled then, and gradually I began to care less for being there, and to have less fear of what father would say when he found it out. I was growing very brave, entrenching myself behind the bad example of those who little suspected the harm their presence was doing. Father did not know the ways of the world, I thought, but after being enlightened by me, I was sure he would become a convert at once, and possibly at the next circus he would be in attendance, but from this last idea I involuntarily shrank, thinking I could never respect him again, were he guilty of such a thing.

I enjoyed it vastly, all except the riding of the girl, who I fancied had on her little sister's dress, and when she came out I looked for a place where to hide my head; but hearing the spectators cheer louder than ever, I cast furtive glances at those around me, discovering to my amazement that they seemed more delighted with her than with anything else; while, to crown all, I heard Will telling a young man, that "she was a splendid rider, that he never saw but one who could beat her, and that was a girl in Albany." Then turning to Lizzie, he asked if she would not like to ride in that way?