UC-NRLF 
 
 B M 720 
 
 J 
 
BITS OF TALK 
 FOR YOUNG FOLKS 
 
(From a fresco of Titian s in the Doge s Palace, Venice.} 
 
 ST. CHRISTOPHER. PAGE 7- 
 
BITS OF TALK, 
 
 IN VERSE AND PROSE, 
 
 FOR YOUNG FOLKS. 
 
 BY HELEN JACKSON (H. H.), 
 it 
 
 AUTHOR OF "KITS OK TALK ABOUT HOME MATTERS, 
 
 "BITS OF TRAVEL," "VERSES." 
 
 
 
 " in all the lands 
 
 No such morning-glory." PAGE 133. 
 
 BOSTON: 
 
 ROBERTS BROTHERS. 
 1892. 
 
(/-mm a fresco of Titian? itt tkt Doge s Palacf, 
 
 ST. CHRISTOPHER. PAGE 7. 
 
BITS OF TALK, 
 
 IN VERSE AND PROSE, 
 
 FOR YOUNG FOLKS. 
 
 BY HELEN JACKSON (H. H.), 
 
 \y 
 
 AUTHOR OF " BITS OF TALK ABOUT HOME MATTERS," 
 "BITS OF TRAVEL," "VERSES." 
 
 " in all tlie lands 
 
 No such morning-glory." PAGE 133. 
 
 BOSTON: 
 
 ROBERTS BROTHERS. 
 1892. 
 
Copyright, 1876, 
 .Br RO 
 
 UNIVERSITY PRESS: JOHN WILSON & SON, 
 CAMBRIDGE. 
 
PS 2.1 07 
 
 CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGB 
 
 The Parable of St. Christopher . . . . 7 
 
 A Christmas-Tree for Cats 18 
 
 The Legend of St. Nicholas 38 
 
 My Ant s Cow 45 
 
 St. Martin s Cloak 5 ? 
 
 RunnaRig 60 
 
 The Palace of Gondoforus 81 
 
 The Ant s Monday Dinner 87 
 
 The Nest . . . 97 
 
 The Festival of San Eustachio in Rome ... 99 
 
 Colorado Snow-birds I* 2 
 
 The Water-works of Heilbrun . . . .117 
 
 Morning-Glory 133 
 
 Children s Preaching in the Church of Ara Coeli 
 
 in Rome 134 
 
 1 The Penny ye meant to gi e" .... 145 
 
 A Parable 147 
 
 My Broken-winged Bird 165 
 
 Cheery People 167 
 
 A Short Catechism 173 
 
 W57591 
 
vi CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 The Expression of Kooms 179 
 
 By Stage to Boston .195 
 
 Good Temper 197 
 
 Lizzy of La Bourget 211 
 
 Kicking against Pricks 215 
 
 My First Voyage Hound the World . . .225 
 A Good Time" , 231 
 
BITS OF TALK, 
 
 THE PARABLE OF ST. CHRISTOPHER. 
 
 a king s court a giant came, 
 " O king, both far and near 
 I seek," he said, " the greatest king, 
 And thou art he, I hear. 
 
 " If it please thee, I will abide; 
 To thee my knee shall bend; 
 Only unto the greatest kings 
 Can giants condescend." 
 
 Right glad the king the giant took 
 
 Into his service then, 
 For since Goliath s mighty days 
 
 No man so big was seen. 
 
 Well pleased the giant, too, to serve 
 
 The greatest king on earth ; 
 He served him well, in peace, in war, 
 
 In sorrow, and in mirth, 
 
 7 
 
BITS OF TALK. 
 
 Till -came a 1 wandering minstrel by, 
 . One tfay, who plaYcd and sang 
 Wild songs, through which the devil s name 
 Profanely, loudly rang. 
 
 Astonished then the giant saw 
 
 The king look sore afraid ; 
 At mention of the devil s name, 
 
 The cross s sign he made. 
 
 " How now, my master I Why dost thou 
 
 Make on thy breast this sign?" 
 He said. " It is a spell," replied 
 The king " a spell divine, 
 
 " Which shall the devil circumvent, 
 
 And keep me safe and whole 
 From all the wicked arts he tries 
 To slay my precious soul." 
 
 " O, ho, my master I then he is 
 More powerful than thou I 
 They lied who called thee greatest king; 
 I leave thy service now, 
 
THE PARABLE OF ST. CHRISTOPHER. 9 
 
 " And seek the devil; him will I 
 
 My master call henceforth," 
 The giant cried, and strode away 
 Contemptuous and wroth. 
 
 He found the devil soon. I ween 
 
 The devil waited near, 
 Well pleased to have this mighty man 
 
 Within his ranks appear. 
 
 They journeyed on full many a day, 
 And now the giant deemed 
 
 At last he had a master found, 
 Who was the king he seemed. 
 
 But lo! one day they came apace 
 To where four roadways met, 
 
 And at the meeting of the roads 
 A cross of stone was set. 
 
 The devil trembled and fell back, 
 
 And said, " We go around." 
 " Now tell me," fierce the giant cried, 
 Why fearest thou this ground ? " 
 
10 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 The devil would not answer. " Then 
 I leave thee, master mine," 
 
 The giant said. " Of something wrong 
 This mystery is sign." 
 
 Then answered him the fiend, ashamed : 
 " Tvvas there Christ Jesus died; 
 
 "Wherever stands a cross like that, 
 I may not, dare not bide." 
 
 " Ho, ho I " the giant cried again, 
 Surprised again, perplexed ; 
 
 " Then Jesus is the greatest king, 
 I seek and serve him next." 
 
 The king named Jesus, far and near, 
 
 The weary giant sought ; 
 His name was everywhere proclaimed, 
 
 His image sold and bought, 
 
 His power vaunted, and his laws 
 
 Upheld by sword and fire ; 
 But him the giant sought in vain, 
 
 Until he cried in ire, 
 
THE PARABLE OF ST. CHEISTOPHEE. \ i 
 
 One winter eve, as late he came 
 
 Upon a hermit s cell : 
 " Now by my troth, tell me, good saint, 
 Where doth thy master dwell ? 
 
 For I have sought him far and wide, 
 
 By leagues of land and sea ; 
 I seek to be his servant true, 
 In honest fealty. 
 
 " I have such strength as kings desire, 
 
 State to their state to lend; 
 But only to the greatest king 
 Can giants condescend." 
 
 Then said the hermit, pale and wan: 
 
 " Oh, giant man I indeed 
 The King thou seekest doth all kings 
 
 In glorious power exceed ; 
 
 " But they who see him face to face, 
 
 In full communion clear, 
 Crowned with his kingdom s splendor bright, 
 Must buy the vision dear. 
 
I2 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 " Dwell here, O brother, and thy lot 
 
 With ours contented cast, 
 And first, that flesh be well subdued, 
 For days and nights thou lt fast I " 
 
 " I fast ! " the giant cried, amazed. 
 
 " Good saint, I ll no such thing. 
 My strength would fail ; without that, I 
 Were fit to serve no king ! " 
 
 " Then thou must pray," the hermit said; 
 
 " We/ kneel on yonder stone, 
 And tell these beads, and for each bead 
 A prayer, one by one." 
 
 The giant flung the beads away, 
 
 Laughing in scornful pride, 
 " I will not wear my knees on stones; 
 I know no prayers," he cried. 
 
 Then said the hermit, " Giant, since 
 Thou canst not fast nor pray, 
 
 I know not if our Master will 
 Save thee some other way. 
 
THE PARABLE OF ST. CHRISTOPHER. 13 
 
 " But go down to yon river deep, 
 
 Where pilgrims daily sink, 
 
 And build for thee a little hut 
 
 Close on the river s brink, 
 
 " And carry travellers back and forth 
 
 Across the raging stream ; 
 Perchance this service to our King 
 A worthy one will seem." 
 
 " Now that is good," the giant cried; 
 
 " That work I understand; 
 A joyous task twill be to bear 
 Poor souls from land to land, 
 
 " Who, but for me, would sink and drown. 
 
 Good saint, thou hast at length 
 Made mention of a work which is 
 Fit for a giant s strength." 
 
 For many a year, in lowly hut, 
 
 The giant dwelt content 
 Upon the bank, and back and forth 
 
 Across the stream he went, 
 
14 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 And on his giant shoulders bore 
 
 All travellers who came, 
 By night, by day, or rich or poor, 
 
 All in King Jesus name. 
 
 But much he doubted if the King 
 His work would note or know, 
 
 And often with a weary heart 
 He waded to and fro. 
 
 One night, as wrapped in sleep he lay, 
 
 He sudden heard a call : 
 " Oh, Christopher, come carry me I " 
 He sprang, looked out, but all 
 
 "Was dark and silent on the shore. 
 
 " It must be that I dreamed," 
 He said, and laid him down again ; 
 
 But instantly there seemed 
 
 Again the feeble, distant cry: 
 "Oh, come and carry me I " 
 
 Again he sprang, and looked ; again 
 No living thing could see. 
 
THE PARABLE OF ST. CHEISTOPHEE. 15 
 
 The third time came the plaintive voice, 
 
 Like infant s soft and weak ; 
 With lantern strode the giant forth, 
 
 More carefully to seek. 
 
 Down on the bank a little child 
 He found, a piteous sight, 
 
 Who, weeping, earnestly implored 
 To cross that very night. 
 
 With gruff good- will he picked him up, 
 
 And on his neck to ride, 
 He tossed him, as men play with babes, 
 
 And plunged into the tide. 
 
 But as the water closed around 
 His knees, the infant s weight 
 
 Grew heavier and heavier, 
 Until it was so great 
 
 The giant scarce could stand upright; 
 
 His staff shook in his hand, 
 His mighty knees bent under him, 
 
 He barely reached the land, 
 
!0 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 And, staggering, set the infant down, 
 And turned to scan his face ; 
 
 When, lo I he saw a halo bright 
 Which lit up all the place. 
 
 Then Christopher fell down afraid 
 
 At marvel of the thing, 
 And dreamed not that it was the face 
 
 Of Jesus Christ, his King, 
 
 Until the infant spoke, and said: 
 " Oh, Christopher, behold! 
 
 J am the Lord whom thou hast served I 
 Rise up, be glad and bold! 
 
 " For I have seen and noted well 
 
 Thy works of charity ; 
 And that thou art my servant good, 
 A token thou shalt see. 
 
 " Plant firmly here upon this bank 
 
 Thy stalwart staff of pine, 
 And it shall blossom and bear fruit, 
 This very hour, in sign." 
 
THE PARABLE OF ST. CHRISTOPHER, 
 
 Then, vanishing, the infant smiled. 
 
 The giant, left alone, 
 Saw on the bank, with luscious dates, 
 
 His stout pine staff bent down. 
 
 For many a year, St. Christopher 
 Served God in many a land ; 
 
 And master painters drew his face, 
 With loving heart and hand, 
 
 On altar fronts and church s walls ; 
 
 And peasants used to say, 
 
 To look on good St. Christopher 
 
 Brought luck for all the day. 
 
 I think the lesson is as good 
 
 To-day as it was then 
 As good to us called Christians 
 
 As to the heathen men : 
 
 The lesson of St. Christopher, 
 Who spent his strength for others, 
 
 And saved his soul by working hard 
 To help arid save his brothers I 
 
BITS OF TALK. 
 
 A CHEISTMAS-TREE FOR CATS. 
 
 "XT 7IIEN I was a little girl, I knew two 
 old maids who were so jolly and nice 
 that I am always ready, beforehand, to love 
 anybody who is called an old maid. To 
 be sure I have never yet seen any others in 
 the least like them ; and I begin to be afraid 
 that that particular kind of old maid has died 
 out, like the big birds called Dodos, which 
 used to live in Australia. But I am always 
 hoping to see two more before I die, and 
 that I shall find them living together in a 
 pretty little yellow cottage, just like the one 
 the Miss Ferrys lived in, and that they will 
 keep four splendid cats, just like the cats 
 the Miss Ferrys had. I never saw such 
 cats. Nobody ever .saw such cats. They 
 were almost twice as large as common cats. 
 
A CHRISTMAS-TREE FOR CATS. ig 
 
 Miss Esther Ferry used to say that if there 
 was anything in the world she utterly despised 
 the sight of, it was a little dwarf of a cat ; 
 and as soon as she began to talk about it, 
 her black cat Tom used to stand right up 
 and bulge himself until all the hairs of his 
 fur stood out like the spokes of a wheel. 
 Tom was the cleverest cat of the four. He 
 really did understand more than half of all 
 that was said before him, and sometimes 
 Miss Esther used to send him out of the 
 room when the neighbors were telling her 
 any gossiping story. "Of course I know 
 that Tom can t repeat it," she would say ; 
 " but it does make me nervous to have him 
 listen so, and he is just as well oif down 
 cellar." Tom and Spitfire were Miss Esther s 
 cats ; we thought they were a little hand- 
 riomer than Spunk and Yellow, who belonged 
 to Miss Jane ; but I think it was only be 
 cause we loved Miss Esther best that we 
 
2O SITS OF TALK. 
 
 thought so. Strangers never could decide 
 which of the four cats was the best looking. 
 Tom was as black as ink, not a white or 
 gray hair about him ; Spitfire was a Maltese, 
 of the loveliest soft mouse color all over, 
 with a great white star on her breast ; Spunk 
 was pure white, and her eyes shone like 
 topazes in the sunlight ; Yellow was a tor 
 toise-shell cat, black and yellow and white : 
 he was the largest and fiercest of the four. 
 We were all more afraid of him than of any 
 dog in town. You will hardly believe it, 
 but these cats used to sit in high chairs at 
 the table, and feed themselves with their 
 paws like squirrels. They had little tin 
 plates, with their names stamped on them ; 
 and one of the things I used to like best to 
 do, when I went there to tea, was to change 
 their plates, and then watch to see what 
 they would do. Yellow was the only one 
 who would eat out of any plate but his 
 
A CHRISTMAS-TREE FOE CATS. 21 
 
 own ; he was always greedy, and did not 
 care. But the others would look down at 
 the plate, smell of it, and begin to mew ; 
 and once black Tom jumped right across the 
 table at Spunk, who had his plate, pushed 
 her out of her chair, and dragged the plate 
 away. It was some minutes before he would 
 let her come back to the table without spit 
 ting at her. But the best time we ever had 
 in that dear yellow cottage w r as at a Christ 
 mas party which the old ladies gave for their 
 cats. I don t believe there was ever such a 
 thing heard of before or since. I knew 
 about it a week before it came off, and it 
 was the hardest secret I ever had to keep. 
 My mamma came home one evening just at 
 dark. I was lying on a sofa in a dark 
 corner, where she could not see me, and 
 papa was sitting by the fire. She went up 
 to his chair and kissed him, and burst out 
 into such a laugh, as she said, " Darling, 
 
22 SITS OF TALK. 
 
 what do you suppose those dear absurd old 
 Ferry s are going to do ? They are going to 
 have a Christmas-tree for their cats." 
 
 "You are not in earnest, Mary," said 
 papa. 
 
 "But I am, though," said mamma, sitting 
 down on his knee, and putting her arms 
 around his neck. It makes the tears come 
 into* my eyes even now, to remember how 
 my papa and mamma used to love each 
 other. Since I have grown up, and have 
 seen what men and women really are, I 
 know how wonderful jt was. They have 
 been in heaven a great many years, but it 
 would be hard to make me believe they are 
 very much happier there than they were 
 here. 
 
 "But I am. You always think I am jok 
 
 ing." 
 
 "Because you always are," interrupted 
 papa. 
 
A CHRISTMAS-TREE FOR CATS. 23 
 
 w Don t interrupt. You are always inter 
 rupting," said mamma. "I have been at 
 the Ferrys for an hour this afternoon, and 
 the dear old souls are quite beside themselves 
 about it. They are going to have linen 
 drilling put down over their carpets, and 
 they are wondering whether it will do to 
 have as many as twenty cats in the room 
 with twenty children." 
 
 " The old geese ! " exclaimed papa, who 
 was not always quite as civil as he could 
 be. 
 
 "I don t know," said mamma thoughtfully. 
 "I am not so sure about that. I think it 
 will be great fun ; and Helen will be out of 
 her senses." 
 
 I could not keep still any longer. I 
 bounded off the sofa, crying, "O mamma, 
 mamma, am I really to go? And shall I 
 take Midge ? " 
 
 Midge was my cat, a dowdy little gray 
 
24 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 cat, whom nobody ever called good-looking, 
 but whom I loved dearly. 
 
 " Mercy on me I " screamed mamma. 
 " How yon frightened me ! Yon bad child, 
 1o lie still, and hear secrets. But you will 
 be punished enough by having to keep one 
 for a week. You must not tell a soul. 
 Nobody knows it but I, and the Miss Ferry s 
 are very anxious that nothing should be said 
 about it." 
 
 People talk about the pleasure of antici 
 pations. I never could see it when I was a 
 child,-aud I don t now. I think it is misery. 
 That week was the most uncomfortable week 
 of my life, excepting one which I passed 
 shut up in the garret for a punishment, after 
 I had been very naughty. If it- had not 
 been for lying on the hay-mow with Midge, 
 and talking to her about it, I know I should 
 have been sick. 
 
 At last the invitations came, all sent 
 
A CHRISTMAS-TREE FOR CATS. 25 
 
 out in one forenoon, two days before Christ 
 mas. Such a hubbub as all the children in 
 town were in ! The invitations were written 
 on bright pink paper. 
 
 " The Miss Ferrys request the pleasure of 
 your company on Christmas Eve, from six 
 till nine o clock. 
 
 " You will please bring your cat. There 
 will be a Christmas-tree for the cats. 
 
 "Each cat is expected to wear a paper 
 ruff. 
 
 w The servants can be sent to take the cats 
 home at half-past seven." 
 
 I did not know what a ruff was, but 
 mamma explained it to me, and showed me 
 the picture of an old queen in one. We 
 cut one out, and put it on Midge, but she 
 tpre it off in about half a minute ; and 
 mamma said that if the cats were to be 
 kept in ruffs through the entire evening, 
 she thought it would be more work than 
 
2 6 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 play ; but we could all carry half-a-dozen 
 extra ones in our pockets, and put them on 
 occasionally, if Miss Esther and Miss Jane 
 thought best. I had six for Midge, one 
 red, one green, one blue, and three white. 
 We thought it would be funnier to have a 
 variety of colors. 
 
 By quarter before six o clock, on Christ 
 mas Eve, a droll procession was to be seen 
 walking towards the yellow cottage. Each 
 boy and girl carried a cat hugged up 
 tightly, and as it was pitchy dark, the 
 cats eyes shone out like little balls of fire 
 moving about in the air. We had a dread 
 ful time taking off our things in the hall, 
 for the cats all began to mew, they were 
 so frightened. We all wore our everyday 
 gowns, because our mammas said that the 
 cats would probably fight, and spill things ; 
 but Miss Esther and Miss Jane were dressed 
 in their best stiff black silks, and had on 
 
, 
 
 I X 
 
 
 
A CHEISTNAS-TEEE FOE CATS. 27 
 
 their biggest gold chains, and we felt quite 
 ashamed till we forgot about our clothes. I 
 did not go till six o clock, for I did not 
 want to have Midge the first cat in the room, 
 she was such an ugly little thing; but as 
 soon as I went into the parlor, I laughed so, 
 that I dropped her right on the floor, and 
 -she put her paw through her blue ruff, and 
 tore it off, before Miss Esther had seen iv 
 
 There sat Tom, and Spunk, and Spitfire, 
 and Yellow, all in a row, in their high-chairs, 
 with enormous paper ruffs on, so big that 
 ours looked like nothing at all by the side 
 of them. Tom had a white one ; Spitfire 
 had a deep blue, which was beautiful with 
 her gray fur; Spunk had a shining black 
 one ; and Yellow s was fiery red. There 
 they sat as solemn as judges, and everybody 
 in the room was screaming with laughter. 
 
 o o 
 
 Six cats beside Midge had already arrived, 
 and they had all hid under the chairs and 
 
23 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 tables, the perfect pictures of misery. Miss 
 Esther and Miss Jane looked very proud of 
 their cats, who really did behave as if they 
 had been all their lives accustomed to re 
 ceiving company. "However," I thought to 
 myself, " it won t last long," and it didn t. 
 As soon as I saw Willie Dickinson come in 
 with his old Iron Gray, I knew black Tom 
 could not keep quiet, for Iron Gray and he 
 always fought "like cats and dogs." In about 
 five minutes Tom caught sight of him, and 
 just as Miss Esther was kissing Bessie White, 
 who had her tame Maltese kitten tucked 
 under her arm like a hat, Tom jumped right 
 over Miss Esther s shoulder, and came down 
 headforemost between Willie and Bessie, and 
 stuck his claw into Iron Gray s ear. Willie 
 sprang to catch up Iron Gray, and trod on 
 Midge, who began to mew, and for a minute 
 it looked as if we should have a terrible 
 time. But Miss Esther snatched Tom up, 
 
A CUEISTMAS-TEEE FOE CATS. 29 
 
 and gave him a box on the ears, and put 
 him back into his chair, where he sat look 
 ing just as guilty and ashamed as a whipped 
 child ; and Willie said he would hold Iron 
 Gray in his lap, so all was soon quiet. As 
 for the rest of the cats, they were as still as 
 mice ; two or three of them had crept quite 
 out of sight under the great hair-cloth sofa. 
 
 By quarter-past six the company had all 
 arrived : twelve girls, eight boys, and twenty 
 cats. The room was large, but it seemed 
 crowded ; and it was quite troublesome to 
 get about without stepping on a cat, espec 
 ially as everybody was laughing so that they 
 could hardly walk straight. 
 
 I soon found out that the only way to feel 
 easy about Midge was to hold her in my 
 arms; but I must say that she behaved 
 as well as any cat there, excepting Lucy 
 Turner s cat Box, which was almost as 
 handsome as Miss Jane s yellow, and had 
 
30 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 been trained to sit on Lucy s shoulder. That 
 was the prettiest sight in the room ; for 
 Lucy Turner was the prettiest girl in town, 
 and Box s ruff was made of satin paper, of 
 a brilliant green color, which looked beauti 
 ful against her own yellow fur, and Lucy s 
 yellow curls. 
 
 At half-past six the doors were thrown 
 open into the little library, and there stood 
 the Tree. It was a thick fir-tree, and it had 
 twenty splendid Chinese lanterns on it, all 
 in a blaze of light. Then there were twenty- 
 four phials of cream, tied on by bright red 
 ribbons ; twenty -four worsted balls, scarlet 
 and white and yellow ; and as many as two 
 hundred gay-colored bonbon papers, with 
 fringe at the ends. 
 
 We all took up our cats in our arms, and 
 marched into the room, and stood around 
 the tree. Then the cats high-chairs were 
 brought in, and placed two on the right, and 
 
A CHEISTMAS-TBEE FOX CATS. 31 
 
 two on the left, of the tree ; and Tom, and 
 Spitfire, and Spunk, and Yellow, were put 
 into them. 
 
 I never would have believed that twenty 
 four cats could be so still ; they all looked 
 as grave as if they were watching for rats. 
 
 Miss Esther rang a bell, and the maid 
 brought in twenty-four small tin pans on a 
 waiter ; then Miss Jane told us each to take 
 a phial of cream off the tree and empty it 
 into a pan for our cat. This took a long 
 time, for some of the phials hung quite high, 
 and none of us dared to put our cat down 
 for a minute. Such a tapping and spattering 
 as they made drinking up the cream ! It 
 sounded like rain on window-blinds. 
 
 After this, Miss Esther distributed the 
 bonbon papers by handfuls, and told us to 
 " let the dear cats eat all they could." Some 
 of the papers had nice bits of roast veal in 
 them ; some had toasted cheese, and some 
 
32 SITS OF TALK. 
 
 had chicken-wings. We did not get on very 
 well with this part of the feeding. We 
 tried to keep the cats in our laps, and feed 
 them out of our fingers ; but they were 
 more accustomed to eating on the floor, or 
 on the ground, and they would snatch the 
 meat out of our hands, in spite of all we 
 could do, and jump down with it in their 
 teeth. Then one cat would see another with 
 a bit of meat which looked nicer than her 
 own, and she would drop hers, and fly to 
 quarrelling and snatching after the other. 
 They all wanted chicken-wings ; after once 
 tasting of those, they despised the roast 
 veal, and even the cheese, and as there 
 were only a few chicken-wings, it made 
 trouble. Before we got through with this, 
 we were rather tired ; and the cats, too, had 
 more than they ought to eat, and began to 
 get fretful, just like children who have been 
 etulTcd ; there must have been thirty or forty 
 
A CHRISTMAS -TREE FOE CATS. 33 
 
 of the bonbon papers left on the tree ; l>ut 
 Miss Esther said they would do for the cats 
 breakfasts the next day, so they would not be 
 wasted. It seemed ungrateful, after the old 
 ladies had taken so much pains to amuse us, 
 to find any fault with the party ; but we did 
 begin to feel hungry, and to think that the 
 cats need not have had everything. At last 
 I saw Willie Dickinson turn his back to 
 the people, and slyly bite a mouthful off a 
 chicken-wing before he gave it to Iron Gray. 
 This made me hungrier than ever ; and I am 
 ashamed to say, that I, too, watched my 
 chance, and popped a bit of veal into my 
 mouth when I thought nobody was looking. 
 Fancy my mortification when I heard Miss 
 Esther s kind voice behind me, saying, "I 
 am afraid our little friends are getting hun 
 gry. Their turn will come by and by." 
 Oh, I wished the floor would open and swal 
 low me up. I have never been so ashamed 
 
34 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 since, and I never can be, if I live a hundred 
 years. 
 
 All this time, Tom, and Spitfire, and 
 Spunk, and Yellow sat up in their high- 
 chairs as grand as so many kings on thrones, 
 and had two little tables before them, off 
 which they ate. Really they hardly looked 
 like cats, they were so dignified and so 
 large. If they had only known it, though, 
 it was not very civil of them to be sitting 
 up in that way, at their own party, the only 
 ones who had either a chair or a table, but 
 it was not their fault. 
 
 At last Miss Esther said, " Now we will 
 give the cats a game of ball to wind up 
 with," and she took a red worsted ball from 
 the tree, and threw it out into the parlor. 
 Midge sprang after it like lightning; then 
 we all took balls and threw them out, and 
 let all the cats run after them, and for a few 
 minutes there was a fine jumble and turnblo 
 
A CHRISTMAS-TREE FOE CATS. 35 
 
 of cats and balls on the floor. But as soon 
 as the cats found out that the balls were not 
 something more to eat, all except the very 
 young ones walked off and sat down, just 
 like grown-up men and women, round the 
 sides of the room. This was the funniest 
 sight of all, for they all began to wash their 
 faces and their paws ; and to see twenty cats 
 at once doing this is droller than can bo 
 imagined. In the middle of the floor lay 
 the bright balls, and Midge and three other 
 kittens were rolling over and over among 
 them. We all laughed till we were so tired 
 we could not speak, and most of us had 
 tears rolling down our cheeks. 
 
 Pretty soon the door-bell rang ; the maid 
 came into the parlor and said, 
 
 " Judge Dickinson s man has come after 
 Willie s cat." 
 
 Then we all laughed harder than ever, and 
 Willie called out, 
 
36 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 " That is no way to speak. You should 
 say, Mr. Irou Gray s carriage has come. : 
 
 Next carne our Bridget after Midge, and I 
 must say I was glad to get rid of her. In a 
 few minutes the cats were all gone ; then we 
 looked at each other and wondered what we 
 should do next. Tom and Spunk had got 
 down from their chairs and gone to sleep 
 before the fire; and Yellow and Spitfire 
 were playing with the bits of paper which 
 were scattered on the floor. What with the 
 bonbon papers, and the torn ruffs, it looked 
 like a paper-mill. We were just proposing 
 a game of Blind Man s Buff, when the maid 
 opened the dining-room door, and oh, how 
 we jumped and screamed when we saw the 
 fine supper-table which was set out for us ! 
 It was a nice old-fashioned sit-down supper, 
 such as nobody gives nowadays ; and the 
 things to eat were all wholesome and plain, 
 f?cr that nobody could be made sick by eating 
 
A CHRISTMAS-TREE FOR CATS. 37 
 
 all they chose. Miss Esther and Miss Jane 
 walked around the tables all the time, and 
 slipped apples and oranges into our pockets 
 for us to carry home, and kept begging us 
 to eat more chicken and bread and butter. 
 When we went away, we each had one of 
 the splendid Chinese lanterns given to us ; 
 and there was not a single little girl there, 
 who did not think for years and years after 
 ward that it would be the grandest thing in 
 this world to be an old maid like Miss Esther 
 Ferry, and live in a yellow cottage, with one 
 sister and four big cats. 
 
38 SITS OF TALK. 
 
 THE LEGEND OF ST. NICHOLAS. 
 
 / T A HE tales of good St. Nicholas 
 Are known in every clime ; 
 Told in painting, and in statues, 
 
 And in the poet s rhyme. 
 For centuries they ve worshipped him, 
 
 In churches east and west ; 
 Of all the saints we read about 
 
 He is beloved the best. 
 Because he was the saint of all 
 
 The wretched and the poor, 
 And never sent a little child 
 
 Uusuccored from his door. 
 In England s isle, alone, to-day, 
 
 Four hundred churches stand 
 Which bear his name, and keep it well 
 
 Eemembered through the land. 
 And all the little children 
 
 In England know full well 
 Tin s tale of good St. Nicholas, 
 
 Which I am now to tell. 
 
THE LEGEND OF ST. NICHOLAS. 39 
 
 The sweetest tale, I think, of all 
 
 The tales they tell of him; 
 I never read it but my eyes 
 
 "With tears begin to swim. 
 
 There was a heathen king who roved 
 
 About with cruel bands, 
 And waged a fierce and wicked war 
 
 On all the Christian lands. 
 And once he took as captive 
 
 A little fair-haired boy, 
 A Christian merchant s only son, 
 
 His mother s pride and joy. 
 He decked him in apparel gay, 
 
 And said, " You re just the age 
 To serve behind my chair at meat, 
 
 A dainty Christian page." 
 Oh, with a sore and aching heart 
 
 The lonely captive child 
 Roamed through the palace, big and grand, 
 
 And wept and never smiled. 
 And all the heathen jeered at him, 
 
 And called him Christian dog, 
 And when the king was angry 
 
 He kicked him like a log, 
 
40 SITS OF TALK. 
 
 And spat upon his face, and said: 
 " Now by my beard, thy gods 
 
 Are poor to leave their worshippers 
 At such unequal odds." 
 
 One day, just as the cruel king 
 
 Had sat him down to dine, 
 And in his jewelled cup of gold 
 
 The page was pouring wine, 
 The little fellow s heart ran o er 
 
 In tears he could not stay, 
 For he remembered suddenly, 
 
 It was the very day 
 On which the yearly feast was kept 
 
 Of good St Nicholas, 
 And at his home that very hour 
 
 Were dancing on the grass, 
 With music, and with feasting, all 
 
 The children of the town. 
 The king looked up, and saw his tears; 
 
 His face began to frown : 
 " How now, thou dog ! thy snivelling tears 
 
 Are running in my cup ; 
 Twas not with these, but with good wine, 
 
 I bade thee fill it up. 
 
THE LEGEND OF ST. NICHOLAS. 41 
 
 Why weeps the hound ? " The child replied : 
 
 " I weep, because to-day, 
 In name of good St. Nicholas, 
 
 All Christian children play; 
 And all my kindred gather home, 
 
 From greatest unto least, 
 And keep to good St. Nicholas 
 
 A merry banquet feast." 
 The heathen king laughed scornfully: 
 
 " If he be saint indeed, 
 Thy famous great St. Nicholas, 
 
 "Why does he not take heed 
 To thee to-day, and bear thee back 
 
 To thy own native land? 
 Ha ! well I wot, he cannot take 
 
 One slave from out my hand I " 
 
 Scarce left the boastful words his tongue 
 
 When, with astonished eyes, 
 The cruel king a giant form 
 
 Saw swooping from the skies. 
 A whirlwind shook the palace walls, 
 
 The doors flew open wide, 
 And lo I the good St. Nicholas 
 
 Came in with mighty stride. 
 
42 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 Right past the guards, as they were not, 
 
 Close to the king s gold chair, 
 With striding steps the good Saint came, 
 
 And seizing by his hair 
 The frightened little page, he bore 
 
 Him, in a twinkling, high 
 Above the palace topmost roof, 
 
 And vanished in the sky. 
 
 Now at that very hour was spread 
 
 A banquet rich and dear, 
 "Within the little page s home, 
 
 To which, from far and near, 
 The page s mourning parents called 
 
 All poor to come and pray 
 "With them, to good St. Nicholas, 
 
 Upon his sacred day. 
 Thinking, perhaps, that he would heal 
 
 Their anguish and their pain, 
 And at poor people s prayers might give 
 
 Their child to them again. 
 
 Now what a sight was there to see, 
 "When flying through the air, 
 
 The Saint came carrying the boy, 
 Still by his curly hair I 
 
THE LEGEND OF ST. NICHOLAS. 43 
 
 And set him on his mother s knee, 
 
 Too frightened yet to stand, 
 And holding still the king s gold cup 
 
 Fast in his little hand. 
 And what glad sounds were these to hear, 
 
 What sobs and joyful cries, 
 And calls for good St. Nicholas, 
 
 To come back from the skies I 
 But swift he soared, and only smiled, 
 
 And vanished in the blue ; 
 Most likely he was hurrying 
 
 Some other good to do. 
 But I wonder if he did not stop 
 
 To take a passing look 
 Where still the cruel heathen king 
 
 In terror crouched and shook ; 
 While from the palace all Ms guarda 
 
 In coward haste had fled, 
 And told the people, in his chair 
 
 The king was sitting dead. 
 
 Hurrah for good St. Nicholas I 
 
 The friend of all the poor, 
 Who never sent a little child 
 
 Unsuccored from his door. 
 
44 SITS OF TALK. 
 
 We do not pray to saints to-day, 
 
 But still we hold them dear, 
 And the stories of their holy lives 
 
 Are stories good to hear. 
 They are a sort of parable, 
 
 And if we ponder well, 
 "We shall not find it hard to read 
 
 The lesson which they tell. 
 "We do not pray to saints to-day, 
 
 Yet who knows but they hear 
 Our mention of them, and are glad 
 
 "We hold their memory dear? 
 Hurrah for good St. Nicholas, 
 
 The friend of all the poor, 
 Who never sent a little child 
 
 Unsuccored from his door I 
 
MY ANT S Cow. 
 
MY ANTS COW. 45 
 
 MY ANT S COW. 
 
 "TV yfY Ant lives in the country and keeps 
 a cow. I am ashamed to say that, al 
 though I have always known she was a most 
 interesting person, I never went to see her 
 until last week. I am afraid I should not 
 have gone then, if I had not found an ac 
 count of her, and her house, and her cow, 
 in a book which I was reading. 
 
 "Dear me," said I, "and there she has 
 been living so near me all this time, and I 
 never have been to call on her." To tell 
 the truth, it was much worse than that ; I 
 had often met her in the street, and had 
 taken such a dislike to her looks that I 
 always brushed by as quickly as possible 
 without speaking to her. But I knew that 
 she had never taken any notice of me, so I 
 
46 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 hoped she would not recognize me, if I went 
 to call on her, and behaved very politely, 
 now that I had found out how famous she 
 had become. I had great difficulty in find 
 ing her house, though it is quite large. She 
 belongs to a very peculiar family ; they 
 prefer to live in the dark ; so they have no 
 windows in their houses, only doors ; and 
 the doors are nothing but holes in the roof. 
 The houses are built in shape of a mound, 
 and not more than ten inches high ; they are 
 built out of old bits of wood, dead leaves, 
 straw, old bones ; in short, every sort of old 
 thing that they find they stick in the walls 
 of their houses. Their best rooms are all 
 down cellar ; and dark enough they must be 
 on a rainy day, when the doors are always 
 kept shut tight. 
 
 But I ought to have told you about my 
 Ant herself before I told you about her 
 house ; when you hear what an odd person 
 
MY ANT S COW. 47 
 
 she is, you will not be surprised to know in 
 what an outlandish kind of house she lives. 
 To begin with, I must tell you that she 
 belongs to a most aristocratic family, and 
 never does any work. You d never suppose 
 so, to see her. I really think she is the 
 queerest-looking creature I ever met. In 
 the first place, her skin is of a dark brown 
 color, darker than an Indian s, and she has 
 six legs. Of course she can walk three 
 times as fast as if she had only two, but I 
 would rather go slower and be more like 
 other people. She has frightful jaws, with 
 which she does all sorts of things besides 
 eatijg. She uses them for tweezers, pick 
 axes, scissors, knife and fork, and in case 
 of a battle, for swords. Then she has grow 
 ing out of the front part of her head two 
 long slender horns, which she keeps moving 
 about continually in all directions, and with 
 which she touches everything she wishes to 
 
48 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 understand. The first thing she does, when 
 she meets you, is to bend both these horns 
 straight towards you, and feel of you all 
 over. It is quite disagreeable, almost ar, 
 bad as shaking hands with strangers. 
 
 My Ant s name is Formica Rufa. If 1 
 knew her better 1 should call her Ant Ru, 
 for short. But I do not expect ever to know 
 her very well ; she evidently does not like 
 to be intimate with anybody but her own 
 family ; and I don t so much wonder, for I 
 never was in any house so overrun with 
 people as hers is. I wondered how they 
 knew themselves apart. When I went to 
 see her last week I found her just going out, 
 and I thought perhaps that was one reason 
 she didn t take any more notice of me. 
 
 "How do you do, Ant?" said I. "I am 
 spending the summer near by, and thought 
 I Avould like to become acquainted with you. 
 
MY ANTS COW. 49 
 
 I hear you ha\e a very curious cow, and I 
 have a great desire to see it." 
 
 " Humph ! " said she, and snapped her horns 
 up and down, as she always does when she 
 is displeased, I find. 
 
 Then I realized that it was a mistake to 
 mention in the first place that I had come to 
 see the cow. But it was too late to take it 
 back. That is the worst of these awkward 
 truths that sometimes slip out in spite of us ; 
 there is no putting them out of sight again. 
 
 However, I went on, trying to conciliate 
 her as well as I could, in my entire ignorance 
 of the rules of behavior in the society to 
 which she belonged. 
 
 " I hope it will not give you any trouble to 
 show her to me. You rnusf be very proud 
 of having such a fine cow. Perhaps you 
 are on the way to milking now, and if so I 
 should be most happy to go with you." 
 
 * Humph ! " said my Ant again. At least I 
 4 
 
50 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 think that was what she said. It looked 
 like it. I can t say that I heard any distinct 
 Articulate sound ; and I was too embarrassed 
 to listen very attentively, for I did begin to 
 feel that she might resent my coming out of 
 mere curiosity to see her cow, when I had 
 lived to be an old woman without ever go ; ^g 
 near her. 
 
 But she turned short on Iter heels (I 
 suppose she has heels), and plunged int- 
 the woods at the right, stopping and looking 
 back at me as if she expected me to follow. 
 So I stepped along after her as fast as I 
 cculd, and said, "Thank you ; I suppose this 
 is the way to the pasture." 
 
 My Ant said nothing, but went ahead 
 snapping her horns furiously. 
 
 "Oh, well," thought I to myself, "your 
 an uncivil Ant anyhow, if I have come simply 
 out of curiosity. You might be a little 
 more polite in your own house, or at least 
 
MY ANTS COW. 51 
 
 on your own grounds, which is the same 
 thing. I sha n t speak to you again," and 
 that s about all the conversation I have ever 
 had with my Ant. But she took me to the 
 pasture, and I saw her cow. 
 
 I am almost afraid to tell you where the 
 pasture was, and what the cow was ; but if 
 you don t believe me, you can look in books 
 written about such things, and they will 
 convince you that every word I say is true. 
 The pasture was the stalk of a green brier; 
 and there stood not only my Ant s cow, 
 but as many as live hundred others, all 
 feeding away upon it. You have seen 
 millions of them in your lives ; I dare say 
 have killed them by teaspoonfuls ; for you 
 must know that they were nothing but little 
 green lice, such as sometimes kill our rose 
 bushes, and we try in every possible way to 
 get rid of. Who would ever suppose there 
 could be a race of creatures for whom these 
 
52 SITS OF TALK. 
 
 little green plant-lice could serve as cows ! 
 But I assure you it is true, find if you live 
 in the country you can see it for yourself; 
 but you will have to look through a magnify- 
 ing-glass to see tKem milked. Think of 
 looking through a maguifying-glass at any 
 body s cow I I looked at my Ant s for an 
 hour, and it seemed to me I hardly winked, 
 I was so absorbed in the curious sight. 
 
 Its skin was smooth as satin and of a 
 most beautiful light green color. It had six 
 legs, and little hooks at the end, instead of 
 hoofs ; the oddest thing of all was that the 
 horns were not on its head, but at the other 
 end of its body, where the tail would have 
 been, if it had had a tail like any other cow ; 
 the horns are hollow tubes, and it is out of 
 them that the milk comes, a drop at a time. 
 The milk is meant for the little plant-lice to 
 suck before they are old enough to hook 
 their six legs on to stalks and leaves, and 
 
MY ANT S COW. 53 
 
 feed on sap. But I think that in any place 
 where there are many of my Ant s race, the 
 little plant-lice must fare as badly as poor 
 little calves do when men shut them up 
 away from their mothers ; for the Ants are 
 so fond of this milk that sometimes they 
 carry off whole herds of the plant-lice and 
 shut them up in chambers in their houses, 
 and feed them as we do cows in barns, and 
 go and milk them whenever they please. 
 
 "Oh, dear Ant," said I to my Ant, "do 
 pray milk your cow ! I have such a desire 
 to see how you do it." 
 
 She did not appear to understand me, 
 and I dare say if she had she would not have 
 clone it any sooner. But presently I saw 
 her go up behind her cow, and begin to tap 
 her gently on her back, just at the place 
 where the horns grew out. The cow did 
 not look round nor stop eating, but in a 
 moment out came a tiny drop of liquid from 
 
54 SITS OF TALK. 
 
 the tip of each tube ; my Ant picked it up 
 with her wonderful horns and whisked it 
 into her mouth as quick as you would a 
 sugar-plum. Then she went on to the next 
 cow and milked that in the same manner, 
 and then a third one ; she took only two 
 drops from each one. Perhaps that is all 
 that this kind of cow can give at a time. 
 However, I think that for my Ant to take 
 that one drop at a mouthful was about the 
 same in proportion to her size that it would 
 be for us to take a gallon at a swallow. So 
 after all, by milking her own cow and two of 
 her neighbors , she made quite a respectable 
 meal. There were several of her friends 
 there at the same time doing their milking ; 
 and I could not help thinking how easy it 
 would be for the great herd of cows to kill 
 my Ant and all her race, if they chose. 
 But it is thought by wise people who have 
 studied these wonderful things that the cows 
 
MY ANTS COW. 55 
 
 are fond of being milked in this way, and 
 would be sorry to be left alone by them 
 selves. 
 
 After my Ant had finished her supper, she 
 stood still watching the co\vs for some time. 
 I thought perhaps she would be in a better 
 humor after having had so much to eat, and 
 might possibly feel like talking with me. 
 But I was determined not to speak first. 
 So I sat still and tried to look as if I did 
 not care whether she spoke or not, for I 
 have observed that that is the surest way to 
 make sullen and contrary people talk. But 
 she never once opened her mouth, though I 
 think I sat there a good hour and a half. 
 At last it began to grow dark, and as I had 
 quite a long walk to take, I knew I must 
 go, or I should not get home in time for my 
 own supper of milk. 
 
 , "Good-night, Ant," said I. "I have had 
 a charming visit. I am very much obliged 
 
56 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 to you indeed for showing me your cow. I 
 think she is the most wonderful creature I ever 
 saw. I should be very happy to see you at 
 my house." 
 
 " Humph 1 " said my Ant. 
 
8T. MABTIXTS CLOAK. 57 
 
 ST. MARTIN S CLOAK. 
 
 OT. MARTIN was a soldier 
 
 Of Constantino the Great ; 
 While yet he was a stripling 
 
 He bore full armor s weight ; 
 He fought right well and valiantly ; 
 
 No worse because he prayed ; 
 His comrades sometime scoffed at him, 
 
 When the cross s sign he made. 
 But they loved him in their hearts, 
 
 And revered his saintly life, 
 And felt safer with him close to them, 
 
 In the thickest of the strife. 
 
 They tell a many tales of him ; 
 
 His generosity ; 
 His love for all the poor ; his deeds 
 
 Of gracious charity ; 
 Above them all, this one is sweet 
 
 And wonderful to read, 
 And holds a tender lesson 
 
 For us to learn and heed. 
 
$8 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 Oh if we lived to-day, as lived 
 Those blessed ancient saints, 
 
 This world of ours less full would be 
 Of weeping and complaints. 
 
 One dreadful winter, when the cold 
 
 Was so bitter that it killed 
 Men on the streets, and, spite of fires, 
 
 In houses they were chilled, 
 St. Martin went one morning 
 
 To pass the city s gate, 
 And there he saw a ragged man, 
 
 Whose pitiable state 
 So moved Ms heart, that in a trice 
 
 He drew his good broadsword, 
 And cut his warm fur cloak in two 
 
 Without a single word, 
 And threw the beggar-man one-half; 
 
 Then in the other, clad 
 But meagrely, he rode all day 
 
 Half frozen, but most glad. 
 
 At night, St. Martin dreamed a dream, 
 Such dreams as angels bring ; 
 
 They led him in his dream to Heaven, 
 To see a wondrous thing. 
 
ST. MARTIN S CLOAK. 59 
 
 He saw the Good Lord walking 
 
 Along the golden street, 
 "With angels crowding round him, 
 
 On silver pinions fleet ; 
 And lo, upon his shoulders 
 
 A wrap of fur he bore, 
 The self-same wrap of fur which matched 
 
 The half St. Martin wore! 
 
 And turning to the angels, 
 
 "With smile, the Good Lord said, 
 " Now do ye know, my angels, 
 
 Who thus hath me array d? 
 My servant Martin hath done this, 
 
 Though he is unbaptized, 
 And dreameth not his charity 
 
 By me is known and prized." 
 
 The next day, while the vision 
 
 Glowed within him like a flame, 
 Young Martin sought a holy priest, 
 
 "Who baptized him in God s name. 
 And after that, for thirty years 
 
 He fought the Emperor s fights 
 As one whose eye and hand are nerved 
 
 By Heaven s sounds and sights. 
 
60 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 RUNNA RIG. 
 
 THE NAUGHTY FAIRY WHO PLAYED WITH FIRE. 
 
 /^~\NE cold night in March, when the wind 
 blew wildly and shook the windows, I 
 sat alone in a small garret-room, which was 
 lit only by one candle. The candle had 
 burned nearly out ; not more than two inches 
 of it was left, and that did not stand very 
 firmly in the candlestick. The room was 
 cold and seemed quite dark. I was thinking 
 of some one whom I loved so much, that 
 while I thought the tears came into my eyes. 
 It is very strange, but when our eyes are 
 full of tears of love, we can see more clearly 
 than at any other time. Sometimes I think 
 that if we always looked through such tears 
 
KUNNA EIG. 6 1 
 
 we could see into Heaven, but this night I 
 only got a peep into Fairy Land. 
 
 As I looked steadily at the flame of the 
 caudle, I suddenly observed, for the first 
 time in my life, how tall and stiff the round 
 black wick stood up in the middle of it. 
 The flame was nearly an inch high, shaped 
 like an arched gate, blue, and looked almost 
 solid at bottom, pale yellow, and quite trans 
 parent at top ; the slender black thread of 
 the burning wick came half-way to the top 
 of the arch, and stood firm as a little ebony 
 soldier, while the blaze swayed about it. I 
 blew the flame gently, and then harder, but 
 the small black figure did not stir. As I 
 looked at it more carefully, I saw that it had 
 a head. The longer I looked, the darker 
 the room grew, and at last I lost sight of 
 the candlestick, table, everything except the 
 arch of fire, with a patient, erect little figure 
 in the centre of it, looking directly at me 
 
62 SITS OF TALK. 
 
 out of two bright red eyes. I thought 
 it was very odd that I had never noticed 
 before how much the wicks of candles looked 
 like tiny black boys. "While I was won 
 dering if they always looked so, the figure 
 tottered, and I took up the snuffers to snuff 
 the candle. 
 
 Think how I jumped, when out of the 
 little bit of a black head came a little bit of 
 a voice, crying: 
 
 "Oh ! don t cut me off! don t cut me off ! " 
 
 Of course I knew at once that it must be 
 a fairy, but I thought to myself, I won t be 
 afraid while he speaks English ; so I said : 
 
 "No, indeed, you funny little manikin, I 
 won t cut you off; however, if I don t, you ll 
 tumble down in a minute into this boiling 
 fat, and that will be worse than to be 
 jammed in the hinges of the snuffers. But 
 how did you ever get into the candlewick, 
 
RUNNA EIG. 63 
 
 and don t you very much dislike being 
 there?" 
 
 "Oh, dear! I think I do," said he; "but 
 unless } 7 ou can contrive to prop me up, I 
 shall not have time to tell you anything, and 
 I would like to tell you who I am and how I 
 came here." 
 
 I propped the wick up as well as I could 
 with the snuffers and two sticks, so that 
 I thought it would last long enough for 
 such a mite of a fairy to tell all he knew, 
 and then I begged him to use short words, 
 and skip all about the time when he was a 
 baby, and perhaps he could get through. 
 His voice was a droll little voice, finer than 
 the finest squeak you ever heard from a 
 kitten. I had to listen with all my might 
 to understand what he said, and in spite 
 of all my pains, I now and then lost a 
 word. It was queer that such a little thread 
 of a voice could sound like crying, but it 
 
64 SITS OF TALK. 
 
 really did, and the melting wax of the 
 candle bubbled round his feet, too, which 
 made it all the harder to hear him. I shall 
 tell his story to you in his own words, 
 for they are much better than mine would 
 be: 
 
 The Fairy s Story. 
 
 "My name is Eunna Rig, and that in fairy 
 language means mischief. I have always 
 thought that if I had only been called by 
 some other name, I should never have got 
 into any trouble, for my brother Taik Tyme 
 and my sister Nevva Dew Raung have 
 always lived peaceably and in comfort, but 
 I have never done anything but mischief 
 since I was born, and I have had more 
 punishments than I could tell you. This 
 one I am bearing now, however, is so much 
 worse than any of the others, that they all 
 look like play to me as I remember them. 
 
BUNNA.RIG. 65 
 
 When I tell you the cause of this one, 
 you will not think it too severe. I my 
 self own that it is just. If I had been in 
 the Queen s place, I would have made it 
 harder still ; though I am sure I don t know 
 what could be harder," groaned the poor 
 little fellow. " Do you suppose you have 
 the slightest idea how hot it is in here ? But 
 I must make haste and tell you what it was 
 that I did. 
 
 "One clay, as my brother and I were 
 taking a nap on a burdock-leaf, we were 
 waked up by a loud noise. We ran in great 
 fright to the top of the tallest stem of the 
 burdock, and there we saw at a little dis 
 tance two human children, with small pine- 
 sticks in their hands, tipped with something 
 bright yellow, which shone in the sun. 
 These sticks they struck with great force 
 against a rock, and immediately there fol 
 lowed a tremendous noise, and a great fire 
 
66 SITS OF TALK. 
 
 which lit up the whole place, while the 
 blazing bits of yellow stone fell on all 
 sides. My brother was too frightened to 
 speak, but I thought it the most beautiful 
 sight I had ever seen, and I longed to have 
 a piece of the yellow stone myself, and see 
 what I could do with it. After the children 
 went away, we crept down, and found the 
 ground covered with small sparkling pieces 
 of the precious yellow. I begged Taik 
 Tyme to help me carry some of it home. 
 At first he would not have anything to do 
 with it, but finally consented, more to please 
 me than because he cared for it himself. 
 It is wonderful to see any being with so little 
 curiosity as my brother has. We collected 
 a great quantity of it, as much as we could 
 pile on a large plantain-leaf, which we lifted 
 carefully by the edges and carried home. 
 Just as we reached the edge of Periwinkle 
 Path, in which Tve lived, the weight of the 
 
EUNNA EIG. 67 
 
 yellow stone split the leaf, and it all fell 
 through to the ground, which gave us a, 
 great deal of trouble. At last we got it 
 safety hid under a bed of old red poppy- 
 leaves, where some strolling beggars had 
 slept the night before, and near which we 
 knew that no one would go. By this time 
 my brother had been made so ill by the 
 smell of the strange stuff, that he could not 
 eat any supper ; which was a dreadful pity, 
 for we had some rare mignonette honey, 
 which had been sent by my uncle, who is 
 High Steward to the Queen. 
 
 " I could not sleep all night for thinking 
 of my treasures, and planning how I should 
 make my experiments. It was a stormy 
 night, the wind blew like a hurricane, and 
 rocked the whole garden. Some neighbors 
 of ours, who had known no better than to 
 go to sleep in the upper story of a honey 
 suckle, were blown out of their beds just 
 
68 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 before morning. I was thankful that I had 
 thought to put some large stones on the 
 edges of the poppy-leaves to hold them 
 down ; afterward, I wished that I had not 
 done any such thing, and that they had all 
 blown away, yellow stones and all, in the 
 night. 
 
 "I was up before light, and ran to the 
 poppy-bed. All was safe. But now I could 
 not think of any way to fasten the yellow 
 stone to the ends of sticks, and I did not 
 dare to fire them off in any other way. 
 In despair, I called my bosom friend Kare- 
 fauaut, showed him my treasures, and told 
 him what I had seen the children do. 
 
 " Oh! I know all about that, said he. 
 It is something which comes on the end of 
 what they call matches. I have often seen 
 children playing with them. It is perfectly 
 splendid. How did you get it? But, bah I 
 
EUNNA RIG. 69 
 
 what an odor I It must be that human beings 
 have no sense of smell ! 
 
 "Finally, Karefanaut proposed that we 
 should put a piece of it on a flat stone, and 
 then let another stone fall on it from a great 
 height; that, he thought, would make it 
 explode. It was not easy to do this, but it 
 worked capitally. We lugged heavy stones, 
 almost as large as ourselves, up to the tops 
 of bushes, and threw them down on the 
 piece of yellow stone which we had arranged 
 below. Bang! Pop! off it went, and 
 sometimes a veiy little blaze and smoke 
 came with it. But the best part of all was 
 to see everybody run. Everybody thought 
 it came from the sky, and everybody began 
 to think that the world must be coming to 
 an end. For weeks, Karefanaut and I spent 
 all our time in this way. Nobody suspected 
 us ; in fact, the noises and smells were so 
 very queer that nobody could help believing 
 
70 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 that something dreadful must be going on in 
 the world, of which we knew nothing. The 
 two wisest men of the court, Digg Phoreva 
 and Peer Abaut, wrote treatises to prove 
 that the earth was getting too close to the 
 sun, and that we should all be burnt up in 
 six years. The Queen called a solemn, 
 secret council under the White Rose, to 
 decide whether we had not better all take 
 refuge with her brother, the King of the 
 Wood-mice. Nobody talked of anything 
 except these terrible sounds and smells, and 
 Karefanaut and I were ready to die a-laugh- 
 ing from morning till night. How little we 
 dreamed of the misery in store for us ! 
 
 "You may not think so, seeing me now," 
 continued the fairy, leaning sadly against 
 the snuffers, and bowing his little head 
 under the arch of flame; "but, really, Kare- 
 fauaut and I had a merry time of it as long 
 as the yellow stone held out. At last, we 
 
EUNNA EIG. 71 
 
 had used it all up except one large piece, 
 which was so heavy we could not move it. 
 This was a piece which Karefanaut had 
 found under the burdock ; he had harnessed 
 two beetles to it, and drawn it home in the 
 night: It was quite a rock, and we knew 
 would make a grand explosion. 
 
 "Finally, Karefanaut, who had a repu 
 tation as a student of science, gave out 
 that he was going to try some experiments 
 in distilling the juice of poppies, of which a 
 great deal was used in the Queen s nurseries 
 as soothing-syrup. So we built a tower in 
 the poppy-bed over our precious rock, and 
 carried up into the top of it many heavy 
 stones. The tower was so built that by 
 pulling out one board at the bottom, the 
 whole would fall. To this board we fastened 
 a strong chain, the end of which we carried 
 just under ground, a long way outside of 
 the garden. We knew better than to be 
 
72 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 very near when this explosion took place. 
 For some weeks, after all was ready, we 
 delayed. Karefanaut, for the ilrst time in 
 his life, was afraid, and I could do nothing 
 without him, as it took all the strength of 
 both to lift the chain. At last, he grew 
 ashamed of his fears, and hurried me off 
 one morning before I had finished my break 
 fast. 
 
 "The Queen was giving a grand enter 
 tainment in honor of the marriage of her 
 youngest daughter, Fli Fasta, to her cousin, 
 Heavi Stepp, from the seashore, and we 
 thought that, perhaps, the noise would not 
 be noticed so much when the court was all 
 agog about this. Alas ! what a mistake ! 
 
 " It was a long time before we could start 
 the chain , it seemed to have rusted in the 
 ground. At last it gave way so suddenly 
 that Karefanaut and I both fell over back 
 ward, and hurt ourselves severely. Between 
 
RUNNA RIG. 73 
 
 the pain of the fall and the frightful noise 
 which followed when the tower fell, we were 
 too frightened to stir, and lay on the ground 
 for an hour, looking at each other without 
 speaking a word. Then I said : 
 
 We may as well go home first as last, 
 I suppose/ 
 
 "No, said Karefanaut, I think not; the 
 longer we are away, the less likely we shall 
 be to be suspected. They will think that 
 the tower blew up of itself; and we can say 
 that we have been over in the fir-wood, 
 hunting. 
 
 " This seemed to me very good advice ; so 
 I bound up an ugly cut on my head with 
 clover-blossoms, and went to sleep on a tuft 
 of grass. I slept all day, for I was utterly 
 tired out. When I waked, Karefanaut had 
 gone. I did not know what to make of 
 this ; but I loved him too well to suspect 
 him of anything wrong. 
 
74 SITS OF TALK. 
 
 "I walked slowly toward home, growing 
 more and more unhappy and afraid at every 
 step. Alas ! my worst forebodings were 
 nothing. As soon as I reached the border 
 of the garden, I was seized by two of the 
 Queen s archers, who forbade me to speak, 
 and dragged me to prison. The next morn 
 ing I was taken before the Queen and all the 
 court, and learned that the cowardly and 
 faithless Karefanaut had hastened back be 
 fore me, to throw himself on their mercy 
 and confess all. He had sworn that I was 
 the contriver of the whole plot, and that 1 
 had forced him to help me by the most 
 dreadful threats. I scorned to accuse him in 
 turn, and received my sentence in silence. 
 When I heard of all the frightful ruin which 
 the explosion had caused, I was only too 
 thankful to get off with my life. 
 
 "The tower fell at noon, just as the court, 
 after a late breakfast, had dispersed for the 
 
RUNNA BIG. 75 
 
 amusements of the day. The young Prince 
 Heavi Stepp was swinging in the Grand 
 Fandango, which the Queen had created in 
 honor of his marriage. It was the most 
 magnificent one ever seen in our court. 
 The seats were made of white tiger-lilies, 
 and would hold eight persons. The ropes 
 were twisted of the shining threads spun by 
 black spiders, and there were five thousand 
 strands to a rope. At the moment of the 
 explosion, Prince Heavi Stepp had just 
 asked the Princess Fli Fasta to take her 
 seat in it with him ; but she was afraid, and 
 he had sprung in alone, to show her that 
 there was no danger. At that instant the 
 tower fell. The shock broke six of the 
 largest ropes, and threw the prince to the 
 ground. He was not killed, but his nose 
 and his right leg were broken, so that he 
 was lamed and disfigured for life. The 
 princess fainted from fright, and for many 
 
76 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 days the doctors thought she would die. 
 The Queen herself did not escape. She 
 was standing under a pink althea canopy, 
 which had been newly put up for her pavil 
 ion, when a piece of the blazing stone fell 
 through the top, utterly ruining the pink 
 silk and setting fire to the Queen s dress. A 
 carpenter rolled her up in some blankets of 
 mullein which happened to be lying there, 
 and this was all that saved her life. There 
 were more than twenty gold buttercup-boats 
 sailing in the basin of the fountain, filled 
 with the most beautiful ladies of the court. 
 These were all upset, and three of the maids of 
 honor were drowned. But the saddest thing 
 of all was the burning up of Moss Pink 
 Square. A blazing brand fell right in the 
 middle of it, and the houses were so light 
 and dry, and close together, that they burnt 
 like tinder. All the poor working-people 
 lived there, and they lost nearly everything. 
 
EUNNA EIG. 77 
 
 Orl Twistliup, the court tailor, in trying to 
 save the Prince Heavi Stepp s wedding-coat, 
 which was in a closet in his shop, was so 
 badly burned, that he will never be able to 
 sew again. Poor little Utta Trimkiu, dress 
 maker to the Queen, lost all the rare and 
 beautiful cloths which she had bought to 
 make up for the wedding ; and some of them 
 could not be replaced, because they were 
 bought of the glass-pedler, who deals with 
 the mermaids, and only comes once in a 
 hundred years. This was the thing I felt 
 worst of all about, for I knew Utta Trim- 
 kin very well, and she was a dear little thing. 
 I felt very sadly, too, about the Princess Fli 
 Fasta s favorite brown caterpillar. She had 
 just ridden him up to the Fandango, and 
 fastened him to a plantain-leaf. He was 
 the only creature in all the Queen s stables 
 that the Princess Fli Fasta dared to mount. 
 Whether he was hit by a piece of the burn- 
 
78 BITS OF TALE:. 
 
 ing stone, or died of fright, could not be 
 told; but he rolled over in a bail, and they 
 found him stiff and dead. 
 
 "Now, you will not think our gracious 
 Queen was too severe in condemning me to 
 punishment by fire. I have not told you 
 one-half of the miseiy and distress which 
 my thoughtless act caused in her kingdom. 
 My punishment will have come to an end 
 long before their traces have disappeared. 
 
 "As soon as night comes, I am obliged to 
 take my place in a candlewick, and to stand 
 straight and still till the wick is so burned 
 that it falls of its own accord. If the wick 
 is snuffed, I have to begin again, and this 
 makes it almost more than I can bear. For 
 this reason, I have learned to look for 
 candles in garret-rooms like this, where 
 poor people live, for they very seldom snuff 
 their candles. 
 
 "My sentence said that I must do this for 
 
RUNNA EIG. 79 
 
 two hundred years, that is, about twenty 
 years of your time. Only one hundred and 
 fifty years have gone ; but I have great 
 hopes of being pardoned soon. The Queen 
 is said to be much pleased with my patience, 
 and a petition has been sent to her for my 
 pardon. It cut me to the heart to hear that 
 Orl Twisthup and Utta Trimkin had both 
 signed it. 
 
 "As for Karefanaut, he has led a miser 
 able life. Everybody despises him, and I 
 would much rather be in my place than in 
 his. 
 
 "There is one thing which I have the 
 greatest curiosity to know, which, perhaps, 
 you can tell me, and that is what sort of 
 punishment human beings have when they 
 play with ma " 
 
 Phiz ! sputter ! over went the snuffers and 
 the sticks, down tumbled the wick. ? 
 jumped up with such a start that I knocks 
 
80 BITS OF TALK 
 
 the candlestick to the floor, and was left in 
 the dark ; and that is the end of the fairy 
 Eunna Rig s story. 
 
 Moral : Never snuff candles, and don t 
 play with fire. 
 
THE PALACE OF GONDOFORUS. 8 1 
 
 THE PALACE OF GONDOFOEUS. 
 
 A LEGEND OF ST. THOMAS. 
 
 "VT7HEN King Gondoforus desired 
 
 To have a palace built that should 
 Be finer than all palaces 
 "Which in the Roman Empire stood, 
 
 He sent his provost Abanes 
 To search the countries far and wide 
 
 For builders and for architects, 
 Whose skill and knowledge had been tried. 
 
 Then God unto St. Thomas said: 
 
 " Go, Thomas, now, and tell this king 
 
 That thou wilt build a palace which 
 Immortal fame to him shall bring." 
 
 
 Then to the saint, Gondoforus 
 
 Gave stores of silver and of gold, 
 And precious stones and jewels rich ; 
 Kought did the eager king withhold. 
 U 
 
82 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 " Now see thou build, O saint," he cried, 
 All proud and arrogant of mien 
 
 " Now see thou build right speedily 
 Such palace as was never seen I " 
 
 Then to far countries journeyed he 
 Two years and more he staid away ; 
 
 At other sovereigns palaces 
 All scornful gazing, he would say: 
 
 " St. Thomas, sent from God, doth build 
 
 For me a palace. God hath said 
 Its splendor an immortal fame 
 Upon my name and reign shall shed." 
 
 Gondoforus returned and sought 
 With eager haste his palace site ; 
 
 The field was bare as when he went, 
 The sod with peaceful daisies white ! 
 
 " What has the man called Thomas done 
 With all my gold? " he hotly cried. 
 
 " Given it all unto the poor," 
 
 The courtiers sneeringly replied. 
 
THE PALACE OF GONDOFORUS. 83 
 
 The king, in rage no words could tell, 
 
 St. Thomas into prison threw, 
 And racked his brains to think what he 
 
 For fitting punishment could do. 
 
 That very day, his brother died ; 
 
 His vengeance now must cool and wait ; 
 Until a royal tomb was built, 
 
 The royal corpse must lie in state. 
 
 Lo ! on the fourth day sat erect 
 The royal corpse, and cried aloud, 
 
 While all the mourners and the guards 
 Fled terror-stricken in a crowd ; 
 
 O king! O brother I listen now, 
 These four days I in Paradise 
 Have wander d, and return to tell 
 Thee what I saw with my own eyes. 
 
 " This man whom thou wouldst torture is 
 
 God s servant, dear to God s own heart. 
 Behold, the angels showed to me 
 A palace wrought with wondrous art, 
 
84 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 " Of silver, gold, and precious stones: 
 
 Most marvellously it did shine ; 
 And when I asked whose name it bore, 
 O brother I then they told me thine I 
 
 " St. Thomas this hath built, they said, 
 
 For one Gondoforus, a king. 
 * It is my brother I I exclaimed, 
 
 And fled to thee the news to bring." 
 
 Then fell the royal corpse again 
 Back, silent, solemn in its state ; 
 
 Until the royal tomb was built, 
 The royal corpse must lie and wait. 
 
 Oh ! swift the king the prison doors, 
 
 With his own hands, did open wide. 
 " Come forth I come forth ! O worthy saint I " 
 He, kneeling on the threshold, cried. 
 
 " The dead from heaven this day hath come, 
 
 To tell me how in Paradise 
 The palace thou hast built for me 
 Shines beautiful in angels eyes. 
 
THE PALACE OF GOXUOFOBUS. 85 
 
 " Come forth I coine forth! O noble saint! 
 
 And graciously forgive my sin. 
 As honored guest, my palace gates 
 Oh condescend to enter in I " 
 
 Then, smiling, said St. Thomas, calm 
 
 And gracious as an angel might : 
 " O king! didst thou not know that we 
 Build not God s palaces in sight 
 
 " Of men, nor from the things of earth? 
 
 All heaven lieth full and fair 
 "With palaces which charity 
 Alone can build, alone can share. 
 
 " Before the world began, were laid 
 
 Their bright foundations by God s hand, 
 For Charity to build upon, 
 As God and his son Christ had planned. 
 
 " No other palaces endure; 
 
 No other riches can remain ; 
 No other kingdoms are secure ; 
 No other kings eternal reign." 
 
86 SITS OF TALK. 
 
 Henceforth the king, Gondoforus, 
 "Went on his way, triumphant, glad, 
 
 Remembering what a palace he 
 Already in the heavens had. 
 
 No more the Roman emperors 
 With envy could his bosom move. 
 
 How poor their palaces by side 
 Of one not made with hands, above I 
 
 His treasures in the good saint s hands 
 He poured, and left for him to use, 
 
 In adding to that palace fair 
 Such courts and towers as he might choose. 
 
 And there to-day they dwell, I ween, 
 With other saints and other kings ; 
 
 And roam with hosts of angels bright, 
 From place to place, on shining wings. 
 
TUE ANTS MONDAY DINNER. 8? 
 
 THE ANTS MONDAY DINNER. 
 
 T TOW did I know what the ants had for 
 dinner last Monday? Ha, it is odd 
 that I should have known, but I ll tell you 
 how it happened. 
 
 I was sitting under a big pine-tree, high 
 up on a high hill-side. The hill-side was 
 more than seven thousand feet above the 
 sea, and that is higher than many mountains 
 which people travel hundreds of miles to 
 look at. But this hill-side was in Colorado, 
 so there was nothing wonderful in being so 
 high up. I had been watching the great 
 mountains with snow on them, and the great 
 forests of pine-trees miles and miles of 
 them so close together that it looks as if 
 you could lie down on their tops and not 
 fall through ; and my eyes were tired with 
 
88 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 looking at such great, grand things, so many 
 miles off; so I looked down on the ground 
 where I was sitting, and watched the ants 
 which were running about everywhere, as 
 busy and restless as if theyjatid the whole 
 world on their shoulders. 
 
 Suddenly I saw, under a tuft of grass, a 
 tiny yellow caterpillar, which seemed to be 
 bounding along in a very strange way. In 
 a second more, I saw an ant seize hold of 
 him and begin to drag him off. The cater 
 pillar was three times as long as the ant, 
 and his body was more than twice as large 
 round as the biggest part of the ant s body. 
 
 "Ho ! ho ! Mr. Ant," said I, "you needn t 
 think you re going to be strong enough to 
 drag that fellow very far." 
 
 Why, it was about the same thing as if you 
 or I should drag off a heifer, which was kick 
 ing and struggling for dear life all the time ; 
 only that the heifer hasn t half so many legs 
 
THE ANTS MONDAY DINNER. 89 
 
 to catch hold of things with as the cater 
 pillar had. Poor caterpillar ! how he did 
 try to get away ! But the ant never gave 
 him a second s time to take a good grip of 
 anything; audjie was cunning enough, too, 
 to drag him on his side, so that he couldn t 
 use his legs very well. Up and down, and 
 under and over stones and sticks ; in and 
 out of tufts of grass ; up to the very top of 
 the tallest blades, and then down again ; 
 over gravel and sand, and across bridges of 
 pine-needles from stone to stone ; backward 
 all the way but for all I could see, just 
 as swiftly as if he were going headforemost 
 ran that ant, dragging the caterpillar 
 after him. I watched him very closely, 
 thinking, of course, he must be making for 
 his house. Presently, he darted up the 
 trunk of the pine-tree. 
 
 w Dear me ! " said I, " ants don t live in 
 trees ! What does this mean ? " 
 
9O BITS OF TALK. 
 
 The bark of the tree was all broken and 
 jagged, and full of seams twenty times as 
 deep as the height of the ant s body. But 
 he didn t mind ; down one side and up the 
 other he went. They must have been awful 
 chasms to him ; and to the poor caterpillar 
 too, for their sharp edges caught and tore his 
 skin, and doubled him up a dozen ways in a 
 minute. And yet the ant never once stopped 
 or went a bit slower. I had to watch very 
 closely, not to lose sight of him altogether. 
 I began to think that he was merely trying 
 to kill the caterpillar; that, perhaps, he 
 didn t mean to eat him, after all. Perhaps 
 he was merely a gentlemanly sportsman ant, 
 out on a frolic. How did I know but some 
 ants might hunt caterpillars, just as some 
 men hunt deer, for fun, and not at all be 
 cause they need food ? If I had been sure 
 of this, I would have spoiled Mr. Ant s 
 sport for him very soon, you may be sure, 
 
THE ANT& MONDAY DINNER. 91 
 
 and set the poor caterpillar free. But I 
 never heard of an ant s being cruel ; and if 
 it were really for dinner for his family that 
 he was working so hard, I thought he ought 
 to be helped, and not hindered. Just then 
 my attention was diverted from him by a 
 sharp cry overhead. I looked up, and there 
 was an enormous hawk, sailing round in 
 circles, with two small birds flying after 
 him, pouncing down on his head, and then 
 darting away, and all the time making shrill 
 cries of fright and hatred. I knew very 
 well what that meant. Mr. Hawk was also 
 out trying to do some marketing for his 
 dinner ; and he had his eye on some little 
 birds in their nest ; and there were the 
 father and mother birds driving him away. 
 You wouldn t have believed two such little 
 birds could have driven off such a big crea 
 ture as the hawk, but they did. They 
 seemed to fairly buzz round his head as flies 
 
92 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 do round a horse s head, and at last he 
 just gave up and flew off so far that he 
 vanished in the blue sky, and the little 
 birds came skimming home again into the 
 wood. 
 
 "Well, well," said I, " the little people are 
 stronger than the big ones, after all ! Where 
 has my ant gone ? " 
 
 Sure enough ! It hadn t been two minutes 
 that I had been watching the hawk and the 
 birds, but in that two minutes the ant and 
 the caterpillar had disappeared. At last I 
 found them, whei^e do you think? In a 
 fold of my water-proof cloak, on which I 
 was sitting ! The ant had let go of the 
 caterpillar, and was running round and round 
 him, perfectly bewildered ; and the cater 
 pillar was too near dead to stir. I shook 
 the fold out, and as soon as the cloth lay 
 straight and smooth, the ant fastened his 
 nippers in the caterpillar again, and started 
 
THE ANTS 1 MONDAY DINNER. 93 
 
 off as fast as ever. I suppose if I could 
 have seen his face, and had understood the 
 language of ants features, I should have 
 seen plainly written there, "Dear me, what 
 sort of a country was that I tumbled into, 
 so frightfully black and smooth?" By this 
 time the caterpillar had had the breath pretty 
 well knocked out of his body, and was so 
 limp and helpless that the ant was not afraid 
 of his getting away from him. So he stopped 
 a second now and then to rest. Sometimes 
 he would spring on the caterpillar s back, 
 and stretch himself out there ; sometimes he 
 would stand still on one side and look at 
 him sharply, keeping one nipper on his head. 
 All the time, though, he was working steadily 
 in one direction ; he was headed for home 
 now, I felt very certain. It astonished me 
 veiy much at first, that none of the ants he 
 met took any notice of him ; they all went 
 on their o\vn way, and never took so much 
 
94 SITS OF TALK. 
 
 as a sniff at the caterpillar. But pretty soon 
 I said to myself, 
 
 "You stupid woman, not to suppose that 
 ants can be as well behaved as people ! 
 When you passed Mr. Jones yesterday, you 
 didn t peep into his market-basket, nor touch 
 the big cabbage he had under his arm." 
 
 Presently, the ant dropped the caterpillar, 
 and ran on a few steps I mean inches to 
 meet another ant who was coming towards 
 him. They put their heads close together 
 for a second. I could not hear what they 
 said, but I could easily imagine, for they 
 both ran quickly back to the caterpillar, 
 and one took him by the head and the other 
 by the tail, and then they lugged him along 
 finely. It was only a few steps, however, 
 to the ant s house ; that was the reason he 
 happened to meet this friend just coming 
 out. The door was a round hole in the 
 ground, about as big as my little finger. 
 
THE ANTS MONDAY DINNER. 95 
 
 Several ants were standing in the door-way, 
 watching these two come up with the cater 
 pillar. They all took hold as soon as the 
 caterpillar was on the door-step, and almost 
 before I knew he was fairly there, they had 
 tumbled him down, heels over head, into 
 the ground, and that was the last I saw of 
 him. 
 
 The oddest thing was., how the ants came 
 running home from all directions. I don t 
 believe there was any dinner-bell rung, 
 though there might have been one too fine 
 for my ears to hear; but in less than a 
 minute, I had counted thirty-three ants run 
 ning down that hole. I fancied they looked 
 as hungry as wolves. 
 
 I had a great mind to dig down into the 
 hole with a stick, and see what had become 
 of the caterpillar. But I thought it wasn t 
 quite fair to take the roof off a man s house 
 to find out how he cooks his beef for dinner ; 
 
96 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 so I sat still awhile, and wondered whether 
 they would lay him out straight on the floor, 
 and all stand in rows each side of him and 
 nibble across, and whether they would leave 
 any for Tuesday ; and then I went home to 
 my own dinner. 
 
THE NEST 97 
 
 THE NEST. 
 
 T TNDER the apple-tree, somebody said, 
 Look at that robin s nest overhead I 
 All of sharp sticks, and of mud and clay 
 What a rough home for a summer day ! " 
 Gaunt stood the apple-tree, gaunt and bare, 
 And creaked in the winds which blustered there. 
 The nest was wet with the April rain ; 
 The clay ran down in an ugly stain ; 
 Little it looked, I must truly say, 
 Like a lovely home for a summer day. 
 
 Up in the apple-tree, somebody laughed, 
 Little you know of the true home-craft. 
 Laugh if you like, at my sticks and clay ; 
 They ll make a good home for a summer day. 
 .May turns the apple-tree pink and white, 
 Sunny all day. and fragrant all night. 
 My babies will never feel the showers, 
 For rain can t get through these feathers of ours. 
 Snug under my wings they will cuddle and creep, 
 The happiest babies awake or asleep," 
 Said the robin-mother, flying away 
 After more of the sticks and mud and clay. 
 7 
 
98 BITS OF TALlL. 
 
 Under the apple-tree somebody sighed, 
 "Ah me, the blunder of folly and pride! 
 The roughest small house of mud or clay 
 Might be a sweet home for a summer day, 
 Sunny and fragrant all day, all night, 
 "With only good cheer for fragrance and light ; 
 And the bitterest storms of grief and pain 
 Will beat and break on that home in vain, 
 "Where a true-hearted mother broods alway, 
 And makes the whole year like a summer day.* 
 
FESTIVAL OF SAN EUSTACHIO. 99 
 
 THE FESTIVAL OF SAN EUSTACHIO 
 IN KOME. 
 
 nnHE little children in Rome do not get 
 their holiday-presents on Christmas; 
 they have them almost two weeks later, on 
 the sixth of January. This is because the 
 Roman Catholics think that was the day on 
 which the wise men brought their gifts to 
 the babe Christ Jesus, in the stable in 
 Bethlehem. And they do not say, as the 
 Germans do, that the dear little Christ-child 
 brings the presents ; or, as we do, that jolly 
 Santa Claus comes riding round in the 
 air, above the chimney-tops, and drops the 
 presents down. They tell quite a gloomy 
 story about an old woman they call the 
 Bifana. They say that when the wise men 
 went by her house, carrying the presents 
 
100 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 to the baby Jesus, somebody called to her 
 to coine to the window and see them ; but 
 she said she was too busy to stop, she would 
 see them when they came back. But the 
 wise men, you know, went out of Judea by 
 another road ; and the story says, that to 
 this day the old woman is watching, watch 
 ing for the wise men to come back ; and as 
 often as Twelfth Night comes round she has 
 to fly over the earth, carrying the presents 
 to the children. To the good children she 
 gives nice things ; but to the bad ones, only 
 bags of ashes. I always felt very sorry for 
 the poor little Roman children, to think 
 that they did not hear about the beautiful 
 Christ-kindchen, or our good St. Nicholas. 
 However, they have a very good time out of 
 their "Ekifania," which is the name they 
 give the festival ; and I will tell you about 
 the place where most of the presents are 
 sold. 
 
FESTIVAL OF SAN ESTACl. lOI 
 
 It is in the square of SanTCustachfo i whic n 
 is almost in the middle of Rome, and very 
 near the Pantheon. 
 
 For three hundred and fifty-five days in the 
 year this square, or " piazza," as it is called in 
 Italian, is quite dull and dingy-looking, and 
 has only a few common shops and little 
 booths on the side of the street, where 
 common wares are sold. But for ten days 
 before Twelfth Night, it is so full of booths, 
 and stalls, and shelves, and piles of things 
 to be sold, that one cannot drive through it. 
 Here come all the Roman fathers and mothers 
 who are not very rich ; they bring their 
 children and buy presents for them. 
 
 The rich people go to fine shops on the 
 Corso, which is the Broadway of Rome, and 
 buy much handsomer things ; but I do not 
 believe their children have half such fun as 
 the little children do who can go into the 
 square of San Eustachio at night. 
 
102 SITS OF TALK. 
 
 <3ne Winter*! wont myself, with a Roman 
 girl, whose name was Marianina. She was 
 our servant, and she was seventeen years old, 
 and she went to take care of me ; but I felt 
 all the time as if I had a child with me who 
 was about nine. She enjoyed it so much, and 
 laughed so hard all the time, that I liked it 
 much better being alone with her, and trying 
 to make believe that I was another Roman 
 girl, than I should to have gone with people 
 of my own race. 
 
 It w r as a bitter cold night. The Tra 
 Montana (that is the Roman name for the 
 wind that comes down from the mountains) 
 blew furiously ; but Marianina had nothing 
 on her head, only a little shawl over her 
 shoulders, and no gloves on her hands. She 
 never had anything on her head in her life, 
 unless, perhaps, a white pocket-handkerchief; 
 all the poor women in Rome go bareheaded* 
 
 Our house was in the Via Quattro Fontane. 
 
FESTIVAL OF SAN EUSTACHIO. 103 
 
 Is not that a pretty name? It means the 
 street of the Four Fountains; and there 
 really were four fountains in it. Up at top 
 of the hill, above our house, where another 
 street crossed, a fountain was set in each 
 corner, with a great dusty old stone statue 
 lying behind it, that looked as if it had lain 
 there for hundreds of years. The hill was 
 so steep that I never liked to see horses 
 drawing a carriage up it ; almost every day 
 some poor horse tumbled down on his knees 
 trying to get up. The streets in Rome are 
 all paved with little bits of lava, which are 
 very slippery. So I said to Marianina on 
 this night : "We will walk down to the 
 Barberini Piazza, and get into a little carriage 
 there ; I will not have a horse come up this 
 steep hill to-night." 
 
 The Barberini Piazza was a square at the 
 foot of our hill, and all day ten or twelve 
 little one-horse carriages stood there, wait- 
 
104 mTS OF TALK. 
 
 ing to be hired. When the drivers saw ua 
 coming down, they would all spring up on 
 their seats, and whip their horses, and drive 
 right at us, like an army making a charge, 
 holding up their whips, and shouting out, 
 "Signora, this is a good horse, this is a 
 good carriage, Signora," till sometimes we 
 were afraid of being run over. At last, I 
 made a rule that I would never take any one 
 who drove after me, and when they found 
 that out, they were more quiet. This night, 
 there was only one poor little carriage stand 
 ing there ; and the horse was so thin and 
 weak, he looked as if he were just ready to 
 die. Marianina looked at me with a very 
 sad face ; she was afraid I would not be 
 willing to go in such a shabby carriage ; 
 but I jumped in, and Marianina sang out to 
 the driver, " Go to the Piazza San Eustachio, 
 as fast as you can ; " and then she laughed 
 out loud in spite of herself, she was so 
 
FESTIVAL OF SAN EUSTACHIO. 105 
 
 pleased. She had never been out to the 
 Twelfth Night Festa before. 
 
 The poor old horse did not draw us very 
 far. He had not gone more than two-thirds 
 of the way before he slipped down flat, and 
 could not get up. The driver began to beat 
 him cruelly ; but I sprang out, and gave the 
 man a small piece of money, and told him 
 as well as I could, in my bad Italian, that he 
 was a cruel man not to give his poor horse 
 more to eat. What do you think he said? 
 "Ah! Siguora, he has more to eat than 1 
 have ! " 
 
 Then I took tight hold of Marianina s 
 hand, and we walked along with the crowd. 
 Everybody was going toward San Eustachio. 
 The crowd was pretty thick, even so far off 
 as this ; but it was no crowd at all in com 
 parison with what it was when we got into 
 the square itself. At first I was a little 
 frightened. I did not like being pushed on 
 
106 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 all sides at orlce, and having one boy blow a 
 great whistle in one of my ears, while another 
 flapped a great monkey-jack up and down 
 under my nose. But, in a few minutes, I 
 saw that they were all just as good-natured 
 as they could be, and that there really was 
 not the slightest danger of getting hurt ; so 
 I gave- up minding about being pushed, 
 and then I had as good a time as Marianina. 
 I wish I could tell you half the things that 
 were there to be sold in those queer little 
 out-door shops, with flaring tallow candles 
 or smoking oil-lamps to see by. Every 
 thing you have ever seen in a toy-shop in 
 New York was there ; but of course not so 
 nicely made. There were stalls full of 
 games ; stalls full of books, and portfolios, 
 and stationery of all sorts ; great piles and 
 pyramids of baskets, with candles burning 
 away at top of them, which it made you 
 shudder to see, it would be so easy for 
 
FESTIVAL OF SAN EUSTACHIO. 107 
 
 one upset to kindle the whole in a blaze ; 
 stalls of crockery ; stalls of woollen scarfs, 
 and mittens, and comforters ; stalls of plaster 
 images ; stalls of cheap jewelry ; stalls of 
 pictures of the Madonna and all the saints ; 
 stalls of lamps ; stalls of combs ; stalls of 
 tin- ware, and stalls of iron ; baby-houses, 
 and theatres, and fiddles, and donkeys on 
 wheels, and horses with tails made out of 
 hen s feathers, and noses painted blue, oh ! 
 how they would have made you laugh ! The 
 prettiest stalls were the stalls of dolls ; some 
 of them were arranged in rows of shelves, 
 one above another, high up in the air, on 
 which the dolls stood up, packed closely 
 side by side, as close as sardines in a 
 box. There were so many rows that the 
 upper row seemed almost out of sight, way 
 up in the dark. Others, who could not 
 afford to have nice wooden shelves, had 
 stuck two poles into the ground, and swung 
 
108 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 cords across from pole to pole, and tied 
 their dolls by the necks on these cords ; 
 there they swung back and forth, the poor 
 hung dollies, and looked very uncomfortable. 
 In front of the rows of dolls were rows of 
 drums, and on the drums were bells ; but 
 nobody could tell me why drums and bells 
 always went with the dolls. 
 
 Then there were other people with things 
 to sell, who could not afford even two poles 
 and a string, so they spread theirs down on 
 the ground, and had a few bits of candles 
 stuck in tins to light up their show. It 
 proved how good-natured the Italians are, 
 that this whole crowd took the greatest pos 
 sible pains to turn out for these poor little 
 spreads of things, and never trod on them. 
 I noticed one old woman sitting flat on the 
 stones, by a dozen or two crockery plates ; 
 one boy with a few gay-colored cotton band- 
 
FESTIVAL OF SAN EUSTACHIO. 109 
 
 kerchiefs spread out on the pavement, and 
 another with a row of photograph albums. 
 
 Very many had large wooden trays swung 
 by a string round their necks, and loaded so 
 full of things that it would seem as if the 
 first step in such a crowd would spill them 
 all, but I did not see a single one tip over. 
 One boy had his tray full of salt-cellars, 
 and glass and china ; others had funny fig 
 ures and toys ; others carried long sticks 
 strung full of a sort of jumble-cake, which 
 the Romans call "giambelli," and are very 
 fond of eating. 
 
 Now, I have left to the last the oddest thing 
 of all about this crowd ; almost every man 
 and boy in it had a whistle, or a trumpet, 01 
 a horn, or a drum, or a rattle, and blew, and 
 rattled, and beat, and screamed with all his 
 might, till the noise was something which 
 could not be described. What with the 
 rattles, and whistles, and drums, and horns, 
 
HO BITS OF TALK. 
 
 and everybody s shouting and laughing, yon 
 could not hear yourself speak. You must 
 not think it was only boys who did this ; 
 grown-up men liked it just as much, and 
 blew and screamed quite as loud ; neither 
 was it confined to the Romans. Every 
 now and then, I met a party of English or 
 American people who had come out to see, 
 and they were all blowing whistles and beat 
 ing drums, just like the rest. One young 
 gentleman whom I knew came up behind 
 me, and blew in my ear such a blast from a 
 great tin trumpet that I gave a jump, and 
 nearly knocked poor little Marianina down. 
 
 I forgot, too, to say that more than half of 
 the people carried torches ; and as some of 
 the stalls were set thick with rows of blazing 
 candles, it was as light as clay in some parts 
 of the square, and then, again, in others it 
 would be quite dark. 
 
 We went away at eleven o clock, for I 
 
FESTIVAL OF SAN EUSTACHIO. 1 1 r 
 
 was afraid to be there any later alone with 
 Marianina ; but the fun always lasts until 
 two or three o clock in the morning. Some 
 times, about midnight, the Roman nobility 
 go into the square to look on, and see how 
 the people amuse themselves. They used 
 to throw money into the crowd to see them 
 scramble for it, but they do not do that 
 now. 
 
 When Marianina left me to go to bed, she 
 kissed my hand and almost cried, she was 
 so grateful for the pleasure of seeing the 
 Festa, and for the few things I had bought 
 for her. 
 
 " G razzia, O grazzia, Signora mia. Felic- 
 issima notte ! " she said. I wonder if that 
 will sound as pleasantly printed as it sounds 
 when the affectionate Italian women say it. 
 It means, " Thanks, thanks, my lady I The 
 happiest of nights to you ! " 
 
112 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 COLOKADO SNOW-BIKDS. 
 
 T LL tell you how the snow-birds come, 
 
 Here in our Winter days ; 
 They make me think of chickens, 
 With their cunning little ways. 
 
 We go to bed at night, and leave 
 
 The ground all bare and brown, 
 And not a single snow-bird 
 
 To be seen in all the town. 
 
 But when we wake at morning 
 
 The ground with snow is white, 
 And with the snow, the snow-birds 
 
 Must have travelled all the night; 
 
 For the streets and yards are full of them, 
 
 The dainty little things, 
 With snow-white breasts, and soft brown heads, 
 
 And speckled russet wings. 
 
COLORADO SNOW-BIRDS. 113 
 
 Not here and there a snow-bird, 
 
 As we see them at the East, 
 But in great flocks, like grasshoppers, 
 
 By hundreds, at the least, 
 
 They push and crowd and jostle, 
 
 And twitter as they feed, 
 And hardly lift their heads up, 
 
 For fear to miss a seed. 
 
 What tis they eat, nobody seems 
 
 To know or understand ; 
 The seeds are much too fine to see, 
 
 All sifted in the sand. 
 
 But winds last Summer scattered them, 
 
 All thickly on these plains ; 
 The little snow-birds have no barns, 
 
 But God protects their grains. 
 
 They let us come quite near them, 
 
 And show no sign of dread; 
 Then, in a twinkling, the whole flock 
 
 Will flutter on ahead 
 
 8 
 
114 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 A step or two, and light, and feed, 
 And look demure and tame, 
 
 And then fly on again, and stop, 
 As if it were a game. 
 
 Some flocks count up to thousands, 
 I know, and when they fly, 
 
 Their tiny wings make rustle, 
 As if a wind went by. 
 
 They go as quickly as they come, 
 
 Go in a night or day ; 
 Soon as the snow has melted off, 
 
 The darlings fly away, 
 
 But come again, again, again, 
 All Winter, with each snow ; 
 
 Brave little armies, through the cold, 
 Swift back and forth they go. 
 
 I always wondered where they lived 
 
 In Summer, till last year 
 I stumbled on them in their home, 
 
 High in the upper air ; 
 
COLORADO SNOW-BIEDS. 1 1 5 
 
 Way up among the clouds it was, 
 
 A many thousand feet, 
 But on the mountain-side gay flowers 
 
 "Were blooming fresh and sweet. 
 
 Great pine-trees swaying branches 
 
 Gave cool and fragrant shade ; 
 And here, we found, the snow-birds 
 
 Their Summer home had made. 
 
 " Oh, lucky little snow-birds I " 
 We said, " to know so well, 
 In Summer time and Winter time, 
 Your destined place to dwell 
 
 " To journey, nothing doubting, 
 
 Down to the barren plains, 
 Where harvests are all over, 
 To find your garnered grains ! 
 
 ** Oh, precious little snow-birds! 
 
 If we were half as wise, 
 If we were half as trusting 
 To the Father in the skies, ^ 
 
Tl6 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 " He would feed us, though the harvests 
 
 Had ceased throughout the land, 
 And hold us, all our lifetime, * 
 In the hollow of his hand! " 
 
THE WATEE-WOEK8 OF HEILBEUN. 117 
 
 THE WATER-WORKS OF HEILBEUN. 
 
 THHE Chateau of Heilbrun is near Salz 
 burg, iu Austria. Chateau is only 
 another name for house, though it does 
 sound so grand. I have seen many chateaus 
 which made very pretty pictures when they 
 were photographed, but which were nothing 
 in the world but tumble-down old houses, 
 that we in America should not think nice to 
 live in. But this house of Heilbrun is quite 
 a good one, though it was built two hundred 
 and fifty years ago. It was built by an old 
 archbishop of Salzburg, whose name was 
 Marcus Sitticus. He must have been as 
 fond of playing with water as any boy in 
 America, I am sure ; for instead of spending 
 his money in building a handsome house, 
 he spent it on making all sorts of curious 
 
Il8 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 water-works on his grounds. On every 
 path and in every grove there are stone 
 statues of men, figures of dogs and of 
 horses, all of which are throwing water out 
 of their mouths as hard as they can. You 
 cannot walk ten steps without coming on 
 some new kind of thing either to hold water 
 or to spout water ; and there is so much 
 water dripping and trickling, and showering 
 about, that it seems as if you were out in a 
 rain. 
 
 But the most curious water-works are in a 
 part of the grounds which is kept locked 
 up, and under the care of a man called the 
 water-master. He keeps the keys, and 
 knows how to let on the water to make all 
 the machinery go. The day we went to 
 Heilbrun happened to be a w feast-day " for 
 the people (that is, a day on which they do 
 not work) . So we had the good luck to go 
 in with a crowd of poor workingmen and 
 
THE WATEE-WOEKS OF HEILBKUN. 119 
 
 women ; and it was almost as good fun to 
 see them as it was to see the water-works. 
 
 The water-master was a droll little man, 
 with a gray beard and a fat red face. He 
 never laughed; but his eyes twinkled, and 
 he watched us all the time to see what we 
 thought of his show. When he heard that 
 we were from America, he was very kind to 
 us, and took great pains to put us in good 
 places, where we could see well without 
 being wet. Everybody in Europe love? 
 America, because it is a free country. I 
 mean all the poor people do. I do not 
 wonder that so many of them come away 
 from their homes to live with us. I should 
 think they would all come, to get away from 
 the kings. 
 
 The first place the water-master took us 
 into was a great cave. It was so dark that 
 at first we could hardly see to walk. Then 
 in a few minutes it seemed to grow lighter, 
 
1 2O BITS OF TALK. 
 
 and we saw a great stone basin full of water. 
 Mosses and ferns were growing up around it, 
 and little fir-trees were set up against the side 
 of the cave. In this basin were a great red 
 lobster and a black dolphin, made of wood. 
 The water-master went into a corner and 
 touched some spring, and the lobster and 
 dolphin both began to sail round and round 
 in the basin as if they were alive. Sounds 
 like the singing of all sorts of birds came 
 from among the fir-trees ; and then came 
 the words rf cuckoo, cuckoo," just as plainly 
 as the cuckoo itself could have said it ; and 
 all this was done by machinery, which was 
 moved by the water. 
 
 Then we went to another cave ; and all 
 there was to be seen in this was a huge stone 
 face set in the wall, painted red and white, 
 like a mask, and with enormous black eyes. I 
 was just beginning to wonder what this could 
 mean ; when oh ! what a jump we all gave. 
 
THE WATEE-WOEKS OF HEILBEUN. 121 
 
 to see it suddenly roll up its eyes, open its 
 mouth, and show a fiery red tongue, which 
 caine out ever so far and turned up on the 
 nose, and then went back again into the 
 mouth. It was almost too ugly to look at ; 
 and yet it was very droll, for the eyes kept 
 rolling up and the red tongue running out 
 as fast as they could. The peasants all 
 shouted and screamed with delight; this 
 pleased them much more than the lobster 
 and dolphin. Then the water-master made 
 us all stand back on each side of the cave ; 
 and, before we could ask what for, out flew 
 little fine streams of water from all sides of 
 the cave, making it as wet in one minute as 
 if there had been a hard rain. Then, as the 
 peasants were going out of the cave, he 
 touched some other invisible springs, and 
 played jets of water right across the path 
 they were walking in. The water seemed 
 to come from the ground, from the grass, 
 
122 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 from the air, from everywhere. But he took 
 good care not to let it go on us ; the peasants 
 liked the fun of it, and only laughed. One 
 old woman got very wet, for she could not go 
 so fast as the others ; but she did not seem 
 to mind it. 
 
 Then he entered another gate ; and we 
 followed him through it into a pretty path, 
 with trees and flowers on the right-hand 
 side, and on the left-hand a narrow brook 
 of water. Its sides were straight, like the 
 sides of a candle ; but the water ran very 
 fast. On one side of this brook were built 
 five little stone houses, very much like dog 
 houses, only about twice as large ; and, 
 instead of having a low arched door in 
 front, the whole front side was open, so 
 that we could look in. 
 
 In the first one were a grindstone, and 
 two figures standing by it, a man and a 
 woman. The man held a knife, and the 
 
THE WATEE-WOEKS OF HEILBEUN. 123 
 
 woman had hold of the handle of the grind 
 stone. As soon as the water-master touched 
 a spring, the woman began to turn the grind 
 stone, and the man began to sharpen the 
 knife ; and there they stood, bending and 
 turning and sharpening away as hard as if 
 they were real live people. The brook ran 
 along in front, as quiet and innocent-looking 
 as if it hadn t anything in the world to do 
 with the man and the woman at the grind 
 stone ; and all the while it was a tiny stream, 
 forced up from the brook into the machinery 
 of their legs and arms, which kept them at 
 work. 
 
 The next house was a little grist-mill, 
 with all the wheels and stones and beams in 
 perfect imitation of a real one ; and the 
 miller, all dusty and white, standing by a 
 hopper, which turned swiftly round and 
 round, and let a fine stream of flour run out 
 
T24 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 into the mouth of the bag below. This was 
 the prettiest thing of all. 
 
 The next thing was intended to be very 
 solemn ; but it was only funny. There was 
 an imitation tree, with the figure of a man 
 tied to it. He was meant to look like one 
 of the old martyrs ; but he did not look 
 enough like a real man to look like a 
 martyr. Before him stood another figure 
 of a man, with a long spear in his hand. 
 He was the executioner. When the machin 
 ery was wound up, the executioners began 
 to stick the spear into the martyr s side ; 
 once in so many seconds the spear went in, 
 and once in so many seconds the spear came 
 out, and all this time the martyr never 
 stirred. This was so very different from 
 the way it would be with a real man being 
 killed, that it made us laugh more and more 
 the longer we looked at it. But the poor 
 men and women looked very sober; for 
 
THE WATEE-WOEKS OF HEILBEUN. 125 
 
 they thought it must be the representation 
 of some old saint who had been killed by 
 the heathen, and I am afraid they thought 
 we were wicked people to laugh. 
 
 Next came a little house which I am afraid 
 I cannot describe to you so that you will 
 seem to see it, it was so very strange. In 
 the middle was a little lake of water ; in the 
 lake, an island ; on the island, a rock ; fast 
 ened by chains to the rock, was the figure of 
 a woman. Then there was a thing meant 
 to be a sea-monster. It looked a little like 
 an elephant, a little like a grasshopper, a 
 little like a turtle ; but on the whole it did 
 not look like anything ! This monster came 
 sailing slowly round the island; and, just 
 as it got opposite the woman, and looked as 
 if it were going to bite her, a door flew 
 open, and out stepped the figure of a man in 
 armor, with a bright brass sword in his 
 hand. The sword gave a hack at the head 
 
126 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 of the monster ; but the monster sailed on 
 as if nothing had happened, and came round 
 again from behind the tree. Again the door 
 flew open, the man in armor stepped out, 
 the sword hacked at the monster s head ; 
 and so they kept on sailing round and hack 
 ing, and sailing round and hacking, till we 
 all laughed so we could hardly stand. The 
 peasants did not laugh so much, for they 
 did not understand it, and I dare say they 
 thought it must be a representation of a 
 saint being killed. But it was taken from 
 an old fable. The woman s name was An 
 dromeda ; and the story was that she was 
 bound to a rock, to be eaten up by a hor 
 rible monster, and a great hero came and 
 killed the monster, and set her free. 
 
 The next house was a pretty little dairy. 
 Pans of. milk and cream setting on the 
 shelves ; pats of butter in piles on plates ; 
 and a figure of a man churning with a wooden 
 
THE WATEE-WOEKS OF HEJLBEUN. 127 
 
 churn, which made a spattering noise quite 
 like a real churn. 
 
 This was the last of the little stone houses. 
 
 Now we came to the greatest curiosity of 
 all : a large chamber hollowed out in the 
 rock, and two great folding-doors on the side 
 toward the path. When these were thrown 
 open, there we saw in the centre of the 
 chamber a tower three stories high, full of 
 windows, and with galleries running around 
 it. This was meant, we thought, for a sort 
 of palace ; many men and women were look 
 ing out of the windows, and standing on the 
 galleries. 
 
 Around the walls of the chamber were 
 also galleries, with pillars at the front, and 
 divided off into rooms. In each room there 
 was a representation of some trade, or some 
 sort of store ; and men and women at work 
 at the trade, or selling goods in the store. 
 The floor of the chamber was crowded with 
 
128 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 figures as the streets of a city are ; in fact, 
 the whole thing was intended to represent a 
 town, with its inhabitants all engaged about 
 their business. 
 
 The water-master let us look at it for some 
 time before he set it in motion. Then he 
 went across the path to a high wooden box, 
 lifted up the lid, and did something with a 
 key, we could not see what; but in one 
 second every figure in the town began to 
 move. The people in the windows of the 
 tower turned their heads from side to side, 
 and looked as if they were talking with each 
 other. The King on the balcony took off 
 his hat and bowed to the people below. 
 The baker began to knead his bread ; the 
 shoemaker to hammer on his last; the 
 butcher knocked an ox on the head to kill 
 it ; the ox plunged down on its knees as if 
 dead, but got up on his legs in a half second, 
 all ready to be killed again when the time 
 
THE WATER-WORKS OF HEILBEUN. 129 
 
 cuine round. There was a tavern, with two 
 men sitting at dinner, and one of them 
 laughing so that he bent back almost double. 
 There was a beautiful little store, with silks 
 and ribbons and stockings and laces, all 
 hanging at the windows and in the door ; 
 and the storekeeper himself, standing on the 
 threshold, stretching out his hands to invite 
 the people to come in. There was an old 
 woman being wheeled about in a wheel 
 barrow ; and another old woman, funniest of 
 all, who was running wildly up and down in 
 the crowd, shaking her head and looking as 
 if she were crazy. Then there were brick 
 layers going up ladders, with hods full of 
 bricks on their shoulders ; carpenters upon the 
 roof of a house, hammering at the shingles ; 
 workmen with a derrick, lifting up stones. 
 In short, I might as well tell you that there 
 is nothing that you have ever seen workmen 
 doing in the streets of a city which this old 
 9 
 
130 SITS OF TALE:. 
 
 Marcus Sitticus, the Archbishop, had not 
 contrived to get into this great toy-house of 
 his. While these things were going on, 
 there was also music, like the music of an 
 organ, coming from nobody could see where ; 
 but it was made on some hidden instrument, 
 which was played by the water. Still the 
 little brook went trotting along at our feet, 
 as unconcerned as if it had no share in all 
 this wonderful machinery. 
 
 The peasants were quite silent while they 
 looked at this. Over the other things they 
 had laughed and shouted ; but this was too 
 mysterious for them. I think they were a 
 little afraid of it. I thought it very strange 
 they had not brought their little children 
 with them to see these things. There was 
 not a single child there. 
 
 The last sight of all was the most beautiful. 
 We went into another great dark cave ; and 
 here, on a round stone table, lay a gilt 
 
THE WA TEE- WORKS OF HEILBE UN. I j I 
 
 crown. Who could imagine what this had 
 to do with water-works? Presently the 
 crown rose slowly up in the air, though 
 nobody s hands touched it. The stone table 
 had holes in it, and through these holes five 
 streams of w&ter were being forced up, and 
 they lifted the crown. Higher and higher 
 and higher it went, until it reached nearly 
 the top of the cave; and there it hovered, 
 gently rising and falling on the top of the 
 shining fountain of water. Then the foun 
 tain slowly sank, lowering the crown, till it 
 lay on the table again. Three times we 
 saw it rise and fall, and each time it looked 
 more beautiful than before. The peasants 
 clapped their hands with delight, and so did 
 we. Then we gave the good-natured water- 
 master some money, and walked back through 
 the shady path, past the little town, and 
 the mill, and the dairy, and the martyr, 
 and Andromeda. They were all as still 
 
132 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 as midnight ; and the little figures looked 
 droller than ever, standing so quietly. Only 
 the crazy old woman, in the streets of the 
 little town, still shook her head ; and we 
 took the liberty of giving her a tap on 
 the cheek as we passed. 
 
 The water-master opened the gate for us, 
 and stood smiling and bowing his red face as 
 long as we were in sight. w Good-by, Kuhle- 
 born," said we ; but he did not know what 
 we meant ; and neither will you , unless you 
 ask some kind friend to tell you the beautiful 
 German story of Undine, who had an uncle 
 called Kuhleborn, that lived in the sea and 
 ruled all the brooks and rivers. 
 
MOKNING-GLOEY. 133 
 
 MORNING-GLORY 
 
 TT7ONDROUS interlacement I 
 
 Holding fast to threads by green and 
 silky rings, 
 With the dawn it spreads its white and purple 
 
 wings ; 
 
 Generous in its bloom, and sheltering while it 
 clings, 
 
 Sturdy morning-glory. 
 
 Creeping through the casement, 
 Slanting to the floor in dusty, shining beams, 
 Dancing on the door, in quick fantastic gleams 
 Comes the new day s light, and pours in tideless 
 streams, 
 
 Golden morning-glory. 
 
 In the lowly basement, 
 
 Rocking in the sun, the baby s cradle stands. 
 Now the little one thrusts out his rosy hands ; 
 Soon Ins eyes will open ; then in all the lands 
 
 No such morning-glory. 
 
134 BtTX OF TALK. 
 
 CHILDREN S PREACHING IN THE CHURCH 
 OF ARA CGELI, IN ROME. 
 
 A RA CGELI is the name of one of the 
 oldest churches in Koine. It is at the 
 top of a high hill, and to get to it you have 
 to go up a flight of more than a hundred 
 stone steps. These steps are as old as 
 Rome is, and Julius Caesar himself went up 
 them many a time ; for in his day there was 
 a temple to Jupiter where the church of Ara 
 Coeli now stands, and all the Roman em 
 perors and generals used to go there to give 
 thanks to Jupiter whenever they had a vic 
 tory. In this church the little Roman 
 children preach sermons, every afternoon, 
 from Christmas until Twelfth Night, and 
 once I heard a little girl preach there. As 
 I went up the long flight of stone stairs, I 
 
CHILDREN* S PEE A CHING IN E ONE. 1 3 5 
 
 passed many Eoman men and women sitting 
 there, with all sorts of odd and useless 
 things to sell, old bits of money, which 
 they pretended were ancient relics, and 
 pictures of saints, which they said would 
 keep me from all harm if I would only buy 
 them. At every step, somebody on my 
 right hand, or on my left, screamed out : 
 " O Signora ! see this fine picture for one 
 bnioccho " (that is about one cent) ; or, "O 
 Signora ! here is good luck for you and the 
 Sacred Heart of Mary, for one baioccho," 
 till I thought I should never get away from 
 them all. On the top step sat a poor 
 old beggar, such as one sees every day in 
 Rome, holding a tin box with a hole in it, 
 through which people drop money. The 
 beggars do not speak a word, but they 
 shake this box furiously as you pass them, 
 jingling the coin to let you hear how much 
 money other people have given them ; and it 
 
136 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 is strange how apt the sound of this money 
 is to make you think you will drop in a 
 little piece more. After I had given the 
 beggar a copper, I went into the church. I 
 remember that I got stuck fast in the 
 door, and a good-natured soldier helped me 
 through. This was not because I was too 
 big for the door ; but all the Eoman churches 
 have great thick leather curtains swung in 
 their doors, the door itself stands wide 
 open; but this great curtain, which is as 
 heavy as a mattress, and looks more like 
 one than like anything else, is hung from 
 the top of the doorway, like a second door, 
 and it takes a strong push to shove it in far 
 enough for a person to squeeze through the 
 opening. 
 
 Away down at one end of the church was 
 a large square table, covered with a red 
 cloth ; behind the table was a little step- 
 ladder leading up to it ; and round the table 
 
CHILDREN S PREACHING IN ROME. 137 
 
 had already gathered a large crowd of peo 
 ple. Presently a man came out of a side- 
 door, leading a little girl, who did not look 
 more than five years old. He helped her to 
 climb up on the table, and then he sat down 
 on the top step of the ladder, so as to be 
 near her. He was her father, and he was 
 very proud of her. The little girl ran into 
 the middle of the table, and made a funny 
 bow, something like the bows monkey-jacks 
 make when you pull the wires. Then she 
 opened her little bit of a mouth, and out of 
 it came the very littlest bit of a voice you 
 ever heard ; it sounded as fine as the finest 
 squeak a violin can make. I suppose her 
 voice was really as loud as other little girls 
 voices ; but it could not make any noise in 
 that great stone church. 
 
 She wore a black and red striped woollen 
 gown, made just like an old woman s gown 
 long, with a tight, straight waist, and 
 
138 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 tight, long sleeves ; she had a row of coral 
 beads around her neck, and her hair was 
 braided tip tight, and wound round and 
 round in a small knot at the back of her 
 head with a big comb, such as grown-up 
 people wear. She had on dark leggins and 
 low shoes ; and altogether she was the 
 drollest, most old-fashioned-looking little 
 body I ever saw. She looked as if she 
 might have been Cinderella s little old fairy 
 godmother, only she was not quite fine 
 enough. But she had learned her sermon 
 perfectly ; she knew it so well, and said it 
 so fast, that she kept getting out of breath 
 every few minutes, and had to stop right in 
 the middle of a sentence, or anywhere, to 
 draw more air into her lungs. 
 
 She made many gestures with her little 
 arms, and sometimes held up her little bit 
 of a forefinger, and shook it with a threat 
 ening shake, which it was enough to make 
 
CHILDREN S PREACHING IN ROME. 139 
 
 anybody shout out loud with laughter to 
 see. I think the finger might have been 
 about an inch and a half long. I could not 
 understand what she said ; I thought this 
 was because I knew so little Italian ; but 
 some of my friends, who spoke Italian very 
 well, were there, and they could not under 
 stand any better than I did. However, we 
 made out enough to know that she was tell 
 ing us that if we did not obey Jesus we 
 should all go, when we died, to a dread 
 ful place, where there were flames of fire 
 to burn us for hundreds and hundreds of 
 years. At the end of her sermon she spread 
 out her arms as wide as she could, and said ; 
 "Farewell, my dear friends ! I hope we shall 
 all meet in heaven, in the presence of the 
 Holy Virgin Mary, and be very happy 
 always." Then she made another funny 
 little bow, and jumped off ihe table. Her 
 father caught her in his arms, and carried 
 
140 SITS OF TALK. 
 
 her over to the other side of the church, to 
 see the sacred Bambino. We all followed 
 him, and crowded up around her, and some 
 of the ladies gave her money. The father 
 said her name was Isabella, and she was six 
 years old, although she looked so young and 
 was so small. The nuns in a convent where 
 she went to school had taught her this little 
 sermon, and it had taken her three whole 
 weeks to learn it. He was so proud of her, 
 and so pleased that she had preached her 
 sermon so well, that he kept kissing her 
 over and over, and smiling at all of us, as if 
 he had known us all our lives. He was only 
 a poor workingman, and I suppose it was 
 the greatest pleasure of his whole year to 
 have this little girl of his preach a sermon in 
 Ara Coeli, and be praised and admired by 
 the foreign gentlemen and ladies. 
 
 But now I must tell you what is the sacred 
 Bambino, which we all went to look at after 
 
CHILDREN S PREACHING IN ROME. 141 
 
 the sermon was ended. w Bambino " is Italian 
 for " little baby ; " and the sacred Bambino is 
 a doll which is dressed to represent Jesus 
 Christ when he was a little baby. It is kept 
 either sitting or lying in the lap of a large 
 wax figure of a woman who is called the 
 Virgin Mary, Christ s mother. Every Roman 
 Catholic Church has these figures, and I 
 presume you may have seen them in America. 
 But no church in Rome has so fine a Bam 
 bino as this in Ara Cceli, nor one of which 
 such wonderful stories are told. The monks 
 say that it was carved out of wood which 
 grew on the Mount of Olives, and that 
 St. Luke himself painted its face. They 
 have made the Romans believe that it has a 
 miraculous power to cure diseases, and it 
 is often sent for where people are very ill. 
 When it is being carried through the streets, 
 very good Roman Catholics go down on 
 their knees, or, at least, make the sign 
 
142 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 of the cross. Sometimes they run along 
 after the carriage, and try to touch the 
 wheels, crying out : " O most blessed Bam 
 bino ! keep us well ; O holy Bambino ! give 
 us thy blessing." 
 
 Twenty years ago there was a great revolu 
 tion in Eome, and some of the people who 
 did not like the Pope and his cardinals, 
 burnt up the fine red coaches which the 
 cardinals rode in. They were just going 
 to burn the Pope s, too ; but somebody 
 proposed that, instead of burning it, they 
 should give it to the sacred Bambino of Ara 
 Cceli. 
 
 This pleased the people very much; for 
 although they hated to be ruled over and 
 oppressed by the cardinals, they were very 
 good Eoman Catholics at heart. So they 
 drew the coach up to Ara Cceli, and the 
 monks put the Bambino in it, and drove 
 through all the chief streets of Home, to let 
 
CHILDREN S PREACHING IN ROME. 143 
 
 everybody know what had been done with 
 the Pope s carriage. 
 
 Think of a wooden doll, about as big as a 
 baby three months old, dressed all in laces 
 and tinsel and diamonds, with a gold crown 
 of most precious jewels on its head, being 
 taken out to ride in a coach, and carried into 
 the rooms of sick people, that they might be 
 cured by looking at it ! 
 
 But the oddest story of the Bambino of 
 Ara Cceli is about its having once been 
 carried off. The monks tell this story as if 
 they believed it. Perhaps some of them do, 
 though it is hard enough to see how they can. 
 They say that many years ago, there was an 
 English woman in Rome who fell in love 
 with the Bambino, and used to come every 
 day to the church, and sit for long hours 
 looking 1 at it. At last, she wanted so much 
 to have it for her own, that she had another 
 doll made exactly like it, and took that to 
 
144 B ITS OF 
 
 the church, and watched and waited for an 
 opportunity, when no one was near, to change 
 them, putting her common doll into the 
 lap of the Virgin Mary, and carrying off the 
 sacred Bambino for herself. All the rest of 
 that day, nobody noticed the change ; but at 
 midnight all the bells of the church and of the 
 convent adjoining it began to ring. The 
 monks were frightened enough as well 
 they might be to find all their bells ring 
 ing furiously, and no human hands touching 
 the ropes. They ran into the church, and 
 opened the door at the top of the stone 
 steps, and there stood the sacred Bambino, 
 waiting to be let in ! What became of the 
 English woman, the story does not say ; but 
 that is the true story, as many a little 
 Roman boy and girl would tell you, of the 
 Sacred Bambino of Ara Creli. 
 
" THE PENNY YE MEANT TO GFE." 145 
 
 "THE PENNY YE MEANT TO GI E." 
 
 T V HERE S a funny tale of a stingy man, 
 
 Who was none too good, but might have 
 
 been worse, 
 
 Who went to his church on a Sunday night, 
 And carried along his well-filled purse. 
 
 When the sexton came with his begging-plate, 
 The church was but dim with the candle s light 
 
 The stingy man fumbled all through his purse, 
 And chose a coin by touch and not sight. 
 
 It s an odd thing now that guineas should be 
 So like unto pennies in shape and size. 
 
 " I ll give a penny," the stingy man said; 
 " The poor must not gifts of pennies despise." 
 
 The penny fell down with a clatter and ring I 
 And back in his seat leaned the stingy man. 
 
 " The world is so full of the poor," he thought, 
 " I can t help them all, I give what I can." 
 
 Ha, ha ! how the sexton smiled, to be sure, 
 To see the gold guinea fall in his plate I 
 
 Ha, ha ! how the stingy man s heart was wrung, 
 Perceiving his blunder, but just too late I 
 10 
 
146 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 " No matter," he said; " in the Lord s account 
 That guinea of gold is set down to me. 
 
 They lend to Him who give to the poor ; 
 It will not so bad an investment be." 
 
 " Na, na, mon," the chuckling sexton cried out, 
 " The Lord is na cheated He kens thee well; 
 
 He knew it was only by accident 
 That out o thy fingers the guinea fell I 
 
 " He keeps an account, na doubt, for the puir; 
 
 But in that account He ll set down to thee 
 Na mair o that golden guinea, my mon, 
 
 Than the one bare penny ye meant to gi e I " 
 
 There s a comfort, too, in the little tale 
 
 A serious side as well as a joke ; 
 A comfort for all the generous poor, 
 
 In the comical words the sexton spoke. 
 
 A comfort to think that the good Lord knows 
 How generous we really desire to be, 
 
 And will give us credit in His account, 
 For all the pennies we long " to gi e." 
 
A PARABLE. 147 
 
 A PARABLE. 
 
 there was born a man with a great 
 genius for painting and sculpture. It 
 was not in this world that he was born, 
 but in a world very much like this in some 
 respects, and very different in others. The 
 world in which this great genius was born 
 was governed by a beneficent and wise Ruler, 
 who had such wisdom, and such power, that 
 he decided, before each being was born, for 
 what purpose he would best be fitted in life ; 
 he then put him in the place best suited 
 to the work he was to do ; and he gave into 
 his hands a set of instruments to do the 
 work with. 
 
 There was one peculiarity about these 
 instruments : they could never be replaced ; 
 on this point this great and wise Ruler was 
 
14$ SITS OF TALK. 
 
 inexorable. He said to every being who 
 was born into his realms : 
 
 "Here is your set of instruments to work 
 with ; if you take good care of them, they 
 will last a lifetime; if you let them get 
 rusty or broken, you can perhaps have them 
 brightened up a little, or mended ; but they 
 will never be as good as new, and you 
 can never have another set. Now you see 
 how important it is that you keep them 
 always in good order." 
 
 This man of whom I speak had a com 
 plete set of all the tools necessary for a 
 sculptor s work, and also a complete set of 
 painters brushes and colors. He was a 
 wonderful man ; for he could make very 
 beautiful statues, and he could also paint 
 very beautiful pictures. He became, while 
 he was very young, famous ; and everybody 
 wanted something that he had carved or 
 painted. 
 
A PAEABLE. 149 
 
 Now I do not know whether it was that 
 he did not believe what the good Kuler 
 told him about his set of instruments, or 
 whether he did not care to keep on working 
 any longer ; but this is what happened : he 
 grew very careless about his brushes, and let 
 his tools lie out over night where it was 
 damp. He left some of his brushes full 
 of paint for weeks, and the paint dried in, 
 so that when at last he tried to wash it out, 
 out came the bristles by dozens, and the 
 brushes were entirely ruined. The damp 
 ness of the night air rusted the edges of 
 some of his very finest tools, and the things 
 which he had to use to clean off the rust 
 were so powerful, that they ate into the 
 fine metal of the tools, and left the edges so 
 uneven that they would no longer make 
 fine strokes. 
 
 However, he kept on painting, and mak 
 ing statues, and doing the best he could 
 
150 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 with, the few and imperfect tools he had 
 left. But people began to say, "What is 
 the matter with this man s pictures? and 
 what is the matter with his statues? He 
 does not do half as good work as he used 
 to!" 
 
 Then he was very angry, and said the 
 people were only envious and malicious ; 
 that he was the same he always had been ; 
 nnd his pictures and statues were as good as 
 ever. But he could not make anybody 
 else think so. They all knew better. 
 
 One day the Euler sent for him, and said 
 to him : 
 
 "Now you have reached th6 prime of 
 your life ; it is time that you should do 
 some really great work. I want a grand 
 statue made for the gate-way of one of 
 my cities. Here is the design. Take it 
 home and study it, and see if you can 
 undertake to execute it." 
 
A PARABLE. 151 
 
 As soon as the poor sculptor studied the 
 design, his heart sank within him ; there 
 were several parts of it which required the 
 finest workmanship of one of his most delicate 
 instruments ; that instrument was entirely 
 ruined by rust ; the edge was all eaten 
 away in notches. In vain he tried all 
 possible devices to bring it again to a fine, 
 sharp edge. Nothing could be done with it. 
 The most experienced workmen shook their 
 heads as soon as they saw it, and said : 
 
 "No, no, sir! it is too late; if you had 
 brought it to us at first, we might possibly 
 have made it sharp enough for you to use a 
 little while with great care ; but it is past 
 help now." Then he ran frantically around 
 the country, trying to borrow a similar instru 
 ment from some one. But one of the most 
 remarkable peculiarities about these sets of 
 instruments given by the Ruler of this world 
 I am speaking of was, that they were of no 
 
152 SITS OF TALK. 
 
 use at all in the hands of anybody except 
 the one to whom the Ruler had given them. 
 Several of the beulptor s friends were so 
 sorry for him, that they offered him their 
 instruments in place of his own ; but he 
 tried in vain to use them. They were not 
 fitted to his hand ; he could not make the 
 kind of stroke he wanted to make with 
 them. So he went sadly back to the Ruler, 
 and said : 
 
 "Oh, sir, I am most unhappy ! I cannot 
 execute this beautiful design for your statue." 
 
 " But why cannot you execute it ? " said 
 the Ruler. 
 
 "Alas, sir !" replied the unfortunate man, 
 "by some sad accident one of my finest 
 tools was so rusted that it cannot be re 
 stored. Without that tool, it is impossible 
 to make this statue. " t 
 
 Then the Ruler looked very severely at him, 
 and said : 
 
A PARABLE. 153 
 
 "Oh, Sculptor! accidents very seldom 
 happen to the wise and careful. But you 
 are also a painter, I believe. Perhaps you 
 can paint the picture I wish to have painted 
 immediately, for my new palace. Here is 
 the drawing of it. Go home and study this. 
 This also will be an opportunity worthy of 
 your genius." 
 
 The poor fellow was not much comforted 
 by this ; for he remembered that he had not 
 even looked at his brushes for a long time. 
 However, he took the sketch, thanked the 
 Ruler, and withdrew. 
 
 It proved to be the same with the sketch 
 for the picture, as it had been with the 
 design for the statue ; it required the finest 
 workmanship in parts of it, and the brushes 
 which were needed for this had been long 
 ago destroyed ; only their handles remained. 
 How did the painter regret his folly as he 
 picked up the old defaced handles from the 
 
154 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 floor, and looked at them hopelessly ! Again 
 he went to the Ruler, and, with still greater 
 embarrassment than before, acknowledged 
 that he was unable to paint the picture, 
 because he had not the proper brushes. 
 This time the Ruler looked at him with 
 terrible severity, and spoke in a voice of 
 the sternest displeasure. 
 
 "What, then, do you expect to do, sir, for 
 the rest of your life, if your instruments are 
 in such a condition ? " 
 
 "Alas, sir, I do not know !" replied the 
 poor man, covered with confusion. 
 
 "You deserve to starve," said the Ruler; 
 and ordered the servants to show him out of 
 the palace. 
 
 After this, matters went from bad to worse 
 with the painter ; every few days, some one 
 of his instruments broke under his hand ; 
 they had been so poorly taken care of, that 
 they did not last half as long as they were 
 
A P ARABLE. 155 
 
 meant to. His work grew poorer and poorer, 
 until he fell so low that he was forced to eke 
 ou 1 ; a miserable living by painting the walls 
 of the commonest houses, and making the 
 coarsest kind of water-jars out of clay. 
 Finally his last instrument failed him ; he 
 had nothing left to work with ; and as he 
 had for many years done only very coarse 
 and cheap work, and had not been able to 
 lay up any money, he was driven to beg his 
 food from door to door, and finally died of 
 hunger. 
 
 This is the end of the Parable. Next 
 comes the Moral. Now, please don t skip 
 all the rest, because it is called "Moral." It 
 will not be very long. I wish I had called 
 my story a Conundrum instead of a Parable, 
 and then the moral would have been the 
 answer. How that would have puzzled you 
 all, a conundrum so many pages long! 
 And I wonder how many of you would have 
 
156 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 guessed the true answer? How many of 
 you would have thought enough about your 
 own bodies, to have seen that they were 
 only sets of instruments given to you to 
 work with ? The Parable is a truer one than 
 you think, at first ; but the longer you think, 
 the more you will see how true it is. Are 
 we not each of us born into the world pro 
 vided with one body, and only one, which 
 must last us as long as we live in this world ? 
 Is it not by means of this body that we feel, 
 learn, and accomplish everything? Is it not 
 a most wonderful and beautiful set of instru 
 ments? Can we ever replace any one of 
 them ? Can we ever have any one of them 
 made as good as new, after it has once been 
 seriously out of order? In one respect the 
 Parable is not a true one, for the Parable 
 tells the story of a man w r hose set of instru 
 ments was adapted to only two uses, to 
 sculpture and to painting. But it would not 
 
A PAEABLE. 157 
 
 le easy to count up all the things which 
 human beings can do by help of these won 
 derful bodies in which they live. Think, for 
 a moment, of all the things you do in any 
 one day : all the breathing, eating, drinking, 
 and running, of all the thinking, speaking, 
 feeling, learning, you do in any one day. 
 Now if any one of the instruments is seri 
 ously out of order, you cannot do one of 
 these things so well as you know how to do 
 it. 
 
 When any one of the instruments is very 
 seriously out of order, there is always pain. 
 If the pain is severe, you can t think of 
 anything else while it lasts ; all your other 
 instruments are of no use to you, just be 
 cause of the pain in that one which is out 
 of order. If the pain and the disordered 
 condition last a great while, the instrument 
 is so injured that it is never again so strong 
 en rt was in the beginning. All the doctors 
 
158 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 in the world cannot make it so. Then you 
 begin to be what people call an invalid ; 
 that is, a person who doesn t have the full 
 use of any one part of his body ; who is 
 never exactly comfortable himself, and who 
 is likely to make everybody about him more 
 or less uncomfortable. 
 
 I do not know anything in this world half 
 so strange as the way in which people 
 neglect their bodies : that is, their set of 
 instruments ; their one set of instruments 
 which they can never replace, and can do 
 very little towards mending. When it is 
 too late, when the instruments are hope 
 lessly out of order, then they do not neglect 
 them any longer; then they run about 
 frantically, as the poor sculptor did, trying 
 to find some one to help him ; and this is 
 one of the saddest sights in the world , a 
 man or a woman running from one climate 
 to another climat?, and from one doctor to 
 
A PAEABLE. 159 
 
 another doctor, trying to cure or patch up a 
 body that is out of order. 
 
 Now, perhaps you will say this is a 
 dismal and unnecessary sermon to preach 
 to young people ; they have their fathers 
 and mothers to take care of them; they 
 don t take care of themselves. Very true ; 
 but fathers and mothers cannot be always 
 with their children ; fathers and mothers 
 cannot always make their children remember 
 and obey their directions. More than all, it 
 is very hard to make children realize that 
 it is of any great importance that they should 
 keep all the laws of health. I know when I 
 was a little girl, when people said to me you 
 must not do thus and thus, for if }^ou do you 
 will take cold, I used to think, "Who cares 
 for a little cold ? Supposing I do catch one ! " 
 and when I was shut up in the house for 
 several days with a bad sore throat, and 
 suffered horrible pain, I never reproached 
 
l6o BITS OF TALK. 
 
 myself. 1 thought that sore throats must 
 come now and then, whether or no, and that 
 I must take my turn. But now I have 
 learned, that if no law of health were ever 
 broken we need never have a day s illness, 
 might grow old in entire freedom from suf 
 fering, and gradually fall asleep at last, 
 instead of dying terrible deaths from disease ; 
 and I am all the while wishing that I had 
 known it when I was young. If I had 
 known it, I ll tell you what I would have 
 done : I would have just tried the experi 
 ment, at any rate, of never doing a single 
 thing which could, by any possibility, get 
 any one of the instruments of my body out 
 of order. I wish I could see some boy or 
 girl try it, yet : never to sit up late at 
 night ; never to have a close, bad air in the 
 room ; never to sit with wet feet ; never to 
 wet them, if it were possible to help it; 
 never to go out in the cold weather without 
 
A PARABLE. l6l 
 
 oeing properly wrapped up ; never to go 
 out of a hot room into the cold out-door air, 
 without throwing some extra wrap on ; never 
 to eat or drink an unwholesome thing ; never 
 to touch tea, or coffee, or candy, or pie 
 crust ; never to let a day pass without at 
 least two good hours of exercise in the open 
 air ; never to read a word by twilight, or in 
 the cars ; never to let the sun be shut out 
 of rooms. This is a pretty long list of 
 w nevers," but "never" is the only word that 
 conquers. "Once in a while," is the very 
 watchword of temptation and defeat. I do 
 believe that the " once in a while " things 
 have ruined more bodies, and more souls, 
 too, than all the other things put together. 
 Moreover, the " never " way is easy, and the 
 " once in a while " way is hard. After you 
 have once made up your mind " never " to 
 do a certain thing, that is the end of it, if 
 you are a sensible person. But if you only 
 11 
 
1 62 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 say " this is a bad habit," or " this is a dan 
 gerous indulgence, I will be a little on my 
 guard, and not do it too often," you have 
 put yourself in the most uncomfortable of all 
 positions ; the temptation will knock at your 
 door twenty times a-day, and you will have 
 to be fighting the same old battles over and 
 over again, as long as you live. This is 
 especially true in regard to the matter of 
 which I have been speaking to you, the 
 care of the body. When you have once laid 
 down to yourself the laws you mean to keep, 
 the things you will always do, and the 
 things you will "never" do, then your life 
 arranges itself in a system at once ; and you 
 are not interrupted and hindered as the un 
 decided people are, by wondering what is 
 best, or safe, or wholesome, or too unwhole 
 some, at different times. 
 
 Don t think it would be a sort of slavery 
 to give up so much for sake of keeping your 
 
A PARABLE. 163 
 
 body in order. It is the only real freedom, 
 though at first it does not look so much like 
 freedom as the other way. It is the sort of 
 freedom of which some poet sung once. I 
 never knew who he was. I heard the lines 
 only once, and have forgotten all except the 
 last three, but I think of those every day. 
 He was speaking of the true freedom which 
 there is in keeping the laws of nature, and 
 he said it was like the freedom of the true 
 poet, who 
 
 " Always sings 
 
 In strictest bonds of rhyme and rule, 
 And finds in them not bonds, but wings." 
 
 I think the difference between a person whc 
 has kept all the laws of health, and thereby 
 has a good strong sound body, that can 
 carry him wherever he wants to go, and do 
 whatever he wants to do, and a person who 
 has let his body get all out of order so that 
 
BITS OF TALK. 
 
 he has to lie in bed half his time and suffer, 
 is quite as great a difference as there is 
 between a creature with wings and a crea 
 ture without wings I 
 
 Don t you ? 
 
 And this is the end of the Moral. 
 
MY BROKEN-WINGED BIRD. 16$ 
 
 MY BROKEN-WINGED BIRD. 
 
 Tj^OR days I have been cherishing 
 
 A little bird with broken wing. 
 I love it in my heart of hearts ; 
 To win its love I try all arts ; 
 I call it by each sweet pet name 
 That I can think, its fear to tame. 
 My room is still and bright and warm ; 
 The little thing is safe from harm. 
 If I had left it where it lay 
 Fluttering in the wintry day, 
 No mate remaining by its side, 
 Before nightfall it must have died. 
 It sips the drink, it eats the food ; 
 Plenty of both, all sweet and good. 
 But alJ the while my hand it flies, 
 Looks up at me with piteous eyes ; 
 From morn till night, restless and swift, 
 Runs to and fro, and tries to lift 
 Itself upon its broken wing, 
 And through the window-pane to spring, 
 
1 66 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 Poor little bird ! Myself I see 
 
 From morn till night in watching thee. 
 
 A Power I cannot understand 
 
 Is sheltering me with loving hand ; 
 
 It calls me by the dearest name, 
 
 My love to win, my fear to tame ; 
 
 Each day my daily food provides, 
 
 And night and day from danger hides 
 
 Me safe : the food, the warmth, I take, 
 
 Yet all the while ungrateful make 
 
 Restless and piteous complaints, 
 
 And strive to break the kind restraints. 
 
 Dear little bird, twill not be long; 
 Each day thy wing is growing strong; 
 "When it is healed, and thou canst fly, 
 My windows will be opened high; 
 And I shall watch with loving eyes 
 To see thee soar in sunn) skies. 
 I, too, some day, on healed wing 
 Set free, shall soar aloft and sing, 
 And in my joy no memory find 
 Of prison-walls I left behind. 
 
CHEEEY PEOPLE. 167 
 
 CHEERY PEOPLE. 
 
 , the comfort of them ! There is but 
 one thing like them, that is sunshine. 
 It is the fashion to state the comparison the 
 other end foremost i. e. to flatter the 
 cheery people by comparing them to the 
 sun. I think it is the best way of praising 
 the sunshine, to say that it is almost as 
 bright and inspiring as the presence of cheery 
 people. 
 
 That the cheery people are brighter and 
 better even than sunshine is very easily 
 proved ; for who has not seen a cheery 
 person make a room and a day bright in 
 spite of the sun s not shining at all, in 
 spite of clouds and rain and cold all doing 
 their very best to make it dismal? There- 
 
1 68 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 fore I say, the fair way is to compare the 
 sun to cheery people, and not cheery people 
 to the sun. However, whichever way we 
 state the comparison, it is a true and good 
 one ; and neither the cheery people nor the 
 sun need take offence. In fact, I believe 
 they will always be such good friends, and 
 work so steadily together for the same ends, 
 that there is no danger of cither s grudging 
 the other the credit of what has been done. 
 The more you think of it, the more you see 
 how wonderfully alike the two are in their 
 operation on the world. The sun on the 
 fields makes things grow fruits and flowers 
 and grains ; the cheery person in the house 
 makes everybody do his best, makes the 
 one who can sing feel like singing, and the 
 one who has an ugly, hard job of work to 
 do, feel like shouldering it bravely and 
 having it over with. And the music and 
 mirth and work in the house, are they not 
 
CHEER Y PEOPLE. 1 69 
 
 like the flowers and fruits and grains in the 
 
 field? 
 
 The sun makes everybody glad. Even 
 the animals run and leap, and seem more 
 joyous when it shines out; and no human 
 being can be so gross-grained, or so ill, that 
 he does not brighten up a little when a great 
 broad, warm sunbeam streams over him and 
 plays on his face. It is just so with a cheery 
 person. His simple presence makes even 
 animals happier. Dogs know the difference 
 between him and a surly man. When he 
 pats them on the head and speaks to them, 
 they jump and gambol about him just as they 
 do in the sunshine. And when he comes 
 into the room where people are ill, or out of 
 sorts, or dull and moping, they brighten up, 
 spite of themselves, just as they do when a 
 sudden sunbeam pours in, only more so; 
 for we often see people so ill they do not 
 care whether the sun shines or not, or so 
 
1 70 SITS OF TALK. 
 
 cross that they do not even see whether the 
 sun shines or not ; but I have never yet seen 
 anybody so cross or so ill that the voice and 
 face of a cheery person would not make 
 them brighten up a little. 
 
 If there were only a sure and certain 
 recipe for making a cheery person, how 
 glad we would all be to try it ! How thank 
 ful we would all be to do good like sunshine ! 
 To cheer everybody up, and help everybody 
 along! to have everybody s face brighten 
 the minute we came in sight ! Why, it 
 seems to me that there cannot be in this life 
 any pleasure half so great as this would be. 
 If we looked at life only from a selfish point 
 of view, it would be worth while to be a 
 cheery person, merely because it would be 
 such a satisfaction to have everybody so glad 
 to live with us, to see us, even to meet us 
 on the street. 
 
 People who have done things which hav 
 
CHEER T PEOPLE. 1 7 1 
 
 r made them famous, such as winning great 
 battles or filling high offices, often have 
 what are called "ovations." Hundreds of 
 people get together and make a procession, 
 perhaps, or go into a great hall and make 
 speeches, all to show that they recognize 
 what the great man has done. After he 
 is dead, they build a stone monument to him, 
 perhaps, and celebrate his birthday for a few 
 years. Men work very hard sometimes for 
 a whole lifetime to earn a few things of this 
 sort. But how much greater a thing it 
 would be for a man to have every man, 
 woman, and child in his own town know 
 and love his face because it was full of 
 kindly good cheer ! Such a man has a 
 perpetual "ovation," year in and year out, 
 whenever he walks on the street, when 
 ever he enters a friend s house. 
 
 "I jist likes to let her in at the door," 
 said an Irish servant one day, of a woman I 
 
i;2 BITS OF TALE.. 
 
 know whose face was always cheery and 
 bright ; "the face of her does one good, 
 shure ! " 
 
 I said if there were only a recipe a 
 sure and certain recipe for making a cheery 
 person, we would all be glad to try it. 
 There is no such recipe, and perhaps if there 
 were, it is not quite certain that we would 
 all try it. It would take time and trouble. 
 Cheeriness cannot be taught, like writing, 
 "in twenty lessons ; " nor analyzed and classi 
 fied and set forth in a manual, such as "The 
 Art of Polite Conversation," or "Etiquette 
 Made Easy for Ladies and Gentlemen." It 
 lies so deep that no surface-rules of behavior, 
 no description ever so minute of what it is 
 or is not, does or does not do, can ever 
 enable a person to "take it up " and "master" 
 it, like a trade or a study. I believe that it 
 is, in the outset, a good gift from God at 
 one s birth, very much dependent on one s 
 
CHEEE Y PEOPLE. 1 73 
 
 body, and a thing to be more profoundly 
 grateful for thau all that genius ever inspired, 
 or talent ever accomplished. This is natural, 
 spontaneous, inevitable cheeriness. This, if 
 we were not born with it, we cannot have. 
 But next best to this is deliberate, intended, 
 and persistent cheeriness, which we can 
 create, can cultivate, and can so foster and 
 cherish, that after a few years the world will 
 never suspect that it was not a hereditary 
 gift handed down to us from generations. 
 To do this we have only to watch the 
 cheeriest people we know, and follow their 
 example. We shall see, first, that the cheery 
 person never minds or if he minds, never 
 says a word about small worries, vexa 
 tions, perplexities. Second, that he is brim 
 ful of sympathy in other people s gladness ; 
 he is heartily, genuinely glad of every bit of 
 good luck or joy which comes to other 
 people. Thirdly, he has a keen sense of 
 
BITS OF TALK. 
 
 humor, and never lets any droll thing escape 
 him ; he thinks it worth while to laugh, and 
 to make everybody about him laugh, at every 
 amusing thing; no matter how small, he has 
 his laugh, and a good hearty laugh too, and 
 tries to make everybody share it. Patience, 
 sympathy, and humor, these are the three 
 most manifest traits in the cheery person. 
 But there is something else, which is more 
 an emotion than a trait, more a state of 
 feeling than a quality of mind. This is 
 lovingness. This is the secret, so far as 
 there is a secret; this is the real point of 
 difference between the mirth of the witty 
 and sarcastic person, which does us no good, 
 and the mirth of the cheery person, which 
 "doeth good like a medicine." 
 
 Somebody once asked a great painter, 
 whose pictures were remarkable for their 
 exquisite and beautiful coloring, "Pray, Mr. 
 , how do you mix your colors ? " 
 
CHEEE Y PEOPLE. l / 5 
 
 "With brains, madam with brains," 
 growled the painter. His ill-nature spoke a 
 truth. All men had or might have the 
 colors he used ; but no man produced the 
 colors he produced. 
 
 So I would say of cheeriness. Patience, 
 sympathy, and humor are the colors ; but 
 patience may be mere do<rgedness and re 
 ticence, sympathy may be wordy and shallow 
 and selfish, and humor may be only a sharp 
 perception of the ridiculous. Only when 
 they are mixed with love love, three times 
 love do we have the true good cheer of 
 genuine cheery people. 
 
176 SITS OF TALE 
 
 A SHORT CATECHISM. 
 
 A T sunset of a summer s day, 
 
 All curled up in a funny heap, 
 Beneath the currant-bushes lay 
 A boy named Willy, half asleep. 
 
 But peeping through his sleepy eyes 
 He watched all things as if he dreamed, 
 
 And did not feel the least surprise 
 However strange and queer the) T seemed. 
 
 And every creature going by 
 
 He hailed with questions from the grass, 
 And laughed and called out sleepily, 
 
 " Unless you answer you can t pass." 
 
 " O caterpillar, now tell me 
 
 "Why you roll up so tight and round ; 
 You are the drollest tiling to see, 
 A hairy marble on the ground." 
 
A SHORT CATECHISM. 
 
 " I roll me up to save my bones 
 
 When I fall down ; young- man, if you 
 Could do the same, the stumps and stones 
 Would never bruise you black and blue." 
 
 O spider, tell me why you hide 
 
 The ropes and ladders which you spin, 
 And keep them all locked up inside 
 Your little body slim and thin." 
 
 " I hide my ropes and ladders fine 
 
 Away from neighbors thievish greed; 
 If you kept yours as I keep mine, 
 You d always have one when you need.* 
 
 " Why do you buzz so, busy bee? 
 
 Why don t you make your honey still? 
 You move about so boisterously, 
 I m sure you must much honey spill." 
 
 " I buzz and buzz, you silly boy, 
 
 Because I can work better so ; 
 Just as you whistle for pure joy 
 When on the road to school you go." 
 
178 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 " O robin, wicked robin, why 
 
 Did you my mamma s cherries eat? 
 You thought no mortal soul was nigh ; 
 But I saw you from bill to feet." 
 
 " And I saw you, my fine young lad, 
 
 And waited till you d left the tree ; 
 
 I thought when you your fill had had, 
 
 There would be little left for me ! " 
 
 " O big bull-frogs, why do you make 
 
 Such ugly noises every night ! 
 Nobody can a half-nap take ; 
 You make our baby cry with fright." 
 
 " O Willy, we suppose the noise 
 
 Is not a pleasant noise to hear ; 
 But we ve one hundred little boys, 
 Frog-boys so cunning and so dear ; 
 
 " And it is not an easy task, 
 
 You may believe, to put to beds 
 A hundred little frogs who ask 
 All questions which pop in their head. ;; 
 
THE EXPRESSION OF ZOOMS. 1 79 
 
 THE EXPRESSION OF ROOMS. 
 
 "D OOMS have just as much expression as 
 faces. They produce just as strong 
 nu impression on us at first sight. The 
 instant we cross the threshold of a room, 
 we know certain things about the person 
 who lives in it. The walls and the floor, 
 and the tables and chairs all speak out at 
 once, and betray some of their owner s 
 secrets. They tell us whether she is neat 
 or uuneat, orderly or disorderly, and, more 
 than all, whether she is of a cheerful, sunny 
 temperament, and loves beauty in all things, 
 or is dull and heavy, and does not know 
 pretty things from ugly ones. And just as 
 these traits in a person act on us, making 
 us happy and cheerful, or gloomy and sad, 
 BO does the room act upon us. We may 
 
i8o BITS OF TALK. 
 
 not know, perhaps, what it is that is raising 
 or depressing our spirits ; we may not sus 
 pect that we could be influenced by such a 
 thing; but it is true, nevertheless. 
 
 I have been in many rooms in which it 
 was next to impossible to talk with any 
 animation or pleasure, or to have any sort 
 of good time. They were dark and dismal ; 
 they were full of ugly furniture, badly 
 arranged ; the walls and the floors were cov 
 ered with hideous colors ; no two things 
 seemed to belong together, or to have any 
 relation to each other ; so that the whole 
 effect on the eye was almost as torturing as 
 the effect on the ear would be of hearing a 
 band of musicians playing on bad instru 
 ments, and all playing different tunes. 
 
 I have also been in many rooms where 
 you could not help having a good time, 
 even if there were nothing especial going 
 on in the way of conversation or amusement, 
 
THE EXPEESSION OF KOOMS. 1 8 1 
 
 just because the room was so bright and cosey. 
 It did you good simply to sit still there. 
 You almost thought you would like to go 
 (Sometimes when the owner was away, and 
 you need not talk with anybody but the 
 room itself. 
 
 In very many instances the dismal rooms 
 were the rooms on which a great deal of 
 money had been spent, and the cosey 
 rooms belonged to people who were by no 
 means rich. Therefore, since rooms can be 
 made cosey and cheerful with very little 
 money, I think it is right to say that it is 
 every woman s duty to make her rooms 
 cosey and cheerful. I do not forget that, in 
 speaking to my readers, I am speaking to 
 girls who are for the most part living in 
 their parents houses, and who have not, 
 therefore, the full control of their own 
 rooms. But it is precisely during these 
 years of life that the habits and tastes are 
 
1 82 SITS OF TALK. 
 
 formed ; and the girl who allows her own 
 room in her father s house to be untidy and 
 unadorned, will inevitably, if she ever has; 
 a house of her own, let that be untidy and 
 unadorned too. 
 
 There is not one of my readers, I am 
 sure, who does not have, in the course of 
 the year, pocket-money enough to do a great 
 deal toward making her room beautiful. 
 There is not one whose parents do not 
 spend for her, on Christmas, and New 
 Year s, and her birthday, a sum of money, 
 more or less, which they would gladly give 
 to her, if she preferred it, to be spent in 
 adorning her room. 
 
 It is not at all impossible that her parents 
 would like to give her, also, a small sum to 
 be spent in ornamenting the common living- 
 room of the house. This is really a work 
 which daughters ought to do, and which 
 busy, tired mothers would be very glad to 
 
THE EXPRESSION OF ROOMS. 1 83 
 
 have them do, if they show good taste in 
 their arrangements. The girl who cares 
 enough and understands enough about the 
 expression of rooms to make her own room 
 pretty, will not be long content while her 
 mother s rooms are bare and uninviting, and 
 she will come to have a new standard of 
 values in the matter of spending money, as 
 soon as she begins to want to buy things to 
 make rooms pretty. 
 
 How much better to have a fine plaster 
 cast of ^Apollo or Clytie, than a gilt locket, 
 for instance ! How much better to have a 
 heliotype picture of one of Eaphael s or Cor- 
 reggio s Madonna s, than seventy-five cents 
 worth of candy ! Six shillings will buy the 
 heliotype, and three dollars the Clytie and 
 Apollo both ! 
 
 No ! It is not a question of money ; it is 
 a question of taste ; it is a question of 
 choosing between good and beautiful things, 
 
1 84 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 and bad and ugly things ; between things 
 which last for years, and do you good every 
 hour of every day, as often as you look at 
 them, and things which are gone in an hour 
 or a few days, and even for the few days 
 or the hour do harm rather than good. 
 
 Therefore I think it is right to say that it 
 is the duty of every one to have his or her 
 rooms cheerful and cosey, and, as far as pos 
 sible, beautiful ; the duty of every man and 
 woman, the duty of every boy and girl. 
 
 To give minute directions for all the 
 things which help to make rooms cosey and 
 cheerful and beautiful, would require vol 
 umes. Many books have been written on 
 the subject, and I often see these books 
 lying on tables in very dismal rooms. The 
 truth is, these recipes are like many recipes 
 for good things to eat ; it takes a good cook 
 in the beginning, to know how to make use 
 of the recipe. But there are some first 
 
THE EXPRESSION OF ROOMS. 185 
 
 principles of the art which can be told in a 
 very few words. 
 
 The first essential for a cheerful room is 
 Sunshine. Without this, money, labor, taste, 
 are all thrown away. A dark room cannot 
 be cheerful ; and it is as unwholesome as it 
 is gloomy. Flowers will not blossom in it ; 
 neither will people. Nobody knows, or 
 ever will know, how many men and women 
 have been killed by dark rooms. 
 
 w Glorify the room ! Glorify the room ! " 
 Sidney Smith used to say of a morning, 
 when he ordered every blind thrown open, 
 every shade drawn up to the top of the 
 window. Whoever is fortunate enough to 
 have a south-east or south-west corner room, 
 may, if she chooses, live in such floods of 
 sunny light that sickness will have hard 
 work to get hold of her ; and as for the 
 blues, they will not dare to so much as 
 knock at her door. 
 
1 86 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 Second on my list of essentials for a 
 cheerful room, I put Color. Man\ r a room 
 that would otherwise be charming, is expres 
 sionless and tame for want of bright color. 
 Don t be afraid of red. It is the most 
 kindling and inspiring of colors. No room 
 can be perfect without a good deal of it. 
 All the shades of scarlet or crimson are 
 good. In an autumn leaf, in a curtain, in a 
 chair-cover, in a pin-cushion, in a vase, in 
 the binding of a book, everywhere you put 
 it, it makes a brilliant point and gives pleas 
 ure. The blind say that they always think 
 red must be like the sound of a trumpet; 
 and I think there is a deep truth in their 
 instinct. It is the gladdest and most trium 
 phant color everywhere. 
 
 Next to red comes yellow ; this must bo 
 used very sparingly. No bouquet of flowers 
 is complete without a little touch of yellow ; 
 and no room is as gay without yellow as 
 
THE EXPRESSION OF BOOMS. 1 8/ 
 
 with it. But a bouquet in which yellow pre 
 dominates is ugly ; the colors of all the 
 other flowers are killed by it ; and a room 
 which has one grain too much of yellow in 
 it is hopelessly ruined. I have seen the 
 whole expression of one side of a room 
 altered, improved, toned up, by the taking 
 out of two or three bright yellow leaves 
 from a big sheaf of sumacs and ferns. The 
 best and safest color for walls is a delicate 
 cream color. When I say best and safest, I 
 mean the best background for bright colors 
 and for pictures, and the color which is least 
 in danger of disagreeing with anything you 
 may want to put upon it. So also with 
 floors ; the safest and best tint is a neutral 
 gray. If you cannot have a bare wooden 
 floor, either of black walnut, or stained to 
 imitate it, then have a plain gray felt carpet. 
 Above all things, avoid bright colors in a 
 carpet. In rugs, to lay down on a plain 
 
1 88 B^TS OF TALK. 
 
 gray, or on a dark-brown floor, the brightei 
 the colors the better. The rugs are only so 
 many distinct pictures thrown up into relief 
 here and there by the under-tint of gray or 
 brown. But a pattern either set or other 
 wise, of bright colors journeying up and 
 down, back and forth, breadth after breadth, 
 on a floor, is always and forever ugly. If 
 one is so unfortunate as to enter on the pos 
 session of a room with such a carpet as this, 
 or with a wall-paper of a similar nature, the 
 first thing to be done, if possible, is to get 
 rid of them or cover them up. Better have 
 a ten-cent paper of neutral tints and indis 
 tinguishable figures, on the wall, and have 
 bare floors painted brown or gray. 
 
 Third on my list of essentials for making 
 rooms cosey, cheerful, and beautiful, come 
 Books and Pictures. Here some persons will 
 cry out : " But books and pictures cost a 
 great deal of money." Yes, books do cost 
 
THE EXPRESSION OF ROOMS. 189 
 
 money, and so do pictures ; but books 
 accumulate rapidly in most houses where 
 books are read at all ; and if people really 
 want books, it is astonishing how many they 
 contrive to get together in a few years with 
 out pinching themselves very seriously in 
 other directions. 
 
 As for pictures costing money, how much 
 or how little they cost depends on what sort 
 of pictures you buy. As I said before, you 
 can buy, for six shillings, a good heliotype 
 (which is to all intents and purposes as 
 good as an engraving) of one of Raphael s 
 or Correggio s Madonnas. But } T OU can buy 
 pictures much cheaper than that. A Japan 
 ese fan is a picture ; some of them are 
 exquisite pictures, and blazing with color, 
 too. They cost anywhere from two to six 
 cents. There are also Japanese pictures, 
 printed on coarse paper, some two feet long 
 and one broad, to be bought for twenty-five 
 
190 SITS OF TALK. 
 
 cents each ; with a dozen of these, a dozen 
 or two of fans, and say four good helio- 
 types, you can make the walls of a small 
 room so gay that a stranger s first impres 
 sion on entering it will be that it is adorned 
 for a festival. The fans can be pinned on 
 the Avails in endlessly picturesque combina 
 tions. One of the most effective is to pin 
 them across the corners of the room in over 
 lapping rows, like an old-fashioned card- 
 rack. 
 
 And here let me say a word about corners. 
 They are wofully neglected. Even in rooms 
 where very much has been done in way of 
 decoration, you will see all the four corners 
 left bare, forcing their ugly sharp right 
 angle on your sight at every turn. They 
 are as ugly as so many elbows ! Make the 
 four corners pretty, and the room is pretty, 
 even if very little else be done. Instead of 
 having one stiff, straight-shelved book-case 
 
THE EXPRESSION OF ROOMS. 191 
 
 hanging on the wall, have a carpenter put 
 triangular shelves into the corners. He will 
 make them for thirty cents apiece, and screw 
 them on the walls. Put a dozen books on 
 each of the lower shelves, a bunch of autumn 
 leaves, a pretty vase, a little bust of Clytie, 
 or a photograph on a small easel, on the 
 upper ones, and with a line of Japanese fans 
 coming down to meet them from the cornice, 
 the four corners are furnished and adorned. 
 This is merely a suggestion of one out of a 
 dozen of ways in which walls can be made 
 pleasant to look at without much cost. 
 
 If the room has chintz curtains, these 
 shelves will look well covered with the same 
 chintz, with a plaited ruffle tacked on their 
 front edge. If the room has a predominant 
 color, say a green carpet, or a border on the 
 walls of claret or crimson, the shelves will 
 look well with a narrow, straight border of 
 billiard-cloth or baize (to match the ruling 
 
192 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 color of the room) pinked on the lower 
 edge, and tacked on. Some people put on 
 borders of gay colors, in embroidery. It is 
 generally unsafe to add these to a room, but 
 sometimes they have a good effect. 
 
 Fourth on my list of essentials for a cosey, 
 cheerful room, I put Order. This is a 
 dangerous thing to say, perhaps ; but it is 
 my honest conviction that sunlight, color, 
 books and pictures come before Order. Ob 
 serve, however, that while it comes fourth on 
 the list, it is only fourth ; it is by no means 
 last ! I am not making an exhaustive list. 
 I do not know where I should stop if I 
 undertook that. I am mentioning only a 
 few of the first principles, the essentials. 
 And in regard to this very question of order, 
 I am partly at a loss to know how far it is 
 safe to permit it to lay down its law in a 
 room. I think almost as many rooms are 
 spoiled by being kept in too exact order, as 
 
THE EXPRESSION OF ROOMS. 193 
 
 by being too disorderly. There is an ap 
 parent disorder which is not disorderly ; 
 and there is an apparent order, which is only 
 a witness to the fact that things are never 
 used. I do not know how better to state 
 the golden mean on this point than to tell 
 the story of an old temple which was once 
 discovered, bearing on three of its sides this 
 inscription : "Be bold." On the fourth side 
 the inscription : "Be not too bold." 
 
 I think it would be well written on three 
 sides of a room: "Be orderly." On the 
 fourth side : "But don t be too orderly." 
 
 I read once in a child s letter a paragraph 
 somewhat like this : 
 
 " I look every day in the glass to see how 
 my countenance is growing. My nurse has 
 told me that every one creates his own 
 countenance ; that God gives us our faces, 
 but we can make a good or bad countenance, 
 13 
 
BITS OF TALK. 
 
 by thinking good or bad thoughts, keeping 
 in a good or bad temper." 
 
 I have often thought of this in regard to 
 rooms. When we first take possession of a 
 room, it has no especial expression, perhaps, 
 at any rate, no expression peculiar to us ; 
 but day by day we create its countenance, 
 and at the end of a few years it is sure to be 
 a pretty good reflection of our own. 
 
BY STAGE TO BOSTON. 195 
 
 BY STAGE TO BOSTON. 
 
 T HAVE been young, and now I have grown old, 
 
 But never until yesterday I knew 
 How many living souls a stage can hold, 
 And make the quickest time its journey through. 
 
 I came upon the stage so suddenly, 
 And, for a stage, in such a funny place; 
 
 I stood stock still, surprised as I could be, 
 With blank amazement written in my face. 
 
 Twas just behind old Deacon Thatcher s shed* 
 The wheels in butter-cups sunk to the hubs ; 
 
 The pole stretched over a white clover-bed, 
 And almost into Mrs. Thatcher s tubs. 
 
 From every window looked out laughing eyes ; 
 
 From every window came a scream and shout ; 
 Before, behind, the children swarmed like flies, 
 
 And madly rocked the old blue stage about. 
 
106 BITS OF TALE". 
 
 " O ho! " I said, and felt as young as they; 
 
 " "Whose stage is this? To what town does it go? 
 And is there room for me to go to-day? 
 
 And how much is the fare, I want to know? " 
 
 As quick as lightning all the children cried: 
 " We go to Boston, and we ve got our load; 
 
 But you can go if you will ride outside ; 
 The fare is just a dollar for each rod ! " 
 
 " Oh dear ! " said I, " your fare is much too high; 
 
 The money that I have would not begin " 
 " Jump on! jump on! " they all began to cry, 
 
 " We ll take you once for nothing ; you are thin I " 
 
 I knew much better than to spoil their fun ; 
 
 So I went on and found a shady place, 
 And watched, and saw that till the day was done 
 
 They travelled tireless, at their quickest pace. 
 
 But all the time I watched I could not win 
 My heart from thinking, while I dreamed and 
 smiled, 
 
 Of that fair kingdom none can enter in 
 Without becoming first a little child. 
 
GOOD TEMPEE. 197 
 
 GOOD TEMPER. 
 
 / nr v HE dictionaries give eight definitions of 
 the word " Temper " ; some of them are 
 rather surprising the first time one reads 
 them. We are so in the habit of using 
 words without thinking much about what 
 they mean, that when we happen to look 
 them out in the dictionary, we find that 
 we are more ignorant than we supposed. 
 The other day I was turning over the leaves 
 of a dictionary, and my eye accidentally fell 
 on a very common word, one we use every 
 hour, of which I should have said that it 
 might perhaps have half-a-dozen different 
 meanings, and it had twenty-two ! This 
 shows you what an interesting book the 
 dictionary is. 
 
 The second definition of the word "tern- 
 
198 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 per" is, "the constitution or natural condi 
 tion of the body." This is a definition 
 which we ought always to remember when 
 we are criticising other people s temper. It 
 ought to make us very charitable and very 
 patient. Nobody knows how much of the 
 ill-temper in the world is the result of a 
 feeble or diseased body. On the other hand, 
 however, nobody knows how much can be 
 done in the way of controlling the ill-temper 
 which is the result of a feeble or diseased 
 body, and therefore I think while we ought 
 to remember this definition when we are 
 judging other people, we would better for 
 get it when we are judging ourselves. No 
 doubt that we will find plenty of excuses for 
 being cross, without going to the dictionary 
 for them. And yet, if one looks at the 
 matter honestly, is there really ever such a 
 thing as an excuse for being cross ? Why, 
 the minute you sit down in a leisurely and 
 
GOOD TEMPER. 199 
 
 good-natured way, and think the thing over, 
 does it not seem the stupidest thing in the 
 world ever to permit one s self to give way 
 to bad temper? In the first place, it never 
 does the least good ; on the contrary, it 
 always makes bad matters worse. In the 
 second place, it is misery. I don t believe 
 there is anything in the world, except the 
 toothache, which is so uncomfortable ; and 
 even the toothache doesn t make one look so 
 hideous ; no, not even if it swells one s 
 cheek up to twice the natural size. A good- 
 natured smile could make even such a face as 
 that look not unpleasing ; but a face dis 
 torted by bad temper nothing can redeem ; 
 and the worst of it is, that the distortion 
 lasts. Every time a fit of bad temper hap 
 pens, it leaves its mark behind it; there is 
 no writing plainer than it writes on faces j 
 day by day the lines grow deeper, as if they 
 were graven in by a sharp instrument : ugly 
 
200 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 furrows between the eyes ; a still uglier 
 droop to the corners of the mouth ! Why, 
 even, the babies know the face of a cross 
 person, at sight, and begin to cry if he offers 
 to touch them. Animals know it; cats and 
 dogs run when they see some persons coming 
 towards them : and, if you look closely, you 
 will usually see that the person has some of 
 the signs of. bad temper on his face. 
 
 But I think I hear a whisper from some 
 child who is reading this page, "Why, she 
 said she was going to talk about Good 
 Temper, and she is speaking of bad tem 
 per all the while." So I am ; and I won 
 der if I did begin my talk wrong-end 
 foremost? No! I think not. I think the 
 best way to understand what Good Temper 
 is, is by observing bad temper : the best way 
 to realize how much more sensible and 
 comfortable a good-tempered person is, is to 
 
GOOD TEMPER. 2OI 
 
 observe how silly and wretched bad-tempered 
 people are. 
 
 It is much easier to define Good Temper 
 by giving a list of the things it will never 
 do, than by trying to tell what it does. And 
 that would be the best way, too, to man 
 ufacture a recipe for Good Temper, I think : 
 to mention all the things which must be left 
 out, though this does really sound like an 
 Irish Bull. Many people suppose that good 
 temper and natural amiability are the same 
 things. It is not so. Some of the best- 
 
 o 
 
 tempered people I ever knew, were not 
 naturally amiable at all ; and I have several 
 times in my life seen people who were 
 called very amiable, who did not seem 
 to me at all good-tempered. The sort 
 of person who is generally called "very 
 amiable," is apt to be very obstinate ; and 
 obstinacy is a trait of which a really good 
 temper must not have a trace. Good Temper 
 
202 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 must be ready to " give up " ; give up having 
 its own way ; give up trying to convince 
 other people that its own way is best ; give 
 up having "the last word." How hard it 
 does seern, sometimes, to do this ! how very 
 provoking it is to see a thing distinctly your 
 self, and not be able to make the person who 
 is disputing with you see it ! And, if he 
 loses his temper, and says things which you 
 know that he must know are unjust, how 
 very hard it is to give up the argument, and 
 let the whole thing go. No ! I used the wrong 
 word. I said, how hard it "is"! I ought 
 to have said, how hard it "seems." It is 
 not really half so hard in the long rim, as 
 the other way, if we could only realize, at 
 the time, how little we should care about 
 the" whole thing a few hours later ; and how 
 much happier we should be by that time, if 
 we stopped short in the quarrel. 
 
 I suppose more bad temper is shown, and 
 
GOOD TEMPER. 203 
 
 more angry resentment felt, in disputes about 
 little things which are not really of the least 
 consequence, than in all other ways put to 
 gether : about a date, for instance, or the 
 place where a thing was left ; or the heat or 
 the cold, or the best way of doing some 
 thing. 
 
 You have all seen people lose their tempers 
 sadly, in discussing trifles like these. Now 
 isn t it silly? In a week, in a day, perhaps, 
 we Avould not even remember the thing we 
 were quarrelling over ; and if we did re 
 member it, it would only be to be ashamed 
 of having allowed ourselves to be angry 
 about it. 
 
 This is a thing which good temper will not 
 do. Good Temper is too strong and too sen 
 sible ; Good Temper thinks in time, and says 
 to itself, " Never mind ; it is not of the least 
 consequence, one way or the other. Let it 
 go." 
 
204 SITS OF TALK. 
 
 There is another thing which Good Temper 
 thinks in time about : and that is about the 
 sort of answer it is best to make to unkind 
 or harsh words. 
 
 There is a little verse in the Bible which 
 Good Temper has always at its tongue s 
 end, as you might say : 
 
 " A soft answer turneth away wrath." 
 
 Good Temper will not let itself be pro 
 voked into " answering back." When people 
 are too unreasonable or cross, so that even 
 soft answers seem to do little good, Good 
 Temper keeps silent; not a sulky silence 
 that is the worst possible shape which the 
 worst possible temper can take but a calm, 
 gentle silence, ready at a second s notice to 
 speak pleasantly about something else, as if 
 nothing had happened. 
 
 There is one more thing which Good Tem 
 per does not do : it does not grumble. It 
 
GOOD TENPEE. 205 
 
 is the easiest thing in the world to get a 
 habit of grumbling, so many things go wrong 
 every day, and every hour. I suppose there 
 is not a person in this world, at this minute, 
 who has not some real troubles, and a great 
 many discomforts. And if we all lifted up 
 our voices, and told them, there would be 
 a great chorus of complaints. But Good 
 Temper knows better. Good Temper holds 
 its tongue : Good Temper has a shrewd old 
 motto about such things, 
 
 "What can t be cured must be endured." 
 
 These three things, then, Good Temper 
 never does : never disputes, never answers 
 back hastily, never grumbles. These are the 
 negatives of its laws. 
 
 The things that it does, Time would fail 
 us to tell, for they are so many ; and they 
 are not alike in any two people, in any two 
 places. Good Temper is unselfish, likeb to 
 
206 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 see other people comfortable. Good Tem 
 per helps everybody it can. Good Tem 
 per smiles when it looks into people s faces, 
 and says a pleasant word whenever it has a 
 chance. In short, Good Temper keeps the 
 "Golden Kule," that wonderful, simple, short 
 rule in so few words, which covers every act 
 that is possible in the life of a human being. 
 
 The sixth definition which the dictionary 
 gives of " Temper," is, 
 
 " State to which metals, particularly steel, 
 are reduced, in respect to hardness or elas 
 ticity." 
 
 The word elasticity here is the one which 
 applies both to the temper of metals, and of 
 men. Of the finest-tempered steel a weapon 
 can be made so elastic that you may bend it 
 double and it will not snap. The instant the 
 pressure is removed it will fly back to its 
 original shape, unbent, untarnished, and un 
 hurt. This is wonderfully like the way the 
 
GOOD TEMPER. 2O7 
 
 finest-tempered people meet the trials and 
 crosses of everyday life. Good Temper 
 bends double, if need be ; but it does not 
 snap. When the pressure is over, it is 
 itself again as shining and perfect as ever. 
 It is like the famous cimeter of Saladiu, 
 which put to shame King Richard s huge 
 broadsword in the hands of King Richard 
 himself. The broadsword was of good metal, 
 no doubt ; and it was " so long that it reached 
 well nigh from the shoulders to the heels" of 
 a man, the old tale says. Few men could 
 even lift it; but Richard Cceur de Lion 
 made nothing of swinging it round his head, 
 and brmffinff it down with a blow that would 
 
 O O 
 
 fell an ox. One day, when he was in 
 Palestine, to show the Saracens what he 
 could do with this broadsword, he cut a 
 thick bar of iron through, at a single stroke ; 
 the two pieces rolled on the ground, "as a 
 woodsman would sever a sapling," and w the 
 
208 BITS OF TALK. . 
 
 blade of the sword was so well-tempered as 
 to exhibit not the least token of having 
 suffp-^d by the feat it had performed." 
 
 Then Saladin, the Saracen Prince, took a 
 silken cushion stuffed with down, and plac 
 ing it upright, asked King Richard if he 
 could cut that in two. 
 
 "No, surely," replied the King, "no sword 
 on earth can cut that which opposes no 
 steady resistance to the blow." 
 
 Ha ! ha ! how the Saracen must have 
 laughed when he heard the King say that, 
 for he knew very well that his cimeter, 
 which was narrow and light as a reaping- 
 hook, could cut that bag of down much 
 more easily than King Richard had cut the 
 iron bar. 
 
 Then the story goes on to say, "He drew 
 the cimeter across the cushion, applying the 
 edge so dexterously, and with so little ap 
 parent effort, that the cushion seemed rather 
 
GOOD TEMPER. 209 
 
 to fall asunder than to be divided by vio 
 lence." 
 
 King Richard s followers did not like to 
 see this ; and one of them exclaimed : 
 
 "It is a juggler s trick ; there is gramarye 
 in this." 
 
 That is just the way we feel sometimes 
 when we see how stupid people, and inert 
 people, and obstinate people, are managed, 
 and set right, and kindled up by one person s 
 good temper brought to bear on them. It 
 seems almost like "gramarye." 
 
 When the Englishman said this, the Sar 
 acen Prince took a thin veil, and letting it 
 fall across the edge of his cimeter, cut that 
 also into two pieces, which floated away in 
 the air. This was even more wonderful 
 than the other. How stupid and coarse the 
 mere brute force of the great broadsword 
 seemed after this ! 
 
 There are occasions, no doubt, when the 
 
2IO BITS OF TALK. 
 
 broadsword kind of temper is of use ; but 
 they are rare. For the everyday needs of 
 everyday life, for the little worries, and the 
 little perplexities, for the silliness, and the 
 stupidity, and the contrariness of people, the 
 fine, and light, and elastic touch of Saladin s 
 cimeter is a great deal better. 
 
LIZZY OF LA BOURGET. 21 1 
 
 LIZZY OF LA BOUKGET. 
 
 T TELL you the tale as twas told to me. 
 
 Tis a tale that I dearly love to tell ; 
 The tale of Lizzy of La Bourget, 
 Of faithful Lizzy, who ran so well. 
 
 This Lizzy of La Bourget was a mare ; 
 
 She was all snow white except two black feet; 
 Her sire was an Arab steed, coal black, 
 
 Her dam was a Cossack pony fleet. 
 
 Her Arab blood made her tireless and strong, 
 Her Cossack blood made her loving and true ; 
 
 Oh I Lizzy of La Bourget could love 
 As warmly as human beings do. 
 
 She followed her peasant master to work, 
 Obeyed at a sign or call of her name ; 
 
 All day she tugged at his cart or plough, 
 And bounding at night she homeward came. 
 
212 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 She was never groomed, but she shone like silk, 
 And fattened well on the poorest fare ; 
 
 She played with the children like a dog, 
 And the children fed her with her share. 
 
 "When the war broke out and her master went 
 To fight with the French, good Lizzy went too : 
 
 And many a battle, night and day, 
 
 She carried him bravely, safely through. 
 
 But at last there came a turn in the tide, 
 For Lizzy and master, disastrous day; 
 
 The day on which a battle was fought, 
 A bloody battle at La Bourget. 
 
 The cavalry regiment, horse and man 
 "Were caught in an ambush and hemmed in : 
 
 The Frenchman captured them every one, 
 And held them, a ransom large to win. 
 
 The captors were tipsy; twas late at night; 
 
 The foolish men drank because they were glad: 
 Alone, by a half-open casement low, 
 
 Sat Lizzy s poor master, weary and sad, 
 
LIZZY OF LA BOUEGET. 213 
 
 When, sudden, he heard a sound that he knew ; 
 
 He could not mistake, it was Lizzy s neigh ; 
 She had broken loose and was seeking him, 
 
 Oh, brave, good Lizzy of La Bourgetl 
 
 The captors were tipsy ; they did not hear 
 Their prisoner call " Lizzy " in whisper low; 
 
 They did not notice the joyous neigh : 
 The first they knew, with one ringing blow 
 
 The casement was burst from its hinges strong, 
 Their prisoner had leaped on his good mare s 
 back; 
 
 And through the darkness he raced, he flew, 
 With a hundred bullets on his track. 
 
 No bridle ! no spur I But well Lizzy knew 
 The life of her master lay in her speed, 
 
 She ran like a whirlwind, and paid to the shots 
 No more than to summer raindrops heed. 
 
 No compass I no guide I Nought knew the Hussar 
 
 Of right or left in his perilous way ; 
 But safe, sure instinct his Lizzy had, 
 
 She knew the road back to La Bourget. 
 
214 
 
 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 All night and the most of a day she ran, 
 She had 110 water, she was not fed ; 
 
 And when she arrived at La Bourget, 
 You well may think, she was almost dead. 
 
 But a shout arose from each man who saw 
 Her dash into camp with her gallant stride. 
 
 And the General himself came out to see 
 The horse and the master of such a ride. 
 
 The fight had been fierce, and many men won 
 Great fame in the heat of that bloody day, 
 
 But long after they are forgotten all, 
 The world will know Lizzy of La Bourget. 
 
KICKING AGAINST PEICKS. 2 1 5 
 
 KICKING AGAINST PRICKS. 
 
 nPI-IE world is full of things that prick. 
 There are nettles, and burdocks, and 
 thistles, and rose-bushes, and raspberry- 
 bushes, and blackberry-vines, which ever/ 
 child knows by sight. Then in the South, 
 and out in the far West, where I live, at the 
 foot of the Rocky Mountains, there are in 
 addition to all these, more than a dozen 
 different kinds of cactus which prick worse 
 than anything else in the world ; and there 
 is a plant called Yucca, which has long leaves 
 almost as narrow as a grass-blade, pointed at 
 the end, and as stiff as a knife. Sometimes 
 this is called Spanish Bayonet, because its 
 leaves are as sharp as the point of a bayonet. 
 They could run a long way into flesh if 
 they were used as weapons. I presume 
 
2l6 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 there are a great many more things that 
 prick that I never heard of. Probably no 
 country is without them ; I am sure we have 
 enough of them in America. 
 
 How carefully we move about where such 
 things are growing ! How closely we look 
 where we step ! Everybody knows nettles, 
 and will not go near a nettle-bed if he can 
 help it. In picking raspberries and black 
 berries, how sharply we look out not to get 
 scratched by the thorns ; how often we see 
 beautiful purple thistles, and say to our 
 selves: "Oh, dear! if thistles hadn .t such 
 sharp thorns on them, I would pick one." 
 And as for roses, it has passed into a proverb 
 about them, 
 
 " No rose without a thorn," 
 
 which means that hardly anybody ever picked 
 
 a rose in his life without pricking his fingers 1 
 
 The only waj to handle any of these 
 
KICKING A GAINST PEICKS. 2 1 / 
 
 things safely, is to wear very thick gloves, 
 or else to take a pair of scissors and cut 
 off all the thorns before you touch the 
 stems. 
 
 This is a great deal of trouble ; but not 
 so much trouble as to have to pick thorns 
 out of your flesh, and to bear the pain of 
 their pricking. Some thorns are poisonous, 
 and the pain lasts a long time. I knew a 
 lady in Colorado who carelessly stepped on. 
 a prickly pear-plant, that is a kind of 
 cactus ; it has flat round leaves about as 
 large as the palm of your hand, and shaped 
 something like a mitten with the thumb left 
 off. These leaves are quarter of an inch 
 thick, and are covered all over with little 
 pricking points, as fine as the finest needles ; 
 these points are called spines ; they are so 
 fine you can hardly see one alone by itself, 
 and it is almost impossible to get one out of 
 your flesh if once it has sunk in. This lady 
 
21 8 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 stepped on some of these leaves, and the 
 spines ran through her boot and her stock 
 ing, and went so far into her foot she could 
 not pull them out. Her foot swelled, and 
 her whole leg swelled ; for two weeks she 
 had to sit with her leg resting on a chair, 
 and suffered great pain all that time. Don t 
 you believe she was careful always after that, 
 when she walked on the plains where the 
 cactus grew? 
 
 And now what do you suppose is the 
 reason I am saying all these things about 
 different sorts of plants which prick? I ll, 
 tell you. This is a little sermon, and all 
 this first part about the plants that prick, is 
 the text to it. 
 
 Now comes the sermon itself; and ^ou 
 see if it doesn t "stick to its text" better 
 than some sermons do. 
 
 There are hundreds of things in life that are 
 just like these thorny leaves and stems that 
 
KICKING AGAINST PRICKS. 219 
 
 prick. Every day we come across them, or 
 they come across us ! Some of them are like 
 the nettles and burdocks, just mere torments, 
 to get away from if we can : ugly-tempered 
 people, and stupid, tiresome people ; I think 
 the ugly-tempered people are like nettles ; 
 how they do sting us and make us smart ! 
 and the stupid, tiresome people are like 
 burdocks ; how they do stick to us when we 
 want to shake them off! But most of the 
 things in life which prick us are like 
 the roses, and the raspberries, and the 
 blackberries ; good things which we want, 
 beautiful things which we like to see, and 
 wholesome things which it is best for us to 
 have ; but they all have thorns, and if we 
 don t take hold of them the right way, we 
 shall surely get pricked. I will mention 
 one of the things I mean, and you will think 
 of dozens yourselves : 
 
 Sleep, is one. Once I asked a little girl 
 
220 KITS OF TALK. 
 
 what she disliked most of all things in this 
 world, and she answered me, without stop 
 ping to think a minute, 
 
 "Bed-time ! bed-timo s the thing I hate 
 worst ! Bed-time s the meanest thing in all 
 the world ! " 
 
 I didn t wonder much, for I remember 
 very well how I used to hate to go to bed 
 when I was a child. But if I had only 
 known then, as I know now, that every hour 
 I spent in sleep was helping to make me a 
 strong, healthy woman, and giving my body 
 a chance to grow to its full size, I wouldn t 
 have hated it so. No, indeed ; I would have 
 gone to bed early every night, of my own 
 accord, without anybody s having to coax 
 or to drive me. I should have known that 
 the more hours I spent sleeping, while I was 
 a little child, the better time I should have 
 when I grew up. 
 
 But little children cannot possibly under- 
 
KICKING AGAINST PEICKS. 221 
 
 stand this. They cannot believe it when 
 their fathers and mothers tell them. So 
 they have to be made to go to bed early, no 
 matter how much they dislike it. Almost 
 every day I see some child being dragged 
 off to bed, by a nurse or a mother ; and 
 when I hear it crying, and screaming, and 
 holding back, I say, 
 
 "Oh, you foolish child, you are kicking 
 against the pricks ! How much harder you 
 make it for yourself, as well as for everybody 
 else." 
 
 Now, I wish every boy and girl that reads 
 this would just try, for one week, going to 
 bed when the. regular time comes, without 
 making any fuss about it. Take the bed 
 time just as you take the dinner-time, or 
 the tea-time, or the breakfast-time, or some 
 thing that is fixed and settled, and that is 
 the end of it. Why, at the end of the week 
 you won t think much about it ; when seven 
 
222 SITS OF TALK. 
 
 o clock comes, or eight o clock, whatever 
 your bed-time is, you will go, as a matter of 
 course, and you ll see how much happier 
 you ll be. You will save ever so many 
 pricks ! Try it ! 
 
 And it would be just so with all the things 
 which children have to do which they don t 
 like to do and all the things which they 
 want to do, and can t ; all such things are 
 things with pricks. If you fret and cry and 
 tease, that is kicking against the pricks, and 
 you get dreadfully hurt. If you say to your 
 self resolutely, 
 
 " Well, it can t be helped. I ve got to do 
 it. I ll make the best of it ! " That is taking 
 hold of the thorns the right way, and saves 
 all the scratches. 
 
 There is one more thing to be said about 
 this kicking against pricks : It always leaves 
 shocking marks on people s faces. 
 
 You can imagine how a boy s clothes 
 
KICKING AGAINST PEICKS. 22$ 
 
 would look, if he had been in a bed of 
 nettles and brambles, and had just plunged 
 right through, kicking the thorny stems on 
 every side. Why, he would look like a, 
 beggar ! his clothes would hang in rags and 
 tatters ; great pieces would have been torn 
 out and left behind. 
 
 Now, our faces are the clothes of our 
 souls ; and the strange thing is, that the 
 soul s clothes always show what shape the 
 souls have. The body s clothes are quite 
 different. You can have clothes made for 
 the body which* will quite conceal its shape ; 
 it may be deformed and ugly to look at, and 
 yet good clothes, rightly made, can almost 
 cover up the deformity. But not so with the 
 face, which is the outside garment of the soul. 
 
 If you kick against the pricks of life, 
 every kick leaves its mark on your face ; 
 and if you keep on kicking, that is, if you 
 keep on fretting, and whining, and teasing, 
 
224 & IT8 OF 
 
 and making a fuss about things that can t be 
 helped, by and by your face will be all full 
 of ugly lines and marks which are just like 
 the rags and tatters which would come on 
 your clothes if you plunged through a 
 bramble-bed every day. 
 
 And you can mend the clothes ; but you 
 can t possibly mend a face. The scowls and 
 the frowns, and the discontented looks, all 
 grow deeper and deeper, the older we 
 grow ; sometimes we see old men or women 
 with faces so full of such marks, that we are 
 almost afraid to speak to them. 
 
 " Oh, what a cross old man ! " " What an 
 ugly old woman ! " we say. 
 
 These are the men and women who began, 
 when they were children, to kick against 
 pricks, and have never left off. 
 
 And this is the end of the little sermon 
 about pricks. 
 
 Did it not stick to its text ? 
 
FIRST VOYAGE ROUND THE WORLD. 225 
 
 MY FIRST VOYAGE ROUND THE WORLD 
 
 heads peeped over my shoulder, 
 And four merry voices said, 
 " Oh, Aunty! tell us a story 
 
 Of some journey you have made." 
 
 The lilac-bush at the window 
 
 Nodded, and whispered : "You know 
 There s that one you took in my shadow 
 
 Almost thirty years ago." 
 
 I nodded back to the lilac, 
 " Good friend, your plumes are as curled 
 As when I took, in their shadow, 
 My first voyage round the world. 
 
 " But I am so old and weary, 
 
 I almost forget that sail ; 
 If I find I cannot tell it, 
 Will you finish me the tale?" 
 15 
 
226 SITS OF TALK. 
 
 The lilac-bush shook with laughter, 
 And the fragrance floated in ; 
 
 The children crowded up closer, 
 And shouted : " Begin, begin I " 
 
 "Well, once there was a little girl." 
 
 "That s you," 
 
 They cried. " Yes, it was I, but twill not do 
 For you to interrupt. 
 
 " One day in June 
 
 She and her brother took their books at noon 
 And sat down on the grass, where lilacs made 
 A green and purple tent with pleasant shade. 
 They meant to study, but the day was hot ; 
 And watching birds and bugs, they soon forgo t 
 The lessons, and began to idly trace 
 With pencil-marks the atlas s old face. 
 But presently, with slow and sleepy gait, 
 As if they never heard of being late, 
 Two caterpillars crawled up on the map, 
 And stopped, and snuffed, and made their feelers 
 
 snap 
 
 With wisest look, on land and on the sea. 
 1 Halloo 1 old fellows, cried the boy. You ll be 
 
FIRST VOYAGE ROUND THE WORLD. 22? 
 
 Two travelled worms, and you shall draw our 
 
 ships. 
 
 Go faster, now, or you shall feel the whips. 
 Just then two dainty apple-blossoms blew 
 Down in their laps: one pink, one white. Ana 
 
 you 
 Shall be our ships. he cried; one called "The 
 
 Rose," 
 The other, " Snow-bird." > 
 
 " Then his sister chose 
 
 < The Rose 9 for hers ; and with fine silken strings 
 They made the caterpillars, helpless things, 
 Fast to the ships, then watched to see them start. 
 Oh I ne er before did worms play such a part ; 
 Oh I ne er before such ships go gliding through 
 The seas. Each child a curving stamen picked 
 From out a tiger-lily bud, and pricked 
 The sluggish caterpillars right and left 
 Until they must have been of sense bereft, 
 If any sense they had. 
 
 " Oh I now I know 
 
 What I will do ; for gold and pearls I ll go 
 To Africa ; the good " Snow-bird " shall fly 
 Past all these islands/ said the boy. 
 
228 SITS OF TALK. 
 
 " < And I 
 
 Will carry first a whole ship-load of bread 
 To these poor Irishmen who are half dead 
 With famine/ said the girl; then through the 
 
 Straits 
 
 Of old Gibraltar I will seek the gates 
 Of Thebes. Oh, dear ! all of the Eiver Nile 
 My caterpillar covers up. Don t smile, 
 Bad boy ; yours is as much too big, and more, 
 To get between Madeira and the shore. 
 The open ocean is a better place 
 For ships towed at a caterpillar s pace. 
 Fm going round the world, like Captain Cook: 
 Here is the very track marked out he took. 
 And so will I, cried he ; < see who will win : 
 The ship that without cheating first gets in 
 Shall be the champion ship. 
 
 " Then hard and fast 
 The poor worms legs were pricked. They hurried 
 
 past 
 
 Whole continents in seconds. Side by side 
 These funny racers crawled. No time nor tide 
 Made odds to them: they thought but of escape. 
 At last, just as the * Snow-bird round the Capo 
 Of Good Hope turned, lo I in a fuzzy ball 
 
FIRST VOYAGE ROUND THE WORLD. 229 
 
 Her caterpillar rolled him up, and no 
 
 Amount of pricks and shoves could make him go 
 
 Another step, or straighten out. The race 
 
 "Was over, but The Rose kept on apace ; 
 
 Poor caterpillar I patient o er and o er 
 
 Cook s track in seventeen seventy-three and four, 
 
 Through Artie seas and past firm fields of ice, 
 
 Past tropic isles, where trade-winds load with 
 
 spice, 
 He toiled. At last the play grew dull. The 
 
 Kose 
 
 Wtnt into port; the Snow-bird too ; then those 
 Young tyrants set their victims free ; more dead 
 Than live, the puzzled worms, with feeble tread, 
 Stole off, and ever after were esteemed, 
 No doubt, in their own country, as beseemed 
 Such travellers. 
 
 " As for the girl and boy, 
 
 They grew up just like all the rest, through joy 
 And grief, with books, and work, and healthful 
 
 Play; 
 
 But always they remembered well this day ; 
 And when they journeyed in good earnest, said, 
 Sometimes with pensive laugh: That trip we 
 
 made 
 
230 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 By map, beneath the lilac-bush, was best ; 
 No noise, no smoke, no cinders to molest 
 On land; no stormy gales on any sea; 
 Rivers and roads, hotels and harbors free ; 
 Each step of that we both remember yet, 
 While last year s jaunts we jumble and forget. 
 Oh I sweet, wise days, when caterpillars made 
 Fast time enough for us neath lilac s shade ; 
 And fancy was so strong that we took trips 
 Round the whole world in apple-blossom ships. " 
 
 Four mouths stretching round my shoulder, 
 
 Put sweet kisses on my lips ; 
 " Oh ! Aunty, what funny stories! 
 How jolly about the ships I " 
 
 And just then a caterpillar, 
 Who had listened to each word, 
 
 Tumbled down, quite blind with terror, 
 Into the mouth of a bird. 
 
 And the lilac-bush at the window 
 
 Nodded at me with a laugh, 
 And whispered: "You re growing so old 
 
 You ve forgotten more than half." 
 
"A GOOD TIME." 23! 
 
 "A GOOD TIME." 
 
 T TOW often we hear the phrase. It is in 
 everybody s mouth ; grown people s as 
 well as children s. I think there is no other 
 phrase we hear half so often. " Did you 
 have a good time ? " " Come and see us ; 
 we ll have a right good time ! " " What 
 shall we do for a good time, to-day ? " " Oh, 
 what a good time we have had ! " or , " Dear 
 me, we haven t had a bit good time I " Are 
 not countless such sentences as these heard 
 on every side, every hour of every day? 
 
 Everybody wants to have a good time, all 
 the time, day in and day out. Hardly any 
 body does have a good time, so much of 
 the time as that. Almost everybody s good 
 times come once in a while : an afternoon, 
 
232 SITS OF TALE. 
 
 or an evening, or a clay ; or sometimes, per 
 haps, a great treat of a week, or a month, 
 spent on a visit or a journey. 
 
 Some people would say that it is selfish 
 and silly to he all the while wanting to have 
 a good time ; that we ought to just do our 
 duty, and not mind whether we have a good 
 time or not. I do not think so. I think it 
 is only natural to want to have a good time ; 
 nobody can help liking to have a good time. 
 A person who says he doesn t care about it, 
 has something out of order in him some 
 where, in his body or his soul : either he is 
 ill, or he is a hypocrite. It is not only 
 natural to want to have a good time, it is 
 sensible ; could anything be sillier than to 
 let ourselves be uncomfortable, and mis 
 erable, and forlorn, if we can help it? Why 
 should we? 
 
 But we must stop a minute, and make sure 
 what we mean by the words "a good time, 
 
"A GOOD TIME." 233 
 
 before we gc any further. Once I heard a 
 little boy say, 
 
 "I m going to have a jolly good time, this 
 afternoon ! " and I said to him, 
 
 " What is a good time, Freddy ? " 
 
 He looked at me for a few minutes with 
 out speaking. Then he said, 
 
 "Ponds, and fishes in em, and lots of 
 grasshoppers for bait." 
 
 That was the particular kind of good time 
 he was going to have, that afternoon. 
 
 Another time, I asked a little girl the 
 same question. She had just come to 
 the house where I was stopping, and had 
 asked two other little girls who lived 
 there to come and spend the afternoon with 
 her. 
 
 " Oh, do let them come ! " she said to the 
 little girls mother. "Do ! do ! We ll have 
 a real good time." 
 
 " What will you do ? " I asked. 
 
234 BITS OF 
 
 "We re going berrying," she replied. 
 " The pasture s just full of blueberries." 
 
 Now do you think it was really the fishes 
 or the blueberries which made the good 
 time ? Not a bit of it ! 
 
 Sticking grasshoppers on a hook is a dis 
 agreeable thing to do, and leaning over the 
 edge of a boat by the hour at a time makes 
 any boy s back ache ; and as for picking 
 berries off low bushes, in a field where the 
 sun shines hot as it does in July, it is just 
 as tiresome a thing as one could find to do. 
 No ! The " good time " was in this : that 
 catching the fishes, and seeing how many 
 they could catch before supper-time, and 
 trying hard to fill their pails with blue 
 berries before it was time to go home, would 
 make the time pass so pleasantly to the chil 
 dren, that it would be sundown before they 
 would think it was more than the middle of 
 the afternoon ; and they would wish they 
 
"A GOOD TIME." 23$ 
 
 could have another afternoon joined right 
 on, without any night between. This was 
 the one secret of their good time, being 
 busy. 
 
 Even if it is being busy with things which 
 it would be better not to do, it still makes 
 people have a certain sort of good time ; 
 young people, for instance, who dance all 
 night, till they are tired out ; or old people 
 who play cards half the night ; and middle- 
 aged people who play billiards, or cricket, 
 or race in yachts, or with horses. What 
 everybody is seeking after is something 
 which shall keep him from being idle. 
 There is a dreadful phrase which you often 
 hear among people who have not enough 
 to do, it is " passing time away ; " " killing 
 time," also, they sometimes call it. Isn t 
 that a terrible expression to come from the 
 lips of a human being, who will not have, at 
 the outside, more than seventy or eighty 
 
236 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 years of time ? not half enough to do all 
 that a man or woman ought to want to do 
 in this world I 
 
 " Killing time 1 " Killing is a very true 
 word there, for it is like a wicked murder 
 to waste time. 
 
 All these expressions show how strong 
 the desire is, in everybody, to have a good 
 time ; and that everybody has an instinct 
 that the way to have a good time is to have 
 always something to do. 
 
 Now the mistake that most people make 
 about it is, that they think the "something 
 to do " must be provided for them by some 
 body else; must be forced upon them, as 
 you might say. They are to sit still and 
 wait, as if this life were a sort of great 
 tea-party, where occupation and amusement 
 were to be passed round like refreshments, 
 and it would not be polite to do anything 
 but wait quietly till your turn came to bo 
 
"A GOOD TIME." 237 
 
 helped. I see crowds of people everywhere, 
 who are really doing this absurd thing, 
 though they don t know it. These are the 
 people that you often hear say of a place, - 
 
 "Oh, it is a frightfully dull place," or of 
 a summer or a winter that they have just 
 passed, 
 
 w It has been such a stupid summer," or 
 " It was a stupid winter ; nothing going 
 on." 
 
 Sometimes, when I hear people saying such 
 things as these, I wonder that God does not 
 punish them instantly for their ingratitude 
 to Him. I am sure if any earthly king had 
 fitted up a place half as beautiful as this 
 world, and half as full of lovely things to 
 see, and wonderful things to learn, and had 
 given it to a few men and women for their 
 own, and then they were to walk up and 
 down, and sit about, lazy and sleepy, and 
 complain that it was "dull," and "stupid," 
 
238 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 the king would turn them all out pretty 
 quick. Wouldn t he? He would say, 
 
 " You are a good-for-nothing set of vaga 
 bonds. I think you must be idiots. You 
 do not deserve anything but a desert to live 
 in ; and it would not be a bit too hard pun 
 ishment for you to have your eyes put out 
 and your hands cut off, if you will not use 
 them to any purpose. Clear out I Clear 
 out I I won t have you here. I ll find some 
 other kind of beings to put in my world." 
 
 Now the truth is, there is not a "dull" 
 spot on this earth, not one ; and there ought 
 not to be a "dull" moment in any human 
 being s life, not one. The barrenest place 
 you can find, has enough in it for a man to 
 study for his whole lifetime, and then he 
 wouldn t have learned all that could be 
 learned about it. You can sit down any 
 where you like out of doors, and even 
 within reach of your hand there will be 
 
"A GOOD TIME." 239 
 
 more things than you can count, that you 
 do not know anything about; things that 
 you could not understand without having 
 studied at least half-a-dozen different sciences. 
 Why, it is enough to make us unhappy, just 
 to look closely down at any one square inch 
 of ground, at the little grains of earth, the 
 blades of grass, the weeds, the strange live 
 creatures it holds, and think how little we 
 know about them ; and then, to think that if 
 we brought a good strong microscope and 
 put it above that square inch of ground, we 
 should discover hundreds more of growths 
 and living creatures too small to be seen oy 
 our poor eyes, and much more wonderful 
 than the things they can see. 
 
 Now isn t it a strange thing that anybody 
 should ever call any place " dull" on such an 
 earth as that ? Isn t it strange that anybody 
 can help having " a good time " here ? 
 
 I think the more natural thing would be 
 
240 BITS OF TALK. 
 
 for us to be half ready to cry, all the time, 
 because there is so much to see, so much to 
 do, so much to learn, that there isn t one- 
 quarter time enough in any one day, and 
 not half days enough in the longest lifetime. 
 
 One great trouble about people s having 
 "a good time" is, that they do not begin 
 young enough to form the habit of provid 
 ing it for themselves. When I hear boys 
 or girls say to their mother 
 
 " What shall I do next? " I always think 
 to myself, " Dear me ! what a pity ! Why 
 doesn t their mother make them find out for 
 themselves what to do ? " 
 
 There is not a boy who cannot keep busy, 
 if he tries, not a girl who cannot find plenty 
 to do, if she likes, in-doors and out-doors, 
 daytimes and evenings ; there are more things 
 to be looked at, more books to be read ; 
 more things to be contrived and made by 
 fingers, than any boy or girl can get through 
 
"A GOOD TIME." 241 
 
 with, before childhood is over, and manhood 
 and womanhood begin. Almost every child 
 has some one thing it likes best to do. I 
 know a boy who has a passion for bugs ; 
 it keeps him hard at work all the time he 
 can get out of school ; in the summer he 
 catches every winged creature he can find ; 
 in the winter he arranges them, and studies 
 about them ; he has already a collection 
 wlrch any naturalist might be glad to own, 
 and in the hours he has spent out of doors, 
 he has learned a great many other things 
 about nature besides what he knows about 
 bugs. That is one of the most beautiful 
 and wonderful things about knowledge : that 
 no one bit of knowledge is alone by itself; 
 it has others which are so closely connected 
 with it, that if you know one well, you are 
 sure to know the others ; just as if you 
 know a person very intimately, you are 
 pretty sure, sooner or later, to know his 
 16 
 
242 SITS OF TALK. 
 
 brothers and sisters, and even his aunts and 
 uncles and cousins. It is quite likely that 
 this boy will be a great naturalist when he 
 grows up ; that is, he will devote his whole 
 life to studying the earth and the creatures 
 that live on it. But even if he does not, if 
 he becomes a business-man, or a doctor, or 
 a lawyer, he will be happier all his life for 
 knowing about bugs. When he goes into 
 the country, he will never find it " dull." 
 Every corner of the fields will be full of 
 interest to him, and he will help his own 
 boys have "a good time," just as he used to 
 have it when he was a boy himself. 
 
 I know a little girl, too, who has a love 
 for making little dishes out of clay. She 
 makes little bowls, and pitchers, and plates, 
 and then she paints stripes or figures of gay 
 colors on them ; she has quite a little china- 
 shop of her own. When other children 
 would be asking, perhaps, what they should 
 
"A GOOD TIME." 243 
 
 do, or what game they should play, Caddie 
 sits down and makes a new. wash-bowl and 
 pitcher for her baby-house, 
 
 Now I don t mean, by telling you these 
 stories, to make you think that all boys must 
 catch bugs, or all girls make clay pitchers ; 
 only that each child ought to find some one 
 thing it likes best, and spend time enough on 
 it to do it well ; you can do one thing one 
 year, and another thing the next year, per 
 haps : make a collection of bugs one summer, 
 and of flowers the next ; draw one winter, 
 and paint the next ; it is not so much matter 
 what it is, so long as you care enough about 
 it to like to do it, and to keep at it till you 
 do it as well as it can be done ; or at least 
 as well as it can be done by you. When 
 you love any one thing, like this, you will 
 always have it in your own power to have "a 
 good time ; " no place can be " stupid " to 
 you ; no day "dull, "and the chances are that 
 
244 BITS OF 
 
 you will in many ways get a great deal of 
 good out of this one thing you can do. 
 Somebody said once, " a man will always 
 make his way in life if he can do any one 
 thing better than anybody else can do it ; if 
 it is only making a toothpick ! " 
 
 And I think it was Dr. Johnson who said 
 that happiness had only these ingredients : 
 
 1. Health. 
 
 2. A little more money than you need. 
 
 3. A little less time than you want. 
 
 "A little less time than you want ? " That 
 means, always to have so many things you 
 want to see, to have, and to do ; that no 
 day is quite long enough for all } r ou think 
 you would like to get done before you go to 
 bed. 
 
 This is the one great secret of w A Good 
 Time," and it is a secret which never wears 
 out. This kind of " good time " lasts as long 
 as yon live. 
 
Messrs. Roberts Brothers Publications. 
 
 BITS OF TALK 
 
 ABOUT HOME MATTERS. 
 BY H. H. 
 
 Auiuor of " Verses" and " Bits of Travel" S quart 
 \Zrno. Cloth, red edges. Price, $:.oo. 
 
 " A NEW GOSPEL FOR MOTHERS. We wish that every mother In 
 the land would read Bits of Talk about Home Matters, by H. H., and 
 that they would read it thoughtfully. The latter suggestion is, however, 
 wholly unnecessary : the book seizes one s thoughts and sympathies, 33 
 
 only startling truths presented with direct earnestness can do. ... The 
 adoption of her sentiments would wholly change the atmosphere in many 
 a house to what it ought to be, and bring almost constant sunshine and 
 
 bliss where now too often are storm and misery." Laturtnce (Kansas) 
 Journal. 
 
 " In the little book entitled Bits of Talk, by H. H., Messrs. Roberts 
 Brothers have given to the world an uncommonly useful collection of 
 essays, useful certainly to all parents, and likely to do good to all chil 
 dren. Other people have doubtless held as correct views on the subjects 
 treated here, though few have ever advanced them ; and none that we are 
 aware have made them so attractive as they are made by H. H. s crisp 
 and sparkling style. No one opening the book, even though without rea 
 son for special interest in its topics, could, after a glimpse at its pages, 
 lay it down unread ; and its bright and witty scintillations will fix many a 
 precept and establish many a fact. Bits of Talk is a book that ought 
 to have a place of honor in every household ; for it teaches, not only the 
 true dignity of parentage, but of childhood. As we read it, we laugh and 
 cry with the author, and acknowledge that, since ^the child is father of 
 the man, in being the champion of childhood, she is the champion of the 
 whole coming race. Great is the rod, but H. H. is not its prophet 1" 
 M~s. Harriet Prescott Spofford, in Newburyport Herald. 
 
 Sold everywhere. Mailed, post-paid, by the pub 
 lishers, 
 
 ROBERTS BROTHERS, BOSTON. 
 
Messrs. Roberts Brothers Publications. 
 
 RAMONA: A STORY. 
 
 BY HELEN JACKSON (H. H.). 
 
 I2mo. Cloth. Price $1.50. 
 
 TJjf Atlantic Monthly says of the author that she is "a MuriDo 
 in literature," and that the story " is one of the most artistic 
 creations of American literature." Says a l^dy : Tome it is the 
 most distinctive piece of work we have had in this country since 
 k Uncle Tom s Cab:n, and its exquisite finish of style is beyond that 
 classic." "The book is truly an American novel," says the Boston 
 Advertiser. " Ramor.a is one of the n.est charming creations ol 
 modern fiction," says Charles D Warner " The romance of the 
 story is irresistibly fascii.ating," says The Independent. 
 
 " The best novel written by a woman sii.ce Gaorge Eliot died, as 
 it seems to me, is Mrs. Jackson s * Ramona What action is there 
 What motion I How entrainant it is! It carries us aiong as if 
 mounted on a swift horse s back, from beginning to end, and it is 
 only when we return for a second reading that we can appreciate 
 the fine handling of the characters, and especially the Spanish 
 mother, drawn with a stroke as keen and ^rm as that which 
 portrayed George Eliot s Dorothea. " T. W. Higgim,on. 
 
 Unsolicited tribute of a stranger, a iady in Wisconsin : 
 
 " I beg leave to thank you with an intense heartiness for your 
 public espousal cf the cause of the Indian. In your Century of 
 Dishonor you showed to the country its own disgrace. In 
 Ramona you have dealt most tenderly with the Indians as men 
 and women. You have shown that their stoicism is not indiffer- 
 ence, that their squalor is not always of their own choosing. You 
 have shown the tender grandeur of their love, the endurance of 
 their constancy. While, by Ramona, you have made your name 
 immortal, you have done something which is far greater You are 
 but one: they are many. You have helped those who cannot heip 
 themselves. As a novel, Ramona must stand beside Romola, 
 both as regards literary excellence and the portrayal of life s deepest, 
 most vital, most solemn interests. I think nothing in literature 
 since G<" Msmith s Vicar of Wakefield equals your description of 
 the flight of Ramona and Alessandro. Such delicate pathofi and 
 tender joy, such cure conception of life s realities, and such loftiness 
 Of self-abnegacing love ! How much richer and happier the world 
 C> with Ramona in it. ! " 
 
 Sold by all booksellers. Mailed, post-paid, by the publishers^ 
 ROBERTS BROTHERS, BOSTOM. 
 
The sparrow again waited until the child had almost reached him." 
 
 SPARROW THE TRAMP. 
 
 HOEFT. With illustrations by Jessie McDermott. Price, $1.25. 
 
 ROBERTS BROTHERS, PUBLISHERS, BOSTON. 
 
"H. H. s" CAT STORIES. 
 
 MAMMY TITTLEBACK AND HER FAMIL 
 
 A TRUE STORY OF SEVENTEEN CATS. 
 
 
 
 WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY ADDIE LEDYARD. 
 
 Small quarto. Cloth, black and gold cover. Price $1.25. 
 
 EGBERTS BROTHERS. Publishers. 
 
Messrs. Roberts Brothers Publications. 
 
 NELLVS SILVER MINE, 
 
 BY H. H. 
 
 With Illustrations. i6mo, cloth. Price $1.50. 
 
 " The sketches of life, especially of its odd and out-of-the-way aspects, by H. H. 
 always possess so vivid a reality that they appear more like the actual scenes than 
 jmy copy by pencil or photograph. They form a series of living pictures, radiant 
 *with sunlight and fresh as morning dew. In this new story the fruits of her fine 
 genius are of Colorado growth, and though without the antique flavor of her recol 
 lections of Rome and Venice, aie as delicious to the taste as they are tempting to 
 the eye, and afford a natural feast of exquisite quality." N. Y. Tribune. 
 
 "This charming little book, written for children s entertainment and instruc 
 tion, is equally delightful to the fathers and mothers. It is life in New England, 
 an4 the racy history of a long railway journey to the wilds of Colorado. The 
 children are neither imps nor angels, but just such children as are found in every 
 happy home. The pictures are so graphically drawn that we feel well acquainted 
 with Rob and Nelly, have travelled with them and climbed mountains and found 
 silver mines, and know all about the rude life made beautiful by a happy fan ily, 
 and can say of Nelly, with their German neighbor, Mr. Kleesman, Ach well, she 
 haf better than any silver mine in her own self. " Chicago Inter-Ocean. 
 
 i "In Nelly s Silver Mine Mrs. Helen Hunt Jackson has given us a true 
 classic for the nursery and the school-room, but its readers will not be confined to 
 any locality. Its vivid portraiture of Colorado life and its truth to child-nature 
 give it a charm which the most experienced cannot fail to feel. It will stand by 
 the side of Miss Edgeworth and Mrs. Barbauld in all the years to come." Mrs. 
 Caroline H. Dall. 
 
 We heartily commend the book for its healthy spirit, its lively narrative, and 
 its freedom from most of the faults of books for children." Atlantic Monthly. 
 
 Our publications are to be had of all Booksellers. When 
 not to be found, send directly to 
 
 ROBERTS BROTHERS, BOSTON, 
 
H. H. s" CAT STORIES. 
 
 LETTERS FROM A CAT. 
 
 Published by her Mistress for the Benefit of all Cats and the Amus 
 ment of Little Children. With seventeen Illustrations by ADDIE LEDYAB 
 Sr*ll quarto. Cloth, black and gold cover. Price $1.25 
 
 ROBERTS BROTHERS, Publishers. 
 
LOUISA M, ALCOTT S STOEY-BOOKS, 
 
 A CHRISTMAS DREAM. 
 
 LULU S LIBRARY. 
 
 4 COLLECTION OF STORIES BY "AUNT JO, 
 
 With Illustrations by JESSIE McDERMOTT. 
 
 3 vols. I6mo. Cloth. Price, $1.00 per volume. 
 
 ROBERTS BROTHERS, PUBLISHERS, 
 
 BOSTON. 
 
Messrs. Roberts Brothers Publications, 
 
 BY THE AUTHOR OF "THE BROWNS." 
 
 JOLLY GOOD TIMES; OR, CHILD LIFE ON A FARM. 
 JOLLY GOOD TIMES AT SCHOOL 
 
 Two volumes, with illustrations, neatly bound in cloth. Price $1.25 each, 
 
 " Allow me to express, unasked, the zest and satisfaction with which I nave 
 read your new children s book, Jolly Good Times; or, Child Life on a Farm. 
 The author s name is wholly new to me; but I am delighted that while our 
 novelists are apt to ignore the joyous country-life of New England, or to treat 
 it as something bare and barren, it should still be printed in its true colors for 
 children. A few literary faults can easily be pardoned in a writer who describes 
 thus graphically the healthy pleasures of country children, putting so much oxygen 
 into her story that it is like a whiff of wholesome air among the prevailing exotic 
 flavors." From a letter by T. W. HIGGINSON. 
 
 " Jolly Good Times and Jolly Good Times at School, are two books for 
 children, written by P. Thorne. Teddy and Millicent and all the other little ones 
 in these jolly good times are the envy of our ten-year-olders who are shut up 
 in the city nearly the whole year round. The writer of these books must have 
 a gleeful heart and a quick sympathy with children ; she tells of their pranks 
 and droll ways with an evident enjoyment, and has given to her little readers 
 an entertaining story." Christian Union. 
 
 " Jolly Good Times not only deserves its title, but the further praise of being 
 pronounced a jolly good book. The Kendall children and their neighbors and 
 playmates live in the Connecticut valley, not far from Deerfield, and we are given 
 a sketch of their life during one period, from the breaking up of winter till the 
 appearance of snow just after Thanksgiving. The merit of the story lies in its 
 evident biographical truth. . . . The result is a charming local picture, quite 
 worth the attention of English boys and girls, as showing what New England 
 life is in a respectable farmer s family, plain folks who do their own work, but 
 entirely free from the low-comic variety of Yankee talk and manners too often 
 considered essential to the success of a New England story." The Nation. 
 
 " Jolly Good Times is a story of country life, evidently written by one who 
 is thoroughly acquainted with the subject. It is redolent of rural odors, vocal 
 with rural sounds, and instinct with the simple sweetness of old New England 
 life. . . . The children are real creatures, compounds of good and evil, full of 
 spirit, yet amiable and obedient. Teddy, like Artemus Ward s kangaroo, is very 
 amoosin, and some of his predicaments are very laughable. The chapter 
 in which the quiet passage of a country Sunday is described is remarkable for its 
 fidelity to fact and its graceful expression. Jolly Good Times is as pure as a 
 summer sky, and exhilarates without exciting." Literary World, Boston. 
 
 " P. Thorne is a pseudonym pleasantly associated in the minds of the readers 
 of the Register with many bright and earnest contributions to its columns. She 
 is also the author of one of the successful children s books of last year; and the 
 present little work. Jolly Good Times at School." is in some sort a sequel to her 
 former venture. It is also an improvement upon it in both matter and manner. 
 Pleasing pictures it gives us of the school and child-life of New England as it 
 existed twenty-five years ago, and as it still exists in the more secluded and rural 
 districts. . . . Interwoven here and there in the narrative are charming descrip 
 tions of the natural beauties and characteristic scenes of New England : the cold 
 snap, the first snow-storm, the exciting coast down the mountain, the Indian 
 stories, &c., &c. In short, we cordially commend this little book to the seeker 
 for Christmas gifts." Christian Register, Boston. 
 
 Sold by all Booksellers. Mailed, postpaid, by the pub 
 lishers, 
 
 ROBERTS BROTHERS, BOSTON. 
 
Messrs. Roberts Brothers * Publications. 
 
 VERSES. 
 
 BY H. H. 
 
 A New Enlarged Edition. Square iSnto. Uniform with 
 " Bits of Talk " and " Bits of Travel." Price $1.00. 
 
 "The volume is one which will make H. H. dear to all the lovers of true 
 poetry. Its companionship will be a delight, its nobility of thought and of purpose 
 an inspiration. . . . This new edition comprises not only the former little book 
 with the same modest title, but as many more new poems. . . . The best critics 
 have already assigned to H. H. her high place in our catalogue of authors. She 
 is, without doubt, the most highly intellectual of our female poets. . . . The new 
 poems, while not inferior to the others in point of literary art, have in them more 
 of fervor and of feeling ; more of that lyric sweetness which catches the attention 
 and makes the song sing itself over and over afterwards in the remembering brain. 
 . . . Some of the new poems seem among the noblest H. H. has ever written. 
 They touch the high-water mark of her intellectual power, and are full, besides, oi 
 passionate and tender feeling. Among these is the Funeral March. " N. Y. 
 Tribune. 
 
 "A delightful book is the elegant little volume of Verses, by H. H., 
 instinct with the quality of the finest Christian womanhood. . . . Some wives and 
 mothers, growing sedate with losses and cares, will read many of these Verses 
 with a feeling of admiration that is full of tenderness." Advance. 
 
 " The poems of this lady have taken a place in public estimation perhaps 
 higher than that of any living American poetess. . . . They are the thoughts of 
 a delicate and refined sensibility, which views life through the pure, still atmos 
 phere of religious fervor, and unites all thought by the tender talisman of love." 
 Inter-Ocean. 
 
 " Since the days of poor L. E. L., no woman has sailed into fame under a 
 flag inscribed with her initials only, until the days of H. H. Here, however. 
 the parallelism ceases ; for the fresh, strong beauty which pervades these Verses 
 nas nothing in common with the rather languid sweetness of the earlier writer. 
 Unless I am much mistaken, this enlarged volume, double the size of that origi 
 nally issued, will place its author not merely above all American poetesses and all 
 living English poetesses, but above all women who have ever written poetry in 
 the English language, except Mrs. Browning alone. H. H. has not yet proved 
 herself equal to Mrs. Browning in range of imagination ; but in strength and depth 
 the American writer is quite the equal of the English, and in compactness and 
 Symmetry altogether her superior." T. W. H. in The Index. 
 
 Sold by all booksellers. Mailed, post-paid, by the Pub 
 Ushers- 
 
 ROBERTS BROTHERS, BOSTON. 
 
Messrs. Roberts Brothers Publications. 
 MBS. DODGE S POPULAK BOOK 
 
 A PORTRAIT OF DOROTHY AT SIXTEEN. 
 
 DONALD AND DOROTHY 
 
 BY MARY MAPES DODGE. 
 
 Beautifully Illustrated and Bound. Price #1.50. 
 
 An honest tribute from an admiring- friend. 
 
 "DHAR MKS. DODGE, ! have just finished your book called Donald ard 
 Dorothy for the third or fourth time, and would like very much to (enow 
 whether Dorothy is a real person, and if so, what is her name ? I am nearly 
 as old as Dorothy was at the close of the book, so am very much interested 
 in her. I would also like to know how old she is, and where she lives li you 
 V90uld be kind enough to reply, you would greatly oblige 
 
 44 Your admiring inend." 
 
 ROBERTS BROTHERS. PUBLISHERS, BOSTON. 
 
Messrs. Roberts Brothers Publications^ 
 
 BITS OF TRAVEL. 
 
 BY H. H. 
 Square iSmo. Cloth, red edges. Price $1.25. 
 
 " Some one has said that, if vtie could open the mail-bags, and read the 
 women s letters, they would be m^re entertaining than any books. This vol 
 ume is an open mail-bag, forwaraed from Germany or Rome or the Tyrol. 
 The faded wonders of Europe turn out to be wholly fresh, when seen through 
 a tresh pair of eyes ; and so the result is very charming. As for the more 
 elaborate sketch of A German Landlady, it cannot be forgotten by any 
 reader of the Atlantic. Jt comprises so much such humor, such pathos, 
 such bewitching quaintness of dialect that I can, at this moment, think of 
 no American picture of a European subject to equal it. It is, of course, the 
 best thing in the volume ; but every page is readable, and almost all delight 
 ful." Col. T. IV. Higginson. 
 
 " The volume has few of the characteristics of an ordinary book of travel. 
 It is entertaining and readable, from cover to cover ; and, when the untrav- 
 elied reader has finished it, he will find that he knows a great deal more about 
 life in Europe having seen it through intelligent and sympathetic eyes 
 than he ever got before from a dozen more pretentious volumes." Hartjord 
 Courant. 
 
 " It is a special merit of these sketches that, by their graphic naturalness 
 of coloring, they give a certain vitality to scenes with which the reader is not 
 supposed to be familiar. They do not need the aid of personal recollection 
 to supply the defects of the description. They present a series of vivid pic 
 tures, which, by the beauty of their composition and the charming quaintness 
 of their characters, form an exception to the rule that narratives of travel are 
 interesting in proportion to the reader s previous knowledge of the subject. 
 In several instances, they leave fhe beaten track of the tourist ; but they 
 always afford a fresh attraction, and, if we mistake not, will tempt many of our 
 countrymen, in their European reconnoitring, to visit the scenes of which they 
 are here offered so tempting a oretaste." New York Tribune. 
 
 " Travel increaseth a man. But, next to going bodily, is to wander, through 
 the magical power of print, whithersoever one will. A good book of travel 
 is a summer s vacation. This little book, by Mrs Hunt, is ?. series of rare 
 pictures of life in Germany, Italy, and Venice. Every one is in itself a gem. 
 Brilliant, chatty, full of fine feminine taste and feeling, just the letters one 
 waits impatiently to get, and reads till the paper has been fingered through. 
 It has been ouen observed that women are the best correspondents. We can 
 not analyze the peculiar charm of their letters. It is a part of that mysterious 
 personnel which is the atmosphere of every womanly woman." Boston 
 Courier. 
 
 Sold everywhere by all Booksellers. Mailed, postpaid, 
 by the Publishers, 
 
 ROBERTS BROTHERS, BOSTON. 
 
Messrs. Roberts Brothers Publication*. 
 
 BITS OF TRAVEL AT HOME 
 
 BY H. H. 
 
 Square i8mo. Cloth, red edges. Price $1.50. 
 
 M Mrs. Helen Hunt is too well and favorably known to need introduction to 
 American readers. Her poems are among the most thoughtful, vigorous, and 
 truly imaginative this country has produced. She is a poet to the manner born, 
 and something of the poetic touch and quality enters into her prose writings. Her 
 Hits of Travel, published years ago, gave charming accounts of places and 
 scenes and experiences in Europe. Her Bits of Talk were full of wise and 
 useful suggestions put in exceedingly felicitous ways; they had the sweetnes* 
 and bloom of life s morning with the insight and practicality of its mid-day. Her 
 other books have each widened her literary reputation. The little volume of Bits 
 of Travel at Home is in her best vein. It tells something of New England, but 
 is chiefly devoted to California and Colorado. She both describes and paints, and 
 she intersperses her sketches of nature with cha/ming pictures of human life on 
 the frontier and in the new communities springing up there. All through the 
 closely printed book are delicate little bits of description, cropping up like flowers 
 in a meadow, which the reader lingers over, and the reviewer longs to pluck for a 
 bouquet of quotations. It is a charming book for summer reading, and will make 
 many a dull day brighter by its vivacity and beauty. She gives five sunrises from 
 her calendar in Colorado, and closes her volume as follows : O emperor, wilt 
 thou not build an eastern wing to thy palace and set thy bed fronting the dawn t 
 And by emperor I mean simply any man to whom it is given to make himself a 
 home ; and oy palace I mean any house, however small, in which love dwells and 
 On which the sun can shine. " N. Y. Express. 
 
 "A charming volume. Those that remember and who that read the book 
 will forget the grace, the freshness, the bright, piquant charm of the first Bits, 
 will be glad to have an opportunity to read a new volume by a writer remarkable 
 for her humor, her quaintness, and her pathos. Those that want a thoroughly 
 enjoyable and entirely fascinating book are heartily recommended to this." Cin 
 cinnati Times. 
 
 "The descriptions of American scenery in this volume indicate the imagination 
 of a poet, the eye of an acute observer of Nature, the hand of an artist, and th 
 heart of a woman. 
 
 " H. H. s choice of words is of itself a study of color. Her picturesque d:ctioa 
 rivals the skill of the painter, and presents the woods and waters of the Great 
 Wast with a splendor of illustration that can scarcely be surpassed by the bright 
 est glow of the canvas. Her intuitions of character are no less keen than het 
 perceptions of Nature." N. Y. Tribune. 
 
 Our publications are to be had of all Booksellers. When 
 not to be found, send directly to 
 
 ROBERTS BROTHERS, BOSTON. 
 

 
 o 
 
 * 
 
 CXI 
 
 
 
 rn 
 
 
 
 FEB 1 6 2006 
 
U.C. BERKELEY LIBRARIES 
 
 W57591 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY OF CALIFORNIA LIBRARY 
 
 ^