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THE
PROVE THEIR SISTERHOOD
THE SEVEN LITTLE SISTERS PROVE THEIR SISTERHOOD
EACH AND ALL
A COMPANION TO
THE SEVEN LITTLE SISTERS WHO LIVE ON THE ROUND
BALL THAT FLOATS IN THE AIR," "TEN BOYS
WHO LIVED ON THE ROAD FROM LONG
AGO TO NOW," "GEOGRAPHICAL
PLAYS," ETC.
BY
JANE ANDREWS
BOSTON, U.S.A.
GINN & COMPANY, PUBLISHERS
1894
Copyright, 1877,
By LEE AND SHEPARD.
Copyright, 1885,
By LEE AND SHEPARD.
A II rights reserved.
Prove their Sisterhood.
EDUC-
PSYCH.
IBRARY
GIFT
tctuc -
Library
MARGIE AND ANDREWS,
AND TO THE FOUR YOUNGEST MEMBERS OF MY SCHOOL,
DOSSIE, EDITH, DADIE, AND GEORGIE,
I DEDICATE
THIS LITTLE BOOK.
072
CONTENTS.
PAGB
The Story of Agoonack, and her Sail upon
the Ice Island 1
A Long Journey through a Strange Land 26
What was Gemila doing all this Time ? . 57
New Work for Pen-se and Lin. . .91
Can the Little Brown Baby do any thing? . 120
Chkjstmas-Time again for Louise . . .128
EACH AND ALL.
THE STORY OF AGOONACK,
AND HER SAIL UPON THE ICE ISLAND.
Do you remember Agoonack, the lit-
tle Esquimau girl who lived through
the long sunshine and the long dark-
ness?
I have had news of her lately. Do
you want to know what it is? Then
come with me once more to the cold
countries, and visit our old acquaint-
ances, the seals and the bears, and the
chubby little girl and her baby brother.
It is an April day. If we were at
home, we should perhaps hear a blue-
Dird sing. There would be swelling leaf-
2 BACH AND ALL.
buds on the lilac and the horse-chestnut
trees, and little green tufts of grass
pushing up here and there in sunny
spots ; and out in the pine woods I am
sure we should find May-flowers. But
in the far-away cold countries there are
no such pleasant signs of spring; and
yet there are some things that are very
cheering to the people who live there
Best of all, there is the sun, that hafc
come back again after the long night,
and gives them now a short day, just a
few hours long. Then Puseymut the
seal, who knows that the spring is com
ing, has begun to build her curious
house. And about these seal-houses 1
must tell you; for they are almost sa
curious and pretty as a bird's nest.
You know the seals live in the water
And here the water is all covered with
ice, — ice as thick as you are tall, little
Edith, and in some places very much
thicker. And on the top of the ice
there is deep, deep snow. Now, of what
can the seal build her house ?
THE STORY OF AGOONACK. 3
Ah ! you merry children who build
snow-houses in winter know very well
of what it is built. See, I will make
you a picture of it, and the mother seal
swimming in the clear water just below.
Here is the passage-way or entry, cut
through the clear, hard ice. To make
4 BACH AND ALL.
that was difficult work for the mother
seal ; but she did it all herself. See what
a little doorway leads into the pretty
arched room above, — a room whose
walls are of snow. It is shaped just like
an Esquimau house. Indeed, I have
sometimes thought that the Esquimaux
learned of the seals how to make their
houses. It is hardly big enough, you
will say, for the mother seal to live in.
No : she didn't build it for herself. She
can swim about wherever she likes,
come up to some little hole in the ice
for an occasional breath of fresh air,
creep out and sun herself if the day is
warm; and, in short, she doesn't seem
to need a house for herself.
For whom, then, is the little house ?
Georgie thinks it must be for her baby.
And Georgie is right ; for in that pretty
round house lies a little white baby seal,
with soft hazel eyes, and tiny little flip-
pers hardly big enough to swim with as
yet. And she lies there so snugly while
THE STORY OF AGOONAOK.
the mother goes away for food ; and she
gives a little call of welcome when she
hears her coming up the ice-entry that
leads to the door.
On this April day, Agoonack has on
her bear-skin jumper and hood, and runs
out on the snow beside her father, who
carries his long spear in his hand. The
sun is up, and sends level rays across
the ice, and makes the little girl think
of warmth, although, if she had a ther-
mometer, she would see that it stands
at -30° ; and that is colder than you
have ever known it to be. She trots
briskly along beside her father, until
with a sudden " Hush ! " and touch of
his hand on her shoulder, he stops the
child in the shelter of a great iceberg,
and, running swiftly forward, with a sud-
den jump he breaks through the snow-
crust, and has come crashing down into
the pretty seal igloe, and seized the baby
seal. The poor little thing is so taken by
surprise, that it can only utter a plaintive
6 EACH AND ALL.
cry, which the mother — swimming off
in the clear water under the ice —
hears instantly ; and she hastens, as any
mother would, to help her poor child.
Metek knows she will come : he is
ready. Her smooth, round head, and
mild eyes, have scarcely appeared above
the ice, when she is struck by his spear,
and drawn out through the hole. And
now she will furnish meat for dinner, oil
for the lamp, and boots for the men.
I think you wouldn't like to see all
this : it would be too painful. But
Agoonack is used to it ; and she knows
besides, that, if they catch no seals, they
will have nothing to eat. And hunger
is to her as painful as is death to this
poor seal.
Do you remember where her father
stopped her while he ran forward to the
seal igloe ?
It was in the shelter of an iceberg ;
wasn't it, Dossie ?
Now, if he had known something
THE STORY OF AGOONACK. 7
about the iceberg, I am sure he would
never have left his little daughter there
alone ; indeed, I think he wouldn't have
liked to stop there very long himself.
Creep with me round to the other side
of the berg, and up the slippery slope a
little way. Here is a narrow opening in
the ice. It is like the mouth of a little
cave. Look in and see the beautiful
clear blue ice-walls of this crystal room.
If we had come an hour ago, I believe
you would have been ready to turn and
run quickly away, without stopping to
see that this is Mother Bruin's nursery,
and she and her two children were at
play in it.
" But who is Mother Bruin ? "
Why, don't you know ? she is the great
white bear; Nannookj as Agoonack calls
her. And, although she would be a very
surly creature if we should meet her on
the ice, at home here in the crystal nur-
sery she plays with the two cubs, rolls
them over with her paw, pats them, and
8 EACH AND ALL.
cuddles and hugs them as tenderly in her
rough way as your mother does you.
And sometimes she takes them out
sliding down the steep snow-hills, sitting
on their hind -legs, and steering down,
after a good coasting - place has been
worn by their mamma. You see, they
have their little family pleasures. I
wish we might be friends with them ;
but, unfortunately, they know very well
that Metek would rejoice to have their
flesh for meat, and their warm, shaggy
skins for clothes : so they return the
compliment, and kill him if they can.
And now you see why he wouldn't have
left Agoonack there if he had known.
But, fortunately for the child, Mamma
Bruin had taken little Hugger and
Growler out for a walk just at that
time ; and she did not return until the
child and her father were safe at home,
and drinking seal's-blood soup for supper.
They have company, too, at supper
to night ; not that it is at all surpris-
THE STORY OF AGOONACK. 9
ing for them to have company, for any
hunter who has killed a seal never keeps
it all to himself, but is always kind
enough to invite his neighbors to share
his feast. But to-night they have a rare
and wonderful visitor : Kudlunah, Metek
calls him ; and, if we knew the Esqui-
mau language, we should understand
that this queer word means " white
man."
Never has Agoonack or little Sipsu
seen such a man. His cheeks are red,
his eyes are bright, and he has a curly
beard: his voice is very pleasant, and
he can speak a few words of their own
language. And out of his pockets come
treasures such as the little ones have
never dreamed of. The shy little girl
can hardly look up, and say " Thank
you/' when he puts a string of bright
beads round her neck; and her father
grunts out his satisfaction over a knife,
the best thing to cut with that he ever
saw in his life.
10 EACH AND ALL
But where did this white man come
from ? Ah, yes ! that is the greatest
wonder, after all ; for he points far away
to the south to show where his home is,
and he says " oomiak " (ship), when they
wonder how he came so far. To-night
he will sleep in their hut ; and to-mor-
row, if they will go with him, he will
show them his great oomiak. And so,
when the seal feast is finished, and the
Kudlunah, as well as the rest, has drunk
his bowl of seal-blood soup, they lie
down together.
In the morning Metek goes with the
stranger ; but the others stay at home,
doubting whether it can be perfectly
safe to trust themselves in such com-
pany upon so short an acquaintance.
But Agoonack thinks all day of the
wonderful Kudlunah, and she plays with
her pretty beads, and says over and over
again softly to herself, " Koyenna, koy-
enna " (thanks, thanks). And she is
the first one to see her father, far in the
THE STORY OF AGOONACK. 11
distance, a black speck on the moonlit
snow, as he trudges homeward with his
hands full of presents, and his head full
of strange and marvellous news.
You know it doesn't make much dif-
ference to the Esquimaux whether they
sit up late or not, for the sunrise could
hardly be called the beginning of day at
any time of year ; and, sleep as late as
they might in the morning, nobody
would cry, " What a shame that the sun
should find you in bed ! "
So this evening, even little Sipsu cud-
dles forgotten behind his mother, and
listens with wide-open mouth and eyes to
the story of the great oomiak, built all
of wood, — wood which you remember
is so precious in the Esquimau land, —
and as big as a hundred kyaks. It is
filled with pale-faced, shaggy-bearded
Kudlunahs, plenty of knives, and, better
, than that, strange weapons, stronger than
spears, for out of them flashes fire, and
a seal will be struck dead with the terri-
ble noise that follows that flash.
12 EACH AND ALL.
Oh, that was a marvellous story!
Agoonack could hardly believe it; but
she learned by and by to be very famil-
iar with the guns and pistols, and very
thankful for them too. You will see
pretty soon how that came about ; for
before a week has passed, even the little
girl herself has been on board the great
oomiak, and tasted the Kudlunah's food,
a ship-biscuit, as strange and unknown
to her as seal's-blood soup to you. Think
how funny it would be to taste for the
first time bread or cracker !
The child's mother, too, is made very
happy when she receives needles and
thread (so much better than her bone
needles and seal-sinews) and a good p^ir
of scissors, as payment for the bag of
eider-down that she gathered last sum-
mer when the ducks came to make their
nests among the rocks. The exchange
of these things as presents, or in trade,
shows them that the white men and the
Esquimaux can serve each other, and
THE STORY OF AGOONACK. 13
awakens a very friendly feeling between
them ; and, when Metek kills a seal or a
bear, the white captain is always welcome
at the feast.
When two or three months have
passed, the Kudlunahs are going away.
They have only stopped for a little while
to search along the rocky shores for
traces of some lost friends of theirs who
sailed that way many years ago ; and,
finding none here, they will push on
through the icy seas, hoping for better
success farther north.
One day just before they started, Me-
tek was called down into the cabin of the
ship to see the captain ; and when he
came up it was with a smile on his broad
face, and a look of great importance
which made him hold his head very high.
What had the captain been saying to
him?
" Metek," he said, " you are a good
hunter. Will you go with us on this
voyage to kill seals and walruses for us ?
14 EACH AND ALL.
I will teach you to shoot, and give you
a rifle ; and you shall be paid with knives,
guns, powder, and shot."
Then Metek answered, " I will go with
the great captain, but I cannot leave my
wife and children behind. How could
they live alone ? They cannot hunt : they
would die of hunger."
Then the captain sat silent and
thoughtful for a minute or two ; and at
last, seeing that what Metek had spoken
was plainly true, he answered, "Bring
your wife and children with you." It
was this that made Metek so proud and
happy ; and he hurried home with his
news.
Ah ! now they must break up house-
keeping ; but that is an easy thing, ea-
sier even than for Gemila in the desert,
for her father had mats and tents, and
camels and goats, and water-bags : but
Metek' s family had nothing at all to
carry, except a seal-skin drinking-cup, a
knife or two, the precious new sewing-
THE STORY OF AGOONACK. 15
utensils, some strings of beads, the
clothes they wear, and one additional
suit for summer which the mother has
just sewed out of tuktoo or reindeer skin.
So it is a very easy matter to make the
change ; and the berth of the ship is a
luxurious bed for Sipsu and Agoonack.
I can't tell you all the wonderful things
that happened for the next few months,
while the great oomiak, after pushing
through the icy sea as far as it could go,
was at last frozen fast among the great
ice-floes ; or how Metek learned so well
to shoot the seals and the bears, and
provide fresh meat for the whole ship's
company.
But we are coming to a very impor-
tant time, — a time when the ice begins
to break up, and, tossed by the rising and
falling tides, it crowds and crushes the
strong ship. And at last one night, dark
and very stormy too, while the children
who are so used to the thumping and
tossing, are asleep rolled up in bear-skins,
16 EACH AND ALL.
a great shout is heard through the storm :
the ship is leaking badly, and they must
throw out upon the ice as many things
as possible.
The barrels and casks, the bundles of
skins, and heavy boats, are soon upon the
floe ; and in the hurry and confusion
somebody picks up the roll of skins in
which the children are sleeping, and they
are tossed out like any other bundle.
When at last the dim morning dawns,
behold, the ship has drifted away, and left
upon the great cake of floating ice a par-
ty of fifteen men, besides Metek and his
wife and the two little children who have
crept out of their nest of skins, and are
neither surprised nor frightened at find-
ing themselves in this strange position.
Think of it, children. How would you
like it? — a great cake of ice two or
three miles broad, almost like a floating
island. When the days are warm enough
to thaw a little, it moves with the moving
water, and freezes hard to the land or the
iceberers when a cold snap comes
THE STORY OF AGOONACK. 17
I believe you and I should be very
much troubled about it, and I dare say
the captain felt very anxious ; but he did
not say so : he tried to be cheerful and
hopeful, and plan what to do.
In some ways it is not so bad, you see ;
because if they are floating in the water
they will meet both seals and walruses,
and can get something to eat. And
there is another good thing to remember :
they are drifting always southward, and
that takes them towards warmer seas,
towards home, at least towards the Kud-
lunah's home. But the way is long, and
the ice-boat may not sail always steadily
on as they would like. You know they
cannot steer it as men do a ship, or even
as you do your sled. They must patient-
ly let it take its own way and its own
time ; and what are they to do for shel-
ter and for fire, even if food is plenty ?
I think the Kudlunahs would have
been poorly off, although they are so
wise, if it hadn't been for Esquimau
18 EACH AND ALL.
Metek then. See how he goes promptly
to work to build snow-houses, igloes he
calls them. The ice floor is cold, to be
sure, and the platform of ice raised at
one side for a bed seems colder still when
you lie down ; but there are two old can-
vas sails that will serve for carpets ; and
in a few hours the arched snow walls are
finished, so high in the middle that the
captain himself can stand upright; and
a window one foot square of clear ice lets
in light enough to see each other by,
even when the seal-blubber lamp is not
burning. There is a home for them, and
a pretty comfortable home too, they
think. But it is now the middle of Octo-
ber, and winter is coming. To be sure,
they have casks of pemican and some
barrels of biscuits ; but it takes a great
deal of food to feed nineteen hungry
people every day, and in the cold coun-
tries you have to eat a great deal more
than we do here; for food, as you will
one day learn, is like fuel for a little fire
THE STORY OF AGOONACK. 19
inside of you that keeps you warm, and,
the colder the weather is, the more of
that fuel is needed to keep the fire burn-
ing.
Metek must hunt every day for seals.
Unfortunately it is just the time when
the bears are taking their long nap ; for
you must know that they are very lazy
fellows in the winter, and creep away to
some snug hiding-place where they doze
and dream until early spring. It wouldn't
be easy to find that hiding-place : so they
can't expect much bear's meat.
There is another reason why they
dread the winter. Who can tell me
what it is ?
" It must be the darkness," says Da-
die. You are right, my little boy : that
is what they dread, and what you and I
should dread too, — not to see the sun
day after day, and week after week, per-
haps not even to see each other's faces.
" But why don't they light their
lamps ? " says Edith. Ah ! there may be
20 EACH AND ALL.
a sad reason for not doing that. Don't
you remember that if no seals are killed
there will be no oil for the lamps ?
I cannot tell you all about it : the sto-
ry is too long and too sad. You see
what the dangers are ; but neither you
nor I who live so safely at home in our
warm houses, and find a good dinner on
our tables every day, can really under-
stand how hard it was for them. There
were days of no light, no dinner, no com-
fort of any kind. There were nights
when the ice-island cracked in two, and
one-half drifted away before morning.
There were times when the children
moaned, " I am so hungry," and their
mother gave them a little piece of seal-
skin to chew to make believe it was
meat.
Among the Kudlunahs was one who
had blue eyes and fair hair, and who
spoke sometimes in a language strange
even to his companions. He had come
from the river Ehine. Do you remem
THE STORY OF AGOONACK. 21
ber Louise and Fritz and little Gretchen,
who once lived there ?
This man had a wise way of looking
at the stars, and rinding out by them in
what direction the ice-island was drifting.
He could also tell you wonderful things
about icebergs, and about birds and
beasts, and fishes too : in short, he was
what we should call a scientific man, but
that hard word didn't puzzle Agoonack
as it does you, for she never heard it ;
her only knowledge of Mr. Meyer is his
kindness to her when he one day slips a
bit of meat into her thin little hand, and
says, " My little cousin at home is no
bigger than you, you poor child.' '
At last there was a time when the sun
came back. Oh, how glad they all were !
but even that blessing seemed to bring a
fresh trouble with "i; for they had floated
now into warmer seas, and you all know
what the sunshine will do to the ice and
snow. It is very well that they should
be melted, we say ; but then, we don't
22 EACH AND ALL.
happen to live on an ice island and in a
snow house.
By and by the time comes when it is
no longer safe to sleep in the snow
houses : cold as the nights are, they must
be ready at any minute to leap into the
boat, should the now tiny island crack in
two. And the poor boat is neither large
nor strong.
They have drifted now so far south-
ward that the ice is breaking up all
about them, and, happily for them, the
seals are sporting in the spring sunshine.
It is the last day of April. To-mor-
row will be May Day. You will have
May fairs, May parties, May flowers.
What pleasure will come to these poor
people drifting in the icy seas ?
Oh! it is something better than May
fairs or parties or even flowers. They
see the long black line of smoke made
by a steamer, miles away, but coming
on slowly, steadily, through the ice, to
find them. Isn't that the very, very
THE STORY OF AGOONACK. 23
best blessing for them? and aren't you
very, very glad ? I am sure that I am.
Oh the comfort, the rest, and the
safety ! And the way that sturdy little
steamer puffs and steams away towards
home, w T ith her load of weary, thin,
worn-out men ! Towards home, did I
say ? but haven't they drifted far beyond
Agoonack's home, and now aren't they
going still farther from it ? That is true.
And, after the first relief of finding them-
selves safe is over, Metek goes to the
Nalegak Soak (great captain), and asks
how he is ever to reach his home again.
And the captain comforts him with the
promise, that, when they reach the
United States, he shall be sent safely
back in the first ship that goes up to the
frozen seas for whale - fishing ; and in
the mean time he and his wife and chil-
dren will see a new sight, — whole cities
full of tall houses built of stone or wood,
railroads and factories, and, indeed, more
Wonders than *hey can name.
24 EACH AND ALL.
But all this while they are steaming
steadily on. They have left the ice-
bergs far behind them ; grassy shores
are sometimes seen in the distance ; the
sun is so hot at noon that the fur cloth-
ing is uncomfortable., but unhappily they
have no other.
At last comes a day when they cast
anchor at a crowded wharf. The news
of their rescue had been sent before
them, and friends have crowded down
to welcome them home again.
Oh, there is such a hand-shaking and
kissing ! Everybody forgets Agoonack
and Sipsu, who do not know what to
make of all the happy greetings. At
least, they can understand how glad the
people are : that is something that can
be told alike in all languages. But it
makes them feel all the more lonely; for
nobody is glad to see them.
But what little blue-eyed girl has her
arms about Mr. Meyer's neck? Now
see, he is leading her by the hand, and
THE STORY OF AGOONACK. 25
looking on this side and on that until he
spies the little Esquimau girl in her
corner. He puts the soft white hand
into the little brown one, and says,
" Louise, this is Agoonack, the little girl
who has drifted with us fifteen hundred
miles on the ice."
Louise, the fair-faced, sweet, clean lit-
tle girl ; Agoonack, the dark and dirty,
yes, still dirty, little Esquimau, the lone-
ly little stranger in a strange land.
Louise looks her full in the face for
one minute : then her arms are round
Agoonack's neck, and her red lips are
giving her a hearty kiss of welcome.
They are little sisters, after all.
A LONG JOURNEY THROUGH A
STRANGE LAND.
Who is this little girl sitting on the
sand-bank in the broad valley where a
few months ago a swift river ran ?
Let us see what she is doing, and then
perhaps you will know who she is.
She has brought a bundle of tall reeds
from the bank, and laid them beside her;
and now notice how, with her flat palm,
she smooths a broad place on the sand,
and begins to drive in the reeds like
posts close together, and in a circle.
Isn't it going to be a little garden, with
a fence all round it ? Watch a minuce
longer : she is plastering her wall with
damp clay ; and while that dries, she has
carefully measured off a bundle of broad,
stiff leaves, tied them firmly together at
26
A LONG JOURNEY.
27
one end, and with her strong fingers
pulled them wide apart at the other so
that they look like an open umbrella.
Do you know what that is for ? It is
a roof, to be sure. And now she puts it
carefully on top of the circular wall, and
then she has a pretty little round house
with a pointed roof; and you notice she
left a doorway in the first place.
" Why, it is Manenko ! " says Dossie.
Yes, it is Manenko, the little dark
girl who lived in the sunshine. She is
building a play-house for herself; and
you might build one like it next sum-
mer, I think, if you should try.
You knew her by the kind of house-,
didn't you ? And you would have re-
membered her in a minute more, when
I had told you that her little brother
Shobo is sitting beside her, trying to
make a tiny spear with a sharp barbed
end, out of one of her best reeds.
A great trouble has come to Manenko's
country since you first knew her. You
28 EACH AND ALL.
remember the broad river where the hip-
popotamus used to sleep under the water,
and where the men used to come down
in a canoe loaded with elephants' tusks.
That beautiful, cool, swift-flowing river
has dried up ; and our little Manenko is
at this moment building her play-house
in the very place where the waves used
to dance along over the sandy bottom.
But why is this a great trouble ? I will
answer this question by asking you an-
other. Who can live without water to
drink? And the simple round houses
have no water-pipes, and the one well of
the village is already almost dry. The
women are holding up their hands to the
sky, and crying, " Poola, poola ! " (rain,
rain) ; but the sky is blue and clear, and
not the smallest fleecy cloud answers
their call ; and the men have gone to the
next village to ask the old medicine-
man to come and make rain for them,
which you and I know very well he will
not be able to do. So this is really a
serious trouble, isn't it ?
A LONG JOURNEY. 29
Sekomi has been thoughtful for many
days. He has watched the sky, he has
looked sadly at the dry bed of the river ;
and now a morning has come when there
seems no longer any hope, and he says,
" Where shall we drink water to-night ? "
But Maunka, the good mother, is more
cheerful. " Let us go to the mountain
country," she says. "Do you not see
that the river once ran down to us from
the mountains ? There we stall find
springs and wells, build a new house, and
live as happily as we have here."
I am sure, dear children, that you will
think this good advice ; for you all know
that the rivers come from the mountain
springs.
And so this whole family prepared to
go on a long journey through a strange
land.
Perhaps some of you know what it is
to move. We moved once when I was a
little girl ; and there were great wagons
to carry the furniture, and men to load
30 EACH AND ALL.
and unload them. It was a long and
wearisome business, I assure you.
Now we will see how Manenko's fami-
ly move. There are no horses and wag-
ons to carry any thing ; but they march
on foot, single file, and carry all the bag-
gage themselves. First the father with
his spear and shield, bow and arrows,
slung over his shoulders. Then Zungo,
the oldest son : he, too, carries bow and
spear, and also a load of sleeping-mats
tied together with rope made of palm-
fibre. Then follows the mother. I hope
some good children are carrying all her
bundles for her. But no : see, she has
the heaviest load of all. On her head is
the water-jar ; over her shoulders all the
family clothing and cooking-utensils ; in
her hands the baskets, and the short hoes
for hoeing corn ; and more than all, in
the loose folds of her waist-cloth little
Shobo must ride when he is tired, some-
thing as Agoonack's little brother Sipsu
rode in his mother's jumper-hood.
A LONG JOURNEY. 31
Why didn't Manenko carry some of
these things for her mother ? Only look
at the little girl, and you will be able to
answer the question. See, she, too, has
a little water-jar on her head (and I think
she carries it more safely than any one
of you could do), and a basket of hard
cakes, baked in the ashes of the morn-
ing's fire, in her hand ; a smaller basket
of honey is slung over her shoulder ; and
all that is load enough for a little girl.
If you ask why Sekomi and Zungo do
not carry more, I can only answer that
I am afraid they are not very thoughtful
about such things. However, nobody
complains, least of all the cheerful moth-
er, who takes up her burdens without a
word ; and they turn their faces towards
the hill-country.
The first day's march is not so very
hard if it were not for that .thicket of
wait-a-bit thorn bushes past which the
path led them.
Did you ever hear of the wait-a-bit
32 EACH AND ALL.
thorn? It tells its whole story in its
name ; for the thorns are like little fish-
hooks, and, if once they catch you, you
must needs wait a bit before you can get
away. 1 am glad they don't grow in this
country. To-day they tore long slits in
Manenko's little cotton skirt, the first and
only garment that she ever had, and she
had only worn it a few weeks ; you re-
member, when you knew her before, she
did not wear clothes. I am sorry the
wait-a-bit has served her so unkindly, for
there is no cloth to make a new dress.
Just before sunset they find a pool of
muddy water, and on its borders great
heavy foot-marks where the elephants
have been down to drink. This will be
a good camping-place, if they keep out
of the elephants' path, for the water-jars
are empty, and here is a new supply to
fill them for to-morrow, and also to make
some porridge for supper. So the chil-
dren gather sticks for a fire, and Sekomi
selects a sheltered spot for the camp.
A LONG JOURNEY. 33
But how shall they light the fire ? Do
you think Sekomi has any matches in
his pocket ? In the first place, he hasn't
any pocket; and in the second, they
never heard of such a thing as a match,
a little stick with a fiery end : they
would look at it with wonder. No,
there are no matches, but Zungo will
light the fire nevertheless.
He is looking about for a wild fig-tree ;
and, finding one, he cuts a smooth twig,
sharpens it into a point, and after wetting
the point rolls it in the sand until some
of the sharp, shining bits stick to the
wet end. Now it is all ready for rubbing
or twirling in the hollow of that piece
of wood that he has carried all day slung
to his bundle of mats. How hard he
works, holding the pointed stick straight
in the hole, and twirling it hard between
his two hands, while his mother waits be-
side him to catch the first spark in a
wisp of dried grass ! There, it is smok-
ing, and now the grass is smouldering ;
34 EACH AND ALL.
and in a minute there will be a merry
blaze under the earthen chattie where
the porridge is to be cooked.
But before the porridge is well boiled,
a long train of men and animals comes
crashing through the low bushes; and,
while the frightened family hides behind
a rock, Sekomi comes doubtfully forward
to see who the intruders are.
Two tall creatures with long necks,
great humps on their backs, and loaded
with bales and bundles of goods ; four
little sturdy animals, not wholly unlike
zebras excepting in color; and, besides
the six men with woolly hair and dark
faces like Sekomi' s own, two tall, grave-
faced, straight-haired men whom you
would have known at once for Arabs, be-
cause you have heard about such people
who lived in the desert with Gemila.
But the greatest wonder of all is the man
who rides upon one of the smaller ani-
mals, — a white man ! Sekomi has heard
that such men come sometimes to the
A LONG JOURNEY. 35
sea-coast, but he never before saw one ;
and so, while he wonders much at the
camels and the donkeys, strange beasts to
him, he wonders still more at a simple
man who is in every outward way as dif-
ferent from himself as possible. He has a
white skin instead of a dark one, straight
hair instead of wool, blue eyes instead of
black, and he wears instead of the sim-
ple apron and mantle of antelope-skin,
strange garments so well known to us as
coat and pantaloons. But the words that
he speaks are the most wonderful ; and
yet Sekomi knows by their sound that
they are kind, although he cannot under-
stand their meaning until one of the
black interpreters hurries forward to
help about the talking.
Do you know what an interpreter is ?
See what he does, and then you will
know. He listens to the white man's
talk, and then he changes it into Sekomi' s
language, and so makes them understand
each other. Do you want to hear what
the white man says to Sekomi ?
36 EACH AND ALL.
"We have the same kind heavenly
Father. Let us be friends and like
brothers."
But Sekomi is afraid. He can hardly
believe it, and he answers, —
" It cannot be so : however much we
wash ourselves, we do not become white.
It cannot be that I have the same Father
as Bazungu " (white man).
Then the Bazungu speaks again in his
kindly voice, and says, " It is not the
skin that makes us brothers : it is the
heart."
And now Sekomi dares to come for-
ward, and touch the hand that is held out
to him in kindness, and clap his own as
an act of politeness. " And, since we are
brothers, my wife will give you por-
ridge.' '
The Bazungu is tired and hungry, and
the porridge is hot and delicious ; but be-
fore eating it he gives Sekomi a piece of
bright-colored cloth from one of his bales,
and he also calls Maneuko, and puts a
A LONG JOURNEY. 37
string of red and blue beads round her
neck. The child says timidly, " Motota,
motota" (" thanks"), and claps her
hands as her mother has taught her,
for it would be very bad manners not to
clap your hands if any one gave you a
present.
The white man wants help, for one of
his camels is sick and tired, and cannot
carry so great a load ; and to-morrow
morning the packages must be divided,
and the men must carry a part of them.
He will be glad of Sekomi's help, and
will pay him one yard of calico a day.
That is a great price ; and as Sekomi was
going in the same direction, he is very
glad to earn so much calico by carrying
one of the bales.
Do you wonder why he isn't paid in
money ? He knows nothing about mon-
ey. In his country cloth and ivory and
beads are used instead, and a yard of cal-
ico is as good as a dollar.
So the bargain is made, and the wages
38 EACH AND ALL.
agreed upon; and then the camp-fires
are lighted to frighten away the lions,
and all lie down to sleep.
You would be surprised to see this fire.
We all know what a bright wood fire is ;
but what should you think of a fire of
ebony, that fine black wood of which the
piano-keys are made, and perhaps a stick
of mahogany or lignum-vitse added to
it ? That is all the wood they can find
to burn; and although the white man
knows that it is fine enough to be made
into beautiful tables or desks or pianos,
the black people think it of no value
except for their fires.
In the side of the hill half a mile
away, is a broad belt of black rock. It
is coal, just such coal as we burn in our
grate ; but when the Bazungu shows it
to his men, and tells them that it will
make a hot fire, they smile, and say,
"Kodi?" ("really?") for they don't
believe it.
Very early in the morning Manenko
A LONG JOURNEY. 39
hears her mother rise quietly, and take
her grinding-stone, and begin to grind
some corn into flour. * Mother, why-
grind in the dark? " asks the child.
" I grind meal to buy a cloth from the
stranger, and make you a little dress,"
answers the mother ; and sure enough,
when the Bazungu comes out of his tent
at sunrise, Maunka stands waiting with
her basket of fresh meal ; and he gladly
buys it, and gives the cloth. So the
poor dress torn by the wait-a-bit is re-
placed.
They are soon ready for the march.
Sekomi now carries a great bale of cloth ;
and Zungo, too, has been employed to
attend to the white man's fires when
they camp at night For this work he
is to have a strange kind of pay,
stranger even than the cloth : it is the
heads and necks of all the animals that
the white man may shoot on the way.
If he should shoot a rhinoceros, I think
there would be meat enough in his head
40 EACH AND ALL.
to last the whole family several days;
but a little antelope's head would be
only enough for one dinner. At any
rate, it is a great help to them all to have
this work and this pay from the friendly
stranger; and they are ready to serve
him in every way that they can.
As they come near a village, they
hear the people shouting, " Malonda,
malonda ! " (" things for sale : do you
want to sell any thing ? ") and they find
themselves just in time to go to a mar-
ket, which is being held in the middle
of the town.
Let us see what they have to sell.
Here is the blacksmith who has a forge
on the top of yonder ant-hill. He has
been making short-handled iron hoes,
and will sell them for cloth or for honey ;
and honey is very cheap, — a whole gal-
lon for one yard of cloth.
See these two nice girls with clean
hands and faces, and neat baskets full of
something to eat. It looks very good,
A LONG JOURNEY. 41
but I am afraid you won't buy any
when I tell you that it is roasted white
ants. But I don't know why we
shouldn't find it as agreeable as a kungo-
cake that the women who live by the
lake have for sale ; for a kungo-cake is a
round flat cake, an inch thick, and as
large as a breakfast-plate, made entirely
of boiled midges that are caught by the
basket-full as they hover over the lake.
We will not buy either, but will give
that little naked girl a blue bead in pay-
ment for a cup of fresh water, and then
sit down in the shade of a wild fig-tree
to watch the others. Zungo has sold a
spear-head, and has in return some large
green, bitter melons. They are too bit-
ter to be eaten raw, but will be very
juicy and sweet when baked in the ashes.
Sekomi has spent all his cloth for an
ornament of ivory shaped like a new
moon ; and he marches about the town
with it hanging round his ne<:k with one
horn over each shoulder.
42 EACH AND ALL.
There is one kind of food here that
perhaps we shall like. It is a sort of
a soup made out of the blossoms of a
pretty blue flowering pea. The people
call it chilobe; and when they learn that
the white man never saw it before, they
exclaim, " What a wretched country you
must live in, if you do not even have
chilobe !" But you and I know that
they haven't the least idea how many
other good things we have instead.
On one side of the market-place stand
some men curiously marked on their
backs, shoulders, and arms. They are
covered with patterns pricked into their
skins, — tattooed we should call it.
There are crosses, and half-moons, and
various other figures; and all the men
of one family have the same sort of
mark, so that you can tell, the minute
you see one of them, whether he is a
moon-man or a cross-man. They have
brought salt to sell ; for they live in a
place where the very earth tastes saltj
A LONG JOURNEY. 43
and if you take some of it, and wash it
carefully, you can wash out little crys-
tals of clear white salt.
The Bazungu has bought a pot of
fresh butter ; and when he eats his sup-
per that evening, the black people look
on with surprise to see him eat butter
raw, spread on his bread ; and Maunka
offers to melt it for him, that he may
dip his bread into it. That is the way
she would eat it.
And now I must tell you something
about the new country into which they
are coming. Already they have met lit-
tle rivers coming down from the moun-
tains, and the plains are covered with
tall grass, tall enough for tall men to
play hide-and-seek in; and the bufEilo
and rhinoceros are roaming there, think-
ing themselves safely hidden from hunt-
ers.
There is need of meat in the camp,
and Bazungu plans a great hunt. The
men take their bows and spears ; but the
44 EACH AND ALL.
white man has a " gun with six mouths,
and the balls travel far and hit hard."
I suppose we should call it a six-barrel
revolver.
They leave the camp early one morn-
ing ; and as they will not return for two
days, the men carry their fumbas, or
sleeping-bags of palm-leaves, and the
little mosamela, or carved wooden pil-
low, hung over their shoulders.
First they shoot a zebra, which they
think gives " the king of good meat."
But the buffalo and rhinoceros are not
so easy to approach, for each is guarded
by a watchful little bird sitting on its
back, and looking out for danger; and
no sooner do the faithful little sentinels
catch a glimpse of spear or bow, than
the buffalo-bird calls out, " Cha, cha,
cha ! " and the rhinoceros-bird, " Tye,
tye, tye ! " as much as to say to their
clumsy friends, in their own pretty
language, "Scamper, scamper, quick,
^uick ! " and away gallop the great crea-
A LONG JOURNEY. 45
hires, and it is no easy matter to over-
take them.
But there is always something to be
had for dinner, when all else fails. You
know the guinea-hens with speckled
backs, and their funny call, " Come
back, come back ! " We see a few of
them here ; but in Manenko's land they
are very common, hundreds and thou
sands of them to be found everywhere ;
and our hunters can have roasted or
boiled guinea-hen, if nothing else : only,
m that case, poor Zungo will fare badly ;
for the heads and necks' are his, and
very small indeed they are as payment
for cutting the hard lignum-vitoe and
ebony for the firewood. The good Ba-
zungu, however, is kind and thoughtful,
and sometimes gives him a whole fowl
for dinner.
On the second day they kill two great
buffalo; and as they cannot carry all
the meat at once to camp, a part has to
be left among the bushes. When they
46 EACH AND ALL.
go back for it, they hear a low growling,
and, approaching cautiously, see a great
lion tearing the buffalo-flesh and eating
it as fast as he can. Oh, what a pity,
after all their trouble in hunting ! And
Sekomi calls out boldly to the lion,
"Why don't you kill your own beef?
Are you a chief, and so mean as to steal
what other people have killed?" For
Sekomi believes that some chiefs have
the power of turning themselves into
lions, just as people do in fairy-stories ;
and he thinks this lion is really a man,
and can understand what he says. But
the lion does not heed him: he only
growls, and goes on with his meal, and
the buffalo-meat is lost.
The white man cannot wait many
days for hunting, because he is on his
way to visit a great lake of which he
has heard, and to look for the source of
a long river of which you will know
more some day. So they are soon on
the march again; and the days are
A LONG JOURNEY. 47
growing warmer and warmer, for it is
mid-summer in that country. Mid-sum-
mer, did I say? It is just the 25th of
December ; and do you know what day
that is ? " Christmas Day ! " you all ex-
claim. Yes, it is Christmas Day; and
the birds are singing, the corn is spring-
ing up, and the fields are full of gay
flowers.
You all know the little humming-
birds that you see dipping into the flow-
ers on a summer-day. In Manenko's
land there are not many humming-birds,
but tiny sun-birds instead, no bigger
than a great humble-bee, and fluttering
on swift-fanning wings over the pome-
granate-flowers. The little weaver-birds,
too, have put off their winter clothes of
sober brown, and are gayly dressed in
scarlet and black velvet. And here is
one little red-throated bird who has put
on a long train for summer wear, and
finds it as difficult to fly about with it
as some ladies do to walk with theirs.
48 EACH AND ALL.
I wish you could see the goat-sucker
bird that Zungo caught, and brought
into camp on Christmas Day. He might
have followed it all day long, a month
ago, and yet have come home empty-
handed ; but the vain little bird is now
dressed with two very long feathers (as
long as your arm) growing out of each
wing, and trailing so heavily, that, al-
though at other times he flies too swiftly
for any one to catch him, he is now slow
and clumsy; and Zungo caught him
without trouble.
In spite of the hunting, there is great
need of meat in the camp ; and some of
the men are sick, and cannot travel any
farther.
You may wonder why they can't buy
meat, as we do, of the butcher ; but, be-
sides the fact that there is no butcher,
there is another great objection, — there
is no meat. There are neither sheep
nor oxen in this part of the country ; foi
the enemy has driven them all away.
A LONG JOURNEY. 49
a What enemy," do you ask ?
A little enemy not a thousandth part
as large as an ox, black and yellow in
color, and carrying a very sharp and
dangerous weapon. His name is tsetse,
and he is a terrible fly. He bites the
oxen and the sheep; and they sicken,
and in a few days die. And so deter-
mined is this fierce little enemy, that no
sheep or oxen can live in the country
after he appears. For some reason of
his own, he doesn't bite goats; and,
when the white man brought camels
and donkeys, it was because he thought
they, too, would be safe from the tsetse.
But he was mistaken ; for although he
rubbed them with lion's fat to keep them
safe, knowing well that the tsetse will
not hurt the lion, yet they were bitten,
and one by one they died ; and now there
are not men enough to carry the loads
which the animals used to carry, and
neither is there meat to eat : so he de-
cides to send Zungo as a messenger to
50 EACH AND ALL.
the great chief, Kabobo, who lives thirty
miles away in a town where there is
food in plenty.
He does not write a letter ; for none
of these people can read ; but this is the
message that he teaches to Zungo, and
Zungo must say it over and over to him-
self as he travels along, that he may be
sure not to forget it.
" Bazungu needs ten strong men, and
goats and corn. He will pay cloth and
beads, and he sends you this present to
let you know his friendship.' '
The present was a red shirt, and a
string of clear white beads. It was
carefully wrapped in palm-leaves, and
Zungo carried it on his head.
Over and over again he repeated his
message, and did not forget a single
word; and in four days his joyful shout
was heard in the distance, and he and
his ten men were soon welcomed with
clapping of hands. Kabobo had sent
corn and palm -wine, and goats, and
A LONG JOURNEY. 51
begged the great Bazungu to visit him
very soon.
But Bazungu cannot visit any one at
present ; for the hot, damp weather has
made him very ill. He lies in his hut,
burning with fever; and poor little Ma-
nenko, too, lies on a mat beside her
mother, with hot, fevered hands, and dry,
quick breath. But, though he is so ill
himself, the stranger, when he hears of
the sick child, prepares for her a bitter
little powder like the one he is taking
himself. Of course, the little girl doesn't
like the bitter taste of it; but the next
day she is better, and able to sit up, and
soon she can go with her mother to say
" Motota" to the kind Bazungu.
Don't forget this bitter medicine, for
you will hear of it again before you fin-
ish this book.
In a few days they are all able to go
to Kabobo's village ; and there, for the
first time in her life, Manenko sees a
square house : there are two or three of
52 EACH AND ALL.
*
them in the village, built by people who
have travelled away to the seacoast, and
there seen houses like them.
Around Kabobo's town are pleasant
fields and gardens; and every thing is
growing finely, excepting one patch of
corn, which the men say they planted in
the mouse-month, and so lost half of it,
for the mice ate the seeds.
One meadow is covered with pure lit-
tle white lilies ; and some medlar-bushes
hang thick with blossoms. Among the
tall reeds you hear the brown ibis
scream, " Ha, ha, ha ! " and flocks of
green pigeons are feeding on the fruits
of the wild fig-tree. Certainly it is a
pleasant place ; and, after their long
journey, Sekomi's family think that here
they will make their new home.
The women of the village look up
pleasantly as they pass, and say, " Yam-
bo?" ("How are you?") And they
answer, " Yambo sana." (" Very well.")
Everybody seems kind, and glad to see }
the travellers.
A LONG JOURNEY. 53
So Maunka begins at once to build
a new house. And then she finds fine
clay, and shapes new water-jars, smooth-
ing; them into their beautiful rounded
forms with her hands, and marking them
on the edge with pretty braided pat-
terns like this which you see in the pic-
ture. And soon the new house is well
provided ; for twenty pots for water, for
honey, and for porridge, hang from the
ceiling.
But no sooner has Maunka built her
house than another builder comes quiet-
ly in, and goes to work to build hers in
one corner of it. It is the paper spider ;
and Manenko sees her lay her forty or
fifty eggs upon the wall, and then begin
to make her pure white paper house to
shelter them. She thinks the mother-
spider is not so different from any other
mother; and, instead of driving her
away, she watches while the careful
builder prepares her little paper wall,
half as big as the palm of Edith's hand,
54 EACH AND ALL.
and then fastens it firmly over the eggs
by a strip not wider than your finger-
nail, pasted strongly all round the edges
For three long weeks she sits, like a
mother-bird on her eggs, to keep them
warm ; after that she goes out for food
in the day, but always comes back to
cuddle them closely at night ; and Ma-
nenko is never afraid for her, but watches
every day to see when the little ones
will come out of the eggs.
Sekomi has been busy planting corn,
and also some seeds that the white man
has given him, and they already feel at
home.
Their good friend the Bazungu has
tried to give them one present better
even than the cloth, or the beads, or the
garden-seeds: he has tried to teach
Zungo and Manenko to read. But, oh,
what hard work it is ! You have no
idea of the difficulty; and at last one
day poor Zungo says in despair, "
Bazungu! give me medicine: I shall
A LONG JOURNEY. 55
drink it to make me understand." But
you and I know that the only medicine
that can make us learn is patience and
perseverance ; and even Zungo will learn
in time, if he has these.
You will all see by and by that even
the little knowledge of reading and
speaking English that he gained is a
help to him; for a few months later,
another white man comes from the north
to Kabobo's village ; and when he finds
that Zungo can read a little, and under-
stands some words of English, he hires
him as an interpreter, and promises to
take him on a long journey, pay him
well, and send him safely home again.
And now, before we leave them in
their new home, I must tell you of one
thing that happens to Manenko. She is
getting to be a great girl ; and it is time
for her to begin to wear the pelele.
But what is the pelele ?
It is an ivory ring, but not for the fin-
ger, or even for the ears. This poor chile 7
56 EACH AND ALL.
is going to have her upper lip bored;
and this ring will be put into the hole,
not to hang down, but to stand out
straight and flat in a very inconvenient
way ; but everybody thought it was
beautiful, and, even if the little girl finds
it painful, she will not complain, but will
consider it quite an honor. Her second
teeth have come now ; and they must bo
filed away to points, so that they look
like a cat's little sharp teeth, and then
she is thought to look very pretty indeed.
The white man has made a picture of
her, dressed in her best beads, and carry-
ing a pretty new water-jar on her head.
He will take it home to his own dear
daughter, that she may learn how her
little dark sisters look in this far-away
land.
WHAT WAS GEMILA DOING ALL
THIS TIME?
We have been wandering through
strange, wild lands. Come with me now
to a great city. But I doubt if you feel
more at home in it than you did on
Agoonack's ice-island, or Manenko's long
journey ; for it is not at all like any city
you have ever seen ; not like Boston or
New York, not like St. Louis or Chi-
cago.
Let us stand still for a minute, if we
can find a quiet spot in this narrow,
crowded street, and see what it is like.
It is Sunday afternoon ; but we hear no
church-bells, and all the business seems
to be going on just the same as on a
week-day.
"Don't these people have any Sun-
day? " asks Dadie.
91
58 EACH AND ALL.
Oh, yes ! but their Sunday is Friday.
On Friday they will go to their churches,
and have their services; but to-day is
their market-day, and, in almost all the
towns we may visit in this country, we
shall find a Sunday market.
We are close beside a shop now, but,
oh ! what a funny shop ! hardly bigger
than a cupboard; and the whole side
towards the street is open. Will you
buy some of these sugared almonds, or
a few delicious golden dates, of that
turbaned man who sits so quietly in
the corner, and doesn't seem to care
whether we buy or not ? If we want
either dates or almonds, we must take a
piastre out of our pockets to pay for
them ; for a bright silver dime, or a five-
cent piece would be something so new
and strange to our shop-keeper, that he
would shake his head, and hand it back
to you.
But we mustn't spend too much time
buying dates. There is something bet-
WHAT WAS GEMILA DOING? 59
ter to do in this wonderful city, where
even the houses are curious enough to
make us stop, and gaze at them. See
the pretty balconies built out around the
windows, and sheltered by screens or
shutters of beautifully carved wood. I
fancy we can catch a glimpse of some
bright eyes peeping out at us through
the delicate lattice-work; for all the
ladies of this city sit with their little
daughters all day long in these balco-
nies, and look out through the screens, on
the streets below them, and on the pass-
ers-by. And the flocks of pretty ring-
doves sit cooing about them; and the
swallows fly in and out ; and sometimes
even the vultures alight there for a mo-
ment, and no one drives them away ; for
what would become of the people and
the city, if the faithful vultures did not
clean the streets every day ?
But, quick, we must crowd ourselves
close to the wall, and keep out of the
way of that tall, brown camel who paces
60 EACH AND ALL.
up the street so silently, that we heard
no footfall, and did not know he was
coming until his long shadow fell across
us from behind. He moves up the nar-
row lane as if the whole of it belonged
to him, for he has come from the desert,
where there is plenty of room, and he
has no idea of being crowded ; and those
donkeys, with their wild-looking little
drivers, must get out of his way as best
they can. How they scramble, and how
the boys shout to them ! but the silent
camel moves on towards the fountain in
the next square, and takes no notice at
all of their noise. He is loaded with
great bales of gum ; and his master is
going to sell them to the gum-merchant
at the corner of the square.
I wonder if you will remember the
master, this gray-faced man, with his
white turban and loose cotton dress. It
is really Abdel Hassan ; but you didn't
expect to meet him a city, did you?
Little Gemila is with him too; that is,
WHAT WAS GEMILA DOING? 61
she is in the camp outside the city gates
(for this city has walls and gates, and is
shut up every night) ; and to-morrow
she will come into the strange streets
with her little brother Alee and one of
the servants, to look about her, as we
were doing just now when we had to
start aside, and make way for her father's
camel.
I wish we could take little Gemila's
hand, and walk with her through the city
to-morrow, and see how wonderful it
would all be to her.
The donkeys with their high-cushioned
red saddles, and the camels with their
noiseless tread, the red fez caps and tur-
bans, and the women with long veils, and
bright eyes peering through the little
slit that is left open for them, — these
would not be strange to her; but the
many beautiful fountains meeting you
at every corner with a refreshing drink,
that is something to astonish our little
desert maiden, who generally has drunk
62 EACH AND ALL.
water only from leathern bags or desert
springs. And the houses that crowd so
close on both sides of the street, and
shut out the sky, so that she sees only
one narrow strip of blue instead of her
wide desert dome ; and the bazaars,
where people are hustling each other,
and shouting, and bargaining for shawls
and slippers, gold lace, and silk embroi-
deries ; these are things almost unheard
of to the little girl, whose only garment
has been the brown cotton dress.
There is one thing, however, at which
Gemila is never tired of looking : she
could sit and watch it from morning till
night, so strange, so wonderful, does it
seem to her. This is not her first sight
of it, as you will presently learn. But so
strange a sight does not lose its newness
very soon ; and so it is that whenever, in
looking down a street, she sees at the
end the broad river sparkling in the sun-
shine, she leaves every other sight for
that, and runs to sit beside it, and see
WHAT WAS GEMILA DOING? 63
the ripples dance along, and the ' boats
with their pointed blue-and-white sails,
and the sailors rowing, and singing to
keep time for their oars.
But you will want to know how it
happened that Gemila left her desert
home, and surprised us by appearing in
the streets of Cairo ; and I must go back
two or three months, and tell you all
about it ; for, like Manenko, she, too, has
taken a long and wonderful journey, at
least, it seems wonderful to you and me,
for we are not so accustomed to travel-
ling as she is.
I think it was about Christmas time, a
hot desert Christmas, remember, that
Abdel Hassan was journeying as usual
from one part of his wide desert home
to another, when he met the caravan
from Kordofan, with thirty camel-loads
of gum, on its way to the great city of
Cairo.
I know you must have seen the gum
that oozes out from the peach and pJum
64 BACH AND ALL.
trees in such clear, sticky drops ; or, at
any rate, if you don't know that, you
have seen gum-arabic, which you can
buy at the druggists. Now, on the bor-
ders of the desert, a great many gum-
trees grow; and the great, clear drops
of gum ooze out of them, as they do
from the peach-tree, only there is much
more of it, so that it lies on the ground
in little lumps, under the trees; and
children as young as Gemila and Alee
go out to help gather it; and the men
pack it in great bags, and load the camels
with it, and set out on a long desert
march of many, many miles, to sell it in
the distant city, and to buy, in return,
cloth and guns, shawls and turbans; just
as the Sheik Hassein did whom Abdel
Hassan met one day long ago, you re-
member. The Kordofan sheik meets
Abdel Hassan gladly, and, dismounting
from his horse, sits beside him on a mat,
and tells him that to see him is like the
blessing of a new moon. And an Arab
WHAT WAS GEMILA DOING? 65
can hardly express greater pleasure than
that. Then they smoke their long pipes,
and drink coffee together, and finally
the sheik explains that he wants more
camels to help carry the gum ; and, after
much talk, he agrees to buy two camels
of Abdel Hassan, and to pay him with
bales of gum. And Abdel Hassan, to
whom one part of the world is as much
home as another, decides to journey
himself to Cairo, and sell the gum.
And, since he goes, his whole family will
go too.
So the next day they turn their faces
northward, and travel towards Cairo,
having first asked the Kordofan mer-
chants how far it is to the next spring.
Their question is answered in a curious
way ; for, as these people have not many
words, they make one answer the pur-
pose of two or three. Let me show you
how they do it. If the spring had been
very near, they would have answered,
u Henak; " but, as it is a very long dis-
66 EACH AND ALL.
tance away, they make the word very
long, and say, " Hen-a-a-a-a-ak," and it
isn't so poor a way of telling distance
after all, is it ?
You know so well what Gemila's
journeys generally are, that I will not
tell you much about this, excepting the
one or two unusual events of it. The
first of these happened on New- Year's
Day, and made it any thing but a happy
new year. It wasn't a snow-storm ; but
it was a sand-storm. The air was hot
and hazy : you could scarcely see the
sun, although there were no clouds to
hide him; and presently all this sultry
air began to stir, and whistle, and rush,
and whirl ; and the light, dry sand was
caught up by it, blown into drifts as high
as a tall man, driven into every fold of
the dress or turban, into every eye and
ear and nostril, with a cutting, stinging
keenness such as we might feel in a
fierce, wild snow-storm in one of our
bitter winter-days, only it is hot and
tingling, instead of cold and tingling.
WHAT WAS GEMILA DOING? 67
You could perhaps bear this for a few
minutes, but not longer ; and this terrible
storm lasted two hours. At first the
men only unfolded the cloth of their
turbans so as to wrap it round the face
and ears; and the women and children
drew veils over their heads : but it was
impossible to continue to travel in such
a storm. And when they saw a great
rock not far away, standing like a tall,
black tower or fortress in the yellow
sand, Abdel Hassan was not slow in leap-
ing from his black horse, and planting
his spear, as a sign that they should en-
camp in this welcome shelter.
Here they lay, and heard the great
whistling wind drive through every
cranny and crevice ; and at last they saw
a tall pillar of sand whirled up by the
wind until it seemed to reach the sky.
It moved along in a stately sort of waltz,
round and round, and still advancing over
the burning sands, and presently it was
joined by another, and another, and the
68 EACH AND ALL.
strange monsters moved on like a party
of giants pleasing themselves by a wild
desert dance ; and it was well for little
Gemila that the wind carried them away
from, instead of towards, her sheltering
rock; for who would have been able to
stand against those terrible, strong,
blinding whirls of sand that the fierce
wind had raised ?
When at last the sun could be seen
again, and the wind slowly died away,
our poor travellers lay tired and fever-
ish, and as little able to proceed on their
way as if they had been ill for many
days.
But a cool and quiet night refreshed
them, and early in the morning they are
up and away. The only signs that the
sand-storm had left behind were great
yellow drifts, some of them as high as
a house, that hid the track, and confused
even Abdel Hassan himself as to which
direction he should take to reach the
bitter wells, their next drinking-place.
WHAT WAS GEMILA DOING? 69
And so it happened that they rode
doubtfully on during all that morning,
and, after the noonday rest, changed
their line of march a little more towards
the north, and looked eagerly forward
for the first distant glimpse of the tufted
top of a palm-tree.
And Gemila is the first to clap her
hands, and shout, t( Look, look ! " while
she points towards the distant horizon ;
and there against the blue sky stand
clusters of feathery palms beside a pret-
ty pond of water, that looks like a bit
of the sky itself dropped down to rest
upon the yellow sands, and in the
water's edge tall reeds are growing, and
on the farther shore stand black rocks
overhanging their black reflections in
the water. Oh, what a lovely little
place ! — the prettiest spring that the
child has ever seen. But although she
claps her hands, and shouts for joy, her
father shows no signs of pleasure ; and
the camel-drivers only shake their heads,
70 EACH AND ALL.
and look sober ; and neither do the cam-
els nor horses hasten forward, as they
usually do when they smell the fresh
water from afar.
" See/' says old Achmet to the little
girl, " see, it is not a true spring : those
are not real palm-trees. Watch them,
and you will know that I tell you the
truth."
And Gemila watched; and presently
some of the trees seemed to be standing
on their heads, and the pretty blue pond
ran into the sky, as if there were no
line between -, and Achmet said to her,
"If it were real water, it would look
darker than the sky ; but this is just the
same color." And, as she watched, a
silvery blur came over it all, and she
rubbed her eyes to see more plainly;
but when she looked again, it was all
gone, and the desolate waste of yellow
sand lay before them. It was only a
beautiful air-picture, which is called a
mirage ; and wise desert travellers like
WHAT WAS GEMILA DOING? 71
Abdel Hassan and Achmet know it
well ; but strangers or children are de-
ceived by it, and wander out of their
way to find the refreshing place, which
vanishes into silver mist, and leaves
them to turn back disappointed, if in-
deed they are able to find the path at
all.
You will be glad to know that before
sunset they did reach a real spring or
well of bitter water, not very good, but
better than nothing; and the camels
drank, and the water-bags were filled,
and they went on as before.
And now every day they see some-
thing new. There are valleys walled in
by black rocks ; and there are strange
caves, where they sometimes camp at
night; and at last, one day, they see
before them everywhere groves of trees,
— date, lemon, citron, and acacia, and
many others ; and, as they turn out of
the rocky valley, the men raise a great
shout, "El bahr, el bahr ! " ("The river,
72 EACH AND ALL.
the river!") The broad, blue, rolling
water lies before them; and this is
Gemila's first sight of the river. Now
it will keep them company for days and
days as they journey along its banks,
and drink of its waters, and hear its rip-
pling waves at night as they lie in the
caves along its shores, and feel its cool
breeze refreshing them after the terrible
desert heat.
One night they reach a great rock
filled with caves like little rooms of a
house, and all the walls inside are paint-
ed with strange pictures.
You know we sometimes take a pic-
ture, and make up a story about it, tell-
ing what we think this or that person is
doing, or where he is going ; but these
pictures tell stories themselves, — that is
what they were painted there for, — and
there is a long, hard name for them,
which means something like picture-
writing.
Gemila sees one wall all marked out
WHAT WAS GEMILA DOING? 73
in bright colors, — red, blue, green, and
yellow pictures, telling how a family
had visitors to dine, and how the cooks
prepared the dishes, and how the baby
sat in his mother's lap and watched the
guests, and how the cats and dogs lived
and played with them just as they do
with you to-day; only nobody in all
those pictures was ever seen to hurt or
trouble any animal ; and when I tell you
that the people who painted them lived
thousands of years ago, you will wonder,
as I do, that we can still see them so
plainly. I think they had very good
paints : don't you ? They couldn't write
as we do now, and they wanted all the
story of their lives — what they did, and
where they went, and what little chil-
dren they had to love and take care of
— to be remembered : so they had it all
painted on these hard rocks, that would
not wear out as the leaves of books do ;
and there you and I could see it this
very day, just as Gemila does when she
74 EACH AND ALL.
wakes at early morning, and creeps up
over the steep rocks, and looks at the
pictures, where the long rays of the
rising sun shine far into the caves.
There is a red man with a green head,
driving four horses harnessed to a char-
iot ; and a little blue girl is feeding the
pigeons, just as we should want to feed
the living pigeons that flutter in such
great flocks around every village, and
sleep in the funny, tall pigeon-houses
made of earthen jars on the top of
almost every house.
You see, now that they have reached
the river, they find villages all along its
banks ; and, for the first time in her life,
Gemila learns what houses are, and
thinks that she likes a tent better ; and
she sees waving fields of golden wheat,
and the rice growing in the low mead-
ows; and she tastes the gingerbread
that grows on the dom-palm tree. She
watches the brown ibis, and the stork
and vulture, busy at their work of clean-
WHAT WAS GEMILA DOING? 75
ing the village streets, picking up and
eating up all the dirty and disagreeable
things that the careless people have
thrown there, which would otherwise
soon decay and cause sickness.
Our little girl has hardly time to sleep,
there is so much to see. The children,
too, are so different in some ways from
herself! Here is one little girl buttering
her hair with a thick layer of not very
sweet butter; and another has all her
braids soaked in castor oil, and thinks it
charming. They can swim too; and
you may very well know that Gemila,
who has never before seen a river, or
even a lake, has never learned to swim ;
and when she sees the girls and boys
splashing in the water, she laughs and
shouts with delight. One little boy sits
astride a round log for a boat, and steers
himself across the stream. How she
wishes she could do the same !
But, if I stop to tell you all the won-
ders of the way, we shall never reach
76 EACH AND ALL.
Cairo : so let us hurry on, past the great
stone pyramids standing so grand in the
desert, and past the wonderful stone
image with head like a person, and fore-
paws like a lion, and all the rest of its
body buried in sand, that looked so
grand and solemn in the moonlight as
they met it suddenly on their march the
last evening before reaching Cairo. The
great solemn face, ten yards in length,
looking out over the desert sands, seemed
to have a thousand wonderful stories to
tell of all that it had seen since the men
of ages ago carved it out of the great
rock; but it told none of them to the
little awe-struck Arab girl, nor to the
camel-drivers, who hastened to pitch
the red-and-black striped tent, and un-
load their camels for the night, as if the
great face were not watching them all
the while.
Very early in the morning, while sky
and sand are covered with rosy light,
Gemila is wandering among the strange,
WHAT WAS GEMILA DOING? 77
great rocks, watching the lizards' little
red or blue tails disappearing through
the cracks as they glide away from her,
and the little jerboas sitting outside their
sand houses. But already the camels
are loaded, and the tents are struck, and
to-day she will see the gates of Cairo.
I wish I had time to tell you of all
that may be seen in that city ; but we
are leading an Arab life now, and do not
stop long in any one place : and so it
is that one day, when the Khamaseen
wind begins to blow, Abdel Hassan is
reminded of the desert; the old wan-
dering feeling comes over him, and he
says he will stay no longer in Cairo.
But perhaps you do not know why
the Khamaseen wind should remind him
of the desert. It has come from the
desert, and it fills all the air with a fine
yellow dust that is borrowed from the
yellow sand on the way. They call it
Khamaseen, because, in the language of
that country, Khamaseen means fifty;
78 EACH AND ALL.
and for fifty days this hot wind blows
most of the time. It has reminded Ab-
del Hassan of his old home, and he must
begin to think of his return.
But he has sold his camels, as well as
his gum ; and what is an Arab without
camels? True, he has money enough
to buy more than he has ever owned
before, but he will buy them better from
the desert tribes than here in Cairo;
and so it happens that a new way of life
offers itself for him and his family. They
will go in a Nile boat as far as Korosko ;
and there, where the river makes a great
curve like the letter C, and half encir-
cles a desert, they will leave it, and be-
gin again their life among the rocks and
sand.
This is a delightful journey to Gemila
and Alee : they are learning to love the
river, and to know what a mighty friend
it is to all the country. We who live
by a river can tell how useful it is in
many ways to our own country; but
WHAT WAS GEMILA DOING? 79
this great river Nile is more useful to its
country than any of our rivers are to us.
Before Gemila reaches her desert home,
she will see a very remarkable change
in it. Now its waters roll quietly on in
a- narrow channel ; but in a few weeks
they will rise and rise higher and higher
every day, and presently all the country
on both sides will be flooded like a great
lake. "Ah!" you say, "what will be-
come of all the poor people and the
houses?"
Do not be anxious about them; for
they have seen the river behave in this
way every year since they were born,
and they have built all their houses on
high land for safety ; and they watch the
rising of the water with delight, for it
comes as a messenger of good-will to tell
them of fruitful fields and fine harvests,
since it waters for them the fields on
which no rain ever falls. Only think of
that : Gemila has never seen rain ! I
have heard it said that there is a great
80 EACH AND ALL.
shower in the desert, perhaps once in
ten or twenty years ; but our little girl
is only nine years old, and it hasn't come
in her time. Think how dry and desolate
the whole country would be if it were
not that this good friend the river gath-
ers all the rains and melted snows from
the mountain countries far away, even
as far as those hills towards which Ma-
nenko travelled, and pours them down
through hundreds of miles to bless and
refresh this thirsty land.
In our country we have four seasons ;
and when the snow is all gone, and the
birds begin to come, and the farmers
prepare to plant their seeds, we call it
spring; summer brings the flowers and
fruits, and autumn is harvest time ;
then comes winter, which Dossie and
Edith like best of all. But in this land
where Gemila is travelling, the river
alone decides what the seasons shall be.
When the water begins to rise, it is
like a promise of spring to the farmer ;
WHAT WAS GEMILA DOING? 81
and so regularly does it rise and fall, that
he knows well, that, when November
comes, he must have his seed ready for
planting ; for the river will have fallen,
and the rich, damp slime will be left by
its waters upon the fields: so we may
call November his spring-time. And
when the wheat and rice are well grown
in the damp fields, and need only a
greater heat to ripen them, then comes
the Khamaseen wind, and hastens the
harvest; and that must bring autumn;
and, after autumn, do you think they
expect snow? Oh, no, indeed! They
have never seen snow, and only once in
a while a little ice. But a dry, hot time
comes, w r hen nothing will grow, and the
river has shrunk away again into its old
narrow bed ; and you may call the sea-
son by what name you like, only the
people are very glad when it ends, and
the friendly river begins to rise again ;
and that is about the last of June.
But all this while the river has been
82 EACH AND ALL.
floating our travellers down to Korosko ;
and here Abdel Hassan buys his camels,
and among them one beautiful milk-
white dromedary, a camel with one
hump upon its back instead of two.
This gentle creature trots and runs with
so easy and steady a motion that its
rider might drink a cup of milk while
going at a full trot, and not spill a single
drop. Wouldn't you like to have that
dromedary to ride on, little Georgie ?
Do you think Gemila will ride it ? Oh,
no ! it is to have quite a different rider :
for in this little town by the river an
English gentleman and his wife are wait-
ing for guides and camels to cross the
desert to Abou Hammed ; and when this
gentleman sees the gentle white drom-
edary, he thinks that nothing could be
more easy and comfortable for his wife's
riding on this hard journey ; and he hires
both Abdel Hassan and his camels to
cross the desert with him.
Six months ago little Gemila would
WHAT WAS GEMILA DOING? 83
have been lost in wonder at seeing the
white people ; but in Cairo she saw, every
day, people from Europe and from Amer-
ica, and she recognizes them at once, and
stretches out her little brown hand for
backsheesh (a present), feeling pretty
sure that they will give it.
And now there are great preparations
for this desert journey. The women
have made crisp abreys, baked in the
sun, and plenty of kisras of dhura flour.
New water-bags are made of gazelle-
skins, and a whole sheep is roasted.
Just before they are ready to start, the
women of the village hurry into camp
with baskets of milk to sell. The heat
will soon turn it sour ; but in that coun-
try sour milk is thought an excellent
drink.
This is a part of the desert quite new
to Gemila ; but her father travelled there
many years ago, and knows it well. The
sand is gray, instead of yellow ; and there
are all sorts of odd round stones strewn
84 EACH AND ALL.
everywhere, as if some giants had been
playing a game of ball, and had neg-
lected to put away their playthings. If
we should break open one of these black
balls, we should find it hollow, and filled
with bright red sand ; though how the
sand came there, or the pebbles either, I
am at a loss to tell you.
Presently one of the camels runs his
head into a kittar-bush for a mouthful
of its spiny leaves ; and since you know
Manenko's wait-a-bit thorn, I will also
introduce you to this kittar-bush, which
is its own cousin, only twice as strong,
and it clutches with such a hold that it
ought to have a name meaning, "stop
entirely ; " and many is the long tear in
dress or turban that the kittar-bushes
give them before they reach the end of
their journey.
Gemila also makes the acquaintance of
some monkeys that are found one day,
poor, thirsty creatures, digging wells for
themselves in the sand — only think how
WHAT WAS GEMILA DOING? 85
wise they are ; and she sees the tal]
milkweed plants, with their pretty, sil-
very fish for seeds ; but old Achmet tells
her not to touch them, for they are very
poisonous, and only the goats can eat
them with safety.
They are coming now to the land of
wild asses and of guinea-hens. Who was
it that had guinea-hens for dinner when-
ever there was nothing else to be had ?
Do you think we are near Manenko's
country ? And after three weary weeks
they come, one beautiful evening, again
in sight of the river and the villages ; and
an old sheik hastens out to meet them,
and says, " Salaam aleikum " (Peace be
with you,") and welcomes them to his
hut.
i I said they had reached the land of
guinea-hens: it also begins to be the
land of round houses with pointed roofs ;
but the houses are of stone, and the roofs
only of reeds and straw. A change, too,
has come in the weather, a very remark-
86 EACH AND ALL.
able change for our desert people. There
is going to be a rainy season! When
the first shower comes, our foolish little
Gemila stands still in wonder, gets wet
through, and the next day lies on her
little mat, and begins to feel very ill, so
ill that her mother goes to the fakir for
some medicine.
Now, we all know that medicine is dis-
agreeable enough to take, but any one
of you will take it for the sake of getting
well ; and you will be interested to know
what Gemila' s medicine is, and how she
takes it.
The old fakir listens to her mother's
account of the child's illness ; and then
he takes down a little board which hangs
beside his door, plasters it over with
lime, and then writes upon it some words
from the Koran, which is the Arab's
Bible. When all is finished, he washes
it off, plaster, ink, and all, into a gourd
cup ; and that is the medicine. Yery
disagreeable indeed, I think ; and, what
WHAT WAS GEMILA DOING? 87
is worse, I am afraid it won't make her
well. I wish she had one of those bitter
white powders that Bazunga gave to Ma-
nenko. Perhaps the English lady, who
always has been kind to the little girl,
will be able to help her.
When the mother has waited three
days for the fakir's medicine to cure her
sick little daughter, and each day she
has grown worse instead of better, she
goes to the tent outside the village,
where the English people are living, and
tells the "sity," as she calls her, that
poor little Gemila will die if she cannot
have some medicine to make her better.
And, only think, the " sity " has some
of those same bitter powders, and she
comes herself to give one to the child,
and leaves another to be taken next
day ; and, although it is a very long time
before Gemila can run and play as usual,
she begins slowly to recover ; and in a
week or two she is able to sit by the
river, and watch the boys floating on
88 EACH AND ALL.
their rafts of ambatch wood, which is a
very safe plaything in the water, for it
is lighter than cork. And in the early
morning she creeps out to see the beauti-
ful lotus-flowers flash open to the sun-
light.
One day a white man's caravan comes
into the village : there are camels and
donkeys and men from the far south, the
mountain country where the great river
gathers its waters. The white man's
face is as brown as an Arab's, he has
travelled so long in the hot sunshine.
His men have woolly hair, strangely
plaited and matted together, and dressed
in such a way as to look like high hel-
mets of thick felt. They are smeared
with grease, and adorned with cowrie-
shells and bracelets of ivory ; and among
them is Zungo, the brother of Manenko.
You remember a white man came and
took him on a journey ; and here we find
him beside the river Nile, and our little
Gemila is looking up at him, and wonder-
WHAT WAS GEMILA DOING? 89
ing if he has a little sister at home with
woolly hair like his own. Of course she
never knew any thing about Manenko ;
but it happens that at this place Zungo's
master is to leave him, or rather send
him back to his home ; and the English
gentleman, who will go southward next
month, is very glad to engage him as a
servant and interpreter. And now he,
for the first time in his life, is paid for
his services with money.
You remember what the Bazunga
paid him for cutting the wood and mak-
ing the fires, and afterwards he had a
yard of cloth a day when he travelled as
interpreter. Now the English gentleman
shows him a large round silver piece of
money. A picture of a lady's head is on
one side, and some figures on the other.
What it is worth he don't know at all,
but you and I would call it a dollar.
When Zungo wants a name for it, he
calls it, as the other men do, " the father
of buttons ; " and when the new master
90 EACH AND ALL.
promises to pay him with just such silver
pieces, he soon learns that here at Abou
Hammed they will buy food and clothes,
and any thing else that he wants, provided
only that he has enough of them. He
stays a month in the village, for it is not
best to start until the heaviest rains are
over ; and he becomes good friends with
Gemila and Alee, as well as with their
father.
When the day arrives for the English
gentleman's caravan to depart for the
south, little Gemila, who is now quite
well, and will start with her father to-
morrow for her old desert home, brings
a big bead, such as the Arabs call a
pigeon's egg 9 and sends it as a present
to Manenko, the little sister that she has
never seen.
NEW WORK FOR PEN-SE AND LIK
Do you remember that Pen-se did not
always live in the boat on the river ? It
was in the tea-country among the hills
that she was born ; and now she is going
back again to a place very near her old
home ; for a letter has come from her
uncle in the Hoo-chow country, asking
her father to come up and help him upon
his silk-farm; and very soon the boat
and the ducks are sold to his neighbor
Ah-foo, and Kang-hy and his wife, with
their three children, are on their way to
the Hoo-chow country.
Even the little girl can work on the
silk-farm ; and you will realize that when
you see what a silk-farm is.
Here are rows and rows of low, bushy
mulberry - trees ; and every morning,
92 EACH AND ALL.
while the leaves are fresh with dew, the
two little girls and their mother go out
with their baskets to gather them ; and
we will follow, and see what they do
next. We carry our baskets to a bam-
boo house with curtained windows,
standing cool and quiet at the farther
side of the field. Kang-hy is there be-
fore us; and, when he sees our fresh
leaves, he opens the door a little way,
and says, " Go in carefully : don't dis-
turb them ; " and then he quickly shuts
the door, for fear of letting in too much
light.
Do you think there is a baby asleep
in there, that we must be so quiet?
Look about you : there is no baby to be
seen; but little trays, something like
sieves, are everywhere; and Pen-se is
going from one to another, and supply-
ing each with her fresh mulberry-leaves ;
and presently all around us rises a curi-
ous little sound of thousands of little
mouths at work munching and munch-
NEW WORK FOR PEN-SE AND LIN. 93
ing. Peep into this nearest tray, and
look at the hungry silk-worms having
their breakfast. Were there ever busier
or greedier eaters ? But when one has
a great deal of work to do, one must eat
to get strength for doing it ; and these
little worms have each three hundred
yards of silk to spin before the month is
out. So they eat and grow, and grow
and eat, as busily as possible ; and when
they get too big for their skins, they
just take them off, and a new, soft, elas-
tic one comes in place of the old, and
gives them a fine chance of growing and
growing more and more.
I am sure you have all seen the pret-
ty chrysalides that caterpillars make in
the autumn. My children know them
well enough; for we had a whole box
full last year, and they peopled a but-
terfly-house in the spring. Sometimes
the chrysalides are dry and horny, but
once in a while you see a silky one ; that
is the kind this worm will make, a silky
94 EACH AND ALL.
chrysalis of a pale gold color ; and then
Pen-se will help to gather them up, and
her mother will wind off the silk in
beautiful, soft, flossy skeins, and take it
to market to sell.
Pen-se likes this work even better
than rowing the tanka-boat on the river.
She grows fond of the little worms. She
is careful to clean out their trays neatly
every morning, and give them the best
and freshest leaves ; and she longs to be
old enough to wind off the silk herself.
She is tempted to try it ; but her mother
says, " No, not yet." And I am glad to
say that in China little girls do not
tease or fret. So Pen-se waits ; and in
a few days a delightful opportunity
comes to her. It is this: Out in the
woods, half a mile from the house, she
finds some wild silkworms spinning their
webs on a mulberry-tree ; and she marks
the place, and promises herself that in a
few days, when the chrysalides are ready,
she will come back and take them. So
NEW WORK FOR PEN-SE AND LIN. 95
one day, a week later, she runs to her
mother with her little bamboo basket
full of wild cocoons, and tells her story
of finding them in the woods, and timid-
ly asks, since they are her own, whether
she may try to wind them. Her mother
is willing ; and oh, what a proud, happy
little girl she is when she has a skein of
silk of her own winding ! not so fine and
even as her mother's, to be sure, — but
wild silk is never the best, — and yet it
is strong and useful for some coarser
weaving; and, when she has a pound,
she may carry it to market and sell it.
Do you wish you lived in a country
where you could find wild silk in the
woods ?
Pen-se is only a little girl, but she has
a great deal of hard work to do, espe-
cially now that her father cannot have
much help from her brother Lin; for
Lin is going to school. Can't Pen-se go
to school too ? No, I am sorry to say
that in her country nobody thinks ft
96 EACH AND ALL.
best for little girls to learn even reading
and writing ; and, when you think of it,
don't you remember that neither Agoo-
nack, Manenko, nor Gemila ever went
to school ? But Lin is a boy ; and boys
must all learn at least reading and writ-
ing, if nothing more.
Do you remember the first day you
ever went to school? If you do, you
will like to hear about Lin's first school-
day.
His father looked in the almanac to
see what would be a lucky day for a lit-
tle boy to begin going to school; and
when he found in the long list of lucky
days, " June 8 is a good day for begin-
ning school," he decided upon that ; and
early in the morning he provided the
child with all that he will need for
school.
Do you think he will have a slate and
pencil, and a book ?
Oh, no ! He carries two little can-
dles, some perfumed sticks, and some
NEW WORK FOR PEN-SE AND LIN. 97
little papers of make-believe money:
that is all ; and walking beside his father,
he goes up to the village where the
schoolhouse is, and, finding the teacher
at the door, Kang-hy makes a low bow,
and presents his son. He does not tell
the teacher Lin's name ; for to-day the
boy will have a new name given him,
which will be called his book-name ; and
we shall have to leave off calling him
Lin, and begin to call him Li-hoo in-
stead. Isn't that funny?
Now, what will he do with the things
he has brought? Do you think they
are a present for the teacher ? No ; for
the teacher leads the little boy to a
table, where he places the candles and
lights them, and then shows the child
how to burn his perfumed sticks and his
mock money; and all that is done in
honor of a great and wise teacher who
taught in that country thousands of years
ago. As the little boy is to study from
the books of that teacher, it is thought
98 EACH AND ALL.
right to perform this service of respect
to his memory. And if to you and me
it seems like nonsense, we will not laugh
at it, but only say, " If he thinks it will
please the wise and good teacher, let
him do it."
And now the real studying is to be-
gin. Do you know how many letters
there are in the alphabet ?
" There are twenty-six," says little
Georgie.
And do you want to know how many
letters there are for this little Chinese
boy to learn in his alphabet? Poor
child! I pity him, for there are thirty
thousand. But, long before he has
learned them all, he will be able to read
common words and stories ; for most of
the letters are really whole words, not
spelled out as ours are, but a sort of pic-
ture-writing. And soon he learns that
this letter (o) means the sun ; and that
if it is made just above a straight line,
so (q), it means the early morning, for
NEW WORK FOR PEN-SE AND LIN. 99
the sun is just above the horizon. This
(/m\) is a mountain. And some of the
others are just as simple and easy to
learn; but there are many almost too
difficult to think of trying.
After his reading and writing are fin-
ished for the day, he learns to repeat
this sentence from the book of the wise
teacher who lived so long ago : —
" The portrait of a father is a book
which teaches a son his duties/ '
I think I understand that ; for I know
some little children who love to play in
the room where the portrait of their
grandfather hangs, and his pleasant face
smiles down upon them, helping them to
be good and patient in their little trials,
and helpful to each other. Perhaps that
is what Li-hoo feels when he has learned
his sentence, and stands back to the
schoolmaster (for that position is consid-
ered only proper and polite), and repeats
it slowly and carefully, word for word.
Now school is over for the day, and
100 EACH AND ALL.
Li-hoo turns into Lin again, and runs
home to tell his wondering little sistei
what new things he has learned.
I cannot say whether Pen-se wishes
that she, too, could go to school. If she
does, she never says any thing about it ;
for she has never heard of such a thing
as girls going to school, and doesn't sup-
pose it possible. But you and I would
welcome her to our school, if she came
here, wouldn't we ?
One day, at the end of the summer,
her brother comes home very happy:
he has, for the first time, read a story
for himself, and at night he repeats it
to Pen-se ; and I will repeat it for you,
that you may see what kind of stories
the Chinese children read.
Here it is : —
" There was a boy whose father was
so poor that he could not afford to send
him to school, but was obliged to make
him work all day in the fields to help
maintain the family. The lad was so
NEW WORK FOR PEN-SE AND LIN. 101
anxious to learn, that he wished to give
up a part of the night to study ; but his
mother had not the means of supplying
him with a lamp for that purpose : so he
brought home every evening a glow-
worm, which, being wrapped in a thin
piece of gauze, and applied to the lines
of a book, gave sufficient light to enable
him to read ; and thus he acquired so
much knowledge, that, in course of time,
he became a minister of state, and sup-
ported his parents with ease and com-
fort in their old age." Lin is so fond of
going to school, that he almost believes
he shall be like the boy in this story ;
and he hopes, at any rate, to take good
care of his father and mother in their
old age. That is what every child in
China means to do, and I hope every
child in our own country too.
But we will leave Lin hard at work
on his studies, and see what the rest of
the family are doing.
Do you know about the wax-makers ?
102 EACH AND ALL.
I think I can hear Edith answer, " Oh,
yes, the bees ! " But I must say, Oh,
no : I mean the tiny brown wax-insects
that cover themselves, and the tree on
which they feed, with fine white wax.
While the women and children have
been busy with silk- worms, Kang-hy has
gone every day to help another man
collect the wax from the wax-trees ; and
now the time has come for the little
wax-insects to lay their very tiny eggs ;
and these are carefully gathered and
packed in leaves, and must be carried to
the hatching-trees, which are miles and
miles away in quite another part of the
country; for, for some curious reason,
these little creatures thrive best during
their babyhood in one country, and
when their wax - working days begin,
they want to be carried to another. So
the men, having collected a great many
packages of eggs, start on a two-weeks'
journey to the hatching-trees. If they
should travel in the day-time, the heat
NEW WORK FOR PEN-SE AND LIN. 103
of the sun would hatch the eggs before
their time ; and, on that account, the
men have chosen to make the journey
at a time when the moon is large, and
they can see to travel in the night ; and
for a whole fortnight they sleep by day,
and walk by night. And pleasant walks
they are, too, through the beautiful
green woods, where the wild azaleas and
camellias lift their fair white faces in the
moonlight, and the great lantern-flies
flash among the dark foliage.
Kang-hy is a very industrious man;
and just now he is earning all the
money he possibly can for two reasons ;
very important reasons, both of them,
as you will see.
The first is, that a little new baby-boy
has been born ; and the father who has
four children must work harder and earn
more than the father who has only three.
Now I must tell you about this little
baby, and how he was welcomed, — wel-
comed with the greatest rejoicings, be-
104 EACH AND ALL.
cause he was a boy ; and in China they
are more glad to have boys than girls.
When he is a few days old, the father
invites all his friends to a feast, and, tak-
ing the baby in his arms, holds him up
before them all, and gives him a name.
At first he thought of calling this child
Number Pour, for a number is considered
as good as a name ; but finally he de-
cides upon Chang-fou; and this becomes
the baby's pet name, or baby- name,
which will last him until he has his
school-name, just as Lin had his a few
months ago. Then the mother ties his
wrists together with a little red string :
that is thought to be the way to make
him good and obedient; and when he
grows big enough to understand, if ever
he is naughty, somebody will say to him,
" Why, why ! did your mother forget to
bind your wrists ? " Isn't that a funny
thing to do ?
And now you can imagine how our
little Pen-se will spend all her spare
NEW WORK FOR PEN-SE AND LIN. 105
minutes in playing with the baby, and
carrying him out to see the beautiful
gold and silver pheasants, and the gay
rice-birds, and the half-dozen pretty lit-
tle puppies that she feeds every day
with rice, and watches and tends so
carefully.
Do you know what she will do with
the puppies when they are very plump
and fat? Don't you remember that
there were fat puppies for sale in the
market of the great city by the river
where Pen-se used to live ? She is really
fattening them to sell ; for she too, little
as she is, must earn money, and help her
father.
Now I must tell you the second reason
why Kang-hy wants to earn all he can.
He has heard of a wonderful country far
away over the sea, — a country where
the hills and the rivers are full of gold,
and where white men and women, such
as he sees in the American ships at Can-
ton, have their homes. I am afraid that
106 EACH AND ALL.
some of the things he has heard are not
wholly true ; but at least it is quite cer-
tain that a man or a boy can earn ten
times as much money in that distant
California, as he can in the rice-fields or
the silk-farms of China.
Of course Kang-hy cannot go himself
and leave his family behind ; but Lin is
now almost fourteen years old, and he
might be sent, if only enough money
could be earned to pay his passage across
the wide ocean. It is for that that his
father works, and Pen-se saves her silk-
money and her puppy-money, and the
mother makes little wax candles colored
red with vermilion, and carries them to
market to sell.
At last they have all together accu-
mulated about ten dollars ; and with this
they go to the mandarin of the village,
and ask him to make arrangements for
sending Lin to America. And the man-
darin goes to the captain of the Ameri-
jan ship, and shows him the money and
NEW WORK FOR PEN-SE AND LIN. 107
the boy, and says, " Can do ? No can
do?" And the captain answers, "No
can do ; " and poor Lin turns away dis-
appointed. But he is to go, after all;
for there is in the city a company of
merchants that has engaged a ship to
take seven hundred men and boys who
want to go to this new country, and
they promise to give Lin a place if he
will pay the ten dollars now, and thirty
dollars more after he has earned it ; and
it seems very easy to earn thirty dollars
in a country where he will be paid half
a dollar a day. At home he only re-
ceived a few cents.
But there is one thing more to be
attended to; his father must write a
promise, that, if the boy does not suc-
ceed in paying the thirty dollars, he will
do it himself. That is a hard promise
for Kang-hy to give. It has been so
difficult to earn ten dollars, how can he
ever earn thirty ? But nevertheless he
makes the promise, and says, " I will
108 EACH AND ALL.
rather sell my other children to pay it s
than not keep my promise, now that it
is made."
And so little Lin will leave his father,
mother, and sisters and baby-brother,
and go alone to a strange country,
where the people speak a different lan-
guage, do not eat with chop-sticks, nor
wear braided tails of hair, where the
school-children do not recite with their
backs to the teacher, and, more surpris-
ing than all, where little girls, as well as
boys, learn to read and write, and a
great deal more besides.
I have said, " where the people speak
a different language;" but already Lin
has learned a little of that strange lan-
guage in the odd talk called pigeon-
English, which he hears the American
sailors talking to the Chinamen of Can-
ton. They seem to think that to put ey
on the end of a word, will make it more
easily understood ; and when they speak
to a Chinaman, they say findey instead
NEW WORK FOR PEN-SE AND LIN. 109
of find, and piecey instead of piece, and
catchey instead of catch ; and they have
other funny words, to which they give
meanings of their own; and since they
succeed in understanding each other, per-
haps it is very well. But what should
you think to hear your papa say,
" Catchey some chow-chow, chop-chop/ '
when he only meant to ask Bridget to
bring him some breakfast quickly ?
This kind of talk may do in Canton,
but I don't believe Lin will find it very
useful in San Francisco, where he will
land in a few weeks.
I can't tell you about the voyage to
San Francisco : I am afraid it was very
uncomfortable. The boys were crowded
together, and they felt homesick and
seasick. But such troubles end at last ;
and so, in time, comes the sunny morn-
ing when they sail into the beautiful
harbor called the Golden Gate ; and the
little boy looks out at the long, low hills,
with their light-houses, and the beautiful
110 EACH AND ALL.
city lying before him in the sunlight;
and he wonders at seeing no tanka-boats,
and no people living in duck-boats, as
there are in his own country ; and then
he has no time to wonder any more, for
he finds himself on land, and is hurried
along with the crowd to the companies'
houses, where he will stay until work is
found for him.
" What kind of work ? " do you ask ?
There are many kinds of work from
which to choose : there is digging at the
gold-mines, but that is too hard for a
boy so young ; and the work on the new
railroad is also too heavy for him. He
can go to the great laundry to do wash-
ing ; or, if he prefers, he can go out to
service with some family. Poor boy!
he is so homesick, that the thought of
a family seems almost like a home, and
he timidly suggests that he should like
that best ; so he is sent to the house of
Mr. Leighton, who came yesterday to
the laundry to look for a boy. When
NEW WORK FOR PEN-SE AND LIN. Ill
Mrs. Leighton looks at him, she says,
" Oh, you are too little ! you are not
strong enough to do the work." To
which poor Lin, only h alf understanding
her, answers, " Me muchey workey, me
wash dish ; " and then catching sight of
the baby, who lay crowing and kicking
on the floor, he added, thinking of his
own little baby-brother at home, " Me
playey baby, me jumpey he."
So the mother's heart softens towards
him, and she says that he may come
and try. And pretty soon it happens
that little baby Margie begins to delight
in Lin more than in any other member
of the household. He lets her play
with his pig-tail, and sings her little
Chinese songs, and talks to her in the
funny language which she thinks a per-
petual joke. And at last, one day, when
her mamma is trying to have her photo-
graph taken to send to her far-away
aunties, nobody can keep her still, until
Lin, all dressed in his best suit, stands
112 EACH AND ALL.
up and holds her in his arms ; and it is
their picture which you see at the be-
ginning of this story.
Lin was delighted when he saw his
own picture with the "Melican baby;"
and Mr. Leighton gave him one of them
to send home to his father and mother.
So he sat down that evening after his
work was done, and wrote the following
letter to send to China by the very
next mail. I will turn it into our
own language for you, as the inter-
preter did for the white man in Man-
enko's land.
But first you will be interested to see
how Lin is writing his letter. When
you write a letter, you begin at the left
side of your paper ; but he begins at
the right, and writes in columns, as you
do sometimes in your writing-books. It
would puzzle you and me ; but his father
will know how to read it, and that is the
most important thing, isn't it ?
NEW WORK FOR PEN-SE AND LIN. 113
My dear and honored Father and Mother,
*-* May the light shine upon you.
You will see a picture of your son Lin, hold-
ing in his arms a Melican baby. She is a pretty
baby, like little Chang-fou ; but in the Melican
country they do not bind the babies' wrists, so
she is sometimes disobedient.
I work every day, wash the dishes, sweep,
take care of the baby, and I earn much money.
Already I pay ten dollars to the company-man.
I will be very industrious. You shall not have
to pay.
Last month we celebrated the New Year.
Three thousand Chinamen walked in a procession
to the Joss-house ; and we had feasts, and fire-
works, and New-Year's cards. I send nry cards
to you. (Here were enclosed two slips of red
paper printed with strange black Chinese letters,
which neither you nor I can read.)
We had a New-Year's week, not a month as
at home. And I went for two days, but no
more ; for I must do my work.
We did not have the new almanacs, as we do
at home ; but I thought about it, and wondered
if the Great Emperor had received his, with its
covers of yellow satin in its beautiful golden
case, and whether you had bought yours, and
were looking into it to see what would be the
lucky day for writing me a letter.
114 EACH AND ALL.
My master he asked me one day if I would
have my hair cut ; but I told him no, not for
twenty dollars. Yet I should very much like the
twenty dollars.
When I have paid the company, I shall have
money to send to you.
When this letter reaches you, I think it must
be very near little Chang-fou's birthday.
I wish I could see you all. When I have
earned plenty of Melican money, I shall come
home to you again, and I will always be your
dutiful and obedient son, Lin.
This was Lin's letter ; and now we
will see how it was received in his
home.
It was a pleasant spring day in the
Hoo-chow country, and the first mul-
berry-leaves were coming out. Pen-se
and her mother were at work, as we
have seen them before; but the little
girl was complaining because her winter
dress made her so warm.
" Tut, tut ! " said her mother, " don't
complain : you can't change it, you
know, until the emperor's decree comes
for putting on spring clothes."
NEW WORK FOR PEN-SE AND LIN. 115
And the little girl, knowing that to
be true, tries to think of something else^
and forget her discomfort. And there is
a pleasant subject to think about ; for
to-morrow will be little Chang - fou's
birthday, and he will be one year old.
Already his new cap and first shoes
have come as a present from his grand-
mother, and preparations are making for
a simple feast among the friends of the
family.
It was very kind for the grandmother
to send the cap and shoes, wasn't it ?
But I must tell you something quite
curious about this present. It wasn't
only because she wanted to, that she
sent the cap and shoes, but because in
China it is thought quite necessary that
a grandmother should always give just
this present, and no other, on the little
grandson's first birthday. Now, if she
had wanted to bring him a rattle and a
jumping-jack, instead of cap and shoes,
she couldn't have done it: everybody
116 EACH AND ALL.
would have cried out that it wasn't the
proper thing; and if she ventured to
ask, "Why?" they would all say, "It
must be so, because it always has been
so." You and I don't think that is a
very good reason, do we ? But it is the
only answer we shall get in China to
many and many of our questions. If
you ask, " Why does the great general
wear an embroidered tiger *on his beau-
tiful silk dress ? why does the writer of
books wear one of his finger-nails two
inches long? and why do the princes
have their almanacs covered with red
satin and silver, while the emperor's are
bound in yellow satin and gold?" to
each and every question the Chinese
will answer, " It always was so, and
therefore it will always be so."
But we must return to the silk-farm
and the baby's birthday.
All the friends have assembled, and
little Chang-fou is brought in dressed in
new clothes. His mother carries him,
NEW WORK FOR PEN-SE AND LIN. 117
and Pen-se walks behind carrying a
round sieve in which lie various things.
There are writing-materials, — the four
precious materials, Kang-hy calls them,
— there are little money-scales, books,
fruits, pieces of gold and silver, a skein
of silk, and some little twigs from a tea-
plant.
Don't you wonder what is to be done
with them all ? See, the sieve is placed
on the table, and the laughing baby is
seated in it among all the things of
which I have just told you. Everybody
watches the little fellow to see what he
will do ; for thev think that what busi-
ness he is to engage in when he grows
up is to be decided now by whichever
of all these things he first grasps in his
little fat hand.
His father would best like to have
him a wise man and a writer ; but the
yellow gloss of the silk attracts him
first, and, stretching out his hands for
it, he lisps, in his own funny language,
118 EACH AND ALL.
"Pretty, pretty;" and everybody de-
clares that he will be a silk-grower, like
his uncle.
And now the bowls of rice are brought
in, and the guests sit around the table
with their chop-sticks, and sip their little
cups of perfumed rice-wine ; and in the
midst of all the festivity, the postman
enters with Lin's letter.
Kang-hy is a proud and happy man
when he reads it; and the picture of
Lin with the " Melican baby " in his arms
is passed from hand to hand, and admired
by every one ; and one neighbor says to
another, " It will be well that we send
our sons to this great and rich country
over the seas."
Then they all leave the table, and go
out with fire-crackers, to finish the en-
tertainment with such a display as we
only expect on Fourth of July.
Pen-se doesn't care much for the
fire-crackers: she has heard and seen
them almost every day since she was
NEW WORK FOR PEN-SE AND LIN. 119
born; but she has stolen away into a
corner, and laid her cheek against the
pretty face of the " Melican baby." She
thinks she should love that little
stranger. Perhaps she is a little sister
toe.
CAN THE LITTLE BROWN BABY
DO ANYTHING?
She is hardly more than a baby. Do
you remember her little swinging bed in
the tree, and her birds and flowers and
butterflies?
What can such a baby do? I am sure
she can't work.
Yes, she is a little creature ; but she
shall have a little chapter, too, of her
own.
Sometimes when we are doing our
little work quietly, and not supposing
that anybody but those who are nearest
us knows or cares or is helped by it, we
find that really we have been doing a
service for unknown friends far away
whom we have never even seen; ana
ISO
THE LITTLE BROWN BABY. 121
this is what our brown baby is going
to do.
She plays in the forest just as she
used to ; she gathers flowers, and chases
butterflies; but one morning, after she
has been to the cow-tree with her cocoa-
nut bowl to get some milk for breakfast,
and has had her bath in the stream, and
her roll on the grass, she sees her mother
walking slowly through the wood, look-
ing carefully on this side and on that, to
find the kina-trees, with their yellow
bark; and even this little girl, who is
now but five years old, shows us that
she can work as well as play, and begins
to pull off the curled bark, and bring
the bits to her mother to see if they are
of the right kind. And at last, down in
the hot valley she finds a beautiful ever-
green-tree, with fragrant white blossoms
something like the white lilac ; and she
runs to call her mother to see the pretty
sight. But no sooner does the mother
look at the beautiful tree, than she hur-
122 EACH AND ALL.
ries back to call the men, who come with
their axes to cut it down ; for it is a true
kina-tree, and will yield many drums of
bark.
And while the men are carefully strip-
ping the great trunk and large boughs,
the little girl works busily at the slender
branches, and soon has her basket full of
curly strips ready for drying.
" But," you ask, " what is all this for,
and how is it to be a help to anybody ? "
Do you remember the time when Ma-
nenko had a fever, and the Bazunga
gave her a white powder? and when
Gemila, too, was ill, and the English lady
brought her also the same bitter pow-
der ? Where do you suppose they got
that medicine ?
Probably they bought it at a drug-
gist's in some city.
But where did the druggist get it ?
Ah, we never thought of that J
Where did he, indeed ?
Why, that bitter powder is made from
THE LITTLE BROWN BABY. 123
fchis very bark that the brown baby is so
carefully pulling from the boughs ; and
her country is the only country in the
world where it grows. Now, only think
what a kind service she has done for her
two sisters, Gemila and Manenko, whom
she has never seen nor heard of.
She doesn't travel, and take long
journeys, as some of the other children
do. She can only do her little work in
her own home, and then send it away in
ships far over the seas to distant coun-
tries ; but when her drum of kina-bark
is taken to Arica for shipment, there is
another great package of something
prettier than bark, that goes with it;
and you will see, by and by, to which of
the seven sisters this will come.
There is a pretty little squirrel-like
animal with the softest of gray fur If
the brown baby had any pets, or any
place in which to keep them, I am sure
she would want one of these little chin-
chillas ; but no doubt it is happier in its
124 EACH AND ALL.
free forest-home, than it would be in
any little house, however fine, with
which you or I could provide it ; and as
for the brown baby, who has no house
for herself, she, of course, has none for
any thing else. And yet the gentle
creature living in its burrow, and sit-
ting at its little doorway in the sun, is a
great pleasure and entertainment to the
child, whenever she climbs up the hill-
side far enough to come to chinchilla-
town ; for it is almost as much of a little
town as are the prairie-dog towns of
which you have sometimes heard ; and,
in fact, the prairie-dog is a cousin of this
same little gray chinchilla.
Our baby watches them with their
tails curled up over their backs like
squirrels', and sees them scamper into
their underground houses when she
comes too near ; and she is sorry, and so
am I, when her father catches as many
of them as he can, that he may pack
their pretty skins in great bundles, and
THE LITTLE BROWN BABY. 125
send them away with the drums of bark
to be sold.
Perhaps some of you will have chin-
chilla muffs and caps made from these
same little skins : so they will be a pres-
ent from brown-baby land.
Do you want to know how all these
packages of bark and fur are carried
down to the ships at the seashore ?
They have neither horses nor carts, as
in our country, for the mountain-roads
are too steep for such travel; but the
packages are loaded on the backs of the
gentle Hamas, who can step lightly and
safely down the steepest paths ; and just
as our men are ready to start with their
loaded animals, the mountain-train from
the silver-mines comes into sight, wind-
ing slowly down the narrow path along
the hillside.
Did you think I meant a train of cars?
Oh, no ! it was a train of llamas, with
their small, graceful, erect heads, and
their slender legs. How gallantly their
126 BACH AND ALL,
leader moves in front, with his gayly-
embroidered halter, and pretty little
streamer floating from his head ! And
the others all follow in single file down
the slope, carrying their burdens so care-
fully that they scarcely seem to need the
care of the drivers, who clamber along
behind them. But, when one poor tired
little animal suddenly lies down by the
roadside, see how quickly his Indian
master shows both love and care for
him! He kneels beside him, pets and
caresses him, and comforts him with ten-
der words, just as Gemila and Alee pet
their father's black horse; and at last
the llama struggles again to his feet, and
follows his companions, who are almost
out of sight. They are all loaded with
silver from the mountain mines; and
when they have left it at the seaport,
they will carry back salt for the moun-
tain people.
The little fur and bark train joins the
silver train, and all go together down to
THE LITTLE BROWN BABY. 127
the ships that are waiting for their loads.
And the little brown baby watches them
out of sight, and then goes back to her
play and her work, and does not dream
that she has sent any thing to Manenko
or to Gemila, or to any other of those
far-away, unknown sisters.
CHRISTMAS-TIME AGAIN FOR
LOUISE.
You all remember the beautiful Christ
mas-time in the happy home by the river
Rhine, and the long, hard journey after-
wards to the new home in the Western
forest.
Do you want to go with me now, and
take a peep at Louise and Fritz, and
Gretchen and little Hans ?
We left them in a log house, didn't
we ? But see : they have now built a
larger and more comfortable one; not
like the beautiful old home by the Rhine,
but simple almost as the log one, only it
has more rooms, better fireplaces, and
more convenient furniture.
Louise and Gretchen have a little room
to themselves ; and last summer a morn-
ing-glory vine climbed all about their
CHRISTMAS-TIME FOR LOUISE. 129
window, and opened its lovely blossoms
to the morning sun. Up in that room
to-day Louise sits down by the sunny
window to think for a minute. She has
just made her bed, and put her room in
order, and in five minutes more she
ought to be down stairs sweeping the
little sitting-room : besides, there is an-
other reason for not stopping, long ; for
this November day, even if the sun does
shine, it is not warm enough in that fire-
less room for any one to sit still long.
What do you suppose she is thinking
about? What do you begin to think
about when November is almost gone,
and December is coming ? " Christmas,
Christmas ! " I hear all the little voices
answering. Yes, that is what Louise is
thinking about. She is not wondering
what she will have in her stocking, nor
what she shall buy for papa and mamma,
or all the brothers and sisters ; but the
question has popped itself into her head :
" Could I, could I, make a little Christ-
130 EACH AND ALL.
mas-tree, such as we used to have at
home by the beautiful river Khine, —
a Christmas-tree to surprise them all ? "
And she is sitting down for just a minute
to think how it would be possible to do
this without telling any one of the fam-
fly-
But to this difficult question no an-
swer presents itself, and she mustn't
linger when there is so much work to
be done. So with the sense of a de-
lightful secret in her mind, she runs
down to sweep the sitting-room, while
Gretchen amuses little Hans in one cor-
ner of the kitchen, and her good mother
puts the bread into the pans, and sees
that the oven is ready for baking.
Sometimes I believe our best thoughts
come when we are busiest ; and I don't
wonder that Louise gave a little jump
for joy in the midst of her work, when
it suddenly occurred to her that Jean-
nette, the little neighbor who had come
last year to live at the nearest farm,
CHRISTMAS-TIME FOR LOUISE. 131
would help her, and that Jeannette's tall
brother Joseph would certainly bring
them a tree from the woods.
Now, I know that she wants to put on
her hat, and run over to Jeanne tte's
house to ask her about it at once ; but
she can't do that, or who will mend the
stockings, and set the dinner-table, and
wash the dishes, and sweep the kitchen
floor when all is done ? So she works
on, singing softly to herself, although
she hardly knows what she is singing
until her mother says, "What makes
you so happy, dear ? and why do you
sing the Christmas hymn ? "
Louise laughs, and answers, "Why,
was I singing the Christmas hymn? I
didn't know it."
It is three o'clock, and at last the
day's work is finished; and, "Mother,
may I take my sewing, and go to Jean-
nette's?" asks Louise. And there is
such a tone of satisfaction in the child's
words, that her mother looks up at her?
132 EACH AND ALL.
glad to see her so happy, and says,
" Certainly."
Jeannette lives in a log house hardly
better than the one in which we left
Louise when you knew her long ago.
But Joseph has made some comfortable
benches, and one with a very high back
that stands always beside the fireplace,
and is called the settle. Into the corner
of this settle cuddle the two little girls ;
and it isn't many minutes before Jean-
ette is as happy as Louise over the
delightful secret.
Jeannette has no little brothers and
sisters to surprise on Christmas ; but she
already loves Gretchen and Fritz and
Hans, and she enters into the plan most
heartily. Of course Joseph will get the
tree : Joseph will do any thing for his
little sister ; and, if there is time, he will
also make some little toys of wood to
put upon it. And Jeannette herself can
help in a delightful way, for she can do
something that few little girls of my
CHRISTMAS-TIME FOR LOUISE. 133
acquaintance knew how to. Shall I tell
you what it is ?
Her father and brothers began two
months ago, after their grain was har-
vested, to dig a cellar for the new house
that they mean to build in the spring.
In digging out the earth, they came to a
bed of red and brown clay, not very
hard, and just sticky enough for mould-
ing into shape. At first the children
played with it in a rough way, making
balls, and sometimes dishes or pans ; but
one day Jeannette patted into shape a
little cat that looked so much like her
own cat Sandwich, that all the children
exclaimed at it with delight ; and, lest it
should crumble to pieces, she set it in a
warm place in the chimney-corner, and
baked it until it was hard. From that
day Jeannette spent all her play-time in
the clay-bed ; and sometimes it was the
old shepherd dog who sat for his picture
with a grave face, and a tail that wanted
to wag, but wouldn't, as if he knew
134 EACH AND ALL.
what it was all about, and was keep-
ing still on purpose. Sometimes it was
Bossy, or Brindle, or Cowslip, on their
way home from pasture; and at last,
when her hands grew skilful with much
practice, she tried the shy antelopes that
would not stop half a minute to be
looked at.
And now Jeannette is planning just
what she will make for each one; and
Louise, who has not such skilful hands
but just as loving a heart, is trying to
think what there is that can be made
without costing any money at all.
There are different kinds of presents
in the world, you know. Some of them
have cost a great deal of money ; and
some have cost a great deal of love, and
thought, and work. This last is the
kind I like best myself, and this is the
kind that Louise must make. Every
day while she is about her work, her
mind is actively thinking, thinking al-
ways ; and first one thing suggests itself,
and then another.
CHRISTMAS-TIME FOR LOUISE. 135
" If we had a feather - duster, how
convenient it would be to brush off the
ashes ! " said her mother one day, when a
fresh log of wood thrown on to the fire
set the ashes flying even up to the high
mantle-shelf; and the little girl could
hardly help exclaiming, " mother ! I
will make you one for Christmas ; " for
it quickly flashed into her head, that the
yard was strewn with turkey-feathers,
and why wouldn't they make a good
duster ?
It is easier to plan than to execute.
But that same afternoon she picked up
all the longest and best of the feathers,
— the stouter, stiffer ones for the middle
part of the brush, and plenty of soft,
downy, fluffy ones for the outside. Jean-
nette's brother Joseph whittled out a
smooth, pretty handle for her, with a
notch near the end, so that she could tie
her feathers firmly on ; and she worked
all her spare time for two days before
they were tied on evenly and well ; and
136 EACH AND ALL.
even then the ends stuck up clumsily
around the handle, and she couldn't think
what would make it look any better.
Now somebody is going to help her.
Who can it be ? A little far-away sister
whom she has never seen.
Do you remember how carefully Pen-
se tended the silk-worms, and gathered
up the cocoons, and learned to wind off
the silk? Some of that very silk has
been woven into a pretty blue ribbon, —
a ribbon that the kind cousin Mr. Mey-
er bought in New York, and sent in a
letter, that Louise might have, as he
said, —
" A bunch of blue ribbons,
To tie up her bonnie brown hair."
That night, after Louise is in bed
and almost asleep, she suddenly thinks,
"Why, I will tie a piece of my blue
ribbon round the ends of the feathers,
and that will finish it off beautifully ! "
So, the next day, the feather-duster was
CHRISTMAS-TIME FOR LOUISE. 137
finished, — the first present of all ; and
it was marked, " Liebe Mutter " (" Dear
mother "), and was hidden away in a lit-
tle chest down at Jeannette's house ; for
it would spoil every thing to have it
seen before the time.
But do you think that Louise is the
only one who has remembered that
Christmas is coming ?
If the little girl had not been so busy
herself, and so anxious to get away into
some obscure corner to do her work
unobserved, she would certainly have
noticed that her mother had a curious
way of slipping something into a drawer
which she shut quickly when any of the
children came in; and she might also
have wondered what Christian was scrib-
bling at so busily at his corner of the
table in the evening ; but, when Christ-
mas-time is near, you should not ask too
many questions, and you should not be
surprised at very mysterious answers.
"Dear Christian," said Louise one
138 EACH AND ALL.
day, when she saw her brother prepar-
ing to go to town with a load of wood,
" if mother can spare me, may I go with
you ? " Louise had an idea in her head,
and she wanted very much to get, in
the town, some materials wherewith to
carry it out; and the chance to ride
there on the load of wood was delightful.
Her mother was willing and glad to have
her go, but hesitated a minute over the
old worn hat and shabby little sack;
then suddenly she exclaimed, "Why,
the dear child shall wear my eider-down
pelisse."
Who remembers the bag of eider-
down that Agoonack's mother brought
to the Kudlunahs in exchange for
needles and thread ? Didn't this warm
garment come from Agoonack's land, or
from some other land very much like it ?
It was a curious old garment, this
pelisse. Perhaps you never heard of a
pelisse ; but I can remember, when I was
a child, an old lady who had just such
CHRISTMAS-TIME FOR LOUISE. 139
a pelisse as this. It was made of silk,
and wadded with eider-down ; and it was
as soft and warm and light as a bird's
coat of feathers. It was a garment
like this that Louise's mother now took
out from one of those great linen-chests
that you remember, and she wrapped it
carefully about her little daughter. It
reached almost to her feet, and the
sleeves covered her hands. " But you
will be all the warmer for that," said the
Hebe Mutter.
Christian has prepared for her a cosey
seat among the logs, and away they go.
It is rather a hard and uneven road ; but
the snow has improved it, and the heavy
runners of the wood-sled make smooth,
broad tracks over the as yet unbroken
way.
It is a great pleasure to Louise to go
to the town. When one stays at home
day after day, and week after week, the
change of seeing a new place is very
delightful* and Louise has rarely been
140 EACH AND ALL.
even to the town, and only once has she
taken a journey since she first came to
America : that was the journey to New
York with her father, when he went on
business, and happened to be just in
time to welcome the cousin home from
his long, strange voyage on the ice-
island.
But what can Louise get to-day in
the town without money ?
Perhaps you thought she was going
to buy a little steam-engine for Fritz,
and a wax doll for Gretchen. Not at
all. You will hardly imagine what she
can do with the little scraps of black
kid and white that she has timidly
begged of the old shoemaker, who was
about to throw them away.
This old shoemaker, with his spectacles
pushed up on his forehead, and his
leather apron tied round his waist, had
always been kind to Louise ever since
her father took her to his shop last sum-
mer to be measured for a pair of shoes.
CHRISTMAS-TIME FOR LOUISE. 141
He had looked at the little worn shoe
that she took off, and had said inquir-
ingly, "That shoe is not made in this
country ? " — " No/' answered the father,
" that shoe came from Germany ; " and
the old man laid his rough hand caress-
ingly over the worn leather, and an-
swered, " I, too, came from the father-
land ; but it is now more than fifty years
since I saw the Rhine."
That made them friends at once ; and
when the little girl in her long pelisse
appeared to-day at his door, old Hans
Stoker pushed back his spectacles, and
smiled with pleasure. And in response
to her timid question about the scraps
of leather, he pulled forward an old box
full, and said heartily, "Help yourself,
my little lady, help yourself: they are
all at your service."
Louise chose long, narrow strips, four
of them white, and four black ; but
while she was busy over the box, old
Hans had opened the drawer under his
142 EACH AND ALL.
bench, and, after measuring and calcu-
lating a minute over a pretty piece of
red morocco, he cut off two or three
corners and bits of that, and, tossing
them into the box, said, "They would
go in to-morrow at any rate : so let
them go to-day instead, and take them
if you like, my dear."
Louise started with pleasure; and in
the joy of her heart she looked up in
the old wrinkled face, and decided to
tell him her Christmas secret.
"I am going to make a ball for my
baby brother. It is to be a Christmas
present, and I don t want any one to
know. It was going to be only black
and white, but the red stripes will make
it just lovely. I thank you so much for
them!"
The kind old man was as pleased as a
child would be with the little plan ; and
he offered to cut the leather for her with
his knife, if she could tell him how she
wanted it done : so presently they to-
CHRISTMAS-TIME FOR LOUISE. 143
gether contrived a paper pattern of a
long piece tapering at both ends, like
the pieces we sometimes take off in
peeling an orange ; and the shoemaker
promised to cut them while Louise went
with Christian to buy yarn for her
mother. On their return, he came out
to the sled with a neat little package all
ready for her.
" What have you bought of the shoe-
maker ? " asked Christian as they drove
away, while Louise looked back to nod
and smile at the friendly old face in the
doorway of the little shop.
"I didn't buy any thing," she an-
swered, " but questions are not good at
Christmas time ; " and she looked up
into his face, and laughed.
Christian laughed too ; and then they
both became so lost in Christmas
thoughts, that neither of them spoke
for a long time. Just before the lights
in their own windows came in sight,
Louise said, " Don't tell anybody that I
144 EACH AND ALL.
went to the shoemaker's." — " Trust nie
for that," said Christian, stooping to kiss
her red lips ; and in another minute they
were at the door.
Now, what do you suppose the liebe
Mutter had been doing a,'l day long?
There had been work enough, you may
be sure ; but little Gretchen was anxious
to fill her sister's place as well as she
could, and to save the dear mother as
much work as possible ; and Hans had a
pile of blocks on the kitchen floor, and
built houses and castles all the morning :
and so it was that the mother found time
to take out of the great chest the pretty
chinchilla muff that she had brought
with her across the seas, because it had
been a Christmas present years ago from
her own dear mother.
But what is she going to do with the
muff? She, too, has a Christmas thought ;
and her skilful fingers will obey that
thought, and make out of the muff a
pretty chinchilla cap for Louise, — just
CHRISTMAS-TIME FOR LOUISE. 145
such a cap as I had when I was a little
girl. Before the children have come
home, it is finished, and safely hidden
away. So you see a good deal of Christ-
mas work was accomplished on that day.
Louise kept her package of kid in her
pocket. It was only when she went up
to bed, and found Gretchen fast asleep,
that she ventured to open it. There
were four beautiful pieces of red, and as
many of the black and the white. It
wasn't many days before the pretty ball
was finished, and stuffed with lamb's
wool. It was a beauty. Can't you
imagine how it looked, and how pleased
little Hans will be with it?
But if I tell you all beforehand, you
won't enjoy the surprise of the tree half
so much. I must leave a great deal un-
told, and take a long leap over to th«
day before Christmas.
Just one thing I will let you have a
peep at, — a box which arrived by ex-
press at the town, ten miles away, and
146 EACH AND ALL.
was brought over by Jeannette's brother
Joseph, who left it down at his house,
and came up and told Louise's father
privately, for he imagined it might have
something to do with Christmas. Don't
you remember the uncles that they left
in the old home by the Rhine, — the un-
cles who wanted Christian to stay with
them, when his father decided to go
away ? They are good, kind uncles, and
they remember Christmas time. Per-
haps you will hear more of that box
when the right time comes.
The day before Christmas, — what a
busy day that was !
"May I have the sitting-room all to
myself, all day, dear mother?" asked
Louise, early in the morning. Her
mother looked surprised. She had
guessed that the child was making pres-
ents of some kind, but the attempt to
have a tree had not entered into her
head. She wisely did not say a word
about it, although she now felt quite
sure of her little daughter's plan.
CHRISTMAS-TIME FOR LOUISE. 147
Jeannette came over ; there was a
mysterious consultation ; and finally a
strange and bulky bundle covered with
a bedquilt was hurried into the room,
and the door was quickly closed. Louise
came out for a small wash-tub ; Jean-
nette carried in a basket of bricks almost
too heavy for her to lift. If you had
listened outside the door, you would
have heard many " Oh's ! " and " Ah's ! "
but at last a little cry of delight, and,
" There ! it stands perfectly firm. Isn't
it a beauty ? "
You, dear children, know just as well
as I do, how many mysterious runnings
up and down stairs there were, and slip-
pings in and out of that door. But you
and I can't come in until the rest of the
company do. We can only look with
great curiosity at Louise, as she comes
out, about four o'clock, with flushed
cheeks and smiling eyes, locks the door,
and puts the key in her apron-pocket
with an air that shows us that her work
is done, and well done too.
148 EACH AND ALL.
Coming to her mother, who throws
her white apron over her work as soon
as the child approaches, she says,
" Mother dear, when we lived at home
by the Khine, we always did something
at Christmas time to make people poorer
than ourselves happy. There is little
Maggie O'Connell down at the new
house in the clearing, and she has neither
brother nor sister to help her keep a
merry Christmas. May we ask her to
come and keep it with us this evening ? "
The mother smiled to see that it was
the same Christmas spirit, independent
of wealth or gifts, that shone in her little
daughter's face. A Christmas spirit can
come even without a Santa Claus. But
perhaps Santa Claus has been here too.
So Louise pinned her shawl over her
head, and ran down to the clearing for
Maggie.
In Maggie's house there were Christ-
mas candles, but no tree ; and no other
children than the lonely little Maggie,
CHRISTMAS-TIME FOR LOUISE. 149
whose two little sisters had died of fever
a year ago. And her mother blessed
Louise, who had come in a sister's place
to try to make Christmas merry for her
child.
It was almost dark when the two chil-
dren reached the house, and Maggie was
left in the kitchen with the little ones,
while Jeannette and Louise, with an air
of great importance, unlocked the sit-
ting-room door, and went in. It wasn't
more than two minutes before they threw
open the door, and called to the expect-
ant company that all was ready.
Don't laugh at the little tree standing
in a wash-tub, and supported by bricks.
Don't laugh at the three lanterns, —
common stable lanterns, — that are hung
among its branches in an attempt to
illuminate it. Don't laugh at any thing,
but think only of all the love, and the
hard work, and the long planning, that
have gone into the preparation of this
Christmas-tree ; and then it will seem
150 EACH AND ALL.
beautiful to you, as it does to me, and
did to all that happy little company
when they saw before them the Christ-
mas surprise on which those two little
girls had employed themselves for the
last month.
There were plenty of festoons of
popped corn, and there were little tufts
of white feathers, relieving here and
there the dark green of the foliage ;
but, strictly speaking, it w r asn't very
brilliant; and, instead of revealing all
its beauties at once, it disclosed them
slowly, and, indeed, some of them could
only be found and carefully taken off by
the very same fingers that had carefully
tied them on.
You would have laughed with pleas-
ure to see all the pretty animals that
Jeannette had made ; for each member
of the family, his or her favorite ani-
mal. Here was old Major, the horse,
made in the character of a paper-weight ;
Gretchen's white kitty, and Fritz's dog ;
CHRISTMASTIME FOR LOUISE. 151
and, to the great surprise of Louise, a
little brown owl for her.
I haven't told you how Louise had
made from pasteboard a pretty chintz-
covered armchair for her little sister's
doll, and knitted warm wristers for Fritz
and Christian.
Her father's present had been the
hardest to make, or rather to plan, until
one day her watchful ears caught the.
words, " There ought to be some safe
place beyond the reach of little Hans
for keeping the newspapers." You see
newspapers were rare and precious in
that Western home.
Now, if you look under that low bougb
of the Christmas-tree, you will see the
pretty birch-bark newspaper-holder, with
a bit of the Pen-se ribbon tied in to hang
it by ; and I think you and I can imagine
how pleased her father is to see that his
little girl has taken such thoughtful no-
tice of his wishes.
But you know there are other presents
152 EACH AND ALL.
besides those that the children have
made. "We have already heard of the
chinchilla cap ; and for each of the other
children the good mother has contrived
to produce some little treasure from her
old-time stores. A white apron with
pockets for Gretchen, — she had always
wanted pockets, — new red mittens for
Fritz, and a picture-book pasted on cloth
for Hans. His father had made a pretty
sled of chestnut wood for Fritz ; and he
had unpacked treasures for all from the
box that the uncles had sent from the
Rhineland. And suddenly the tree be-
gan to produce fruits that Louise and
Jeannette had not dreamed of; for both
father and mother had entered heartily
into the fun, and, hastily bringing out
treasures from their hiding-places, tied
them on to the tree, and as quickly took
them off to distribute among the happy
children.
There was a little writing-desk for
Louise. Peep into it, and see its treas-
CHRISTMAS-TIME FOR LOUISE. 153
ures, — the ivory-handled knife and pa-
per-cutter, the pens and the paper, —
every thing in order. I am sure you
remember where the ivory came from ;
but do you suppose that Louise knows
any thing about Manenko, from whose
land it came ? or did the little dark-
skinned Manenko dream that the ivory
tusks carried on her father's shoulders
were going to help make a Christmas
present for a fair-faced little sister thou-
sands of miles away ?
Then there were books, and pictures
too, just in the right time, for now they
have walls whereon to hang them : the
log walls of last year hardly afforded a
place.
" It begins to seem like our old home,"
said the mother, as she looked at the
beautiful old familiar picture from which
the Madonna and Child had smiled down
upon her when she was a little girl. It
had been hard to part with that when
they came away from the Rhineland ;
154 EACH AND ALL.
and now it had been saved, and sent
back to her.
Presently Louise spied a little white
card fluttering at the end of a branch ;
and, pulling it down, she read from it
the verses that Christian had been writ-
ing on one of those busy evenings when
no one asked the other, " What are you
doing ? "
He had ornamented a plain white card
with a border of delicate-colored lines ;
written on the back these loving words,
" For my dear brothers and sisters," and
on the other side the following little
verses : —
c ' We bear the Christmas message
Brought us so long ago.
Why have the centuries kept it fresh?
Why do we prize it so ?
Because it is rich with the gold of love
That with bright, exhaustless flow,
From unfailing source in the heart Divine,
Supplies our hearts below.
CHRISTMAS-TIME FOR LOUISE. 155
And it tells of a tender human bond,
Since ever the world began,
For it teaches the Fatherhood of God,
The brotherhood of man.
But how can we carry the tidings,
Make each word as living and true
To the poor, the oppressed, and the lonely,
As they are to me and to you ?
Let them shine in thought, in word, in deed,
As we work out the heavenly plan ;
And, blessed by the Fatherhood of God,
Prove the brotherhood of man."
This Fatherhood could not leave them
wherever they might go ; and I am glad
that they felt their brotherhood and sis-
terhood, even so far away there in the
Western world. It was that that made
them so happy, I think.
Have you all the time forgotten little
Maggie, who had come as a guest to the
Christmas-tree ?
Weren't there any presents for her ?
Yes, indeed there were. Louise had
taken the last bit of her blue ribbon,
156 EACH AND ALL.
folded it in a white paper, and written
upon it, " A merry Christmas for Mag-
gie." Jeanne tte had run home to look
over her box of clay figures, and had
chosen the prettiest little cow among
them to mark with Maggie's name. And
the thoughtful mother had taken the last
new apron she had finished for Louise,
and put it on the tree for the little
neighbor.
It was a merry Christmas all round,
wasn't it ? It ended with music from
Christian's violin, and then a hearty
voice outside the window sung a merry
mountain-song. That must have been
Joseph.
I wonder if they would have been any
happier if they had been dressed in silk
instead of calico, and had had a tree
loaded with the richest presents.
Do you see that the seven little sisters
are finding each other, sending each
other presents, sometimes even without
CHRISTMAS-TIME FOR LOUISE. 157
knowing it, and doing for each other
many little services such as sisters are
always glad to do ?
Agoonack has learned from the Kud-
lunah, Manenko from the Bazungu, that,
in this great wide world, there are many
kinds of children, but that one loving
Father takes care of them all.
Do you see that it has always been a
white man who has brought them this
knowledge of each other ? It was the
white captain that brought Agoonack
to New York. It was the good Bazungu
ihat carried the brown baby's medicine
to the little sick Manenko ; and it was
the English lady who brought the sam&
to our poor little Arab Gemila, who
would have died if she had taken noth-
ing but the fakir's curious draught.
It was an American ship that took the
silk that Pen-se had wound off the co-
coons, and carried it to the ribbon- weav-
ers, who made the blue ribbon for Louise.
Most of you, dear children, who read
158 BACH AND ALL.
this book, are children of the white
man's part of our Father's great family.
And yet I hope some little dark-faced
sisters may read it too. But to us of
the white race, some gifts have been
given which as yet are not shared by
our dark-skinned sisters.
You remember that neither Manenko,
nor Gemila, nor Pen-se, nor Agoonack,
can read. No schools for them, no books,
and nothing of all the happiness that
comes to you through books. Think of
it ; not only in that respect, but in oth-
ers besides, you have had more and
greater gifts than they."
Now consider what you would do, if
some day, when you were at home with
your brothers and sisters, a great boun-
tiful basket of presents should come for
you, and nothing for them.
I am sure I know what would be your
first thought. And if, in the wider family
of the world, you see yourself with gifts
of knowledge or of happiness beyond
CHRISTMAS- TIME FOR LOUISE. 159
those of your neighbors, you will know
what to do.
But do not think that these little sis-
ters have done nothing for you.
Did not Gemila's caravan carry the
gum ? Did not Agoonack's father build
the snow-houses and kill the seals, with-
out which the white men would have
died ? And did not Manenko's people
bring the great tusks of ivory ? Does not
Pen-se tend the silk- worms carefully and
well, and so have silk to make ribbons
and dresses for you and your mammas ?
They each work faithfully and well in
their own way ; and faithful work, be it
the work of the wisest man or of a little
child, is never wasted or lost.
They are all helping each other, as
loving sisters should ; and perhaps some
day they will meet, and will realize how
each in her own little way has done some
service for the others.
VOCABULARY
SEVEN LITTLE SISTERS
PART II
PRONUNCIATION.— a, e, I, 5, u, as in fate, mete, site, rope, tube ; a,
S, T, 6, u, as in hat, met, bit, not, cut ; a, e, i, 6, Ii, as in far, her, fir, nor,
cur ; a, e, i, o, u, as in mental, travel, peril, idol, foritm ; ee, as in feet ; 66.
as in hoot ; ou, as in bough ; 66, as in croup ; qh, as in chaise.
■Abdel, Ab'-del.
Abreys, Ab'-ris.
Abou, A'-bou.
Achmet, Ak'-met.
Agoonack, A-goon'-ack.
Ah Fou, Ah' Fou'.
Alee, A '-lee.
Aleikum, A.-leek'-66m.
Ambatch, Am'-batk. t
Arica, Ar'-e-ca.
Backsheesh, Back-sheesh.
Bruin, Brii'-m.
Buzungu, Boo-zoong'-goo.
Cairo, Kl'-r5.
Cha, Cha.
Chilobe, Che-15-ba'.
Chang-foo, Chang'-foo'.
Chrisalides, Kris-al'-i-des.
161
Dom, Doom, a palm-tree.
Dhura, D66'-ra.
Eider, I'-der
El Bahr, El' Bahr'.
Esquimau, Es'-ke-m5. .
Esquimaux, Es'-ke-mS.
Fakir, Fa-kir'.
Gretchen, Gret'-hyen.
Gemila, Jem'-e-la.
Hoo-chow, H66-chow.
Henak, Hen'-ak.
Igloe, Ig'-l-oe, a hut.
Jean, Jeen.
Jeannette, Jen-net 7 .
Kabobo, Ka'-bo-bo.
Kang-hy, Kang'-hl'.
Mandarin, Man-da-reen'.
Manenko, Man-enk'-o.
1 62
VOCABULARY
Maunka, Ma-oonk' a.
Puseymut, P66'-se-m6£t
Metek, Me'-tek.
Salaam, Sa-1'am'.
Meyer, MI'-er.
Sana, Sa'-na.
Mosamela, Mo-sam'-e
la.
Sekomi, Se-ko'-me.
Motota, Mo-to'-ta.
Sheik, Sheek.
Nalegak Soak, Na'-le-
gak So'-ak.
Shobo, Sho'-bo.
Nannook, Nan'-nook.
Sipsu, Sip'-soo.
Oomiak, Oo'-me-ak.
Sity, Se'-ty.
Petele, Pet'-e-le.
Tanka, Tank'-a.
Pen-se Pen'-se.
Tye, Ti.
Pelisse, Pe-leV.
Tsetse, Tset'-se, an insec
Pemican, Pem'-i-can.
Yambo, Yam'-bo.
Poola, Poo'-la.
Zungo, Zoong'-go.
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