THE END OF THE WORLD
"'Taint no such thing! The world couldn't come to an end!" Janey Day
quite forgot Mrs. Craven's strictures on speech. "It's too strong.
And--and----"
"And it's round," said the wit of the school. "Round as a ring and has
no end. There now."
"But the world ain't like a ring."
"So is_n't_ my love for you, my friend."
There was quite a little shout of laughter.
One of the larger girls, Hester Brown, stood with upraised head and
earnest countenance.
"It _is_ coming to an end in October. It is only two or three weeks off.
My father has read it all in the Bible. And we are getting ready."
Her demeanor silenced the little group.
"But how _do_ you get ready?"
"We must repent of our sins. And that's why mother wouldn't let me come
to the dancing-class. She thinks it wrong, any way. And mother and
Auntie are making their ascension robes. We go to church every night."
The girls stood awestruck.
"What's going to happen?" asked one.
"Why, the world will be burned up. All those who love God are to be
caught up to heaven. Then the dead people who have been good will rise
out of their graves. And all the rest--everything will be burned."
The solemnity of the girl's voice impressed so that they looked at each
other in silent fear.
"I just don't believe a word of it," declared Janey Day, drawing a long
breath. "My father's a good man and goes to church and reads the Bible
every night. He's read it through more than fifty times, and he's never
said a word about the world coming to an end. And he's building a new
house for us to move into next spring."
"Fifty times, Janey Day! It takes a long, long while to read the Bible
through. My grandmother's read it all through twice, and she's awful
old."
"Well--twenty times at least. And don't you 'spose he'd found something
about it?"
"Everybody can't tell. It's in Daniel. There's days and times to be
added up."
"Five of _you_, Janey," said the wit with a child's irreverence.
"Just _when_ is it coming to an end? Girls, there's no use to study any
more lessons."
"It will be next week," said Hester with almost tragic solemnity. "But
you must all go on doing your work just the same."
"I don't see the sense. I've just begun fractions, and I hate them. I
won't do another sum."
The bell rang and recess was at an end. The girls straggled until they
reached the doorway, then suddenly straightened themselves into an
orderly line and took their seats quietly. There was a sound of rapidly
moving pencils--slates and pencils were in full swing then. No one had
invented "pads."
One after another read out answers. A few went up to Mrs. Craven for
assistance.
"Lottie Brower," the lady said presently.
Lottie colored. She had a kind of school-girl grudge against Hester.
"I--I haven't done my sums," she replied slowly.
"Why not?"
"Because the world is coming to an end. They're so hard, and what is the
use if we're not going to live longer than next week?"
Every girl stopped her work and stared at Hester, amazed, yet rather
enjoying Lottie's audacity.
"How did you come by such an idea?" asked Mrs. Craven quietly.
"But _is_ there any use of studying or anything?" Lottie's voice had a
little tremble in it. "I'm sure I don't want the world to come to an
end, but----"
"Do your people believe this?"
"No, ma'am," replied Lottie.
"Where, then, did you get the idea?"
"Hester Brown is sure----"
Hester's face was scarlet. She felt that she was called upon to bear
witness.
"My father and mother believe it, and we are all getting ready. My uncle
means to give away all his things next week."
The girl was in such earnest that Mrs. Craven was puzzled for a moment.
"I do not think we shall know the day or the hour," was the reply. "We
are all exhorted to go on diligently with whatever we are doing. And
Lottie, Hester has certainly set you an example. She did her sums
correctly. She has added works to her faith as the Bible commands. I am
aware many people think the end of the world is near, but that is no
reason for our being careless and indolent. I doubt if that excuse would
be accepted; at all events, I cannot accept yours."
"But I hate fractions! The divisors and the multiples get all mixed up
and go racing round in my head until I can't tell one from the other."
"Bring your slate here." Mrs. Craven made room for her by the table.
"Now, what is the trouble?"
Twelve o'clock struck before Lottie was through, but she had to admit
that it wasn't so "awful" when Mrs. Craven explained the sums in her
quiet, lucid manner. The girls rose and went to the closet for their
hats and capes.
"Girls," began Mrs. Craven, "I want to say a word. I hope each one of
you will respect the other's religious belief. Our country has been
founded on the corner-stone of liberty in this matter, and one ought to
be noble enough not to ridicule or sneer at any honest, sincere faith,
remembering that we cannot all believe alike."
Hester went out with two or three of the larger girls.
"I do not think you were quite kind, Lottie," said her teacher, in a
soft tone.
"But what would be the use of fractions if the world came to an end?"
"Oh, Mrs. Craven! _do_ you believe it? I should feel just dreadful. The
world has so many splendid things in it--and to be burned up."
"I should just be frightened to death," and one little girl shuddered.
"Children, I am sorry anything has been said about this. There are a
good many people who believe and who have preached for the last three
years that the end of the world is near. The time has been set for next
week. Yet the Bible _does_ say that _no_ man knoweth the day nor the
hour. I do not believe in these predictions," and she smiled
reassuringly. "I think we can all count on Thanksgiving and a merry
Christmas as well as a happy New Year. I want you all to be kind to each
other, and when Hester is disappointed next week, to refrain from
teasing her. If you think for a moment, you will find it very easy to
believe just as your parents do, for you love them the best of any one
in this world. And the more you respect and obey them, the more ready
you are to be kind and gentle and truthful to all about you, the better
you are serving God. You must leave this matter in His hands, and
remember that He loves you all, and will do whatever is best. Don't feel
troubled about the world coming to an end. I am afraid Lottie here will
have a great deal more trouble about fractions. I doubt if she gets
through by Christmas. Now run home or you will be late for dinner."
The little girl sat very quiet at the table. There was only her mother,
John, and the boys. She wished that her father or Steve were here so she
could ask them. A strange awe was creeping over her. It seemed so
dreadful to have all the world burned up. There might be some people
left behind in the hurry. It hurt terribly to be burned even a little.
There was a very sober lot of girls at school that afternoon. The jest
was all taken out of recess. Hester sat on the steps reading a little
pocket Testament. The others huddled together and shook their heads
mysteriously, saying just above a whisper, "I don't believe it." "My
mother says it isn't so." But somehow they did not seem to fortify
themselves much with these protestations.
Some of the elder cousins had come to visit and take tea. People went
visiting by three in the afternoon and carried their work along. There
was an atmosphere of relationship and real living that gave a certain
satisfaction. You enjoyed it. It was not paying a social debt
reluctantly, relieved to have it over, but a solid, substantial
pleasure.
Martha took the little girl up-stairs and put on a blue delaine frock and
white apron, and polished her "buskins," as the low shoes were called.
Then she went into the parlor and spoke to all the ladies. She had her
lace in a little bag, and presently she sat down on an ottoman and took
out her work.
"You don't mean to say that child can knit lace? And oak-leaf, too, I do
declare! What a smart little girl!"
"Oh, she embroiders quite nicely, also. Hannah Ann, get your apron and
show Cousin Dorcas."
The apron was praised and the handkerchiefs she had marked for her
father were brought out. Then she was asked what she was studying at
school.
Cousin Dorcas was knitting "shells" for a counterpane. There was one of
white and one of red, and they were put together in a rather long
diamond shape with a row of openwork between every block. It was for her
daughter, who was going to be married in the spring, and it interested
the little girl wonderfully.
Then they talked about Steve and Dolly Beekman. While the girls were at
White Plains, Steve had coaxed his father and mother up to the
Beekmans', and the engagement had been settled with all due formality.
Dolly and her mother had been down and taken tea. And now Steve went up
every Sunday afternoon and stayed to supper, and once or twice through
the week, and took Dolly out driving and escorted her to parties.
The Beekmans were good, solid people, and Peggy ought to be satisfied
that Stephen had chosen so wisely. "Was it true that Steve had been
buying some land way out of town? Did he mean to build there?"
"Oh, dear, no!" answered his mother. "It was a crazy thing, but John had
really persuaded him, and John was too young to have any judgment. But
he said the Astors were buying up there, and land was almost given
away."
"I don't know what it's good for," declared Aunt Frasie. "Why it'll be
forty years before the city'll go out there. Well, it may be good for
his grandchildren."
They all gave a little laugh.
Presently another of the cousins sat down at the piano and played the
"Battle of Prague."
Then Aunt Frasie said, "Do sing something. It doesn't seem half like
music without the singing."
Maria Jane ran her fingers over the keys, and began a plaintive air very
much in vogue:
"Shed not a tear o'er your friend's early bier,
When I am gone, I am gone."
Aunt Frasie heard her through the first verse, and then said
impatiently:
"You've sung that at so many funerals, Maria Jane, that it makes me feel
creepy. You used to sing 'Banks and Braes.' Do try that."
It had been said of Maria Jane in her earlier years that she had sung
"Bonnie Doon" so pathetically she had moved the roomful to tears. Her
voice was rather thin now, with a touch of shrillness on the high notes,
but the little girl listened entranced. Then she sang "Scots wha' hae"
and "Roy's wife of Aldivaloch." Margaret had come home, the
supper-table was spread, the men came in, and they sat down to the
feast. They teased Steve a little, and bade John beware, and were so
merry all the evening that when it came her bedtime the little girl had
forgotten all about the world coming to an end.
The girls discussed it the next day. Most of their mothers and fathers
had scouted the idea. Josie Dean was very positive it couldn't be--her
father had been going over the Bible and the Millerites had made a big
mistake.
"And girls," said Josie earnestly, "St. John, one of the disciples of
our Saviour, lived to be a hundred years old. Some people taught that
the world would come to an end before he died. And now it's 1843, and
it's stood all this while, though every now and then there's been an
excitement about it. And I ain't going to be afraid at all, there now!"
The little girl wondered whether she would be afraid. But Friday evening
the boys were full of it, and Steve said it was nonsense. She crept up
into her father's lap and asked him in a tremulous whisper if he was
afraid.
"No, dear," he answered, pressing her to his heart.
"But if it _should_ come."
"Well--I'd take my little girl and mother and Margaret----"
"And what would you do?" as he made a long pause.
"I'd beg to be taken into heaven. And we would all be together. I think
God would be good to us."
"And the boys."
"Yes, the boys." He wondered within himself if they were all fit for
heaven. But he was quite sure the little girl was.
There was a very great excitement. For months there had been meetings of
exhortation and prophesying, and appeals to conscience, to terror, to
the desire of being saved from impending destruction. Last winter there
had been revivals everywhere, yet during the summer thoughtful people
had questioned whether the moral tone of the community had been any
higher. There were heroic souls, that always rise to the surface in
times of spiritual agitation. There were others moved by any excitement,
who seized on this with a kind of ungovernable rapture.
No one spoke of it in Sunday-school. Hanny brought home "Little Blind
Lucy," and was so lost in its perusal that she hardly wanted to leave
off for half an hour with Joe. But her mother let her look over to see
whether Lucy really did have her eyesight restored. She was so sleepy
that when she had said her little prayer she felt quite sure that God
would take care of her and the beautiful world He had made. It would be
cruel to burn it all up.
But the children went to school on Monday. Martha washed as usual. She
did think it would be a waste of labor and strength if the world came to
an end, though she was sure clean clothes would burn up quicker, and if
it had to be, one might as well have it over as soon as possible.
All things went on, the buying and selling, the business of the day, and
in some houses there were weary pain-racked bodies that slipped out of
life gently without waiting for the general conflagration.
Still a strange awe did pervade the city. Some of the churches were
open, and people were on their knees weeping and sobbing to be made
ready; others were full of faith and expectations, singing hymns, and
impatiently waiting the moment when the trump would sound and they be
caught up to glory. Down on Grand Street Hester Brown's uncle was giving
away shoes, and wondering at the fatal unbelief of those who were so
ready to accept. Here and there another of abounding faith was doing the
same thing, or perhaps giving away things they did not need, hoping it
would be accounted to them for good works.
Hester was not in school. Neither did she come on Tuesday, and that
night was to be the fatal end of all things. A great many people went to
church that day. The children did suffer from dread, though Lottie
Brower kept up a sort of cheery bravado, as one whistles or sings in the
dark.
"And I don't think Hester's been such an awful sight better than the
rest of us. She answered correct one day when she had talked, and
pretended she had forgotten all about it. And she was just mean enough
about that clover-leaf pattern and wouldn't show a single girl. And she
gets mad just as easy as the rest of us."
"I think we oughtn't get mad any more. And, girls, I'll lend you my
knife to sharpen your pencils. We ought to _try_ to be just as good as
we could, for my Sunday-school teacher said if we died the world came to
an end for us."
They made many resolves. Mrs. Craven thought they had never been so
angelic in their lives.
But the little girl was very much "stirred up."
People didn't say nervous so much in those days. In fact nervousness was
rather associated with whims and tempers. Joe came over to supper--he
could get off from the hospital now and then. They were all talking
about going to Delancey Street Church, where it was said people would
be dressed in their ascension robes, and remain to the final change.
Margaret begged to go, and said she knew all her lessons. The boys had
theirs to study. Jim scouted the idea of the world's coming to an end.
Benny adduced several remarkable reasons why it couldn't come just yet.
The Millerites had made a mistake in the true meaning of the "days" in
Daniel.
"Are you quite sure?" asked the little girl timidly.
"Well--you'll see the same old world next week this time. Don't you get
frightened, Hanny dear," and Ben kissed her reassuringly.
She sat by the boys and knit on her lace a while. Then her mother looked
up from the stockings she was darning. She said "she always took Time by
the forelock," and the little girl had a fancy some time she would drag
him out. She wondered if she would really like to see Time with his
hour-glass and scythe, and all his bones showing.
Mrs. Underhill looked up at the clock.
"My goodness, Hanny!" she exclaimed, "it's time you were in bed half an
hour ago. Put up your lace. You'll be sleepy enough in the morning."
The little girl wound it round her needles and then stuck the ends in
the stem of the spool and put it away in her basket. She kissed Ben and
Jim good-night, and followed her mother. Her eyes had a half-frightened
look and the pupils were very large. Mrs. Underhill felt out of patience
that there should be so much talk about the world coming to an end
before children. She knew Hanny was "just alive with terror." She
couldn't pretend to explain anything to her; she was of the opinion that
as you grew older "you found out things for yourself." And I am really
afraid she didn't believe in total depravity for sweet little girls like
Hanny. It was well enough for boys. So much of her life had been spent
in doing, that she might have neglected some of the "mint, anise, and
cummin." She undressed the little girl. Oh, how fair and pretty her
shoulders were, and her round white arms that had a dimple at the top of
the elbow. She was small for her age, but nice and plump, and her mother
felt just this minute as if she would like to cuddle her up in her arms
and kiss her as she had in babyhood. If she had, all the fear would have
gone out of the little girl's heart.
Hanny said her prayer, and added to it, "Oh, Lord Jesus, please don't
let the world come to an end to-night." Then her mother patted down the
bed, took off one pillow and the pretty top quilt, and put her in,
kissing her tenderly, the little trembling thing.
Then she stood still awhile.
"I do wonder what I did with your red coat," she began. "Cousin Cynthia
said it might be let down and do for this winter. There's no little girl
to grow into your clothes. Let me see--I put a lot of things in this
closet. I remember pinning them up in linen pillow-cases, but I meant to
store them in the cedar chest. I wonder if I have been that careless."
She stood up on a chair and threw down some bundles with unnecessary
force. Then she stepped down and began to look them over, keeping up a
running comment. She would not have admitted that she was talking
against time, secretly hoping the little girl would drop off to sleep.
But the coat was not in any of the bundles.
"I think it must be in the chest. While I'm about it I may as well go
and see. If you have outgrown it, it could be made over into a dress;
it's nice, fine merino, a little thicker than I'd buy for a dress, but
your father would have just that piece. I'll get a candle and go
up-stairs--I wouldn't trust a glass lamp with this horrid burning-fluid
in _my_ storeroom. Hanny, be sure you don't get up and touch it," as if
there was the slightest possibility. "I'll be down again in five
minutes."
That was a shrewd motherly excuse not to leave the little girl alone in
the dark, though she was never afraid.
She lay there very still, with a feeling of safety since her mother was
up-stairs. Of course she was old enough to know a great many things and
to have ideas on religious subjects. But I think the Underhills were
more intelligent than intellectual, and people were still living rather
simple lives, not yet impregnated with ideas. They had not had the old
Puritan training, and the ferment of science and philosophy and
transcendentalism had not invaded the country places. To-night in the
city there were wise heads proving and disproving the times and half
times, and days and signs, but they really had no interest for Mrs.
Underhill, who was training her family the best she knew how, making
good men and women.
And the little girl's ideas were extremely vague. She thought her soul
was that part of her heart that beat. When it ceased beating you died
and the body was left behind; so of course that was what went to heaven.
And when she had been naughty or when she had left something undone and
was hurrying with all her might to do it, this thing beat and throbbed.
If she wanted something very much and was almost tempted to take it, the
feeling came up in her throat, and she knew that was conscience. She was
trying now to recall and repent of her sins, and oh, she did so wish
her father was here. Would he be back before the end came, and take them
all in his strong arms? and they would run--Oh, no! they were to be
caught up in the clouds. But she would be safe where he was.
Years afterward, she was to understand how human and finite love
foreshadowed the eternal. But then she could only believe, and her faith
in her human father was the rock of her salvation.
And when her mother came down she _had_ fallen asleep, but she thought
it would be just as well to leave the lamp burning until Margaret's
return. She would look in now and then to see that it didn't explode.
Burning-fluid was considered rather dangerous stuff.
Hanny was so tired that she slept soundly. It was almost midnight when
the folks came home, and Mrs. Underhill begged Margaret to go to bed
quietly and not disturb her. And it was all light with the sun rising in
the eastern sky and shining in one window when she opened her eyes.
Margaret stood before the glass plaiting her pretty, long hair.
The little girl sat up. Something had happened. There was a great
weight--a great fear. What was it? Oh, yes, this was their room; they
were all alive, for she heard Jim's breezy voice, and Joe, who had
stayed all night, said impatiently:
"Peggy, are you never coming down?"
Hanny sprang out of bed and clasped her little arms about her sister.
"Oh!" with a great exultation in her sweet child's voice--"the world
didn't come to an end, did it? Oh, you beautiful world! I am so glad you
are left. And everybody--only--Margaret, were the people at the church
dreadfully disappointed? What a pity God couldn't have taken those who
wanted to go; but I'm so glad we are left. Oh, you lovely world, you are
too nice to burn up!"
I think there were a great many people in the city just as glad as
Hanny, if they did not put it in the same joyful words.
Margaret smiled. "Hurry, dear," she said, "Joe will have to go, and I
know he wants to see you."
Hanny put on her shoes and stockings, and Margaret helped her with the
rest, washed her and just tied up her hair with a second-best ribbon.
Joseph had eaten his breakfast and was impatiently waiting to say
good-by. John was off already.
Nothing had happened. The world was going on as usual. True there had
been the comet and falling stars and wars and rumors of wars, but the
old world had sailed triumphantly through them all. The dear, old,
splendid world, that was to grow more splendid with the years.
Perhaps it did rouse people to better and kindlier living and more
serious thought. Before Mr. Underhill went away his wife said:
"'Milyer, hadn't you better look after those old people up at Harlem. I
suppose they had some garden truck, but there's flour and meat and
little things that take off the money when you haven't much. And fuel.
I'll try to go up some day with you and see what they need to keep them
comfortable in cold weather."
The girls could hardly study at school, there was so much excitement.
Did people really have on their ascension robes? What _would_ Hester
say?
Hester did not come to school all the week. Of course they had made a
mistake in computing the time, but a few weeks couldn't make much
difference. Still, the worst scare was over, and if one mistake could be
made, why not another? Were they so sure all the signs were fulfilled?