watch the proceedings. They called to the fleeing Uncle Mose, as he
passed them, and ordered him to stop. They said that they were all there
and would protect him. But Uncle Mose, as he kept on running, hallooed
back:
“I’ll see y’all later!”
He ran at the top of his speed for more than a mile, for he was well
nigh scared to death. By-and-by, from sheer exhaustion, he was compelled
to stop for a little rest. He was wet with perspiration from head to
foot, and his clothes were as limp as a wet dishrag. But the poor old
man had no sooner seated himself on a stone by the roadside than up
jumps the ghost and sits down beside him once more.
“Huh!” said the ghost. “You seem to have made pretty good time
to-night.”
“Yas,” said Uncle Mose; “but what I hase done ain’t nothin’ to what I’se
gwinter do!” And up he jumped and lit out once more.
He had not gone far on his second trip before an old rabbit ran out of
the bushes and took out down the road ahead of him. Uncle Mose hallooed
at the rabbit and said:
“Git out uv de way, rabbit, an’ let somebody run what kin run!”
On and on the poor old man, almost scared to death, ran and ran. Perhaps
he would have been running until now but for a very unfortunate
accident. About five miles from the Widow Smith’s house he came in
contact with the limb of a weeping willow tree that hung across the
road. The poor old fellow, already tired out, was knocked speechless and
senseless. Toward the break of day the judges, who had followed him,
found him lying on the ground doubled up near the tree. Dim
consciousness was slowly returning when they picked him up. They rubbed
him, and walked him around for a little while, and soon he was able to
move himself.
The first thing Uncle Mose said was:
“Tell Noah not to min’ ’bout dem watermillions. I stayed in dat house
des ez long ez I could keep my conscience quiet. My ole mammy allus tole
me dat hit wuz a sin an’ a shame to bet, an’ now I b’lieves hit!”
And to this day, boys and girls, if you want to see a really mad man,
you just ask Uncle Mose if he ever saw a ghost.
XXXIX.
GOOD CHEER.
Everybody loves the cheerful boy or girl, the cheerful man or woman; and
everybody ought to love such people. I wish all the boys and girls in
America would organize one grand SUNSHINE SOCIETY, whose chief object
should be the promotion of good feeling, good cheer, peace and happiness
among all the people everywhere. But, first, a boy or girl, man or
woman, must have sunshine in their own souls before they can communicate
sunshine to others. And, boys and girls, it would greatly assist us in
securing sunshine in our souls if we looked at our mercies with both
eyes, as I might say, and at our troubles and trials with only one eye.
What we enjoy in this world is always a good deal more than that which
we do not enjoy; but we do not magnify our blessings sufficiently. We do
not make as much of them as we ought. We do not rejoice because of them
as we ought. We ought to keep daily a record of God’s goodness and
kindness and patience and love. The Lord’s mercies are new every morning
and fresh every evening; but we do not realize that they are so, because
we do not stop to count them up; we do not think about them. If we
stopped to weigh the matter I think we should find more in our lives to
be happy about than to be sorry about. Our good fortunes always outweigh
our misfortunes; and we should find it so if we only acquired the habit
of remembering God’s goodness to us as well as the disappointments and
sorrows and afflictions which are for us all.
Then we should study contentment. We should study to be content. We must
cultivate the habit of being satisfied with what we have at present, and
we should not worry about those things which we do not possess. Worry
because of things they did not possess has made countless thousands
mourn. Let us enjoy what we have. Let us make the most of what we have.
And let us not worry about things which we do not possess. No matter how
miserable our own lot may be, there is always some one whose lot is more
miserable still. Worry kills more people than work. In fact worry unfits
a man for work. The man who has learned the philosophy of being content
in whatsoever state he is is the man who is and will be happy. One of
the things in this world that pays a hundred-fold is contentment, and
there is nothing that casts so much blight and mildew upon life’s
fairest flowers as discontent.
Again, it would help us to keep cheerful if we kept steadily engaged in
some work of usefulness. Let us go about doing good. Let us go about
seeking opportunities of doing good. Doing good makes the heart healthy,
and heart-health makes sunshine, happiness and good cheer.
A little thought will convince you, boys and girls, that your own
happiness in this world depends very largely on the way other people
bear themselves toward you. The looks and tones at your breakfast table,
the conduct of your playmates, the faithful or unreliable people that
you deal with, what people say to you on the street, the letters you
get, the friends or foes you meet—these things make up very much of the
pleasure or misery of your day. Turn the thought around, and remember
that just so much are you adding to the pleasure or misery of other
people’s days. And this is the half of the matter that you can control.
Whether any particular day shall bring to you more of happiness or of
suffering is largely beyond your power to determine. Whether each day of
your life shall give happiness or suffering to others rests with
yourself. And there is where the test of character comes. We must be
continually sacrificing our wills to the wills of others, bearing
without notice sights and sounds that annoy us, setting about this or
that task when we would rather be doing something else, persevering in
it often when we are very tired of it, keeping company for duty’s sake
when it would be a great joy to us to be by ourselves; and then there
are all the trifling and outward accidents of life, bodily pain and
weakness, it may be, long continued, losing what we value, missing what
we desire, deceit, ingratitude and treachery where we least expected
them; folly, rashness and willfulness in ourselves. All these little
worries which we meet each day may lie as stumbling-blocks across our
way, or we may make of them, if we choose, stepping-stones of grace.
I want all the little boys and girls who read this book to be
joy-makers, to be burden-bearers, to be among those who shall assist in
filling the whole world with good cheer. It is our duty to cheer and
comfort others; it is our duty to make the world not only better but
happier—happier because better—for our having lived in it. To all the
other beatitudes might well be added this one: Blessed are the cheerful
people, for they shall inherit the earth.
XL.
LIFE A BATTLE.
Boys and girls, I want to repeat to you now some words which were
delivered long ago by the Hon. Schuyler Colfax, a man who was once the
vice-president of the United States. These words are wholesome, and
should be read and considered by parents and school teachers and by
children themselves all over our land:
“Above all things, teach children what their life is. It is not
breathing, moving, playing, sleeping, simply. Life is a battle. All
thoughtful people see it so. A battle between good and evil from
childhood. Good influences, drawing us up toward the divine; bad
influences, drawing us down to the brute. Midway we stand, between the
divine and the brute. How to cultivate the good side of the nature is
the greatest lesson of life to teach. Teach children that they lead
these two lives: the life without and the life within; and that the
inside must be pure in the sight of God as well as the outside in the
sight of men.
“There are five means of learning. These are: Observation, reading,
conversation, memory, reflection.
“Educators sometimes, in their anxiety to secure a wide range of
studies, do not sufficiently impress upon their scholars the value of
memory. Now, our memory is one of the most valuable gifts God has
bestowed upon us, and one of the most mysterious. Take a tumbler and
pour water into it; by-and-by you can pour no more: it is full. It is
not so with the mind. You cannot fill it full of knowledge in a whole
lifetime. Pour in all you please, and it still thirsts for more.
“Remember this:
“Knowledge is not what you learn, but what you remember.
“It is not what you eat, but what you digest, that makes you grow.
“It is not the money you handle, but that you keep, that makes you rich.
“It is not what you study, but what you remember and reflect upon, that
makes you learned.
“One more suggestion:
“Above all things else, strive to fit the children in your charge to be
useful men and women; men and women you may be proud of in after-life.
While they are young teach them that far above physical courage, which
will lead them to face the cannon’s mouth; above wealth, which would
give them farms and houses and bank stocks and gold; is moral
courage—that courage by which they will stand fearlessly, frankly,
firmly for the right. Every man or woman who dares to stand for the
right when evil has its legions, is the true moral victor in this life
and in the land beyond the stars.”
These brave and true words were spoken by Mr. Colfax long years ago.
They were true then; they are no less true now. Every boy in America
should treasure them in his heart. Every girl in America should commit
them to memory and make them the rule of her life. Mothers and fathers,
school teachers and preachers, and all who have the care of the young in
any way would do well to study these wise counsels and reflect upon them
and strive to impress upon those for whom they are laboring.
If you would win the victory in the battle of life, my young friends,
you must watch the little things. It is said that there is a barn upon
the Alleghany Mountains so built that the rain which falls upon it
separates in such a manner that that which falls upon one side of the
roof runs into a little stream that flows into the Susquehanna and
thence into Chesapeake Bay and on into the Atlantic Ocean; that which
falls upon the other side is carried into the Alleghany River, thence
into the Ohio, and onward to the Gulf of Mexico. The point where the
waters divide is very small, but how different the course of these
waters! So it is with people, young or old. A very little thing changes
the channel of their lives. Much will depend upon the kinds of tempers
you have, boys and girls. If you are sour and cross and crabbed, no one
will love you. If you are kind and cheerful, you will have friends
wherever you go. Much will depend upon the way in which you improve your
school days; upon the kind of companions you have; and upon the kind of
habits you form. If you would win a great victory in fighting the battle
of life you must look well to the little things.
XLI.
RULED BY PRIMITIVE METHODS.[6]
I learned that the colored male citizens of Laurens County Ga., had
organized a unique “Good Government Club,” and, being anxious to learn
something of it, I called on the secretary. The secretary explained the
club to me as follows:
“Our society is a voluntary organization, and has for its object the
betterment of the race. It doesn’t cost anything to join, and any male
citizen upward of twenty-one years old may become a member by taking an
oath to be governed by our constitution and by-laws. There are no
monthly dues. Now and then we make up a purse to help a needy brother.
Our plan is to inquire into the mode of living of our members and
correct, if possible, any faults. If any member fails or refuses to
correct a fault complained of, he is then tried by a sort of
courtmartial. The man under charge is allowed to have counsel from among
the members of the organization. If he is found guilty, the punishment
is usually a flogging given in the presence of the other members. We
whip a man for a number of things: getting drunk, wife-beating,
vagrancy, selling his vote, failure to provide for his family, failure
to make an honest effort to pay his debts, using profane language and so
on.
“It was reported to the society that one man’s wife was badly in need of
a wash pot. The man was cited to show cause why he had not provided his
wife with the article. He failed to buy one before the trial came off,
and, when tried, failed to show how his wife could get along without one
and still be put to no great inconvenience. Conviction followed. He was
whipped, and ordered to get a pot within thirty days.... In riding past
the home of another man it was seen by one of our members that the front
gate had fallen down. From appearances he had made no effort to put it
up. At the trial it was proved that the gate had been down for several
weeks, and that his wife had tried many times to get him to take more
pride in the care of his home. Conviction followed and the husband will
remember a long time the flogging he got that night....”
[Illustration: “CHARGED WITH KISSING A GIRL ON THE STREET.”]
We had a man before us once charged with kissing a girl on the street.
The girl did not appear against him; we could not get her to do so; and
the man stoutly denied the charge. He told our judge that he had never
kissed a woman in his life. The judge asked him if he wasn’t married.
‘No, sah,’ he said, ‘my wife’s dead. I’m de daddy uv nine chilluns, an’
I nevah kissed a woman in my life.’ In the midst of much laughter, the
judge asked, ‘Did you never kiss your wife?’ Without a moment’s
hesitation the man said: ‘No, sah; no sah.’ Then the judge said: ‘Jim,
you’re the biggest liar in town, and I sentence you to be given
forty-nine lashes, but I’ll suspend the sentence if you’ll agree to
leave town within the next five hours.’ ‘Judge,’ said Jim, ‘I don’t want
no five hours; I’ll be gone in five minutes.’... The strangest case I
remember was the case of a man charged with beating his wife. His wife
was a hard-working washerwoman. She had complained to us three or four
times, but always repented before the time for trial, and would not
appear against her husband. When she did come to our meeting she said:
‘Now, judge, I’se a-gwine ter tell you evaht’ing.’ And she told how her
husband would get drunk and come home and curse and beat her
unmercifully. She gave a graphic account of the last whipping she had
received. The judge said: ‘I sentence this man to be given one hundred
and one lashes—the maximum of the law.’ ‘Dar, now!’ exclaimed the woman.
‘Dar now! I’se done fixed you at las’! I tol’ you ’bout beatin’ on me
like I wuz a dawg!’ Turning to the judge she said: ‘Judge, I’ll take de
whuppin’ fur him ef you’ll lemme; I ’spec’ he’ll be good atter dis.’”
XLII.
HUNTING AN EASY PLACE.
A nicely dressed young man, fifteen or sixteen years old, who had just
finished his course in the high school, stepped into the office of the
president of the Smutville Short Line Railroad.
“Well,” said the president, looking up from a mass of correspondence,
“what can I do for you, sir?”
“I have just finished my course in the high school,” the young man began
nervously, “and I thought that I might be able to secure a desirable
position with your company. I came in to talk with you about it.”
The president asked the young man to have a seat.
“So,” said the president, “you want a desirable place, eh?”
“I do, sir,” said the young man, his heart beating high with hope.
“A place,” continued the president, “that would pay you something like a
hundred dollars a month?”
“Something like that,” said the young man eagerly.
“I guess you would like it very well, too, if I could arrange it so that
you could report for work at nine o’clock in the mornings and get off
every afternoon at three or four o’clock. In other words, you want
something easy. I can see by looking at you that you are not accustomed
to hard work, and you could not fill a place that required you to report
at six o’clock every morning and work until six every afternoon. Do I
size you up correctly?”
“I think so, sir,” was the reply.
“In plain English then, you are looking for a soft place with the Short
Line?”
“I am, sir.”
“Well, sir,” said the president, smiling for the first time, “I regret
to inform you that there is only one such place on our railroad. I
occupy that place myself, and I am not thinking of resigning.”
The young man’s face flushed.
[Illustration: “I HAVE JUST FINISHED MY COURSE IN THE HIGH SCHOOL.”]
The president continued: “I hope you will not think that it is going
beyond what is right and proper for me to say, but I must tell you,
young man, that you have started out in life with the wrong notion. No
brave and strong young man is going about looking for an easy place. The
brave and true man asks only for work. And the men who are occupying
what you call the easy places in this life to-day are the men who have
climbed into them by hard work. You are very much mistaken if you think
that they have stepped into them from the high school. In fact, and
you’ll find it out soon enough for yourself, there are really no soft or
easy places in this world, and the man who goes about seeking such
places stamps himself at once as a failure. Nobody will ever employ such
a boy, and such a boy would be no good if he were employed. Let me, as a
friend, advise you, young man, that the next place you go to to apply
for a job, you ask for a chance to begin at the bottom. If it happens to
be a railroad, ask to be given a chance to do anything—firing an engine,
or cleaning cars, or laboring in the roundhouse. Be willing to begin low
down in the business, and, if you’re made out of the right stuff, you
will fight your way to the front. I started in with the Short Line as a
day laborer myself, and if I had not done so I would not be at its head
to-day. You advertise your own folly when you go and ask a sensible
business man to put you at the start at the head of something. You must
begin at the bottom and work up to the top. That is the rule everywhere,
and you will not, I am sure, prove an exception to it.”
Let us hope, boys and girls, that this young man left the president’s
office a wiser young man. Be sure not to follow his example. Don’t go
around hunting for easy places.
XLIII.
BURT BANKSTON’S BEQUEST.
Burt Bankston was a noted Kentucky gambler. Those who knew him best said
that he had some redeeming traits. He never drank whiskey; he used
tobacco in no form; and he seldom indulged in profanity. Moreover he
frequently went to church.
[Illustration: THE GAMBLER.]
But he never made any excuses for his gambling. He rather defended it,
saying that gambling was not a sport or pastime with him, but a
business. He said he gambled for the same reason that a man kept a store
or practiced law—for a living.
His wife declared that he was peaceable and quiet at home. The only
fault she found with him, according to her own testimony, was that he
kept late hours and often spent the whole night away from home. And she
begged him many times to quit the gambling table. Her appeal always fell
on deaf ears.
“Burt, I’m going to quit; I’ve got enough; this is my last night at this
kind of thing.” The speaker was Bill Mobley, one of Burt’s chums.
“All right, Bill,” said Burt, “I guess I’ll follow you in a few days;
I’m getting old now.”
The next morning Bill Mobley was found dead upon the streets of
Lecompton. Whether he had taken his own life or been sandbagged on his
way home was never found out.
From that day forward no man ever saw Burt Bankston in a gambling house.
He opened a grocery store—that failed. He started a laundry—that fell
through. He tried a peanut stand; he peddled flowers about the street.
Compared with his former high living, his existence was miserable. His
wife died after a few years. Friends said that she died of remorse, or a
broken heart, or something of that kind. She could not bear to live on
after her husband’s downfall—that is, his downfall in the eye of the
world. Soon after she died Burt was stricken with a dreadful sickness.
He came near dying. By-and-by he was restored to health, but he was
broken and bent with old age. Friends pitied him, and secured him a
place as watchman at a celebrated orphan’s home.
[Illustration: THE GAMBLER—IN OLD AGE.]
At last one day Burt Bankston died, everybody believing him to be a
pauper. When his will was probated it was found that he left an estate
worth nearly $500,000. This sum Burt designated to be divided into three
parts—one part to be devoted to the common school education of the
masses; another part to the work of the Y. M. C. A., and the third to
the orphan asylum. Among other things, in the body of the will Burt
Bankston said:
“For twenty years I was a gambler. The past twenty years I have spent
repenting. I advise all young men to let gambling alone; and I hope that
those who may be benefited by my bequest may be willing to follow the
advice of one who has passed through the fire.”
XLIV.
THE BIG BLACK BURGLAR.
One cold winter night, about midnight, my good wife called to me,
saying:
“Dan! Dan! Get up! Get up!”
“What’s the matter?” I asked with much alarm.
“Somebody’s in the dining-room; I heard them rattling the dishes just a
minute ago.”
“I don’t hear anything, wife,” I said slowly.
“There’s somebody in there sure; I heard them myself. Do get up, Dan,
before they take everything we’ve got.”
“I haven’t got a gun or any kind of weapon,” I said, still fighting for
time.
“Well, get up and make a noise—walk around heavy—that’ll frighten ’em
and make ’em leave.”
[Illustration: “THE BIG BLACK BURGLAR.”]
I got up quietly, turned up the lamp, and looked about me with a sigh.
“Be quick,” said my wife.
“In a minute,” said I.
I tipped around to the wall on the side of the bed, and took down an old
iron sword, which had done duty in the Mexican war, and which we had
preserved as an heirloom.
“Hurry, hurry, Dan!” said my wife.
“All right,” I said with meekness.
I took the sword in one hand and the lamp in the other, and moved gently
toward the door, which opened from our bed-room into the dining-room.
Pausing at the door, I said,——
“Hallo! Hallo, in there!”
The response came from my wife in bed.
“Open the door, Dan; open the door!”
Humbly I placed the lamp on the floor close by the door, caught a tight
grip on my old war-piece, and then quickly shoved the door wide open. I
intended, of course, after getting my bearings, to pick up the lamp and
enter the dining-room on a tour of inspection. But, I assure you, there
was no time for any such careful procedure. As soon as the door was
opened and the light went streaming into the dining-room, something fell
to the floor with a terrible thud, and quicker than it takes to tell it
a great big black something, that looked to me like a buffalo or
elephant, came bounding toward me. It was all so sudden that it
surprised me, and I fell back trembling. Over went the lamp. It broke.
Out came the oil. It took fire and pretty soon the lambrequin close by
took fire also. Down I snatched it and threw it into the grate. I
reached for the first thing handy, and tried to smother the fire on the
floor. In doing so, I stepped on a piece of glass and cut my foot. I
burnt my hands terribly. And, to beat it all, my night shirt caught on
fire. I ran to the bed, and sat down in order to quench the blaze. This
shows that I still had some presence of mind left, although, as a matter
of fact, this new extinguishing process scorched my legs awfully.
When all was quiet again, and I lit another lamp in order to take an
inventory, my bed-room was a sight to behold! I found that in the
struggle, my old army sword had been plunged amidship into the handsome
mirror of our dresser, and had also made havoc of a reproduction, of
Millet’s Angelus. I discovered, also, that I had used my brand-new $50
overcoat to extinguish the fire, and that many of the handsome photos of
our friends that stood on the mantle had been ruined. Altogether that
one night’s experience cost me in the neighborhood of $100, not to
mention my own personal injuries. It was a terrible night, I tell you.
And far-off in one corner, I saw, crouching in abject fear, the cause of
all my troubles—the burly black burglar. And what do you think it was?
It was nothing in the world but an old black Tom Cat, who had been a
member of our family for many years!
XLV.
PIN-MONEY MADE WITH THE NEEDLE.