THE trees were still bare, and the grass brown and sere in the Northern
city; but the sky was blue and cloudless, and the air warm and soft.
On a bench under one of the leafless trees in the park sat an old man,
gray-haired and poorly clad. His eyes were fixed on the ground, and he
was thinking of many sorrowful things. Suddenly he heard a little clear
voice saying, “Didn’t they give you any flowers?”
He looked up and saw a little wee girl standing before him, with her
hands full of flowers. She had a round, rosy face and round blue eyes,
and a little round rosebud of a mouth; and she was looking at him very
seriously indeed. “Didn’t they give you any flowers?” she repeated.
“No, dear,” said the old man, gently; “nobody gave me any flowers.
Where did you get your pretty posies?”
“In church, of course,” said the child. “The minister gives us all
flowers. You shall have some of mine,” and she took some sprays of lily
of the valley and a red rose and laid them in the old man’s withered
hand. “Does that make you glad?” she asked, anxiously. “The minister
says everybody _must_ be glad to-day.”
“Why must everybody be glad, my little angel?” asked the old man, sadly.
“Because Christ the Lord is risen,” said the child. “Didn’t you know
that? Don’t you know that this is Easter Day?”
The old man smiled, and raised the flowers to his lips and kissed
them. “I have been ill, my little angel,” he said, “but you have made
me almost well again, and I _will_ be glad! Christ the Lord is risen
indeed.”
“Hallelujah!” cried the child, eagerly.
“Hallelujah!” echoed the old man, reverently.
“Hallelujah!” sang the bluebird in the leafless tree.
“Hallelujah!” said the whole wide world.