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Holiday Stories
FOR
YOUNG PEOPLE.
[Illustration]
Compiled and Edited by
MARGARET E. SANGSTER.
PUBLISHED BY
THE CHRISTIAN HERALD
LOUIS KLOPSCH, Proprietor,
BIBLE HOUSE, NEW YORK.
Copyright, 1896, BY LOUIS KLOPSCH.
DEDICATION.
To John and Jane, to Fred and Frank,
To Theodore and Mary,
To Willie and to Reginald,
To Louis, Sue and Gary;
To sturdy boys and merry girls,
And all the dear young people
Who live in towns, or live on farms,
Or dwell near spire or steeple;
To boys who work, and boys who play,
Eager, alert and ready,
To girls who meet each happy day
With faces sweet and steady;
To dearest comrades, one and all,
To Harry, Florrie, Kate,
To children small, and children tall,
This book I dedicate.
PREFACE.
Boys and girls, I am proud to call a host of you my personal friends,
and I dearly love you all. It has been a great pleasure to me to arrange
this gift book for you, and I hope you will like the stories and
ballads, and spend many happy hours over them. One story, "The Middle
Daughter," was originally published in Harper's "Round Table," and is
inserted here by consent of Messrs. Harper and Brothers. Two of the
ballads, "Horatius," and "The Pied Piper," belong to literature, and you
cannot afford not to know them, and some of the fairy stories are like
bits of golden coin, worth treasuring up and reading often. Miss Mary
Joanna Porter deserves the thanks of the boys for the aid she has given
in the making of this volume, and the bright stories she has contributed
to its pages.
A merry time to you, boys and girls, and a heart full of love from your
steadfast friend,
M.E.S.
CONTENTS.
PAGE
1. The Clover Leaf Club of Bloomdale. By M.E. Sangster 9
2. The Lighthouse Lamp. By M.E. Sangster. 71
3. The Family Mail-bag. By Mary Joanna Porter 73
4. A Day's Fishing. By Mary Joanna Porter 79
5. Why Charlie Didn't Go. By Mary Joanna Porter 85
6. Uncle Giles' Paint Brush. By Mary Joanna Porter 91
7. The Pied Piper of Hamelin. By Robert Browning 95
8. A Girl Graduate. By Cynthia Barnard 104
9. A Christmas Frolic. By M.E. Sangster 116
10. Archie's Vacation. By Mary Joanna Porter 119
11. A Birthday Story. By M.E. Sangster 124
12. A Coquette. By Amy Pierce 130
13. Horatius. Ballad. By T.B. Macaulay 131
14. A Bit of Brightness. By Mary Joanna Porter 151
15. How Sammy Earned the Prize. By M.E. Sangster 157
16. The Glorious Fourth 162
17. The Middle Daughter. By M.E. Sangster 163
18. The Golden Bird. By the Brothers Grimm. 226
19. Harry Pemberton's Text. By Elizabeth Armstrong 239
20. Our Cats 246
21. Outovplace 252
22. The Boy Who Dared to be a Daniel. By S. Jennie Smith 254
23. Little Red Cap. By the Brothers Grimm. 259
24. New Zealand Children 266
25. The Breeze from the Peak 271
26. The Bremen Town Musicians. By the Brothers Grimm 276
27. A Very Queer Steed and Some Strange Adventures.
Told after Ariosto, by Elizabeth Armstrong 282
28. Freedom's Silent Host. By M.E. Sangster 292
29. Presence of Mind. By M.E. Sangster 294
30. The Boy Who Went from the Sheepfold to the Throne.
By M.E. Sangster 312
Holiday Stories for Young People
The Clover Leaf Club of Bloomdale
BY MARGARET E. SANGSTER.
CHAPTER I.
THE HEROINE PRESENTS HERSELF.
My name is Milly Van Doren, and I am an only child. I won't begin by
telling you how tall I am, how much I weigh, and the color of my eyes
and hair, for you would not know very much more about my looks after
such an inventory than you do without it, and mother says that in her
opinion it is pleasantest to form one's own idea of a girl in a story
book. Mother says, too, that a good rule in stories is to leave out
introductions, and so I will follow her advice and plunge into the
middle of my first morning. It was early summer and very lovely, and I
was feeling half-sad and half-glad, with the gladness surpassing the
sadness, because I had never before been half so proud and important.
Father and mother, after talking and planning and hesitating over it a
long while, were actually going on a journey just by themselves and
without me; and I, being now considered old enough and steady enough,
was to stay at home, keep house, and take care of dear grandmamma. With
Aunt Hetty at the helm, the good old servant, whose black face had
beamed over my cradle fifteen years ago, and whose strong arms had come
between mother and every roughness during her twenty years of
housekeeping, it really looked as if I might be trusted, and as if
mother need not give me so many anxious directions. Did mother think me
a baby? I wondered resentfully. Father always reads my face like an open
page.
"Thee may leave something to Milly's discretion, dear," he said, in his
slow, stately way.
"Thee forgets her inexperience, love," said my gentle mother.
Father and mother are always courtly and tender with one another, never
hasty of speech, never impatient. They have been lovers, and then they
are gentlefolk. Father waited, and mother kept on telling me about
grandmamma and the cat, the birds and the best china, the fire on the
hearth in cool evenings, and the last year's canned fruit, which might
as well be used up while she was away, particularly the cherries and
plums.
"May the girls come over often?" I asked.
"Whenever you like," said mother. "Invite whom you please, of course."
Here father held up his watch warningly. It was time to go, if they
were to catch the train. Arm in arm they walked down the long avenue to
the gate, after bidding me good-bye. Grandmamma watched them, waving her
handkerchief from the window of her room over the porch, and at the last
moment I rushed after them for a final kiss and hug.
"Be good, dear child, and let who will be clever," said father, with a
twinkle in his eye.
"Don't forget to count the silver every morning," said mother.
And so my term of office began. Bloomdale never wore a brighter face
than during that long vacation--a vacation which extended from June till
October. We girls had studied very diligently all winter. In spring
there had been scarlet fever in the village, and our little
housekeepers, for one cause or another, had seldom held meetings; and
some of the mothers and older sisters declared that it was just what
they had expected, our ardor had cooled, and nothing was coming of our
club after all that had been said when we organized.
As president of the Bloomdale Clover Leaf Club I determined that the
club should now make up for lost time, and having _carte-blanche_ from
mother, as I supposed, I thought I would set about work at once.
Cooking was our most important work, and there's no fun in cooking
unless eating is to follow; so the club should be social, and give
luncheons, teas and picnics, at which we might have perfectly lovely
times. I saw no reason for delay, and with my usual impulsiveness,
consulted nobody about my first step.
And thus I made mistake number one. Cooking and housekeeping always look
perfectly easy on paper. When you come to taking hold of them in real
earnest with your own hands you find them very different and much
harder.
Soon after I heard the train whistle, and knew that father and mother
were fairly gone, I harnessed old Fan to the phaeton, and set out to
visit every one of the girls with an invitation to tea the very next
evening. I did put my head into grandmamma's chamber to tell her what I
thought of doing, but the dear old lady was asleep in her easy-chair,
her knitting lying in her lap, and I knew she did not wish to be
disturbed. I closed the door softly and flew down stairs.
Just as I was ready to start, Aunt Hetty came to the kitchen door,
calling me, persuasively: "Miss Milly, honey, what yo' done mean to hab
for dinner?"
"Oh, anything you please, aunty," I called back, gathering up the reins,
chirping to Fan, and taking the road to the Curtis girls' house.
Certainly I had no time to spend consulting with Aunt Hetty.
Mother knew me better than father did. I found out later that this
wasn't at all a proper way to keep house, giving no orders, and leaving
things to the discretion, of the cook. But I hadn't really begun yet,
and I was wild to get the girls together.
Bloomdale is a sort of scattered up-hill and down-dale place, with one
long and broad street running through the centre of the village, and
houses standing far apart from each other, and well back from the
pavement in the middle of the green lawns, swept into shadow by grand
old trees. The Bloomdale people are proud of the town, and keep the
gardens beautiful with flowers and free from weeds. Life in Bloomdale
would be perfectly delightful, all the grown-up people say, if it were
not for the everlasting trouble about servants, who are forever changing
their places and going away, and complaining that the town is dull, and
their church too distant, and life inconvenient; and so every one envies
my mother, who has kept Hetty all these years, and never had any trouble
at all.
At least I fancied that to be so, till I was a housekeeper myself, and
found out that Aunt Hetty had spells of temper and must be humored, and
was not perfect, any more than other people vastly above her in station
and beyond her in advantages.
I stopped for Linda Curtis, and she jumped into the phaeton and went
with me. We asked Jeanie Cartwright, Veva Fay, Lois Partridge, Amy
Pierce and Marjorie Downing to tea the next day, and every girl of them
promised to come bright and early.
When I reached home I ran to grandmamma to ask her if I had done right,
and to get her advice about what I would better have for my bill of
fare.
"Thee is too precipitate, dear child," said grandmamma. "Why not have
waited two or three days before having a company tea? I fear much that
Hetty will be contrary, and not help as she ought. And I have one of my
headaches coming."
"Oh, grandmamma!" I exclaimed. "Have you taken your pills?" I was
aghast.
"Thee needn't worry, dear," replied grandmamma, quite unruffled. "I have
taken them, and if the headache does not vanish before dark, I'll sleep
in the south chamber to-night, and be out of the way of the stir
to-morrow. I wish, though, Aunt Hetty were not in a cross fit."
"It is shameful," I said. "Aunt Hetty has been here so long that she
does not know her place. I shall not be disturbed by her moods."
So, holding my head high, I put on my most dignified manner and went to
the kitchen. Aunt Hetty, in a blue gingham gown, with a gay kerchief
tied on her head, was slowly and pensively rocking herself back and
forth in her low chair. She took no notice of me whatever.
"Aunt Hetty!"
No answer.
"Aunt Hetty!" This time I spoke louder.
Still she rocked back and forth, apparently as deaf as a post. I grew
desperate, and, going up to her, put my hand on her shoulder, saying:
"_Aunt Hetty_, aren't we to have our dinner? The fire seems to be out."
She shook off my hand and slowly rose, looking glum and preoccupied.
"Didn't hear no orders for dinner, Miss Alice."
"Now, Aunt Hetty," I remonstrated, "why will you be so horrid? You know
I am the housekeeper when mother is away, and you're going to spoil
everything, and make her wish she hadn't gone. _How_ can I manage if you
won't help? Come, be good," I pleaded.
But nothing moved her from her stony indifference, and I went back to
grandmamma in despair. I was about to pour all my woes in her ear, but a
glance at her pale face restrained me.
She was going to have a regular Van Doren headache.
"We never have headaches like other people."
How many times I have heard my aunts and uncles say this in just these
words! They do not think me half a Van Doren because, owing to my
mother's way of bringing me up, I have escaped the family infliction. In
fact, I am half a Neilson, and the Neilsons are a healthy everyday set,
who do not have aches and pains, and are seldom troubled with nerves.
Plebeian, perhaps, but very comfortable.
I rushed back to the den of Aunt Hetty, as I now styled the kitchen. She
was pacing back and forth like a lioness in a cage at a show, singing an
old plantation melody. That was a sign that her fit of temper was worse
than ever. Little I cared.
"Hetty Van Doren," I said, "stop sulking and singing! There isn't time
for either. Poor grandmamma has a fearful headache, and you and I will
have to take care of her. Put some water on to boil, and then come up to
her room and help me. And don't sing 'Go down, Moses,' another minute."
I had used two arguments which were powerful with Aunt Hetty. One was
calling her Hetty Van Doren. She liked to be considered as belonging to
the family, and no compliment could have pleased her more. She often
said she belonged to the Kentucky _noblesse_, and held herself far above
common trash.
The other was my saying you and I. She was vexed that mother had left
me--a baby, in her opinion--to look after the house, and rather resented
my assuming to be the mistress. By my happy form of speech I pleased the
droll old woman, who was much like a child herself. Then, too, she was
as well aware as I was that grandmamma's pain would grow worse and worse
every hour until it was relieved.
It was surprising how quickly aunty moved when she chose. She had a fire
made and the kettle on to boil in five minutes; and, almost before I
knew it, she had set cold chicken, and nice bread and butter and a great
goblet of creamy milk on the table for me.
"There, honey," she said, "don't mind dis hateful ole woman. Eat your
luncheon, while I go up and help ole miss to bed."
A hot-water bag for her feet, warm bandages laid on her head, some
soothing medicine which she always took, and Hetty and I at last left
grandmamma more comfortable than we found her. It was funny, as I
thought of it afterward. In one of her worst paroxysms the dear lady
gasped, a word at a time:
"Aunt--Hetty,--Miss--Milly--has--asked--friends--to--tea--to-morrow.
Put--some--ham--and--tongue--on--to--boil--directly!"
Aunt Hetty looked as if she thought grandmamma must be raving. I nodded
that it was all right, and up went the two black hands in expostulation
and amazement.
But a while later a savory smell of boiling ham came appetizingly wafted
up the stairs. I drew a free breath. I knew the girls would at least
have something to eat, and my hospitality would not be shamed.
So toward evening I made grandmamma a cup of tea. It is not every one
who knows how to make tea. The water must boil and bubble up. It isn't
fully boiling when the steam begins to rise from the spout, but if you
will wait five minutes after that it will be just right for use. Pour a
very little into the teapot, rinse it, and pour the water out, and then
put in your tea. No rule is better than the old one of a teaspoonful for
every cup, and an extra one for the pot. Let this stand five minutes
where it will not boil, and it will be done. Good tea must be steeped
not boiled. Mother's way is to make hers on the table. I have been
drilled over and over in tea making, and am skillful.
I made some dainty slices of toast in this way: I cut off the crust and
put it aside for a pudding, and as the oven was hot, I placed the bread
in a pan, and let it lean against the edge in a slanting position. When
it was a pale golden brown I took it out, and carried it to grandmamma.
The object of toasting bread is to get the moisture out of it. This is
more evenly done in the oven than over the fire. Toast should not be
burned on one side and raw on the other; it should be crisp and delicate
all through.
My tea and toast were delicious, and tasted all the better for being
arranged in the prettiest china we had and on our daintiest salver.
The next morning grandmamma was better, and I had my hands full.