LITTLE TROUBLES.
Somebody said once to Susy and Flossy, when they were having a frolic in
"Prudy's sitting-room," up stairs, "What happy little things! You don't
know what trouble is, and never will, till you grow up!"
The little girls preserved a respectful silence, till the lady was out
of hearing, and then held an indignant discussion as to the truth of
what she had said. It would have been a discussion, I mean, if they had
not both taken the same side of the question.
"How she sighed," said Susy, "just as if she was the _melancholiest_
person that ever was!" Susy was famous for the use she made of
adjectives, forming the superlatives just as it happened.
"Yes, just the way," responded Flossy. "I'd like to know what ever
happened to _her_? Pshaw! She laughed this afternoon, and ate apples
fast enough!"
"O, she thinks she must make believe have a dreadful time, because she
is grown up," said Susy, scornfully. "She's forgot she was ever a little
girl! I've had troubles; I guess I have! And I know one thing, I shall
remember 'em when I grow up, and not say, 'What happy little things!'
to children. It's real hateful!"
Little folks have trouble, to be sure. Their hearts are full of it, and
running over, sometimes; and how can the largest heart that ever beat be
_more_ than full, and running over?
Susy had daily trials. They were sent to her because they were good for
her. Shadows and night-dews are good for flowers. If the sun had shone
on Susy always, and she had never had any shadows and night dews, she
would have _scorched up_ into a selfish girl.
One of her trials was Miss Dotty Dimple. Now, she loved Dotty dearly,
and considered her funny all over, from the crown of her head to the
soles of her little twinkling feet, which were squeezed into a pair of
gaiters. Dotty loved those gaiters as if they were alive. She had a
great contempt for the slippers she wore in the morning, but it was her
"darlin' gaiters," which she put on in the afternoon, and loved next to
father and mother, and all her best friends.
When ladies called, she stepped very briskly across the floor, looking
down at her feet, and tiptoeing about, till the ladies smiled, and said,
"O, what sweet little boots!" and then she was perfectly happy.
Susy was not very wide awake in the morning; but Dotty was stirring as
soon as there was a peep of light, and usually stole into Susy's bed to
have a frolic. Nothing but a story would keep her still, and poor Susy
often wondered which was harder, to be used as a football by Dotty, or
to tell stories with her eyes shut.
"O, Dotty Dimple, keep still; can't you? There's a darling," she would
plead, longing for another nap; "_don't_ kill me."
"No, no; me won't kill," the little one would reply; "'tisn't _pooty_ to
kill!"
"O, dear, you little, cunning, darling plague, now hush, and let me go
to sleep!"
Then Dotty would plant both feet firmly on Susy's chest, and say, in her
teasing little voice, as troublesome as the hum of a mosquito,--
"Won't you tell me 'tory--tell me a 'tory--tell me a 'tory, Susy."
"Well, what do you want to hear?"
Now, it was natural for Susy to feel cross when she was sleepy. It cost
her a hard struggle to speak pleasantly, and when she succeeded in doing
so, I set it down as one of her greatest victories over herself. The
Quaker motto of her grandmother, "Let patience have her perfect work,"
helped her sometimes, when she could wake up enough to remember it.
"Tell 'bout little yellow gell," said the voice of the mosquito, over
and over again.
Susy roused herself after the third request, and sleepily asked if
something else wouldn't do?
"I had a little nobby-colt."
"No, no, you _di'n't_, you _di'n't_; grandma had the nobby! Tell yellow
gell."
"O," sighed Susy, "how can you want to hear that so many, many times?
Well, once when I was a little bit of a girl--"
"'Bout's big as me, you _said_," put in Dotty.
"O, yes, I did say so once, and I suppose I must tell it so every time,
or you'll fuss! Well, I had a yellow dress all striped off in checks--"
"Di'n't it go this way?" said Dotty, smoothing the sheet with her little
hand, "and this way?"
"What? What?" Susy roused herself and rubbed her eyes. "O, yes, it went
in checks; and I was at grandma Parlin's, and Grace--Grace--O, Grace and
I went into the pasture where there were a couple of cows, a gray cow
and a red cow."
"Now you must say what _is_ couple," says Dotty.
"Then what is couple?"
"Gray cow," answers Dotty, very gravely.
"So when the cows saw us coming, they--they--O, they threw up their
heads, and stopped eating grass--in the air. I mean--threw--up--their
heads." Susy was nearly asleep.
"Up in the air?"
"Yes, of course, up in the air. (There, I _will_ wake up!) And the gray
cow began to run towards us, and Grace says to me, 'O, my, she thinks
you're a pumpkin!'"
"You?"
"Yes, me, because my dress was so yellow. I was just as afraid of the
cow as I could be."
"Good cow! _He_ wouldn't hurt!"
"No, the cow was good, and didn't think I was a pumpkin, not the least
speck. But I was so afraid, that I crept under the bars, and ran home."
"To grandma's house?"
"Yes; and grandma laughed."
"Well, where was me?" was the next question, after a pause.
Then, when the duty of story-telling was performed, Susy would gladly
have gone back to "climbing the dream-tree;" but no, she must still
listen to Dotty, though she answered her questions in an absent-minded
way, like a person "hunting for a forgotten dream."
One morning she was going to ride with her cousin Percy. It had been
some time since she had seen Wings, except in the stable, where she
visited him every day.
But Dotty had set her heart on a rag-baby which Susy had promised to
dress, and Prudy was anxious that Susy should play several games of
checkers with her.
"O, dear," said the eldest sister, with the perplexed air of a mother
who has disobedient little ones to manage. "I think I have about as much
as I can bear. The _children_ always make a fuss, just as sure as I
want to go out."
The old, impatient spirit was rising; that spirit which it was one of
the duties of Susy's life to keep under control.
She went into the bathing-room, and drank off a glass of cold water, and
talked to herself a while, for she considered that the safest way.
"Have I any right to be cross? Yes, I think I have. Here Dotty woke me
up, right in the middle of a dream, and I'm sleepy this minute. Then
Prudy is a little babyish thing, and always was--making a fuss if I
forget to call her Rosy Frances! Yes, I'll be cross, and act just as I
want to. It's too hard work to keep pleasant; I won't try."
She walked along to the door, but, by that time, the better spirit was
struggling to be heard.
"Now, Susy Parlin," it said, "you little girl with a pony, and a pair of
skates, and feet to walk on, and everything you want, ain't you ashamed,
when you think of that dear little sister you pushed down stairs--no,
didn't push--that poor little lame sister!--O, hark! there is your
mother winding up that hard splint! How would you feel with such a thing
on your hip? Go, this minute, and comfort Prudy!"
The impatient feelings were gone for that time; Susy had swallowed
them, or they had flown out of the window.
"Now Rosy Frances Eastman Mary," said she, "if your splint is all fixed,
I'll comb your hair."
The splint was made of hard, polished wood and brass. Under it were
strips of plaster an inch wide, which wound round and round the poor
wounded limb. These strips of plaster became loose, and there was a
little key-hole in the splint, into which Mrs. Parlin put a key, and
wound up and tightened the plaster every morning. This operation did not
hurt Prudy at all.
"Now," said Susy, after she had combed Prudy's hair carefully, and put a
net over it, until her mother should be ready to curl it, "now we will
have a game of checkers."
Prudy played in high glee, for Susy allowed her to jump all her men, and
march triumphantly into the king-row, at the head of a victorious army.
"There, now, Rosy," said Susy, gently, "are you willing to let me go out
riding? I can't play any more if I ride, for I must dress Dotty's doll,
and feed my canary."
"O, well," said Prudy, considering the matter, "I'm sick; I tell you how
it is, I'm sick, you know; but--well, you may go, Susy, if you'll make
up a story as long as a mile."
Susy really felt grateful to Prudy, but it was her own gentle manner
which had charmed the sick child into giving her consent.
Then Susy proceeded to dress Dotty's doll in a very simple fashion, with
two holes for short sleeves, and a skirt with a raw edge; but she looked
kind and pleasant while she was at work, and Dotty was just as well
pleased as if it had been an elegant costume she was preparing. And it
was really good enough for a poor deformed rag-baby, with a head shaped
like a stove-pipe.
Susy was delighted to find how well a little patience served her in
amusing "the children." Next, she went to give Dandy his morning bath.
Mrs. Parlin still thought it a dangerous practice, but had not seen Mrs.
Mason, to question her about it, and Susy was too obstinate in her
opinion to listen to her mother.
"I must do it," said Susy; "it has been ever so long since Dandy was
bathed, and I shouldn't take any comfort riding, mamma, if I didn't
leave him clean."
Susy plunged the trembling canary into his little bathing-bowl, in some
haste. He struggled as usual, and begged, with his weak, piping voice,
to be spared such an infliction. But Susy was resolute.
"It'll do you good, Ducky Daddles; we mustn't have any lazy, dirty
birdies in this house."
Ducky Daddies rolled up his little eyes, and gasped for breath.
"O, look, mother!" cried Susy, laughing; "how funny Dandy acts! Do you
suppose it's to make me laugh? O, is he fainting away?"
"Fainting away! My dear child, he is dying!"
This was the sad truth. Mrs. Parlin fanned him, hoping to call back the
lingering breath. But it was too late. One or two more throbs, and his
frightened little heart had ceased to beat; his frail life had gone out
as suddenly as a spark of fire.
Susy was too much shocked to speak. She stood holding the stiffening
bird in her hands, and gazing at it.
Mrs. Parlin was very sorry for Susy, and had too much kindness of
feeling to add to her distress by saying,--
"You know how I warned you, Susy."
Susy was already suffering for her obstinacy and disregard of her
mother's advice; and Mrs. Parlin believed she would lay the lesson to
heart quite as well without more words. It was a bitter lesson. Susy
loved dumb creatures dearly, and was just becoming very fond of Dandy.
In the midst of her trouble, and while her eyes were swollen with tears,
her cousin Percy came with Wings and the sleigh to give her the promised
ride. Susy no longer cared for going out: it seemed to her that her
heart was almost broken.
"Well, cousin Indigo, what is the matter?" said Percy; "you look as if
this world was a howling wilderness, and you wanted to howl too. What,
crying over that bird? Poh! I can buy you a screech-owl any time, that
will make twice the noise he could in his best days. Come, hurry, and
put your things on!"
Susy buried her face in her apron.
"I'll compose a dirge for him," said Percy.
"My bird is dead, said Susy P.,
My bird is dead; O, deary me!
He sang so sweet, te whee, te whee;
He sings no more; O, deary me!
Go hang his cage up in the tree,
That cage I care no more to see.
My bird is dead, cried Susy P."
These provoking words Percy drawled out in a sing-song voice. It was
too much. Susy's eyes flashed through her tears.
"You've always laughed at me, Percy Eastman, and plagued me about Freddy
Jackson, and everything, and I've borne it like a--like a lady. But when
you go to laughing at my poor little Dandy that's dead, and can't
speak--"
Susy was about to say, "Can't speak for himself," but saw in time how
absurdly she was talking, and stopped short.
Percy laughed.
"Where are you going with that cage?"
"Going to put it away, where I'll never see it again," sobbed poor Susy.
"Give it to me," said Percy: "I'll take care of it for you."
If Susy's eyes had not been blinded by tears, she would have been
surprised to see the real pity in Percy's face.
He was a rollicking boy, full of merriment and bluster, and what tender
feelings he possessed, he took such a wonderful amount of pains to
conceal, that Susy never suspected he had any. She would have enjoyed
her ride if she had not felt so full of grief. The day was beautiful.
There had been a storm, and the trees looked as if they had been
snowballing one another; but Susy had no eye for trees, and just then
hardly cared for her pony.
Percy put the cage in the sleigh, under the buffalo robes; and when
they reached his own door, he carried the cage into the house, while
Susy drew a sigh of relief. He offered to stuff Dandy, or have him
stuffed; but Susy rejected the idea with horror.
"No, if Dandy was dead, he was all dead; she didn't want to see him
sitting up stiff and cold, when he couldn't sing a speck."