that we do no harm and that we’re all right, but no one even gets excited
over squash. It is indeed sad to be nothing but a squash!”
OCTOBER 29: Jack O’Lantern
“I was made by a very fine boy,” said Jack O’Lantern. “I was a little
nervous when he was cutting out my nose for fear he’d give me a crooked
nose.
“But he didn’t. I have a fine nose, haven’t I?”
“Indeed, your nose is a thing of beauty,” said Billie Brownie.
“And my eyes are nice, eh?” asked Jack O’Lantern.
“There is nothing the matter with your eyes,” grinned Billie Brownie.
“Good,” said Jack O’Lantern.
“And,” he added after a moment, “I do hope you feel like admiring my
mouth. It is such a nice big mouth.”
“It is a nice big mouth,” laughed Billie Brownie. “Yes, I think you’re a
fine fellow, and I love the head piece of a bit of green stalk you wear
at the top of your head. It makes you look quite dashing.
“And I’m sure your candle will shine through beautifully when it is
lighted,” Billie Brownie added.
“And then I will go Hallowe’en calling,” said Jack O’Lantern. “What joy
that will be!
“Yes, I will go calling on many people, and I will sit on their
door-steps all by myself with no one to tell me what to do and no one to
tell me how to act.
“For I will know how to act. I will smile at the people and that is why I
am glad my mouth is big, for if I hadn’t a big mouth I mightn’t look as
though I were smiling. I mightn’t look as though I were grinning my best
grin.
“I tell you, Billie Brownie, I’m a cheerful fellow.”
OCTOBER 30: Daddy’s Hallowe’en
“I am going to tell you,” said daddy, “of the things I did when I was
a boy at Hallowe’en time. First of all I used to love bobbing in a tub
for apples. I wore a bathing cap so if it was a cold evening my mother
wouldn’t be afraid I’d get my hair wet and catch cold because she knew
how far down I’d dive into the tub of water!
“And we all did the same. The girls needed the bathing caps on their
heads more than the boys did and they certainly could dive with hair all
held in so dry and safe by their caps.
“Then we would play games and one of our favorite games was to run races
carrying peanuts on knives.
“Two at a time would race against each other. The end of the race would
be a big bowl set on the floor and we would start off at the other end of
the room.
“Then we would each have a lot of peanuts and we would carry as many as
we could on our knife until we had gotten rid of all of them.
“We had to take all the peanuts to the bowl without letting any drop off.
“It was most exciting, for though none of the other children could push
us or joggle us they could make funny remarks to us and we would start
laughing and sometimes our knife would shake and we’d drop the peanuts
and have to start all over again.
“Sometimes we would only take one at a time because we could get them all
to the bowl more quickly that way in the long run.
“Sometimes the one who starts off fastest does not win, you know. And
then of course we went calling each with a Jack O’Lantern, and how mad
we were at those who hadn’t enough fun in them to like these Hallowe’en
callers!”
OCTOBER 31: Hallowe’en
The preparations for the party to be given at Janet’s house that
Hallowe’en evening had already begun. Already they were hanging apples
attached firmly by strings from a door-way and as soon as the guests came
and the tricks began they would all try to bite these apples, which would
swing so annoyingly away from them!
And there was going to be a dish of flour in the kitchen after supper
and the children were all going to try to find a twenty-five cent piece
hidden there. They were going to hunt for it with their teeth! And there
were apples bobbing in a great tub of water. And these had to be caught
by the teeth too. Some of these held pennies!
There would be fortune-telling, too, and Janet’s mother had promised to
be the fortune-telling witch who would sit by her caldron which was now
being made of red cheese-cloth. At the bottom of it, barely hidden, there
would be a flashlight which would be kept going all the time, of course!
Oh, the party was going to be splendid. Janet knew that. And yet—and
yet—she wished she knew why they had a party—not that she didn’t want a
party! But just why was it for this evening with the strange name. What
did Hallowe’en really mean? She hated to ask for she felt she should know
and that she would be laughed at for not knowing.
“Why, Janet,” her mother said that afternoon late as she caught sight of
Janet’s little worried face, “this isn’t the time to look sad when we’re
having a party! What is the trouble, my darling?”
There was something in the understanding, sweet way that her mother asked
her that made Janet ask what she thought was so foolish a question.
“Mother dear,” she began, “just what does Hallowe’en mean?”
“October thirty-first,” her mother said, “is the vigil of All Saints’
Day, or Hallowe’en, for Hallow means to devote time to holy purposes
and e’en is short for evening. So that it means the evening before the
religious day which is known as All Saints’ Day.
“But Hallowe’en, while coming before a religious day, has always been an
evening of festivity and frolic and fun for children. In all countries
they celebrate it—it is a real children’s evening—though in various
countries the children have their own little ways of celebrating.
“Our way, though, is used by children of many countries and we have
make-believe witches just as they have, for in the olden days in the old
countries those who were superstitious or given to imagining things not
so, thought witches came out on Hallowe’en.”
And somehow, Janet never enjoyed a party so much, for it was so nice
to know just what the day meant and to know too that in many countries
children on this very evening were having a celebration of such a weirdly
wonderful kind!
[Illustration: “THERE WOULD BE FORTUNE-TELLING, TOO, AND JANET’S MOTHER
HAD PROMISED TO BE THE FORTUNE-TELLING WITCH WHO WOULD SIT BY HER
CALDRON.”—_Page 256_]
NOVEMBER 1: The Brownies Help
“A little girl, whose name was Kitty, was very anxious to win the prize,”
said daddy. “‘I shall work so hard over it,’ she said to herself, and she
refused an invitation to walk with her friends that afternoon.
“She put her hand to her head and thought hard—but she couldn’t think of
anything to write! She dipped her pen into the ink-well and only made two
smudge spots on the paper in front of her.
“‘Oh,’ she sighed, ‘I wish I had gone for a walk. I feel so sleepy—and
staying in the house all afternoon is so silly!’ She really was much
annoyed with herself and soon she put her head down on her desk and went
sound, sound asleep.
“Pretty soon the two smudge spots grew larger and larger. They seemed to
get round and funny and fat—and she almost saw them grinning at her!
“Soon she saw that around one spot was a wide band of white on which were
written the words:
“‘I’m Mr. Pen and I’ll write you a story.’
“And around the other spot was written:
“‘I’m Mr. Ink and I’ll write you a story.’
“‘But I don’t want two stories,’ cried Kitty. ‘I only want one. If I
write two they will think I want to have two chances while every one else
has one. That will never do.’
“But the round, smudgy spots proved to be Billie Brownie and Bennie
Brownie, and it was around their hats that the words were written about
Mr. Pen and Mr. Ink.
“‘We are going to whisper to you the most marvelous of stories,’ they
said. And they grinned and hugged each other with delight.
“‘She’ll win the prize,’ said Billie Brownie, and his brother Bennie
laughed and said:
“‘She certainly will.’
“And then they told her, while she was napping, the most wonderful story
you can imagine. ‘I won’t forget it, will I?’ she asked. And the two
Brownies laughed and said:
“‘Forget one of your stories? Never!’
“And then Kitty stretched out her arms until one hand was taking hold of
Mr. Pen and the other was bringing Mr. Ink’s Home—the ink-well—forward on
the desk.
“‘Ah,’ she said, as she rubbed her eyes and looked at the paper in front
of her. ‘What a nice sleep I have had. I feel so fresh and just like
writing a composition. I am so glad I didn’t go out—for I know just what
I want to write about.’
“Kitty wrote all the afternoon and the very last thing she did was to
make a nice, neat copy of the composition. When it was all ready and tied
with a little piece of blue string at the top, she put it away in her
desk drawer until the time came to hand it in.
“Of course, she won the prize and the teacher said that it was because
her composition showed she had taken time to think about it, but Kitty
knew it was because of the Brownies!”
NOVEMBER 2: The Butterfly and Bumble-Bee
“Good-by,” said the golden butterfly. “It is late for me to be out and I
must leave now. I have come around because it is what they call Indian
summer.
“That is when another week of summer comes in the autumn when people have
almost become used to cold weather.”
“I must still do a little more work in this warm sunshine,” the
bumble-bee said; “you know it has been said of us that we improve each
shining hour.”
“But,” said the golden butterfly, “how do you know you’re improving each
shining hour? Aren’t the hours all right as they are?”
“Yes,” said the bumble-bee, “that may be so, and they may be all right
spent idly by some people. I don’t suppose the hours care so very much,
though I have heard they hated to be wasted, and we will never waste
them.”
“But they like to give pleasure and to have people take rests and enjoy
themselves, too,” said the golden butterfly. And as he waved a golden
wing in farewell he said to himself, “Bumble-bees overdo things. They
work so hard that they’ve forgotten how to play! And that is the saddest
thing about their lives.”
NOVEMBER 3: The Furnace
“Ha, ha,” said the Furnace, as the pieces of coal were being shoved in;
“ha, ha,” he laughed. “So they’re becoming anxious to have me working
again.
“And I believe they never gave me a moment’s thought all summer long. I’m
sure they didn’t. I feel quite certain of it.
“And then they wonder why at times I act crossly and queerly and why I
get upset at times. I try not to, but of course when I get thinking of
how no one gives the poor old Furnace a thought all summer long, then I
can’t help but get upset.
“And when I get upset they all grumble about me, as if I mustn’t get
upset, no matter how I may feel.
“Well, it’s a bit unfair. But I try to rise above it and give them heat
and no smoke; warmth and no trouble.
“I suppose things aren’t appreciated until they are needed. I’ve heard
that window-shades or blinds or whatever one wants to call them have been
so good about hiding the light from people’s eyes when they were sleepy,
and then when they are old and had holes in them, they were horribly
complained about, though never a ‘thank you’ did they get when they were
doing their good work.
“And no one ever says:
“‘Ah, what a good pair of socks you are, my dear,’ or, ‘What a lovely
pair of stockings you are, Nice Pair.’
“Yet so soon as a hole comes, how they grumble!”
“You’re very useful,” said a piece of coal, “but you aren’t the whole
thing. We’re all needed. Matches are needed. Sticks and paper are needed
when you are started. Some one is needed to watch over you.
“You require a great deal of watching. You must have a nurse, or furnace
man, or watcher of some sort looking after you.
“So, Furnace, you mustn’t become too conceited.” And the Furnace thought
the coal was right.
NOVEMBER 4: The Elephant’s Bath
“Steve, the elephant,” said daddy, “wanted to take a bath. He was in the
big theater when he had this wish, for he did an act every afternoon and
evening on the stage.
“‘Yes,’ Steve said to himself, ‘I feel the need of bathing. I’d like a
good plunge in the real water—a river for example, just as I would have
if I were free.
“‘Of course, the first thing I must do,’ he continued, ‘is to get out of
that side door there and get on the street. Then I will go a-looking for
a river.
“‘I know there are plenty of rivers, for in my five years of circus life
I’ve seen quantities of rivers. Yes, there must be one not far from this
theater. It seems to me on one of my marches that I remember seeing it.
“‘In fact, I feel quite sure I remember seeing a river at the other end
of the long street we marched through.
“‘At any rate, I will go and have a look.’
“So Steve started to go through the door at the end of the lower part of
the stage where he was staying waiting for his act to go on. There would
be other acts first and then he would come.
“‘I’ll be back in time,’ he said to himself, ‘but if not I’ll be just
having a holiday. Of course, usually holidays are given to people and
animals, but this time I will take my own holiday all of my own accord.’
“Instead of undoing the door or opening it in the usual way Steve walked
along pushing the door in front of him and taking it right off its hinges.
“When he got out on the street he looked about him. The children were
just coming from school.
“‘Well, hello, children,’ he said, as he waved his trunk around. Some of
the children had peanuts with them and some of them had pennies so they
threw delicacies to Steve and said:
“‘Oh, aren’t you a nice big elephant.’
“But when their mothers saw that the elephant was walking along they
called to their children to come right in the houses.
“‘He is nice,’ the children called back.
“‘You can’t be sure,’ said their mothers.
“‘Now isn’t that annoying,’ said Steve. ‘Here I am feeling as friendly as
friendly as can be, and the mothers want their children to come away from
me and to go into foolish houses.
“‘I don’t want to go into houses. They needn’t bang their doors so tight
shut. Haven’t I just left a house and don’t I want a bath?
“‘I don’t take a bath by going in people’s houses. I’ve heard of the size
of their bath tubs. They wouldn’t do for me.’
“Steve suddenly discovered a river at the end of another few blocks.
“He hurried along, waving his trunk as he went, and oh, what joy it was
to him, to take a real swim in a real river. By the time he had finished
his keepers had come after him, but he didn’t mind going back again to do
his tricks in the theater for he had had a bath in a real river!”
NOVEMBER 5: Waving and Dreaming
“Laddie lived out in the country on a farm and not far away were the
railway tracks,” said daddy. “How Laddie did love to see the great long
trains go rushing by and curling blue smoke coming from the engine!
“He would sit on the back porch of his home and watch and watch the
trains as they went by, and every day there were sure to be trains
passing five different times. Laddie was always there on the back porch,
just as regularly as if he had to be there.
“And every time a train would pass Laddie would wave and as he waved he
would think of the people in the train and how they would go on and on
into wonderful parts of the land, new parts he had never seen.
“Often people would wave back to him and then he would smile and feel
just like an adventure, too, for he had made friends with these wonderful
people rushing by on adventureful travels.”
NOVEMBER 6: The Clever Fire Horses
“The fire,” began daddy, “was in a deserted barn on the very outskirts of
the town. It was quite near some houses and an inn. So the firemen wanted
to do all they could to keep fire from spreading to the houses, for there
was quite a high wind. No one minded if the old barn burnt, for it really
was of no use to any one, and the owner of it never bothered to keep it
up at all.
“But the fire-engine horses made an awful fuss. They heard, what the
firemen didn’t hear, one of their own kind crying for help in horse
language.
“They tried to break from the engines and kicked their heels and made
a lot of commotion. They shook their heads and made all sorts of funny
sounds.
“Finally one of the firemen said:
“‘I have a suspicion that the horses hear something in that barn, and I
am going in to investigate, for maybe there is something alive inside. I
have never known these horses to make a mistake.’
“So he went in through a broken window, and when he got inside he found a
horse trembling with fear at seeing the flames.
“The old fireman unbolted the back door of the barn where the fire had
not as yet spread and led the horse out. Then you should have seen the
fire-engine horses. They were so happy that the old horse had been saved.
“But just at that moment an old man came running out of the inn and
crying: ‘Oh, save my horse! He’s in that barn!’
“And when he saw that his horse had been saved he went over and put his
head on the horse’s mane, and the horse neighed contentedly.
“The old man had stopped at the inn for the night, and there they had
told him he could safely keep his horse in the old barn.
“‘Oh, I am so grateful to you!’ said the old man to the firemen. ‘I love
my horse like a very real friend. How can I ever thank you?’
“‘We’re not the ones to thank,’ said the fireman who had gone in the
barn when the fire horses had seemed so excited. ‘Our horses saved your
horse’s life.’”
NOVEMBER 7: The Two Roses
“Have I ever met you before?” asked the yellow rose of a beautiful pink
rose. The pink rose was of a very exquisite color and though the yellow
rose had seen many pink roses it was sure it hadn’t seen one of just that
very same shade.
“I don’t believe you have,” said the pink rose, “for I am a new kind of
a rose. I haven’t any thorns on me—that is, I only have some way, way
down by the bottom of my stem. That is what they have trained my family
to do. It took a good deal of training and teaching to make us like that
and last spring when my grandmother made her appearance she was the first
one to have succeeded in being almost thornless. It was a great day for
grandmother!”
NOVEMBER 8: The Moth Balls
“How funny moths are,” said the first Moth Ball. “When most creatures go
to the country or the seashore in the summer the moths prefer to stay if
they can, in great heavy coats and furs and tam-o’-shanters, and so forth.
“It is really most ridiculous. One would think they would prefer it where
it was cool.”
“Still,” said the second Moth Ball, “we do not go to cool spots in the
summer. We stay right in with the warm clothes.”
“That is so,” the first Moth Ball answered, “but we have our work to do.
Our business keeps us in warm clothes in the summer-time, and you’d
think moths would stay away, when they can see there is no hospitality
offered them.”
“Oh, well,” the second Moth Ball said, “I suppose there are some
creatures who will never take hints and perhaps it is just as well.
“For if moths took hints there would be no need for moth balls.”
“True,” the first Moth Ball ended as it was shaken out of a heavy coat
about to begin its second winter.
NOVEMBER 9: Good-Winter
“As you know,” commenced daddy, “when the little creatures who go to
sleep for the winter are about to begin their long, long rest they wish
each other a good-winter just as we would say a good-night to each other,
and Billie Brownie hurried off to make his good-winter calls on some of
his friends.
“‘Well,’ said Billie Brownie to Mother Grizzly, ‘I wish you a good-winter.
“‘If you were only going to have a night’s rest of course I’d only wish
you a good-night and pleasant dreams.
“‘But as you sleep for the winter I wish you a good-winter and pleasant
winter dreams.’
“‘Woof, woof, thank you,’ said Mother Grizzly.
“And Billie Brownie left Mother Grizzly to tuck her children into their
nice beds right by her in the old family den.
“He was very fond of Mother Grizzly.
“Then he went to call on the Ground Squirrels.
“‘Hello, little Ground Squirrels,’ he said, as he saw them after he had
traveled a little distance in his Brownie motor-car.
“‘Are you on your way to bed?’
“‘We are indeed,’ they said. ‘Our parents went to bed at the end of the
summer but we were allowed to stay up longer.
“‘It is such fun to be allowed to stay up a little longer once in a great
while. Good-winter, Billie Brownie.’
“For they said good-winter to Billie Brownie, too, as they would not see
him during the winter, although he would not be asleep.
“They would be the ones asleep!
“And then he called on Mother Black-Bear, the Prairie Dog family, Willie
Woodchuck and his family, and many others and to all he wished pleasant
winter dreams.”
NOVEMBER 10: The Horse’s Complaint
“When I went out to-day,” began the horse, “the farmer had a new check
rein for me. It held my head way, way up in the air and it was so hard
for me. My neck ached and throbbed, and still the farmer drove me
along and never paid any attention.
“I just longed to have him wear it for five minutes and see how he would
feel. But we had not gone so very far when a lady stopped and spoke to
the master.
“‘That check rein is very tight,’ she said.
“‘Oh no,’ said the master. ‘He is used to a rein like that. He always
keeps his head up that way. He is a fine, well-bred horse.’
“‘That’s true,’ said the lady. ‘But that is no reason why you should make
him suffer.’
“‘He doesn’t suffer,’ said the master. And all the time my neck was
aching, aching, and, oh, how I was longing to get my head down a little.
The rein held it up, and never for a moment could I get it down.
“Before another word was said, my check rein was loosened, and then joy
of joys, I put my head down. I moved it around, and twisted it, and I
shook it! It was glorious.
“‘There,’ said the lady. ‘Don’t you see he likes his head down? He
doesn’t want it forced up beyond where he would hold it naturally. That
is a very cruel rein.’
“‘You know nothing about horses,’ said my master as he put the check rein
back.
“There was my head back in its cruel check rein again, and on we drove.
Oh how long that drive to town and back seemed to-day. And though I wish
the master no harm, how I do wish he could be driven into town just
once—with his head way back—held—so he couldn’t move it—couldn’t let it
down for a second! Then he would know what it means to a horse who has
too tight a check rein.”
“Then he would know,” neighed the other horses. “Oh, if masters could
only wear check reins too, so they would know just what they are like,”
they added.
NOVEMBER 11: Armistice Day
We think of days in history and of great and important events and of the
dates upon which they took place. And little do we realize that one of
the greatest dates in history was one which almost all of us remember.
Those who were only babies then are so quickly catching up with those
ahead of them that they will hear about it so often that they will feel
they, too, remember.
Early, early in the morning of November 11, 1918, peace came to a world
in which so many nations had been at war that it was indeed almost a
world war. And so huge and terrible and gigantic a war was it, including
men of so many countries, and so great was the ideal for which they were
fighting against an aggressive tyranny, that it had to be known by some
name quite unusual and quite different.
It was also called The Great War.
It was great in its immensity, its idealism, its heroism, its
scientifically modern and horrible machine-guns and submarines and gases,
its tragedy, its suffering and the confusion and disorder it left behind.
There had been on November 7th a false report of peace. At that false
report (then people did not know that it was false) every one went wild.
The streets were filled with singing, shouting, happy, excited people.
Oh, how happy they were! So happy they couldn’t quite express their
happiness. They had kept their worries and their sorrows so closely to
themselves that they found it hard at first to let out what they felt.
And let it out they must! Joy was not to be kept to themselves. Joy was
to be shared. Joy was something one didn’t have to be brave about—joy was
too kindly and gay and merry—joy didn’t demand any self-control, nor did
joy demand anything that was hard!
Whistles were blown and bells began to ring. Flags began appearing from
windows, flags of all sizes. Many people rushed from their houses to wave
their flags as they ran joyously up and down the streets.
One gray-haired woman spent the day in waving her flag as she walked the
streets and smiled at people she had never met before. But now she could
share her happiness with these strangers.
Her son, who had been fighting for them, too, was now safe!
People made very sure of the report that came next—on November 11th—but
it was a real report and there was no doubt of it this time. Victory had
come. But not only victory—peace! The very word itself was more deeply
thrilling than ever it had been before.