[Illustration: THE FAVORITE CHILD.]
In a very pretty little village not many miles from N----, in Connecticut,
lived Susan Meredith. She was the youngest of three sisters, the eldest of
whom could not be more than twelve or thirteen years of age. A year or two
before the period when our history of this little group commences, the
mother had gone to her rest.
Weighed down with a sorrow too heavy to be borne, and of a nature too
delicate to be confided to others, she sank under it while in the noon of
life, and died commending her children to God. Susan--little Sue, as she
was frequently called--young as she was, remembered a thousand incidents
connected with the departed one, and seemed, so late as the time at which
our story begins, to be never happier than when her mother was the theme of
conversation.
There was something remarkable in this. One reason for it might have been,
that the surviving parent of these sisters, though once a kind and
affectionate father, was now so altered by habits of intemperance, that
they found very little enjoyment in his society. But there was another
reason. Little Sue was an unusually thoughtful, serious child, for one of
her years. Was there not another reason, still? I do not know. I cannot
tell what words God may whisper to the child that loves him; but this I
know, that little Sue talked much of heaven, and seemed to have learned
more of the language of heaven than men can teach.
One bright Saturday, in the early spring time, when there was no school,
these sisters might have been seen winding their way through the woods, not
far from the house where they lived, searching for the first wild flowers.
Little Sue, the youngest, was very happy, but, as usual, more grave than
the other sisters. By and by, wearied with their walk, they sat down under
the shadow, of a tree, and talked a great while. At first, the conversation
was about birds and flowers; but Sue soon gave a serious turn to it.
"I wonder," said she, "if dear mother has pretty flowers in heaven. I hope
so--she loved them so well. Do you remember the little monthly rose she
wanted we should bring into her room, just before she died? How happy she
was, when one of us went and brought it to her bed. And she went to heaven
so soon after that! Oh, I think there must be flowers up there in the sky,
or she would not have thought of them and loved them so, when she was
dying. Don't you think so?"
And she was silent. So were her sisters, awhile. Thoughts of heaven made
them serious. They were sad, too. When the youngest--their darling
Sue--conversed in this strain, a cloud always came over their sunny faces.
They could scarcely tell why it was so; for they, too, loved to think of
heaven. But the language of their sister seemed to them to belong to
another world; and often, in the midst of their brightest hopes, would come
the fear, like a thunderbolt, that God would crush that cherished flower,
and remove her from their embrace while she was young.
"Sue," at length said Eliza, the eldest sister, "why do you always talk so
much about heaven?"
"I don't know," was the reply; "perhaps, because I think a good deal about
it. I dreamed last night"----
"Oh, I thought so," said Maria, playfully interrupting her sister; "I
should think the little fairies were playing hide and seek all around your
pillow every night. I wish they would whisper in my ears as they do in
yours. Why, the naughty things hardly ever speak to me, and when they do,
they tell a very different story from those they tell you. It is generally
about falling down from a church steeple, or something of that kind. Well,
what did they say to you this time, dear?"
"I never had such a dream before," said the favorite, her face glowing with
a new, almost an unearthly radiance; "I mean I never had one just like it.
When dear mother died, you remember I told you a dream about the angels.
Last night I thought they came to me again, and I saw mother, too, so
clearly!"
She stopped, and her eyes fell. She seemed almost sorry that she had said
as much; for she had not forgotten that the former dream to which she
alluded had caused her sisters pain, and she thought, that perhaps she
should make them unhappy again, if she related her dream of the night
before. But her sisters begged her to go on, and she did so.
"When I went to sleep," said she, "I was thinking of--of--what father had
said to me"--and she burst into a flood of tears. Her sisters wept, too;
for they well remembered that their father had come home intoxicated that
night, and that he had spoken very harshly to them all, and especially to
the youngest. They could not say much to console her. What could they say?
Silently they wept, and by their tears and embraces they told her how
deeply they sympathized with her, and how much they would do for her, if
they could. When the little dreamer was able to go on, she said,
"I was thinking about this when I went to sleep. I thought I was crying,
and wondering why God should let dear mother die, and leave us all alone,
when I heard some one say, 'Look up,' I looked up in the sky, and all the
stars were windows, and I saw through them. I saw heaven--so beautiful--so
beautiful! I saw mother looking out of one of these windows, and she
smiled, as she did when we brought the rose to her bed-side. I heard her
call my name, and she reached her arms toward me, and said, 'You may come,'
Oh, this was not like other dreams"----
"Don't think of it, dear sister; don't think of it any more," said Eliza.
"You was not well last night, and I have often heard, that when people are
ill, their dreams are more apt to be disturbed. But we will not say any
more about it now, dear."
"No," said Maria; "we shall all feel too sad, if we do." And she made an
effort to be cheerful; though tears stood in her eyes as she spoke.
"I don't know why it makes others feel sad to think of heaven," said the
favorite. "I should love dearly to go there."
"But then it is so dreadful to die!"
"I know it; but mother was so happy when she died!"
"Would you be willing to leave your sisters, dear Sue?"
"No; not unless I could see my mother and Christ. Oh, I do love Christ more
than all the rest of my friends! Do you think that is wrong?"
The three sisters slowly and thoughtfully bent their steps homeward, and
just as the sun was setting, and the western clouds were spread with the
beauty and glory of twilight, they entered that cottage which, though the
abode of sorrow, was yet dear and sacred to them, because it was once the
home of their mother.
From that time, the gentle, loving, thoughtful little Sue, faded--faded as
a flower in the autumn wind. She had not been well for weeks; and soon it
was evident that she was rapidly declining. Was her dream a cause or an
effect--a cause of her decline, or an effect of an illness already preying
upon her frail system? Perhaps we cannot tell. There is something very
remarkable about many dreams. It is not easy to account for them all, by
what is known of the laws of the mind. But we must not stop now to inquire
into this matter.
Step by step, that cherished sister went downward to the grave; and before
the summer had come, while the early violet and the pure anemone were still
in bloom, God called her home. Peacefully and beautifully her sun went
down. "They have come," she said. So died the youngest--the favorite child.