my opinion, what folks call shyness is very often just another name for
selfishness. If you thought about yourself less and about other people
more, Miss Emmy, you wouldn't be so shy, as you call it. You'll get
better of it as soon as you're old enough to find out that for the most
part of the time nobody is noticing what you do or thinking about you at
all."
There was a certain tonic in this speech of Eliza's which did Emmy good.
She lay meditating upon it that night after the girls had come in to
kiss her and say how dreadfully they had missed her at the picnic, and
how she must get quite well before next Monday, when they were going to
have another. She had slept so much during the day that she was not
sleepy now, and she lay turning over in her mind what Eliza had said.
_Was_ shyness selfishness? and was it her own fault that she got on so
badly and made so many mistakes? or was she really marked for misfortune
and doomed to be misunderstood, as she had sometimes imagined? She
thought of Bess and Jean with a little wonderment of envy. How pretty
and nice they were! how people liked them! how easy it seemed to them to
be graceful and natural and at ease with strangers!
While she was thus thinking, a queer little noise met her ear, like some
one snapping two sticks together. Again it came and yet again, and Emmy
was sure that she smelt a slight smell of burning. All her little
foolish fancies fled at once. She jumped out of bed, lit a candle,
slipped on her dressing-gown, and opened the door. The burning smell was
stronger in the entry, and the air was dim with smoke. Not nervous now
nor cowardly, Emmy ran down-stairs with all her wits about her,
following the smoke till she came to Uncle Tom's office. The door
stood half open, and inside she saw a flaring light. The carpet was on
fire in front of the grate, flames were creeping up the legs of the
table, which was covered with papers. Emmy knew that some of these
papers were valuable, and without a thought of fear she hurried in,
gathered as many as she could in her hands, flung them into the hall,
ran back for more, and never stopped till all were safe. Then she ran to
Uncle Tom's dressing-closet for a pitcher of water which she knew was
kept there, and dashed it on the flames, all the time calling at the top
of her voice, "Fire! fire! fire! O Tom! O aunty! O Uncle Tom! O
somebody! Come, please come! Oh, why don't you hear!"
It is astonishing how long it takes to wake up people who are sound
asleep. Emmy had time to fetch another pitcher of water from the
kitchen, and the fire was nearly out before the family came rushing
down, half dressed and bewildered, to her aid. Fires are easily
managed if they are taken in hand exactly at the right time, but half
an hour more or less makes a great difference. Emmy had acted at the
critical moment, and her courage and presence of mind had probably saved
the house.
Uncle Tom declared that he owed her ten thousand dollars. Part of this
debt he paid the very next week by the present of the prettiest little
gold watch and chain ever seen, with the date of the fire engraved
inside the watch-lid. Aunty, too much agitated to speak, folded Emmy in
her arms and gave her a great squeeze which said more than words. Tom,
when he understood the whole, said that she was "a brick," and that not
one girl in a thousand would have been so plucky or shown so much sense.
So poor, awkward Emmy, who had fared so ill up to this time, got up next
morning, like Lord Byron, to find herself famous, and the heroine of the
house.
To be praised and made much of does some people harm, but to others it
does a great deal of good. Emmy did not grow vain when she found
herself thus made important. She only felt that she was liked, and
approved of, and it set her at her ease. From that day Elliott's Mills
grew delightful to her as it had always been to her sisters. She ran
about freely among the others, talked, laughed, shared in the fun that
was going on, and enjoyed every moment of her visit.
Years afterward, when she and Aunt Emma had grown intimate, Emmy told
that dear friend and relative whom she had learned to love and admire
better than any one else except her own mother, the story of her foolish
troubles.
"But indeed," she ended, "they were lucky troubles to me, for I never
was so bad after that. I think what old Eliza said about selfishness
stuck in my mind, and I found out after a while that she was pretty much
right, and that the way to be comfortable and at ease was to think about
other people instead of myself."
"And I am sure," replied Aunt Emma, "that your troubles were lucky
troubles for us. If you hadn't had the toothache and lain awake
meditating on that and your other sorrows, I'm sure I don't know where
we should all be now, my dear little Emmy."
TOINETTE AND THE ELVES.
THE winter sun was nearing the horizon's edge. Each moment the
tree-shadows grew longer in the forest; each moment the crimson light on
the upper boughs became more red and bright. It was Christmas Eve, or
would be in half an hour, when the sun should be fairly set; but it did
not feel like Christmas, for the afternoon was mild and sweet, and the
wind in the leafless boughs sang, as it moved about, as though to
imitate the vanished birds. Soft trills and whistles, odd little shakes
and twitters,--it was astonishing what pretty noises the wind made, for
it was in good humor, as winds should be on the Blessed Night; all its
storm-tones and bass-notes were for the moment laid aside, and gently,
as though hushing a baby to sleep, it cooed and rustled and brushed to
and fro in the leafless woods.
Toinette stood, pitcher in hand, beside the well. "Wishing Well," the
people called it, for they believed that if any one standing there,
bowed to the East, repeated a certain rhyme and wished a wish, the wish
would certainly come true. Unluckily, nobody knew exactly what the rhyme
should be. Toinette did not; she was wishing that she did, as she stood
with her eyes fixed on the bubbling water. How nice it would be! she
thought. What beautiful things should be hers, if it were only to wish
and to have! She would be beautiful, rich, good--oh, so good! The
children should love her dearly, and never be disagreeable. Mother
should not work so hard--they should all go back to France--which mother
said was _si belle_. Oh, dear, how nice it would be! Meantime, the sun
sank lower, and mother at home was waiting for the water, but Toinette
forgot that.
Suddenly she started. A low sound of crying met her ear, and something
like a tiny moan. It seemed close by, but she saw nothing.
Hastily she filled her pitcher, and turned to go. But again the sound
came, an unmistakable sob, right under her feet. Toinette stopped short.
"What _is_ the matter?" she called out bravely.
"Is anybody there; and if there is, why don't I see you?"
A third sob--and all at once, down on the ground beside her, a tiny
figure became visible, so small that Toinette had to kneel and stoop her
head to see it plainly. The figure was that of an odd little man. He
wore a garb of green, bright and glancing as the scales of a beetle. In
his mite of a hand was a cap, out of which stuck a long-pointed feather.
Two specks of tears stood on his cheeks, and he fixed on Toinette a
glance so sharp and so sad, that it made her feel sorry and frightened
and confused all at once.
"Why, how funny this is!" she said, speaking to herself out loud.
"Not at all," replied the little man, in a voice as dry and crisp as the
chirr of a grasshopper. "Anything but funny. I wish you wouldn't use
such words. It hurts my feelings, Toinette."
"Do you know my name, then?" cried Toinette, astonished. "That's
strange! But what is the matter? Why are you crying so, little man?"
"I'm not a little man. I'm an elf," responded the dry voice; "and I
think you'd cry if you had an engagement out to tea, and found yourself
spiked on a great bayonet, so that you couldn't move an inch. Look!" He
turned a little as he spoke, and Toinette saw a long rose-thorn sticking
through the back of the green robe. The little man could by no means
reach the thorn, and it held him fast prisoner to the place.
"Is that all? I'll take it out for you," she said.
"Be careful--oh, be careful!" entreated the little man. "This is my new
dress, you know--my Christmas suit, and it's got to last a year. If
there is a hole in it, Peascod will tickle me, and Bean Blossom tease
till I shall wish myself dead." He stamped with vexation at the thought.
"Now, you mustn't do that," said Toinette, in a motherly tone, "else
you'll tear it yourself, you know." She broke off the thorn as she
spoke, and gently drew it out. The elf anxiously examined the stuff. A
tiny puncture only was visible, and his face brightened.
"You're a good child," he said. "I'll do as much for you some day,
perhaps."
"I would have come before if I had seen you," remarked Toinette,
timidly. "But I didn't see you a bit."
"No, because I had my cap on," replied the elf. He placed it on his head
as he spoke, and, hey, presto! nobody was there, only a voice which
laughed and said: "Well--don't stare so. Lay your finger on me now."
"Oh!" said Toinette, with a gasp. "How wonderful! What fun it must be to
do that! The children wouldn't see me. I should steal in and surprise
them; they would go on talking, and never guess that I was there! I
should so like it! Do elves ever lend their caps to anybody? I wish
you'd lend me yours. It must be so nice to be invisible!"
"Ho!" cried the elf, appearing suddenly again. "Lend my cap, indeed!
Why, it wouldn't stay on the very tip of your ear, it's so small. As for
nice, that depends. Sometimes it is, and sometimes it isn't. No, the
only way for mortal people to be invisible is to gather the fern-seed
and put it in their shoes."
"Gather it? Where? I never saw any seed to the ferns," said Toinette,
staring about her.
"Of course not--we elves take care of that," replied the little man.
"Nobody finds the fern-seed but ourselves. I'll tell you what, though.
You were such a nice child to take out the thorn so cleverly, that I'll
_give_ you a little of the seed. Then you can try the fun of being
invisible, to your heart's content."
"Will you really? How delightful! May I have it now?"
"Bless me! do you think I carry my pocket stuffed with it?" said the
elf. "Not at all. Go home, say not a word to anybody, but leave your
bedroom window open to-night, and you'll see what you'll see."
He laid his finger on his nose as he spoke, gave a jump like a
grasshopper, clapping on his cap as he went, and vanished. Toinette
lingered a moment, in hopes that he might come back, then took her
pitcher and hurried home. The woods were very dusky by this time; but,
full of her strange adventure, she did not remember to feel afraid.
"How long you have been!" said her mother. "It's late for a little maid
like you to be up. You must make better speed another time, my child."
Toinette pouted, as she was apt to do when reproved. The children
clamored to know what had kept her, and she spoke pettishly and crossly;
so that they too became cross, and presently went away into the outer
kitchen to play by themselves. The children were apt to creep away when
Toinette came. It made her angry and unhappy at times that they should
do so, but she did not realize that it was in great part her own fault,
and so did not set herself to mend it.
"Tell me a 'tory," said baby Jeanneton, creeping to her knee a little
later. But Toinette's head was full of the elf; she had no time to spare
for Jeanneton.
"Oh, not to-night!" she replied. "Ask mother to tell you one."
"Mother's busy," said Jeanneton, wistfully.
Toinette took no notice, and the little one crept away disconsolately.
Bedtime at last. Toinette set the casement open, and lay a long time
waiting and watching; then she fell asleep. She waked with a sneeze and
jump, and sat up in bed. Behold, on the coverlet stood her elfin friend,
with a long train of other elves beside him, all clad in the beetle-wing
green, and wearing little pointed caps! More were coming in at the
window; outside a few were drifting about in the moon-rays, which lit
their sparkling robes till they glittered like so many fire-flies. The
odd thing was, that though the caps were on, Toinette could see the
elves distinctly, and this surprised her so much, that again she thought
out loud, and said, "How funny!"
"You mean about the caps," replied her special elf, who seemed to have
the power of reading thoughts. "Yes, you can see us tonight, caps and
all. Spells lose their value on Christmas Eve, always. Peascod, where
is the box? Do you still wish to try the experiment of being invisible,
Toinette?"
"Oh, yes--indeed I do!"
"Very well--so let it be!"
As he spoke he beckoned, and two elves, puffing and panting like men
with a heavy load, dragged forward a droll little box about the size of
a pumpkin-seed. One of them lifted the cover.
"Pay the porter, please, ma'am," he said, giving Toinette's ear a
mischievous tweak with his sharp fingers.
"Hands off, you bad Peascod!" cried Toinette's elf. "This is my girl.
She shan't be pinched." He dealt Peascod a blow with his tiny hand as he
spoke, and looked so brave and warlike that he seemed at least an inch
taller than he had before. Toinette admired him very much; and Peascod
slunk away with an abashed giggle, muttering that Thistle needn't be so
ready with his fist.
Thistle--for thus, it seemed, Toinette's friend was named--dipped his
fingers in the box, which was full of fine brown seeds, and shook a
handful into each of Toinette's shoes, as they stood, toes together, by
the bedside.
"Now you have your wish," he said, "and can go about and do what you
like, no one seeing. The charm will end at sunset. Make the most of it
while you can; but if you want to end it sooner, shake the seeds from
the shoes, and then you are just as usual."
"Oh, I shan't want to," protested Toinette; "I'm sure I shan't."
"Good-by," said Thistle, with a mocking little laugh.
"Good-by, and thank you ever so much," replied Toinette.
"Good-by, good-by," replied the other elves, in shrill chorus. They
clustered together, as if in consultation; then straight out of the
window they flew like a swarm of gauzy-winged bees, and melted into the
moonlight. Toinette jumped up and ran to watch them; but the little men
were gone--not a trace of them was to be seen; so she shut the window,
went back to bed, and presently, in the midst of her amazed and excited
thoughts, fell asleep.
She waked in the morning with a queer, doubtful feeling. Had she
dreamed, or had it really happened? She put on her best petticoat, and
laced her blue bodice; for she thought the mother would perhaps take
them across the wood to the little chapel for the Christmas service. Her
long hair smoothed and tied, her shoes trimly fastened, down-stairs she
ran. The mother was stirring porridge over the fire. Toinette went close
to her, but she did not move or turn her head.
"How late the children are!" she said at last, lifting the boiling pot
on the hob. Then she went to the stair-foot, and called, "Marc,
Jeanneton, Pierre, Marie! Breakfast is ready, my children. Toinette--but
where, then, is Toinette? She is used to be down long before this."
"Toinette isn't up-stairs," said Marie, from above. "Her door is wide
open, and she isn't there."
"That is strange!" said the mother. "I have been here an hour, and she
has not passed this way since." She went to the outer door and called,
"Toinette! Toinette!"--passing close to Toinette as she did so, and
looking straight at her with unseeing eyes. Toinette, half frightened,
half pleased, giggled low to herself. She really was invisible then! How
strange it seemed, and what fun it was going to be!
The children sat down to breakfast, little Jeanneton, as the youngest,
saying grace. The mother distributed the hot porridge, and gave each a
spoon, but she looked anxious.
"Where can Toinette have gone?" she said to herself.
Toinette was conscience-pricked. She was half inclined to dispel the
charm on the spot. But just then she caught a whisper from Pierre to
Marc, which so surprised her as to put the idea out of her head.
"Perhaps a wolf has eaten her up--a great big wolf, like the 'Capuchon
Rouge,' you know." This was what Pierre said; and Marc answered,
unfeelingly,--
"If he has, I shall ask mother to let me have her room for my own!"
Poor Toinette! her cheeks burnt and her eyes filled with tears at this.
Didn't the boys love her a bit, then? Next she grew angry, and longed to
box Marc's ears, only she recollected in time that she was invisible.
What a bad boy, he was! she thought.
The smoking porridge reminded her that she was hungry; so brushing away
the tears, she slipped a spoon off the table, and whenever she found the
chance, dipped it into the bowl for a mouthful. The porridge disappeared
rapidly.
"I want some more," said Jeanneton.
"Bless me, how fast you have eaten!" said the mother, turning to the
bowl.
This made Toinette laugh, which shook her spoon, and a drop of the hot
mixture fell right on the tip of Marie's nose, as she sat with upturned
face waiting her turn for a second helping. Marie gave a little scream.
"What is it?" said the mother.
"Hot water! Right in my face!" spluttered Marie.
"Water!" cried Marc. "It's porridge."
"You spattered with your spoon. Eat more carefully, my child," said the
mother; and Toinette laughed again as she heard her. After all, there
was some fun in being invisible!
The morning went by. Constantly the mother went to the door, and,
shading her eyes with her hand, looked out, in hopes of seeing a little
figure come down the wood-path, for she thought, perhaps the child went
to the spring after water, and fell asleep there. The children played
happily, meanwhile. They were used to doing without Toinette, and did
not seem to miss her, except that now and then baby Jeanneton said:
"Poor Toinette gone--not here--all gone!"
"Well, what if she has?" said Marc at last, looking up from the wooden
cup he was carving for Marie's doll. "We can play all the better."
Marc was a bold, outspoken boy, who always told his whole mind about
things.
"If she were here," he went on, "she'd only scold and interfere.
Toinette almost always scolds. I like to have her go away. It makes it
pleasanter."
"It _is_ rather pleasanter," admitted Marie, "only I'd like her to be
having a nice time somewhere else."
"Bother about Toinette!" cried Pierre. "Let's play 'My godmother has
cabbage to sell.'"
I don't think Toinette had ever felt so unhappy in her life, as when she
stood by unseen, and heard the children say these words. She had never
meant to be unkind to them, but she was quick-tempered, dreamy, wrapped
up in herself. She did not like being interrupted by them, it put her
out, and then she spoke sharply and was cross. She had taken it for
granted that the others must love her, by a sort of right, and the
knowledge that they did not grieved her very much. Creeping away, she
hid herself in the woods. It was a sparkling day, but the sun did not
look so bright as usual. Cuddled down under a rose-bush, Toinette sat
sobbing as if her heart would break at the recollection of the speeches
she had overheard.
By and by a little voice within her woke up and began to make itself
audible. All of us know this little voice. We call it conscience.
"Jeanneton missed me," she thought. "And, oh dear! I pushed her away
only last night and wouldn't tell her a story. And Marie hoped I was
having a pleasant time somewhere. I wish I hadn't slapped Marie last
Friday. And I wish I hadn't thrown Marc's ball into the fire that day I
was angry with him. How unkind he was to say that--but I wasn't always
kind to him. And once I said that I wished a bear would eat Pierre up.
That was because he broke my cup. Oh dear, oh dear! What a bad girl I've
been to them all!"
"But you could be better and kinder if you tried, couldn't you?" said
the inward voice. "I think you could." And Toinette clasped her hands
tight and said out loud: "I could. Yes--and I will."
The first thing to be done was to get rid of the fern-seed, which she
now regarded as a hateful thing. She untied her shoes and shook it out
in the grass. It dropped, and seemed to melt into the air, for it
instantly vanished. A mischievous laugh sounded close behind, and a
beetle-green coat-tail was visible, whisking under a tuft of rushes. But
Toinette had had enough of the elves, and, tying her shoes, took the
road toward home, running with all her might.
"Where have you been all day, Toinette?" cried the children, as,
breathless and panting, she flew in at the gate. But Toinette could not
speak. She made slowly for her mother, who stood in the doorway, flung
herself into her arms, and burst into a passion of tears.
"Ma cherie, what is it, whence hast thou come?" asked the good mother,
alarmed. She lifted Toinette into her arms as she spoke, and hastened
indoors. The other children followed, whispering and peeping, but the
mother sent them away, and, sitting down by the fire with Toinette in
her lap, she rocked and hushed and comforted, as though Toinette had
been again a little baby. Gradually the sobs ceased. For a while
Toinette lay quiet, with her head on her mother's breast. Then she wiped
her wet eyes, put her arms around her mother's neck, and told her all
from the very beginning, keeping not a single thing back. The dame
listened with alarm.
"Saints protect us," she muttered. Then feeling Toinette's hands and
head, "Thou hast a fever," she said. "I will make thee a _tisane_, my
darling, and thou must at once go to bed." Toinette vainly protested; to
bed she went, and perhaps it was the wisest thing, for the warm drink
threw her into a long, sound sleep, and when she woke she was herself
again, bright and well, hungry for dinner, and ready to do her usual
tasks.
Herself,--but not quite the same Toinette that she had been before.
Nobody changes from bad to better in a minute. It takes time for that,
time and effort, and a long struggle with evil habits and tempers. But
there is sometimes a certain minute or day in which people _begin_ to
change, and thus it was with Toinette. The fairy lesson was not lost
upon her. She began to fight with herself, to watch her faults and try
to conquer them. It was hard work; often she felt discouraged, but she
kept on. Week after week and month after month she grew less selfish,
kinder, more obliging than she used to be. When she failed, and her old
fractious temper got the better of her, she was sorry, and begged every
one's pardon so humbly that they could not but forgive. The mother began
to think that the elves really had bewitched her child. As for the
children, they learned to love Toinette as never before, and came to her
with all their pains and pleasures, as children should to a kind older
sister. Each fresh proof of this, every kiss from Jeanneton, every
confidence from Marc, was a comfort to Toinette, for she never forgot
Christmas Day, and felt that no trouble was too much to wipe out that
unhappy recollection. "I _think_ they like me better than they did
then," she would say; but then the thought came, "Perhaps if I were
invisible again, if they did not know I was there, I might hear
something to make me feel as badly as I did that morning." These sad
thoughts were part of the bitter fruit of the fairy fern-seed.
So with doubts and fears the year went by, and again it was Christmas
Eve. Toinette had been asleep some hours, when she was roused by a
sharp tapping at the window-pane. Startled and only half awake, she sat
up in bed, and saw by the moonlight a tiny figure outside, which she
recognized. It was Thistle, drumming with his knuckles on the glass.
"Let me in," cried the dry little voice. So Toinette opened the
casement, and Thistle flew in and perched, as before, on the coverlet.
"Merry Christmas, my girl," he said, "and a Happy New Year when it
comes! I've brought you a present;" and, dipping into a pouch tied round
his waist, he pulled out a handful of something brown. Toinette knew
what it was in a moment.
"Oh, no!" she cried, shrinking back. "Don't give me any fern-seeds. They
frighten me. I don't like them."
"Now, don't be silly," said Thistle, his voice sounding kind this time,
and earnest. "It wasn't pleasant being invisible last year, but perhaps
this year it will be. Take my advice, and try it. You'll not be sorry."
"Shan't I?" said Toinette, brightening. "Very well then, I will." She
leaned out of bed, and watched Thistle strew the fine, dust-like grains
in each shoe.