FLAXIE IN CHURCH.
The little one went to church the very next Sunday, and though sister
"Ninny" had her in charge, Flaxie felt that she could not drop her off
her own mind for a moment. So charming was wee Ethel in her blue silk
bonnet, with a lace frill about the face, that Flaxie was obliged to
turn half around and gaze at her, completely lost in admiration.
"Oh, she's the sweetest, best little dear! Ninny needn't say she isn't
as pretty as Kittyleen, for she certainly is! Anyway, her _bonnet_ is
just as pretty, and a great deal newer! Now there's Fanny Townsend's
little sister, I should think Fanny'd be ashamed to have her wear such
a bonnet."
Good Mr. Lee was preaching a sermon, which he thought the children in
the congregation could nearly all understand; but the words seemed
to Flaxie to run together without any meaning; she was not trying to
listen.
"How Kittyleen does nestle about! Her mother doesn't watch her a
bit. She lets her do everything and go everywhere. I think she's a
queer woman. My mamma wouldn't let Ethel stir out of the house if she
couldn't behave better than Kittyleen. No, she'd tie her in a chair.
"Why, there's Sadie Stockwell sitting with Aunty Prim. That's my dress
Sadie has on. Pity Sadie's father can't buy her any dresses! Pity he
drinks so, and is so poor! Pity Sadie is so lame, with her shoulders
all hitched up! How kind of Miss Pike, to give Sadie that beautiful
book! When I grow up I'm going to be just like Miss Pike and make
people love me. Perhaps I can be good if I'm _not_ very homely."
Here Flaxie stole another glance at Ethel's bonnet. "Darling! She's
just as still as a lady. I suppose she's saying to herself, 'Effel
won't 'peak a word.' What if she _should_ speak! Just think! I wonder
if Mr. Lee knows she's at church? He loves Ethel, for he sent her a
little box of honey. I shouldn't think he'd like to keep bees. I should
think he'd be afraid they'd sting his little boy.--There, I must look
up at Mr. Lee and hear what he says."
She raised her eyes to the pulpit. "How queer his head looks where the
hair is so bald! The top of it is just as smooth and white! Why, it
shines like the ivory ball on Ninny's parasol. What did make Mr. Lee's
hair all go off? Doctor Papa said _he_ didn't know what made it go off,
for Mr. Lee isn't old a bit, he's almost young." Gazing at the smooth,
ivory-white top of the minister's head naturally reminded the little
girl of something Phil had said not long ago when his hair was to be
cut.
"Please don't cut it _very_ short," said little Phil, "don't cut it as
short as Mr. Lee's."
Flaxie was in great danger of smiling as she recollected this.
"Why don't I listen to the sermon?" thought she. "It's very wicked not
to listen. Oh, he's gone way by the text! What is he saying about the
brook of Cherith? They don't have Bible places in my geography, and I
never heard of the brook of Cherith."
Next moment, after a fond glance at Ethel, her eye fell upon Preston,
and this gave still another turn to her thoughts.
"I should think Preston would be ashamed ever to say anything more to
me about my 'Domestic Animals.' The composition he wrote the other day
is ever so much worse than that."
It was "The Story of Evangeline." Miss Pike had read Longfellow's
beautiful poem aloud, and then asked the children to write down all
they could remember of it.
Here, in Preston's own words, is
THE STORY OF EVANGELINE.
"Evangeline lived in Nova Scotia. She was engaged to Gabriel. He was
a blacksmith's son. The English soldiers came and told the French to
leave. They left. Evangeline and Gabriel did not go on the same boat.
They got mixed up and separated. Evangeline did not like it. She and
her priest went all round out West to try to find Gabriel. He did not
try to find _her_. Then she heard he had gone up North to trade for
mules, and she went to hunt him up. She did not find him. Then she grew
very old and went to live with the Quakers. She was a nun. One Sunday
morning she picked some flowers and went to the poor-house, and found
an old man in bed dying. She said, Gabriel. He looked up. They kissed
each other and he died."
Dr. Gray said this story ought to be entitled "The Fatal Effects of a
Kiss." Even grandma had laughed heartily on reading it, though Preston
himself could see nothing in it to laugh at.
But it was by no means of Evangeline or her fatal kiss that Preston was
thinking just now. Sitting quietly beside his father, he was looking
up at the minister and drinking in every word of the sermon. He had
long been noted for his excellent behavior at church, and Mr. Lee had
more than once said to the boy's father that none of the grown people
listened to their pastor with more respectful attention than young
Preston Gray. I am afraid Mr. Lee would not have said anything like
that about Flaxie. She sat still enough, often very still indeed, but
her eyes were roving all about, and so were her thoughts.
Miss Pike observed this, and it occurred to her that it would be a
very sad thing if Flaxie should allow her inattention to grow into a
confirmed habit. Very likely she said something of the sort to Dr.
Gray, for she felt a great interest in the child's improvement. At any
rate, that afternoon, when the four o'clock dinner was over and the
Gray family were seated in the back parlor,--Miss Pike, grandma, and
all,--Doctor Papa said, rather unexpectedly,--
"Now suppose we ask these little people what the sermon was about this
morning?"
He chanced to be looking at Flaxie as he spoke, but she said quickly,--
"Oh, please ask Julia first, papa, for she is the oldest. No, I mean
Ethel, for she is the youngest."
This was too absurd.
"Isn't _Phil_ young enough? Perhaps we may begin with him. Think hard,
my son, and see if you can remember anything Mr. Lee said to-day."
Little Phil knitted his brows, but like Flaxie he had been looking
around, not listening.
"Oh, papa, there was a woman there, had a thing on all bangled with
beads."
"Yes, my son; but what did the minister say?" Phil rolled his eyes.
"Oh, there was a little girl there, about as big as Ethel, had a white
bonnet on and a white cloak."
"Yes; but what did the minister say?"
"Oh, Ethel," said crestfallen little Phil, turning to his baby sister
for comfort, "you and I are too small. We can't remember what they
preach, can we?"
"We won't be too hard on you, my little son," said Doctor Papa. "You
are only five years old; but I am sure Mr. Lee says some things that
even you can understand. Will you really try next Sunday to listen?"
"I don't know how, papa," replied the little fellow, dropping his head.
"But I only asked you to try. You can try, can't you, Philip? Now, next
Sunday afternoon there will be a particularly large, yellow banana in
the fruit-dish at dessert, and it will go to the small boy who can tell
me something--just a little something--the minister said."
Phil's eyes began to shine. Oh, wouldn't he look straight at Mr. Lee
next Sunday, and bring home lots and lots of the sermon!
"There, it's Flaxie's turn now," said he, as Flaxie with a very sober
face wedged her chair between her mother and Miss Pike.
"Mr. Lee said," began she, hurriedly, "he said something about a
brook,--I forget the name of the brook,--and he said something about a
man,--I can't think what the man's name was,--and the ravens came and
fed him."
"The ravens are right. Go on. Why did the ravens feed him?"
"I don't know, papa." Flaxie looked helpless. "I didn't hear the rest.
I had to watch Ethel for fear she'd talk."
Dr. Gray said nothing more. He merely looked at his little daughter.
"Oh, papa, I won't do so again. I won't, truly. I'll hear every single
word. But sometimes, you know, I can't understand."
"You could have understood this, my daughter; it was all very simple.
Now, Preston?"
"It was about the prophet Elijah, sir. Elijah was a very solemn kind of
man. He lived alone in the mountains and talked with God. There was a
wicked king called Ahab, who worshipped idols, and Elijah went to him
and told him it was wrong, and Ahab was very angry, and Elijah had to
run away. He was told to go to the brook Cherith and drink the waters
of it, and the ravens would come and feed him. And the ravens did.
They brought him bread and meat night and morning till the brook dried
up and Elijah had to go somewhere else. I believe," said Preston,
reflecting, "I believe that's all I can remember."
"You have done well. Do you know to what nation Elijah belonged?"
"No, sir."
"Can Julia tell?"
"Yes, sir, he was an Arab." Julia always looked very modest and pretty
in answering questions. She went on now, with her hands folded in her
lap. "Elijah had long thick hair hanging down his back, and he wore a
cape of sheepskin; they called it a mantle. And he used to hide his
face in it sometimes, and sometimes he rolled it up and used it for a
staff."
"What is a raven?"
"It is a kind of crow."
"Oh, I thought it was a kind of ostrich," said Flaxie.
This extraordinary statement brought a smile to Preston's face, but his
father said, "I was just thinking of a little story about an ostrich.
God has strange ways of saving people's lives sometimes."
The children looked attentive, and Mrs. Gray drew Ethel into her lap to
keep her quiet, while papa pared his orange and began:
"It was more than fifty years ago that Mr. Broadbent, a missionary, was
travelling in Cape Colony. Where is that, Mary?"
"Oh, Africa, Africa; way down there at the bottom of the map."
"He had his family with him, and a few friends and some Hottentots.
There were fourteen in the party. They were crossing a sandy
table-land. What is that, Julia?"
"High and flat land, like a table."
"Right. They rode in wagons, drawn by oxen. It was a week's journey,
but they had not enough food to start with, and could buy but little
at the last town on the way. So after they had travelled two days there
was not much left but a small sack of rice and some tea and coffee.
What would become of them? Five more days across a country where
nothing grew, not even a blade of grass! Now and then they saw a bird
flying overhead, but it was very swift, and far away, and they could
hardly ever hit it with their guns."
"Oh, dear, did they starve?" asked Flaxie.
"There, now, if those birds had only been ravens!"
"The party stopped to rest, and they sent one of the Hottentots to
watch the oxen; but I dare say he fell asleep, for several of the oxen
strayed away.
"It seemed a great pity, for he had to go to look them up and was gone
a long time, and the travellers could not afford to wait."
"Well, if they were going to starve, papa, it didn't make any
difference whether they waited or not."
"When the Hottentot came back he had a great piece of news to tell. He
had found the nest of an ostrich, with forty eggs in it."
"Oh, papa, are ostrich eggs good to eat? Do tell us about it."
"So I will, my daughter, if I am not interrupted too often."
Flaxie blushed, and hid her face on Miss Pike's shoulder.
"The nest of an ostrich is a curiosity, and Mr. Broadbent waded through
two or three miles of deep sand to see this one. You would think the
mother bird had studied arithmetic all her life, for she seemed to have
counted the eggs and set them in their places with perfect exactness.
In the middle were fourteen close together, and three or four feet away
from them were the other twenty-six eggs in an unbroken circle, as even
as a row of gold beads.
"The ostrich had been sitting on the ones in the middle. She expected
to hatch just fourteen birds. She had not sat on the outer eggs at
all, and there they were, entirely fresh and good to eat. She was
saving them as food for the babies. She meant to break them, one after
another, and give them to her chickens as fast as they should come out
of the shell.
"It would be just as much food as the fourteen little ones would need,
before they were old enough to go abroad with her and pick up their
living in the desert. How do you suppose the ostrich knew this? She had
hardly any brain, a very stupid bird indeed. It must have been taught
her directly from Heaven.
"Well, you see now that the travellers did not starve. For a meal they
broke one of these eggs into a bowl, beat it well, and mixed with it a
little flour, pepper, and salt, and fried it in a pan. It served very
well instead of bread with their tea and coffee, and when they arrived
at their station they had two or three eggs to spare."
"Is that all?" asked Preston, as his father paused and offered a piece
of orange to Ethel. "It was almost as good as the ravens, wasn't it?"
"I want to ask one question," said Julia. "How large is an ostrich egg?"
"It weighs perhaps three pounds, and is almost as large around the
middle as Ethel's waist."
"Well, I'm glad those people didn't starve," remarked Flaxie, "I was
afraid one while they would."
I have introduced this true story here, partly for its own sake, and
partly to give you a picture of one of the delightful Sunday afternoons
at Dr. Gray's. If I had time I would like to tell you of the strong
efforts which Flaxie made from this very day to overcome the bad habit
of letting her thoughts wander in church. But this book is so small,
and there are yet so many events waiting to be described, that I must
now hasten on to something else.
In April Miss Pike went home, carrying with her the hearts of all the
Grays, both young and old. The whole family insisted so strongly upon
her coming back the next winter that she said,--
"Thank you; perhaps I may come, for I have been very happy at Laurel
Grove, and love every one of you dearly. But," she added, smiling,
"you forget that you may not be here next winter. If Dr. Gray should be
elected to Congress, won't you all go to Washington?"
"Oh, he does not expect to be elected," replied Mrs. Gray. "But if we
_should_ go to Washington, we shall want you to go there with us. Now,
please remember."
"How delightful! Well, Mrs. Gray, I will say to you as you say to
little Ethel, '_We will see_.'"