to be a minister;” and Frank ran on: “There goes the dinner-bell. What
have you for dinner, Marston?”
“I shall take my dinner after I get home,” I answered.
“Too bad; I wish you would board here. Why not?”
“I’m too poor, Frank; I am glad to come on any terms.”
There was a sudden dropping of balls and jumping from swings, and a
general scudding across the grounds. I walked around to the south side,
and seated myself in an arbor heavily laden with vines.
It had seemed to me delightful to study Latin; but the grammar, now
that I had it in my hand, was altogether a different thing. I thought
of the mountain. We had gone to the top by the simple effort of one
step at a time.
“We are all climbers,” Mr. Kirby had said. Studying Latin could be done
in the same manner as we scaled the mountain, with one step at a time.
Before I went home at night my lesson was recited.
“Very well for the first day,” said Mr. Harlan. “Perseverance and
energy are all that is necessary. You like to study, and I trust you
like to do what you do well. Make thorough work; understand what you
go over. The great fault with our scholars is, they are superficial.
It will require time to accomplish all you desire; but with the right
effort it can be done. Make haste, but make haste slowly.”
Owing to my long walk, and my not having any recitation the first
hour, Mr. Harlan did not oblige me to come in before ten; and I was
also privileged to leave at three. This would give me some time to
help Jennie; and for myself, I knew I should study better in Miss
Grimshaw’s little back parlor than in the large school-room at Rockdale.
Returning home, I had just reached the point where the narrow white
line of a brook became visible, when Jennie bounded up the pathway,
her round cheeks all aglow, her blue sun-bonnet thrown back, and the
sunshine playing with the loose meshes of her hair. She could hardly
steady her voice, so eager was she to know of the day.
“Tell me all about it, brother. Miss Grimshaw said Rockdale was such a
lovely place. Oh, I am sure it cannot be more beautiful there than it
is here. Are there any little girls that go to the school? Did you see
any to-day; and are there any so small as I am?”
“I did not see any so small as you are, Jennie.”
“Oh dear, I do so wish I could go with you. Don’t you think I could
walk easily?”
“Not every day, Jennie; and besides, we are going to study in the
evening, you know; and what I learn at school I will teach you at home.”
“Will you? Oh, that is so good;” and she clung to my hand, this little
sister that my mother had said I must love and care for. Then she
drew me down to the brook, its waters leaping over the stones with
a gurgling music, like the trill of a laughing child; the sunshine
glinting through the pines and climbing up the bank to our feet.
It was a scene of peculiar beauty, and dear Jennie enjoyed it with
a keen relish. I tried, but could not enter into the same sense of
enjoyment. To tell the truth, I was weary, perhaps hungry, and my new
book did not seem to me quite as easy as I expected to find it.
Then I recollected that, in climbing the mountain, the object was not
accomplished by one effort, but by a succession of continued struggles.
It was by pressing through the undergrowth, catching hold of the cliff,
going around the rocks, creeping where it was impossible to walk, yet
advancing steadily all the time, that the ascent was made. Mr. Kirby
had told me it would be just so in my studies; and I looked above me
into the bright blue sky, and thought of the prayer offered in that
jewelled dell--the prayer that I might be led by God’s Spirit, guarded
and guided by his grace, and that a path might open for me. It had
opened thus far; and was not this in answer to Mr. Kirby’s prayer and
my mother’s supplications? and again I resolved to use my time wisely.
The oak grows stronger by the very winds that toss its boughs; so the
heart, from the burdens that apparently weigh it down, gathers new
power to soar above the mists of gloom and discontent.
“You have not noticed my book,” I said at length, holding out my Latin
grammar; “and besides, you forget that I have not been to dinner.”
“It is so pleasant here, brother; don’t it rest you?” and her arms were
twined about my neck.
“Yes; but my lesson for to-morrow will require all my time,” I answered.
“Mr. Willett came to see us to-day,” said Jennie as we went home. “He
spoke kindly of you, and said he supposed you would not want to come
back after you had been to the academy; but if you did, there would be
a place for you; and he told Miss Grimshaw that if you needed books, he
would get them for you. He said a good deal more.”
“Perhaps he would rather you would not repeat it all. Did he know that
you heard?”
“Oh yes. It is not wrong to tell what he said before me, is it?”
“Perhaps not; but Mr. Kirby said that we should not fall into the habit
of repeating what people say, unless necessary to do so; that in this
way much scandal is floated about, which, had it not been repeated,
would have died out immediately.”
“Oh, brother, I did not mean to say any thing wrong.”
“Neither have you, Jennie. I thought at first you probably overheard
him. There is surely no harm in repeating to me simply what he said
before you, especially when he spoke so kindly.”
That night there was a happy meeting in Miss Grimshaw’s back parlor.
Mrs. Jeffries came down with her first instalment of eatables on my
account; and she met us so warmly, taking Jennie on her knee, and
asking me all the little minutiæ of school life.
“You think you will like, then?” and she played with my hair in a
motherly way.
“The only fear is, that I shall have to stop before I have half
accomplished my desire.”
“One step at a time,” said Miss Grimshaw, while Jennie was so tired
with her long walk and the unusual excitement of the day, that she went
to sleep with her head on my shoulder, in the very effort of trying to
master a new lesson.
Friday came, and true to his promise, Frank Clavers ordered two horses
in the room of one. It was a glorious afternoon, and as we leaped into
the saddle, I felt a pride in being able to rein in and manage my
horse handsomely. He was a fine-spirited animal, that Esquire Clavers
kept for his own use. It was to oblige Frank, of course, that I was
permitted this little indulgence.
Riding was the only thing perhaps that I could do well, and this I
had learned at Mr. Jeffries’, and I knew that here I was superior to
the other boys. So with a questionable pride I cantered round the
grounds, and raised my cap as I passed the young ladies at the window.
I enjoyed, as I never had done before, the idea of doing something
well; and I have since learned, what I did not know then, that skill in
horsemanship is considered by all no mean accomplishment.
“That was handsomely done,” said Frank. “Pray where did you learn to
ride so well?”
“You never knew perhaps that I lived two years with Mr. Jeffries. My
business was to assist in the stable. It was there I learned to ride.”
[Illustration]
What a race we had down the street, and how Frank’s gay laugh resounded
through the valley.
“This is something to look forward to, Marston,” said he as we reined
up at his own door. “I have never seen Hunter carry himself better.
It’s all because you know how to ride. Next week we’ll have just such
another ride. It’s glorious.”
“I have enjoyed it intensely,” I answered, while a secret sense of
shame crept over me at the idea of being puffed up because I could
ride, when in my books I knew so very little; and for that evening I
studied harder because of my foolishness.
[Illustration]
VI.
Autumn had run up her banner of red and gold, and under the spreading
folds I had walked every day to Rockdale, and as steadily as the week
came round rode home with Frank Clavers on Friday, until Hunter came
to know me quite as well as his master. Still, after the first ride,
I had never felt the same degree of satisfaction. To ride well no
longer seemed to me such a desirable acquisition. To master my Latin as
readily was now my ambition, and to this I bent all my energies.
As the winter deepened, the walk to Rockdale proved as bleak as before
it had been delightful, and the north winds, sweeping down through the
mountain gorges, made my cheeks and ears tingle. Still I could not
afford to lose a day. Frank was to stay three years, and then four more
in college; but Frank Clavers’ father was rich, and I was dependent
upon my own toil.
As I looked forward, for the first time one night I yielded to
despondency; my book closed, and my head fell forward on the casement.
Far above, the bright stars were shining. It was His hand that
sustained them. He prescribed their courses, and kept them within their
limits; and although I did not understand how, I still felt that his
watch and care was over me; and with this feeling came strength.
Looking back, as we did in going up the mountain, I could feel that I
had accomplished much; and still it was so little of what I craved. I
needed to be again reminded that it was by one step at a time that the
summit was reached; and that, had I stood at the foot of the mountain
and attempted to leap up by a few great efforts, it would never have
been done.
My class-mates were boys accustomed to school life, and still I knew
that some of them hardly looked in their books till they came to
recite. At first I thought Mr. Harlan was to blame; they came to study,
and they ought to be made to do so. Still, I have since found it is
not an easy matter to compel pupils to do what they do not wish to do,
what they will not do cheerfully. Doubtless he did all that he could
to incite them to study; and this failing, he allowed them to drift
on, hoping perhaps they would in time wake up to the responsibility of
wisely improving their time and opportunities.
Another advantage I had gained at Mr. Jeffries’ was to be seen in my
declamation. To stimulate my memory, I had learned nearly the whole
of my English Reader by heart, and these lessons I had been in the
habit of repeating to the servants in the kitchen, and sometimes, if I
had a moment’s leisure, to myself in the stable. It was in the latter
place that Mr. Jeffries had surprised me, the mention of which he often
made, sure of a laugh at my expense, and over which I grew extremely
sensitive. As declamation was a regular weekly exercise in school, I
soon found that the habit had been of great use to me; not only could I
readily commit to memory, but there was no feeling of timidity, and I
could speak before others without a thought of myself, leaving me free
to profit by the suggestions of my teacher.
Prominent in the memory of those days is my long daily walk, with its
frequent concomitants of deep snows, leaden skies, and bitter winds.
One day when the cold was at its height, Miss Grimshaw went to the
door with me, and urged me not to think of going to Rockdale. I had
just begun to translate, and one of my sentences troubled me till rest
seemed impossible; I must go. Neither could I look for a ride, as
grandma suggested. Action was necessary; and buttoning my coat closely,
I told her I could easily go, the sun would soon make an impression.
“It is not half as severe as some days last week.”
Accordingly I started; but before I left the village I was obliged to
stop repeating my lesson aloud; my teeth chattered and my ears were
tingling. I tried to run, but the stiff frozen snow would not allow of
this extra effort. A half mile from town I met Dr. Graham.
“It is too cold to go to Rockdale to-day, Marston;” and he opened his
buffalo robes and offered me a seat.
“Thank you, Dr. Graham,” I answered as well as my chattering teeth
would allow, “it wont be any worse; I can get there.” Again he tried to
turn me; but no, I must recite my lesson, and I needed explanations; I
felt that I could not wait another day.
On I went, the wind rushing and roaring through the leafless branches
of the trees. I rubbed my ears with my mittens, while my feet were so
numb I could hardly walk. Midway I began to fear that I should actually
perish. Should I go back, or should I go on? I glanced at the mountain,
with the proud consciousness that I had been to the top. “Never give
up,” Mr. Kirby said. It was my duty to go to school. I had started; I
would go.
I gave one glance at the marble column of the waterfall, with its
sculptured ridges and diamond points, the feathery spray caught up and
congealed, standing out in bold relief against the clear blue sky, more
beautiful than art could ever hope to imitate. It was worth a great
effort to look upon such a winter picture and I sprang forward with
renewed energy, trying to forget my numbed feet and frozen fingers.
It was harder than I had imagined, however. All the tales I have since
read of suffering on account of cold, seem only a dim outline of what
I then experienced. As I left the hollow I met Philip Allen with his
wood-sled. He had a small load, and was going home as fast as he could
goad on his oxen.
“I never saw such a day as this,” said Philip; “you had better get on
to the sled.”
“I should freeze standing still,” I answered. “I must go on now;” and I
began to feel sorry that I had started. It was indeed a terrible day.
My father had fallen in the snow. What if it should be my fate too?
“Never give up,” said I to myself, and I felt that I should like to
have Mr. Kirby know that I was trying. At length I became aware of a
new sensation stealing over me: it was with difficulty I could put one
foot before the other; the beauty was fading out of the sky; I only
wished to lie down in the snow. I forgot that I was going to school;
strange shapes floated round me, while strains of sweet music soothed
and quieted me. I was no longer cold, but, lapped in a delicious dream,
seemed to be floating towards a palace of dazzling splendor.
The next that I remember, I was in a nice warm room. It was not the
school-room, although Mr. and Mrs. Harlan stood beside me. My coat was
off, and the good woman was rubbing my hands in her own. Then I saw
there were others present, and that not only my hands, but my whole
body had been rubbed vigorously. I was suffering a terrible stinging
pain.
“Drink this,” said Mrs. Harlan, as a bowl of hot tea was handed me;
“it will help you to get warm.” More to please her than from any other
feeling, I drained it off, and ere long felt a genial glow through all
my members.
Seeing that the danger was over, Mr. Harlan went to the school-room;
and at noon all the boys and some of the girls crowded around me. Such
a crying and shaking of hands! And then I learned how near to death I
had come.
Jerry, the Irish man of all work, had seen me stagger along, and
finally fall. His kind Irish heart told him at once it was the cold,
and springing down the road, he carried me in his arms to the kitchen,
from which Mrs. Harlan had me taken at once to her own room.
“To think of your coming to school such a day, when we that live in
the house can hardly study at all,” said Henry Alden. Robert Lovell,
however, said, “I can understand it: you could not have stayed at home,
had you tried. I went one winter nearly as far; but it was not so cold;
neither was the snow so deep as this winter.”
I recited my lesson in Mrs. Harlan’s room; and it seemed to me Mr.
Harlan was never so kind before. He gave me all the explanations that I
needed, and in such a manner that I understood perfectly.
“I trust we shall not have another such a day; but if we do, you must
not expose yourself in this way again. Promise me;” and he took both my
hands. “It is too great a risk.”
“If you say so,” I answered; “but I shall not like to stay at home.”
“You will study, and I shall not mark you as absent without cause.”
As I was taking my books and making ready to start for home, Mr. Harlan
said,
“Jerry will take you home in his sleigh; he has an errand down, and it
wont trouble him at all.”
Mrs. Harlan brought out a pair of fur mittens and slipped over mine,
and got me a large grey shawl that protected me entirely.
“You need not return them,” said the sweet-voiced woman; “I have been
looking all winter for somebody that needed them.” She shook me warmly
by the hand, and Mr. Harlan saw me down to the sleigh.
“No right effort is ever lost, Marston; you aim to do what you do well
and faithfully, and God will open a path for you when he sees that you
can do something better, depend upon it, my son. Thank him for sparing
your life, and devote it to his service.”
The buffalo robe was nicely tucked around me, and the grey shawl pulled
over my head; and feeling for my books, to make sure that I had them,
we started.
“Niver saw the like of such a day,” said Jerry. “If I had not seen
you in the morning-- It was about ten you fell.” Again I shuddered,
and thought of my poor dead father, as near our home as I was to the
academy; and in that blinding storm we failed to see him.
The next day was Saturday; and as I sat in Miss Grimshaw’s back room,
petted a little more than usual by Jennie and grandma, I thought of Mr.
Harlan’s words, “No right effort is ever lost.” And it seemed that I
could hear again Mr. Kirby’s voice, “Whatever you do, do well, and God
will open a path to something better.” Since then they have come to me
often in characters of light, to brighten my darkest hours. They have
helped me labor on. When my heart was sore with heaviness, they have
aided me in adhering to the right in despite of ridicule and temptation.
“No right effort is ever lost.” “Do what you do well, and God will open
a path to you, when he sees that you can do something better.” Bind
the sentiment to your heart, if you are a patient climber, and take
courage. But I had not yet found the way to the Source of all strength,
nor learned the secret of the only true and noble life.
At the close of the term, in February, we had an examination. This
was new to me, and caused me no little uneasiness. I had never been
through with such a day, and as a matter of course I felt not a
little frightened at the idea of being questioned before such a crowd
as the boys told me always came. Mr. and Mrs. Harlan were very kind
and patient teachers, and I was so fresh and new in my studies, that
I trembled in view of the blunders I felt sure I should make before
strangers and critics.
“All Terryville will be here,” said Henry Alden; “but then you need not
mind: you are the best one we have in arithmetic, and history too; and
as for your Latin, why you are only a beginner; they wont expect much;
and in declamation you know you will take the lead.”
“But I have never spoken before so many.”
“That’s nothing; you’ll get accustomed to it in a few times. We don’t
mind it a feather. It a’n’t half of them that know.”
The day came. Miss Grimshaw and Jennie rode with Mr. Willett in a nice
sleigh, with a double set of bells. Then there was Mr. Farnham and Mr.
Wentworth, ministers from Terryville, with Dr. Graham and Dr. Stiles,
and several grey-haired men with gold-bowed glasses and ivory-headed
canes, and with books in their hands, evidently ready to criticize
closely.
“That’s the way they always do,” said Henry; “but if you could peep
over their shoulders, ten chances to one their books are wrong side up.”
Calm and composed, Henry Alden made his comments. He was an amiable,
kindly-disposed lad, but caring nothing for study. Still he managed
to get along, and examination-days had no terrors for him. His easy,
nonchalant air surprised me, and still more the light opinion he had
formed of the learning of some of the visitors.
Around the sides of the room sat the ladies from Terryville; but to me
there was no face that looked kinder than Miss Grimshaw’s, no beauty
that began to equal my little sister Jennie’s.
At eleven o’clock the class that had finished arithmetic were called.
I felt the blood rushing over me at fever heat, my fingers tingling,
and my cheeks burning. Mr. Farnham questioned us, giving examples to
each. The first sum he gave me was in interest, the second in the cube
root. I did not tremble from fear that I could not do the examples, as
I knew perfectly well there was not a sum in the book I could not do;
but I wanted to do it easily, handsomely, and in order. I gave a quick
glance to Jennie, and the calm expression of the sweet face swept away
all trepidation. I crossed the platform, and took up the crayon. Never
was I more collected; I forgot there were others in the room; I only
saw Jennie, and I knew by the expression of her quiet face that she
expected me to do well. She would be disappointed if I failed. I would
not fail. There was no reason why I should.
The example was on the board, and I stood with pointer in hand ready
for explanation. Contrary to my expectation, my voice did not tremble;
and when I finished, I was prouder than I have ever been since.
Then followed algebra, as far as we had gone.
“It is well done,” said Mr. Wentworth with a pleasant smile. “Such
examples make boys think; and when once they begin to think, then they
begin to learn in reality. Perhaps you sometimes wonder why such and
such examples were put into the algebra; you can see no use in them,
except to puzzle you. I will tell you. It is to make you deep, earnest
thinkers. Boys that can think about their sums, solve their problems,
and explain them readily, can also think about something else. That is
why you study algebra, and that is why you are drilled so thoroughly
in Latin and Greek. It is to make you think patiently, and so learn to
overcome difficulties. Learn to think then, and never give up because
you do not understand what practical use it is to be to you.”
And as this was the last lesson on the programme, he took occasion to
tell us the grand incentive to all this labor was because God had given
us minds of untold worth; that these minds were to live for ever, and
the more we acquired, so much the more should we be able to understand
the works of the Creator, so much better should we be able to discharge
the duties incumbent upon us, so much better able to work for Him who
has given us these minds, who has so liberally endowed us with all
these wonderful attributes of the soul. And he urged us all to remember
our Creator in the days of our youth, to give our hearts to him when
young, that we might be led and guarded by him along life’s pathway.
This made me think of Mr. Kirby. “Do good men all talk alike?” asked
Jennie, as soon as the bell struck for recess.
After dinner, which we took with Mr. and Mrs. Harlan, we were again
marched into the school-room, and examined closely in Latin. As
beginners we came first, and I was surprised that we received so much
praise, expecting as a matter of course that this would only be awarded
the advanced classes; but Mr. Wentworth said,
“The foundation is the chief thing. Once well grounded in the
rudiments, and the rest is sure. Here is where the work is to be done.”
At night Dr. Graham shook hands with us kindly, and said that he
thought our village was well represented. Frank Clavers had been sick
for a few weeks, and obliged to stay at home. Still, his class had
well sustained themselves, and Frank had always been at the head. Mr.
Farnham and Mr. Wentworth were particularly kind, and Jennie could
hardly contain herself as we rode home.
“It was better a great deal than the boy in the book; he broke down
several times, and you did not fail once,” and she slid her mittened
hand into mine.
“Fail! I guess he didn’t,” cried Mr. Willett. “Why, he came out the
best there. It was no bad thing his being with me last summer; nothing
like practice for a boy;” and Mr. Willett enjoyed with evident
satisfaction the idea that whatever knowledge I had of mathematics was
based on the practice I had in his grocery.
It had not been specified how long I was to remain at Rockdale. “Till
spring,” Miss Grimshaw said; but whether that meant April or May was to
me uncertain. What was my surprise, however, when May came and I asked
if I was not to stop, and she answered, “The term is so nearly out it
would be a pity for you to leave. I have spoken to Mr. Harlan about it,
and he wishes you to remain; you must work hard enough in vacation to
make up for it.”
The term closed in June, and then there was a final examination of a
week. Frank Clavers was again with us, and as usual at the head of his
class.
VII.