It was near the close of a pleasant Saturday afternoon that I drew
up my weary horse in front of a neat little dwelling in the village
of N. This, as near as I could gather from description, was the
house of my cousin, William Fletcher, the identical rogue of a Bill
Fletcher, of whom we have aforetime spoken. Bill had always been
a thriving, push-ahead sort of a character, and during the course
of my rambling life I had improved every occasional opportunity of
keeping up our early acquaintance. The last time that I returned to
my native country, after some years of absence, I heard of him as
married and settled in the village of N., where he was conducting
a very prosperous course of business, and shortly after received
a pressing invitation to visit him at his own home. Now, as I had
gathered from experience the fact that it is of very little use to
rap one's knuckles off on the front door of a country house without
any knocker, I therefore made the best of my way along a little
path, bordered with marigolds and balsams, that led to the back part
of the dwelling. The sound of a number of childish voices made me
stop, and, looking through the bushes, I saw the very image of my
Cousin Bill Fletcher, as he used to be twenty years ago; the same
bold forehead, the same dark eyes, the same smart, saucy mouth,
and the same "who-cares-for-that" toss to his head. "There, now,"
exclaimed the boy, setting down a pair of shoes that he had been
blacking, and arranging them at the head of a long row of all sizes
and sorts, from those which might have fitted a two-year-old foot
upward, "there, I've blacked every single one of them, and made them
shine too, and done it all in twenty minutes; if anybody thinks they
can do it quicker than that, I'd just like to have them try; that's
all."
"I know they couldn't, though," said a fair-haired little girl,
who stood admiring the sight, evidently impressed with the utmost
reverence for her brother's ability; "and, Bill, I've been putting
up all the playthings in the big chest, and I want you to come and
turn the lock--the key hurts my fingers."
"Poh! I can turn it easier than that," said the boy, snapping his
fingers; "have you got them all in?"
"Yes, all; only I left out the soft bales, and the string of red
beads, and the great rag baby for Fanny to play with--you know
mother says babies must have their playthings Sunday."
"Oh, to be sure," said the brother very considerately; "babies
can't read, you know, as we can, nor hear Bible stories, nor look
at pictures." At this moment I stepped forward, for the spell of
former times was so powerfully on me, that I was on the very point
of springing forward with a "Halloo, there, Bill!" as I used to meet
the father in old times; but the look of surprise that greeted my
appearance brought me to myself.
"Is your father at home?" said I.
"Father and mother are both gone out; but I guess, sir, they will be
home in a few moments: won't you walk in?"
I accepted the invitation, and the little girl showed me into a
small and very prettily furnished parlor. There was a piano with
music-books on one side of the room, some fine pictures hung about
the walls, and a little, neat centre-table was plentifully strewn
with books. Besides this, the two recesses on each side of the
fireplace contained each a bookcase with a glass locked door.
The little girl offered me a chair, and then lingered a moment,
as if she felt some disposition to entertain me if she could only
think of something to say; and at last, looking up in my face, she
said in a confidential tone, "Mother says she left Willie and me to
keep house this afternoon while she was gone, and we are putting
up all the things for Sunday, so as to get everything done before
she comes home. Willie has gone to put away the playthings, and
I'm going to put up the books." So saying, she opened the doors of
one of the bookcases, and began busily carrying the books from the
centre-table to deposit them on the shelves, in which employment
she was soon assisted by Willie, who took the matter in hand in a
very masterly manner, showing his sister what were and what were
not "Sunday books" with the air of a person entirely at home in the
business. "Robinson Crusoe" and the many-volumed Peter Parley were
put by without hesitation; there was, however, a short demurring
over a "North American Review," because Willie said he was sure his
father read something one Sunday out of it while Susan averred that
he did not commonly read in it, and only read in it then because the
piece was something about the Bible; but as nothing could be settled
definitively on the point, the review was "laid on the table," like
knotty questions in Congress. Then followed a long discussion over
an extract book, which, as usual, contained all sorts, both sacred,
serious, comic, and profane; and at last Willie, with much gravity,
decided to lock it up, on the principle that it was best to be on
the safe side, in support of which he appealed to me. I was saved
from deciding the question by the entrance of the father and mother.
My old friend knew me at once, and presented his pretty wife to
me with the same look of exultation with which he used to hold up
a string of trout or an uncommonly fine perch of his own catching
for my admiration, and then looking round on his fine family of
children, two more of which he had brought home with him, seemed to
say to me, "There! what do you think of that, now?"
And, in truth, a very pretty sight it was--enough to make any
one's old bachelor coat sit very uneasily on him. Indeed, there is
nothing that gives one such a startling idea of the tricks that
old Father Time has been playing on us, as to meet some boyish or
girlish companions with half a dozen or so of thriving children
about them. My old friend, I found, was in essence just what the boy
had been. There was the same upright bearing, the same confident,
cheerful tone to his voice, and the same fire in his eye; only that
the hand of manhood had slightly touched some of the lines of his
face, giving them a staidness of expression becoming the man and the
father.
"Very well, my children," said Mrs. Fletcher, as, after tea, William
and Susan finished recounting to her the various matters that they
had set in order that afternoon; "I believe now we can say that our
week's work is finished, and that we have nothing to do but rest and
enjoy ourselves."
"Oh, and papa will show us the pictures in those great books that he
brought home for us last Monday, will he not?" said little Robert.
"And, mother, you will tell us some more about Solomon's temple and
his palaces, won't you?" said Susan.
"And I should like to know if father has found out the answer to
that hard question I gave him last Sunday?" said Willie.
"All will come in good time," said Mrs. Fletcher. "But tell me,
my dear children, are you sure that you are quite ready for the
Sabbath? You say you have put away the books and the playthings;
have you put away, too, all wrong and unkind feelings? Do you feel
kindly and pleasantly towards everybody?"
"Yes, mother," said Willie, who appeared to have taken a great part
of this speech to himself; "I went over to Tom Walter's this very
morning to ask him about that chicken of mine, and he said that he
did not mean to hit it, and did not know he had till I told him of
it; and so we made all up again, and I am glad I went."
"I am inclined to think, Willie," said his father, "that if
everybody would make it a rule to settle up all their differences
before Sunday, there would be very few long quarrels and
lawsuits. In about half the cases, a quarrel is founded on some
misunderstanding that would be got over in five minutes if one
would go directly to the person for explanation."
"I suppose I need not ask you," said Mrs. Fletcher, "whether you
have fully learned your Sunday-school lessons?"
"Oh, to be sure," said William. "You know, mother, that Susan and
I were busy about them through Monday and Tuesday, and then this
afternoon we looked them over again, and wrote down some questions."
"And I heard Robert say his all through, and showed him all the
places on the Bible Atlas," said Susan.
"Well, then," said my friend, "if everything is done, let us begin
Sunday with some music."
Thanks to the recent improvements in the musical instruction of the
young, every family can now form a domestic concert, with words and
tunes adapted to the capacity and the voices of children; and while
these little ones, full of animation, pressed round their mother
as she sat at the piano, and accompanied her music with the words
of some beautiful hymns, I thought that, though I might have heard
finer music, I had never listened to any that answered the purpose
of music so well.
It was a custom at my friend's to retire at an early hour on
Saturday evening, in order that there might be abundant time
for rest, and no excuse for late rising on the Sabbath; and,
accordingly, when the children had done singing, after a short
season of family devotion, we all betook ourselves to our chambers,
and I, for one, fell asleep with the impression of having finished
the week most agreeably, and with anticipations of very great
pleasure on the morrow.
Early in the morning I was roused from my sleep by the sound of
little voices singing with great animation in the room next to mine,
and, listening, I caught the following words:--
"Awake! awake! your bed forsake,
To God your praises pay;
The morning sun is clear and bright;
With joy we hail his cheerful light.
In songs of love
Praise God above--
It is the Sabbath day!"
The last words were repeated and prolonged most vehemently by a
voice that I knew for Master William's.
"Now, Willie, I like the other one best," said the soft voice of
little Susan; and immediately she began:--
"How sweet is the day,
When, leaving our play,
The Saviour we seek!
The fair morning glows
When Jesus arose--
The best in the week."
Master William helped along with great spirit in the singing of this
tune, though I heard him observing, at the end of the first verse,
that he liked the other one better, because "it seemed to step off
so kind o' lively;" and his accommodating sister followed him as he
began singing it again with redoubled animation.
It was a beautiful summer morning, and the voices of the children
within accorded well with the notes of birds and bleating flocks
without--a cheerful, yet Sabbath-like and quieting sound.
"Blessed be children's music!" said I to myself; "how much better
this is than the solitary tick, tick, of old Uncle Fletcher's tall
mahogany clock!"
The family bell summoned us to the breakfast room just as the
children had finished their hymn. The little breakfast parlor had
been swept and garnished expressly for the day, and a vase of
beautiful flowers, which the children had the day before collected
from their gardens, adorned the centre-table. The door of one of the
bookcases by the fireplace was thrown open, presenting to view a
collection of prettily bound books, over the top of which appeared
in gilt letters the inscription, "Sabbath Library." The windows were
thrown open to let in the invigorating breath of the early morning,
and the birds that flitted among the rose-bushes without seemed
scarcely lighter and more buoyant than did the children as they
entered the room. It was legibly written on every face in the house,
that the happiest day in the week had arrived, and each one seemed
to enter into its duties with a whole soul. It was still early when
the breakfast and the season of family devotion were over, and the
children eagerly gathered round the table to get a sight of the
pictures in the new books which their father had purchased in New
York the week before, and which had been reserved as a Sunday's
treat. They were a beautiful edition of Calmet's Dictionary, in
several large volumes, with very superior engravings.
"It seems to me that this work must be very expensive," I remarked
to my friend, as we were turning the leaves.
"Indeed it is so," he replied; "but here is one place where I am
less withheld by considerations of expense than in any other. In
all that concerns making a show in the world, I am perfectly ready
to economize. I can do very well without expensive clothing or
fashionable furniture, and am willing that we should be looked on
as very plain sort of people in all such matters; but in all that
relates to the cultivation of the mind, and the improvement of
the hearts of my children, I am willing to go to the extent of my
ability. Whatever will give my children a better knowledge of, or
deeper interest in, the Bible, or enable them to spend a Sabbath
profitably and without weariness, stands first on my list among
things to be purchased. I have spent in this way one third as much
as the furnishing of my house costs me." On looking over the shelves
of the Sabbath Library, I perceived that my friend had been at no
small pains in the selection. It comprised all the popular standard
works for the illustration of the Bible, together with the best
of the modern religious publications adapted to the capacity of
young children. Two large drawers below were filled with maps and
Scriptural engravings, some of them of a very superior character.
"We have been collecting these things gradually ever since we
have been at housekeeping," said my friend; "the children take an
interest in this library, as something more particularly belonging
to them, and some of the books are donations from their little
earnings."
"Yes," said Willie, "I bought Helon's 'Pilgrimage' with my egg
money, and Susan bought the 'Life of David,' and little Robert is
going to buy one, too, next New Year."
"But," said I, "would not the Sunday-school library answer all the
purpose of this?"
"The Sabbath-school library is an admirable thing," said my friend;
"but this does more fully and perfectly what that was intended to
do. It makes a sort of central attraction at home on the Sabbath,
and makes the acquisition of religious knowledge and the proper
observance of the Sabbath a sort of family enterprise. You know," he
added, smiling, "that people always feel interested for an object in
which they have invested money."
The sound of the first Sabbath-school bell put an end to this
conversation. The children promptly made themselves ready, and as
their father was the superintendent of the school, and their mother
one of the teachers, it was quite a family party.
One part of every Sabbath at my friend's was spent by one or both
parents with the children in a sort of review of the week. The
attention of the little ones was directed to their own characters,
the various defects or improvements of the past week were pointed
out, and they were stimulated to be on their guard in the time to
come, and the whole was closed by earnest prayer for such heavenly
aid as the temptations and faults of each particular one might need.
After church in the evening, while the children were thus withdrawn
to their mother's apartment, I could not forbear reminding my friend
of old times, and of the rather anti-sabbatical turn of his mind in
our boyish days.
"Now, William," said I, "do you know that you were the last boy of
whom such an enterprise in Sabbath-keeping as this was to have been
expected? I suppose you remember Sunday at 'the old place'?"
"Nay, now, I think I was the very one," said he, smiling, "for I
had sense enough to see, as I grew up, that the day must be kept
thoroughly or not at all, and I had enough blood and motion in my
composition to see that something must be done to enliven and make
it interesting; so I set myself about it. It was one of the first
of our housekeeping resolutions, that the Sabbath should be made
a pleasant day, and yet be as inviolably kept as in the strictest
times of our good father; and we have brought things to run in that
channel so long that it seems to be the natural order."
"I have always supposed," said I, "that it required a peculiar
talent, and more than common information in a parent, to accomplish
this to any extent."
"It requires nothing," replied my friend, "but common sense, and a
strong determination to do it. Parents who make a definite object
of the religious instruction of their children, if they have common
sense, can very soon see what is necessary in order to interest
them; and, if they find themselves wanting in the requisite
information, they can, in these days, very readily acquire it. The
sources of religious knowledge are so numerous, and so popular
in their form, that all can avail themselves of them. The only
difficulty after all is, that the keeping of the Sabbath and the
imparting of religious instruction are not made enough of a _home_
object. Parents pass off the responsibility on to the Sunday-school
teacher, and suppose, of course, if they send their children to
Sunday-school, they do the best they can for them. Now, I am
satisfied, from my experience as a Sabbath-school teacher, that the
best religious instruction imparted abroad still stands in need
of the coöperation of a systematic plan of religious discipline
and instruction at home; for, after all, God gives a power to the
efforts of a _parent_ that can never be transferred to other hands."
"But do you suppose," said I, "that the _common_ class of minds,
with ordinary advantages, can do what you have done?"
"I think in most cases they could, if they begin right. But when
both parents and children have formed habits, it is more difficult
to change than to begin right at first. However, I think all might
accomplish a great deal if they would give time, money, and effort
towards it. It is because the object is regarded of so little value,
compared with other things of a worldly nature, that so little is
done."
My friend was here interrupted by the entrance of Mrs. Fletcher with
the children. Mrs. Fletcher sat down to the piano, and the Sabbath
was closed with the happy songs of the little ones; nor could I
notice a single anxious eye turning to the window to see if the sun
was not almost down. The tender and softened expression of each
countenance bore witness to the subduing power of those instructions
which had hallowed the last hour, and their sweet, birdlike voices
harmonized well with the beautiful words:--
"How sweet the light of Sabbath eve!
How soft the sunbeam lingering there!
Those holy hours this low earth leave,
And rise on wings of faith and prayer."