QUAKER MEETING.
AFTER a lovely ride of twenty miles the carriage stopped at a large
yellow farm-house in the midst of trees and flowers. Hop-clover hoped
this was Mr. Littlefield’s home; for it looked like just the place
where she would wish to go visiting.
They drove round to a side-door. A girl was seated in the entry with
her lap full of silver, which she was polishing with all the strength
of her big, strong arm.
“How does thee do, Dorothy? Where’s my wife? I’ve brought her some
company,” said the Quaker, smiling as he handed out the three children.
The girl rose, slipped off her apron, and rolled the silver into it
in a heap on the floor. There were six visitors in the house already,
who had come since Mr. Littlefield went away; but Dorothy was not like
Eliza Potter, she did not know how to be cross. She asked Hop-clover if
her foot was “asleep;” but, when she found the little girl was lame,
she seemed very sorry. Then she led the children into the parlor to
her mistress; while Mr. Littlefield drove into the stable with his man
John, to put up the carriage.
Mrs. Littlefield was a lovely little lady, in a drab silk dress and
fine white cap, with a white kerchief crossed upon her bosom. She was
seated with her guests, four Quaker ladies, who also wore white caps
and kerchiefs. She rose when the children entered, and said with a
kind smile that she was very glad they had come. But I am sure she
wondered where her husband had picked them up; for she had never seen
one of them before.
Hop-clover was quite alarmed by the row of Quakers, but she did nothing
worse than to put her finger in her mouth; while Posy blushed crimson,
and Pollio bowed five times,—once for each lady,—not forgetting to
twitch his front-hair. He had never seen women dressed so strangely
before; but he wished them to understand that he thought none the worse
of them for it.
When Mr. Littlefield came in and said the twins were Judge Pitcher’s
children, his wife kissed them again, and said she had always wanted to
see them.
“And thee wants to see this one just as much, when I tell thee who
she is,” said her husband, leading up Hop-clover. “This is Lucinda
Fearing’s child.”
“What? Thee doesn’t mean _our_ Lucinda,—the one that came to us when
our little grandchild Samuel was born, and lived here five years?” said
Mrs. Littlefield, taking Hop-clover in her arms, and hugging her right
against the starched kerchief. “Bless thy little heart! Why, thee looks
like thy mother!”
“I knew thee would be glad to see her, Liddy,” said Mr. Littlefield,
smiling.
The Quaker ladies all looked on with the kindest interest, and said
they remembered “that good Lucinda.”
“She made my caps for me,” said Mrs. Mott.
“She was very steady about going to meeting,” said Mrs. Swan.
“Didn’t she marry a man by the name of Outhouse?” asked Mrs. Crane.
Hop-clover pressed her cheek against the soft kerchief, and felt so
happy that she couldn’t help crying. It was beautiful to see people who
had known and loved her own dear mother.
“This child looks very pale,” said Mr. Littlefield; “but I thought it
might do her good to play with the calves and chickens awhile. What
does _thee_ think, Liddy?”
The twins looked on, and listened to all this with surprise. Hop-clover
was almost a little beggar-child; yet the people in this house seemed
to care more about her than they did about Judge Pitcher’s children.
Posy was glad of it; but Pollio didn’t quite like it, he was used to a
great deal of attention. Supper was now ready, however,—the very nicest
supper; and, Mr. Swan and Mr. Crane coming in, no more was said about
“that good Lucinda.”
Next morning the children made a telegraph in the barn with the
clothes-line, and sent printed messages back and forth, making a
clicking noise with two sticks while they were going. Hop-clover did
not print, like the others, but wrote remarkably well for a child of
her age. This was her message: “Click, Click. _Dorrythe_ is coming out
here.”
And, before the message had gone “across the wires,” Dorothy really
did appear, with a bowl of corn-meal dough; and the children clustered
around to see her feed the late chickens. It was a pretty sight,
especially to Hop-clover.
“_You’re_ having a good time, I guess,” said Dorothy, smiling down upon
the lame girl kindly.
“Oh, I never was so happy! I never saw such cunning chickens! But don’t
you wish they’d been born sooner? I’m afraid they won’t grow up before
the snow comes.”
“No, they won’t, unless we take good care of them. But this is a famous
place for taking care of every thing,—chickens and folks too,” added
Dorothy, smiling again.
“Why don’t you say thee and thou?” asked Pollio, who had been watching
the girl’s speech.
“Because I’m not a Quaker.”
“Don’t you like the Quakers?”
“Oh, yes! I love them dearly. I’ve lived with Mrs. Littlefield ever
since I was twelve years old. She took me when I didn’t know much, and
hadn’t any home or any parents, and she has been a mother to me ever
since. The Littlefields like folks all the better for being poor, or
sick, or in trouble, _I_ believe,” said Dorothy, with another smile at
Hop-clover.
“Why, that’s just like”—began Posy.
“Like Jesus Christ,” said Pollio.
“To be sure it is: they try to be like Him.”
“Dorothy,” said Hop-clover, drawing near the girl, and speaking low,
“did you know my mother?”
“No: she went away just before I came; but I’ve always heard about her.”
“They say she was awful good,” said Pollio, spattering dough rather
spitefully: “what did she do that was so nice?”
“Well, she went to meeting pretty steady, I guess, for one thing.”
“Poh, so does _my_ mother: she goes every Sunday.”
“Quakers go oftener than that: they go every Thursday. They call Sunday
First Day, and Thursday Fifth Day.”
“I’d like to go to Quaker meeting, ’cause my mother used to,” said
Hop-clover thoughtfully.
“Well, perhaps you can: there will be meeting to-day, and all our folks
will go but the hired men,” said Dorothy, going into the house with her
empty bowl.
When Mrs. Littlefield heard of Hop-clover’s wish, she seemed pleased;
and Pollio said at once that he and Posy wished to go too. He knew
he could sit as still in church as anybody, not even excepting
“Lucy-vindy’s” mother.
So they all went off together,—the eight good Quakers in drab, and the
three little children in pink and blue. Hop-clover had the place of
honor; for she walked between Mr. and Mrs. Littlefield, holding a hand
of each. She looked too gay for a Quaker maiden; and so did Posy, for
Posy wore a pink frock and pink stockings, and swung a pink parasol.
She knew she was looking well, and that Pollio’s hat and jacket were
nice; and I fear she tossed her head a little, as she whispered,—
“Don’t take hold of my hand, Pollio: it isn’t _stylish_!”
Posy was a dear little girl; but Nanty and Nunky had asked each other
lately if she wasn’t growing just the least bit vain.
The Quaker meeting-house was brown, and not very pretty. It had no
pulpit, but the children did not know there was no minister either.
They went in and took their seats, which had very high backs. Pollio
sat with Mr. Littlefield, on the men’s side; and Hop-clover and Posy
were wedged in between Mrs. Swan and Mrs. Crane, on the women’s side.
They waited and waited for the minister, but he didn’t come. They
waited and waited for the music, but nobody sang. Then Pollio observed
that the “other men” wore their hats: so he put his on again, and
peeped roguishly across the aisle at the little girls, who peeped back
again, and tried not to smile.
Then they waited longer, and watched the flies, and wondered why
meeting didn’t begin.
Meeting _had_ begun. These good people, with their hats and bonnets
on, were talking to God; and that is what they call a Quaker meeting.
Perhaps somebody would speak by and by, perhaps not; but, at any rate,
it was a Quaker meeting all the same.
It was so warm, and so still, that Pollio fell asleep, but was wakened
by hearing a sing-song voice say,—
“‘While I mused, the fire burned.’”
It was Mr. Littlefield. Pollio half rose on his toes, and stared at
the stove. Where _was_ the fire?
But Mr. Littlefield meant the “fire of love.” He loved God and all
God’s children; and what he said was very beautiful, only Pollio could
not quite understand it.
Then he sat down again, and sat so still, that one fly washed its face
on his hand, and another walked over his nose and peeped at his eyes,
as if to see if he was asleep.
This was too much for Pollio. Perhaps they were Quaker flies, and had
come out of Mr. Littlefield’s pocket; and, when he thought of that, he
giggled outright.
It was too bad, for he was generally a very well-behaved boy in church.
He could not believe his own ears. Posy could not believe hers, either,
though she blushed crimson, and hid behind Hop-clover. If he had only
waited one minute! The Quakers were shaking hands all round for
good-by: Quaker meeting was done!
Pollio rushed out in an agony of shame; but Mr. Littlefield stopped him
in the entry, by laying his hand kindly on his shoulder.
“I suppose thee got pretty tired, Napoleon. Thee isn’t used to our kind
of meetings.”
Oh, to think the man should speak to him again! Pollio had supposed he
was too bad to be noticed.
Posy peeped up at him from under her parasol, and he saw her face was
covered with blushes. Hop-clover gave him a pitying look as she walked
off with Mr. and Mrs. Littlefield; and Pollio knew she never would say
again she wished she had a brother like him.
I suppose he turned fifty somersets after dinner. He always turned them
when he was happy, and still more when he was sad.
“There is something about that little boy that makes me want to laugh,”
said Dorothy to John. “I don’t know whether it’s his straight hair, or
his black eyes, or the way he has of standing on his head.”
“He is the _limberest_ little chap I ever saw,” said John: “and I can’t
keep my face straight when he quirks himself up in such shapes; but I
wish I could, for he is a great rogue, and bothers me by meddling.”
The next John saw of Pollio he was dangling from the hub of one of the
new carriage-wheels, like a young monkey.
“Come away from there, youngster! you mustn’t meddle with that
carriage,” said John rather sharply, trying not to laugh.
Pollio had never heard the word “youngster” before, and thought it did
not sound very respectful as addressed to the son of Judge Pitcher.
Perhaps it had something to do with his laughing in meeting. Oh, of
course! He dropped lightly on the barn-floor; but his lip curled, and
there was a spark in his eye that meant mischief. The moment John’s
back was turned, he was climbing the wheel, “hand over hand,” into the
carriage.
“O Pollio, get right down!” cried Posy. “You know what John said.”
“Who’s John? He’s no business with _me_!” said Pollio, turning a
somerset on the back-seat.
“O Hop-clover! mustn’t he get down?”
“Of course he must,” replied Hop-clover, chewing some wheat she had
found in a barrel.
“Tell you what it is!” said Pollio, dancing up and down, “if Mr.
Littlefield had a boy, my father’d let him play in _our_ carriage as
easy as nothing.”
“Well, Ike wouldn’t,” returned Posy.
“I can’t help it about Ike, and I can’t help it about John: I guess Mr.
Littlefield wants to be polite to his company,” said Pollio, cracking
the whip.
The little girls had to run away for fear of being hit. It troubled
them to see Pollio climb the wheels, and walk on the thills; but, the
more they begged, the more he was determined to have his own way.
“Oh, what little cowards! ’Fraid of a whip, and ’fraid of a carriage
without any horse! See me now! I can turn a somerset right on the
wheel!”
Whether he would have tried to do it and broken his neck, I can’t
say; for, as he was prancing up and down on the thill, he was stopped
suddenly by a crackling noise, as if wood was splitting in two. He knew
what it was: he had broken the thill!
His brown face turned almost white as he slipped back into the carriage.
“‘O boys! carry me ’long,’” sang he in a husky voice, as if nothing had
happened.
The girls had not heard the noise, for they had been screaming to him
not to turn a somerset on the wheel.
“‘O boys! carry me ’long.’ ‘Swing low, sweet chariot!’” said pale,
guilty Pollio, scrambling slowly down from the carriage. “Let’s go find
some eggs.”
What would he have given now if it were this forenoon instead of this
afternoon! What would he have given if he had obeyed John, and not
broken the beautiful new carriage, and disgraced himself forever!
But need anybody know he had broken it? John was coming back with the
colts; and, as Pollio saw him, he plunged headlong into a barrel of
straw. John laughed, and thought that was a boy’s way of hunting for
eggs. He did not suppose Pollio had climbed into the carriage at all.
“Glad I got out before he came,” thought Pollio, his heart beating
fast.