It was a fair, fair May morning when Mr. Linden and Faith set forth on
their expedition to Kildeer river. After their early rising and early
breakfast, they took their way down to the shore of the Mong, where the
little sail-boat lay rocking on the incoming tide, her ropes and
streamers just answering to the morning breeze. The soft spring
sunlight glinted on every tree and hillside. The "Balm of a Thousand
Flowers"--true and not spurious--was sprinkled through the air, under
the influence of which unseen nectar the birds became almost
intoxicated with joy; pouring out their songs with a sort of
spendthrift recklessness,--the very fish caught the infection, and
flashed and sparkled in the blue water by shoals at a time.
In the sailboat now stood baskets and shawls, a book or two, an empty
basket for wild flowers, and by the tiller sat Faith--invested with her
new dignity but not yet instructed therein. Mr. Linden stood on the
shore, with the boat's detaining rope in his hand, looking about him as
if he had a mind to take the good of things as he went along. Up the
hill from the shore, trotted Jerry and Mr. Skip.
"Endecott," said Faith joyously,--"Goethe would have more than enough
if he was here."
She was not a bad part of the picture herself; fair and glad as she
looked, as fair as the May morning and the birds and the sunlight.--
"Isn't this air sweet?"
"Very! But Goethe would choose my point of view. So much depends, in a
picture, upon the principal light!"
"I wonder which is the principal light to-day!" said Faith laughing.
"How it sparkles all over the river, and then on the young leaves and
buds;--and then soft shining on the clouds. And they are all May! Look
at those tiny specks of white cloud scattered along the horizon, up
there towards Neanticut."
"The principal light to-day," said Mr. Linden, "is one particular
sunbeam, which as it were leads off the rest. It's a fair train,
altogether!" and he threw the rope into the little vessel, and jumped
in himself; then lifting Faith a little from her place, and arranging
and disposing of her daintily among shawls and cushions, and putting
her unwonted fingers upon the tiller.
"Now Miss Derrick," he said, "before we go any further, I should like
to know your estimate and understanding of the power at present in your
hands."
"I know what a rudder is good for," said Faith merrily. "I know that
this ship, 'though it be so great, and driven of fierce winds, yet is
it turned about with a very small helm whithersoever the governor
listeth.' That is what you may call theoretical knowledge."
"Clearly your estimate covers the ground! But you perceive, that while
you take upon yourself the guiding of the boat--(if I might venture to
suggest!--our course lies up the Mong, and not out to sea)--I, with my
sail, control the motive power."
"You mean that if I don't go right, you'll drop the sail?"--
"Not at all!--I shall navigate, not drift. Do you suppose I shall
surrender at the first summons?"
"What would you consider a 'summons'?" said Faith with a funny look. "I
don't think your sail can do much against my rudder."
"My sail regulates the boat's headway--which in its turn affects the
rudder. (If we run down those fishermen the damages may be heavy.) But
you see I have this advantage,--I know beforehand your system of
navigation--you don't know mine. Let me inform your unpractised eyes,
Miss Derrick, that the dark object just ahead of us is a snag."
"My eyes don't see any better for that information," said Faith; with
great attention however managing to guide their little craft clear of
both snag and fishermen, and almost too engaged in the double duty to
have leisure for laughing. But practice is the road to excellence and
ease; Faith learned presently the correspondence between the rudder and
her hand, and in the course of a quarter of an hour could keep the
north track with tolerable steadiness. The wind was fair for a straight
run up the Mong. The river stretching north in a diminishing blue
current (pretty broad however at Pattaquasset and for some miles up)
shewed its low banks in the tenderest grading of colour; very softly
brown in the distance, and near the eye opening into the delicate hues
of the young leaf. The river rolled its bright blue, and the
overarching sky was like one of summer's. Yet the air was not
so,--spicy from young buds; and the light was _Springy_; not Summer's
ardour nor Summer's glare, but that loveliest promise of what is coming
and oblivion of what is past. So the little boat sailed up the Mong.
Mr. Linden's sail was steady, Faith's rudder was still.
"Faith," Mr. Linden said suddenly, "have you made up your mind to my
letter plan?"
"About Reuben? O yes. I am willing."
"You know you are to send me every possible question that comes up in
the course of your studies, and every French exercise, and every doubt
or discomfort of any kind--if any should come. I shall not be easy
unless I think that."
"But you won't have time for my French exercises!"
"Try me. And you are to take plenty of fresh air, and not a bit of
fatigue; and in general are to suppose yourself a rare little plant
belonging to me, which I have left in your charge for the time being.
Do you understand, Mignonette?"
Her blush and smile, of touched pleasure, shewed abundance of
understanding.
"But I want you to tell me, Endecott, all the things in particular you
would like to have me do or attend to while you are away--besides my
studies. I have been thinking to ask you, and waiting for a good time."
"'All the things'?--of what sort, dear child?"
"Aren't there some of your poor people you would like to have
particularly attended to? I could get Reuben to go with me, you know,
where it was too far for me to go alone--or mother."
"Yes, there are some things you might do," said Mr. Linden, "for me and
for them, though more in the way of sending than going; the places are
too far off. But I should like to know that Mrs. Ling's mother had a
bunch of garden flowers now and then, and that another went to that
little lame girl on the Monongatesak road; and once in a great while
(not often, or they will lose their charm) you may send the Roscoms two
fresh eggs!--not more, on any account. Reuben will go for you,
anywhere--and the Roscoms are old protégées of his."
"I didn't mean to forget the Roscoms," said Faith. "But must one manage
with them so carefully?"
"In matter of favours, yes. And even in matter of visits, to a certain
degree,--their life is so monotonous that novelty has a great charm.
Reuben used to go and read to them almost every day on his way from
school, but I found it best to make my coming an event."
"Can I do anything for Reuben?"
"Nothing new that I know of, at present--you are doing something for
him all the while,--and it will be a wonderful delight to him to bring
you letters. Then if you are ever driving down that Monongatesak road,
with nothing to hinder, take the little lame child with you for a mile
or two,--she so pines to be out of the house and moving. Would it be
disagreeable to you?--there is nothing but what is pleasant in her
appearance."
"What if there were?" she said with a wistful look at him. "Do _you_
mind disagreeablenesses? and do you want to have me mind them?"
"No, dear child, but you must get wonted by degrees,--and some
temperaments can never bear what others can. What if we were to
overhaul those fishermen?"
"What do you want?" said Faith, as she carefully set the boat's head
that way. "A fish for dinner?"
"No"--said Mr. Linden,--"I have too much respect for that basket at my
feet. But you know, Faith, we are having a sort of preliminary
play-practice at seeking our fortune, to-day--we must carry it out.
Just imagine, my dear, that we are adrift in this boat, with nothing at
all for dinner, and supper a wild idea!--not the eastern fisherman who
for four fish received from the Sultan four hundred pieces of gold,
would then appear so interesting as these."
"If you wanted dinner from them--but you say you don't," said Faith
laughing. "Endecott, I don't understand in the least! And besides, you
said you wouldn't 'drift' but navigate!"
And her soft notes rolled over the water, too soft to reach the yet
somewhat distant fishermen.
"And so because I turn navigator you turn Siren!" said Mr. Linden. "But
I have you safe in my boat--I need not stop to listen."
"But what did you mean?"
"By what?"
"All that."
"Short and comprehensive!" said Mr. Linden--"come up on the other side,
Faith, the current is less strong. All about seeking our fortune, do
you mean? Did you never hear of any other extraordinary prince and
princess who did the same?"
"If I am not adrift in the boat, I am in my wits!" said Faith,--"and
with no sail nor rudder either. Why are those fishermen interesting,
Endecott?"
"Why my child," he said, "in the supposititious case which I put, they
were interesting as having fish, while we had none. But in the
reality--they were picturesque in the distance,--what they are near by
we will see," he added with a smile at her, as the sail came round and
the little boat shot up alongside of her rough-looking relation. "Well
friends, what cheer?--besides a May morning and a fair wind?"
The fishermen slowly dragging their net, hoarsely speculating on its
probable weight of fish, paused both their oars and tongues and looked
at him. One of the men had the oars; the other at the end of the boat
was hauling in, hand over hand.
"That's about all the cheer you want, I guess,--aint it?" said this
man. It was said freely enough, but with no incivility.
"Not all _I_ want," said Mr. Linden,--while the oarsman, rolling his
tobacco in his mouth, came out with--
"Shouldn't wonder, now, if 'twan't much in your line o'
business!--guess likely you be one o' the mighty smart folks that don't
do nothin'."
"I've no objection to being 'mighty smart'," said Mr. Linden, belaying
his rope with a light hand, "but I shouldn't like to pay such a price
for it. Smartness will have to come down before I'm a purchaser."
The man looked at him with a queer little gleam crossing his face--
"Shouldn't wonder if you hadn't took it when it was down!" he said.
"It's a great thing to know the state of the market," said Mr. Linden.
"I suppose you find that with your fish."
"Gen'lly do, when we take 'em,"--said the man at the net, who never
took his eye off the overhauling boat and its crew. He was not a young
man, but a jovial-looking fellow. "What fish be _you_ arter, stranger?"
"Somewhat of a variety," Mr. Linden said with a smile. "What makes the
fish come into your net?"
"Haven't an idee!" said the man--"without it bees that fish is very
onintelligent creturs. I don't suppose fish has much brains, sir. And
so they goes further and fares worse." Which statement of the case he
appeared to think amusing.
"But then why do they sometimes stay out?" said Mr. Linden,--"because I
have read of men who 'toiled all the night and caught nothing'."
"Wall, you see," said the fisher, "they goes in shoals or flocks like,
and they's notional. Some of 'em won't come at one time o' tide, and
some won't come at another--and they has their favourite places too.
Then if a man sets his nets where the fish _aint_, all creation might
work and catch nothin'. This side the river is better now than over
there."
"These men that I was talking of," said Mr. Linden, "once found a
difference even between the two sides of their ship. But the other
time, when they had caught nothing all the night, in the morning they
caught so many that their net broke and both their ships began to sink."
"What kind o' folks was them?" said the oarsman a little scornfully.
"Why they were fishermen," said Mr. Linden. "They followed your calling
first, and then they followed mine."
"What's yourn?" said the other, in his tone of good-humoured interest.
"Guess you're a speaker o' some sort--aint ye?"
"Yes--" Mr. Linden said, with a little demure gesture of the head,--"I
am--'of some sort,' as you say. But I've got an account of these men in
my pocket--don't you want to hear it?--it's more interesting than any
account you could have of me."
"Like to hear it well enough--" said the man at the net, setting
himself astride the gunwale to listen, with the net hanging from his
hand.
"I wouldn't mind knowing how they worked it--" said the other man,
while Mr. Linden threw a rope round one of the thole-pins of the
fishing boat and gave the other end to Faith, and then took out his
book. And Faith was amused at the men's submissive attention, and the
next minute did not wonder at all!--as she noted the charm that held
them--the grace of mingled ease, kindliness, and power, in Mr. Linden's
manner and presence. Nothing could have greater simplicity, and it was
not new to Faith, yet she looked at him as if she had never seen him
before.
"A great many years ago," he said, "when the Son of God, our Lord Jesus
Christ, was in this world, he went about healing sick people, and
teaching every one the way to heaven; and the people came in great
numbers to hear him.
"'And it came to pass, that, as the people pressed upon him to hear the
word of God, he stood by the lake of Gennesareth, and saw two ships
standing by the lake; but the fishermen were gone out of them, and were
washing their nets.'"
"We wash our'n by pullin' 'em through the water," said the net man.
"The Lord entered one of the ships, which belonged to a man named
Simon, and asked him to push out a little from the shore. 'And he sat
down, and taught the people out of the ship. Now, when he had left
speaking, he unto Simon, Launch out into the deep, and let down your
nets for a draught. And Simon answering, said unto him, Master, we have
toiled all the night, and have taken nothing; nevertheless, at thy word
I will let down the net.'"
"In course! whether 'twas any use or not,"--the man with the net said
approvingly. "So he had oughter."
"Yes, and he knew it would be of use in some way, for God never gives a
command without a reason. And when they had let down the net, 'they
enclosed a great multitude of fishes: and their net brake. And they
beckoned unto their partners, which were in the other ship, that they
should come and help them. And they came, and filled both the ships, so
that they began to sink.'"
"That was a bigger haul than ever I see, yet," remarked the man.
"Neither had Simon ever seen anything like it--he knew that it was
brought about by the direct power of God.
"When Simon Peter saw it, he fell down at Jesus' knees, saying, 'Depart
from me; for I am a sinful man, O Lord.' For he was astonished, and all
they that were with him, at the draught of the fishes which they had
taken."
"Can't see what he said _that_ fur," said the oarsman.
"No more don't I!" said the other. "He had got a good haul o' fish,
anyway--if he was ever so!--and we aint none of us white lilies."
"But then Peter knew that he ought to be a white lily--and such a new
view of God's power and greatness made him feel it more than ever. So
that he was both afraid and ashamed,--he thought himself unworthy to
have the Lord in his ship, and was afraid to have him stay there."
"I wouldn't have asked him to go out, if he had been in mine,--_I_
don't think!"--said the elder fisher slowly. "I don't see as that chap
need to ha' been afeard--he hadn't done nothin' but good to him."
"But it's what we do ourselves that makes us afraid," said Mr. Linden.
"So it was with Adam and Eve in the garden, you know--God had talked to
them a great many times, and they were never afraid till they disobeyed
him--then the moment he spoke they ran and hid themselves."
The oarsman was silent, the other man gave a sort of grunt that
betokened interest.
"What shines had this feller been cuttin' up?"
"Why!" said Mr. Linden, starting up and taking his stand by the mast,
as the little boat curtseyed softly over the waves, "if you tell one of
your boys always to walk in one particular road, and you find him
always walking in another--I don't think it matters much what he's
doing there, to him or to you."
"Wall?"--said the man, with a face of curiosity for what was to come
next, mingled with a certain degree of intelligence that would not
confess itself.
"Well--Peter knew he was not in the way wherein the Lord commands us
all to walk."
"I guess every feller's got to pick out his own road for himself!" said
the fisher, pulling up a foot or two of his net carelessly.
"That's what Peter had thought,--and so he had lived, just as he chose.
But when he saw more of the glory of God, then he was afraid and
confessed his sin. And what do you suppose the Lord said to him then?"
"What did Peter own up to?"
"The account gives only the general confession--that he was a sinful
man, not worthy to have the Lord look upon him except in anger. You see
he falls down at his feet and prays him to depart--he could not believe
that the Lord would stay there to speak good to him."
"Well--what _did_ he say to him?"
"'He said unto him, Fear not'. And no one need fear, who humbly
confesses his sins at the feet of Jesus, 'for if we confess our sins,
he is faithful and just to forgive us our sins, and to cleanse us from
all unrighteousness.' Then the Lord bade Simon and all his companions
to follow him--and they obeyed. And now I want to tell you what this
following means."
He put one arm round the mast, half leaning against it, and gave them
what Faith would have called a 'ladder'--passing from the 'Follow me,'
spoken to Peter,--to the young man who being bid to follow, 'went away
sorrowful',--to the description of the way given in the tenth chapter
of John,--to the place whither the flock follow Christ--
"'And I looked, and lo, a Lamb stood on the mount Zion, and with him an
hundred forty and four thousand, having his Father's name written in
their foreheads.' 'These are they which follow the Lamb whithersoever
he goeth.'"--
The men listened, open-mouthed and with intent eyes;--partly to the
speaker, it was evident, and partly to what the speaker said. And that
his words took hold, it was also evident. When he ceased, the man at
the net dropped his eyes for a moment, a curious look of meditation
covering his face.
"It's easy to talk of follerin'," he said with a half laugh which was
not of carelessness,--"and one might like to,--but it's plaguey hard to
know where to start!--"
"It's easy for God to teach you and easy to ask him to do it. If it was
anything else you wanted to do, you would not stop trying till you
found out," said Mr. Linden--"and that is just the way here. Now I am
going to give you a copy of all this," he said, throwing his own little
Bible softly into Faith's lap and stepping forward to the prow of the
boat (which she thought held only lunch baskets)--"and I shall turn
down a leaf at the story of the net full of good fishes--and another at
a place that tells of a net full 'of every kind, both bad and good.'
And I want you to read them, and think about them, and find out how to
follow Christ--and then come on!" He took his seat once more in the
stern of the boat, and held out the Bible to the fisherman. The other
man, slowly dipping his oars in and out, met his look too, but made no
answer.
The man at the net took the book and turned over the leaves with a
wondering, considering air.
"What do you reckon this here's worth?" he said somewhat awkwardly,
without raising his eyes from it.
"Worth daily reading and study--worth all you have in the world, if you
will use it right," said Mr. Linden. "You need not think about any
other value--I had it in trust to give away."
"I'm much obleeged to you,--I'll take a look at it now and then. Do you
live along here, anywheres?"
"In Pattaquasset, just now," Mr. Linden said, as he prepared to make
sail again. "I don't very often come to this part of the river."
"Well hold on!" said the man, beginning to pull in his net with great
vivacity,--"I'm bound to give you a fish--if I've got one here. Bear a
hand, Dick! Haint you got a place on board there that you can stow it,
without skeerin' the lady?"--
"I'll try to find one!" said Mr. Linden, answering the proposal just as
it was meant. "If the lady is scared she shall turn her face the other
way."
"She'll turn it which way you say?--" ventured the fisher insinuatingly.
Faith did not seem afraid of the fish, by the way she leaned over the
stern of the boat and eyed the up-coming nets which the men were
drawing in. She had listened to the foregoing talk, to the full as
intently as those for whom it was meant, and with a multitude of
interests at work in her mind and heart of which they had never
dreamed. And now her eye was bent on the net; but her thoughts were on
that other kind of fishing of which she had just seen an example--the
first she had ever seen of Mr. Linden's!--and her full heart was
longingly thinking, among other thoughts, of the few there were to draw
those nets, and the multitude to be drawn! What Faith saw in the meshes
the man's hands were slowly pulling up!--
But the fisherman only saw--what pleased him greatly, some very fine
fish; shad they were for the greater part; from which he selected a
noble specimen and cast it over into Mr. Linden's boat. Then standing
up in his own he wiped his hands on the sleeves of his coat.
"Hope you'll come along again some day," said he. "And" (waggishly)
"don't come without the lady!"--
The rope was drawn in and the little skiff shot ahead smoothly and
silently from the great brown fishing boat and her equally brown
owners. Gliding on--watched for a little by the fishers, then their
attention was claimed by the flapping shad in the net, and the sail
boat set her canvas towards Kildeer river. Mr. Linden went forward and
bestowed his prisoner a little more out of sight and sound in some
place of safety, and then sitting down in the prow dipped his hands in
the blue water and took a survey of Faith, as she sat in the stern--the
tiller in her hand, the shadow of the sail falling partly across; the
spring zephyrs playing all about her.
"Little bird," he said, "why don't you sing?"
A smile of much and deep meaning went back from the stern to the prow;
but she presently made the somewhat obvious remark that "birds do not
always sing."
"A melancholy fact in natural history! the truth of which I am just now
experiencing. What shall be done with them at these times--are they to
be coaxed--or chidden or fed with sponge cake? Have you got any in your
basket?"
"Are you hungry?" said Faith.
"Only for words--or songs--or some other commodity of like origin," Mr.
Linden said, coming back to his old place. "What shall I have?--if I
cannot get the two first?"
"You might have a little patience?--"
"'Patience', my dear, 'is a good root'--but nothing akin to sugar
canes."
"There's no need of it, either," said Faith laughing,--"for _you_ can
sing if I can't."
"No, there is no need of it, and therefore--Now, little bird, will you
please not to fly past the outlet of Kildeer river?"
Laughing, colouring, Faith nevertheless bent a very earnest attention
upon this difficult piece of navigation. For the opening of Kildeer
river was as yet but slightly to be discerned;--a little break in the
smooth shore line,--a very little atmospheric change in the soft leafy
hues of the nearer and further point. Faith watched, as only a young
steersman does, for the time and place where her rudder should begin to
take cognizance of the approaching change of course. A little wider the
break in the shore line grew,--more plain the mark of a break in the
trees,--and almost suddenly the little stream unfolded its pretty reach
of water and woodland, stretching in alluringly with picturesque turns
of its mimic channel. Faith needed a little help now, for the river was
not everywhere navigable; but after a few minutes of pretty sailing
among care-requiring rocks and sand-banks, where the loss of wind made
their progress slow, the little skiff was safely brought to land at a
nice piece of gravelly shore. It was wonderful pretty! The trees with
their various young verdure came down to the water's edge, with many a
dainty tint; here one covered with soft catkins of flower,--there one
ruddy with not yet opened buds. The winding banks of the stream on one
hand; and on the other the little piece of it they had passed over,
with the breadth of the Mong beyond. Through all, May's air and
Spring's perfume, and the stillness of noonday.
"Inverted in the tide
Stand the grey rocks, and trembling shadows throw.
And the fair trees look over, side by side,
And see themselves below."
So Mr. Linden told Faith, as he was putting his sail in trim repose,
and then--telling her that the guiding power was still in her hands,
requested to know what they should do next.
"Why," said Faith merrily, "I thought you had business to attend to?"
"I had--" said Mr. Linden,--"but I reflected that you would probably
give me full occupation, and so got rid of the business first."
"Then you have nothing to do here?"
"A great deal, I suppose; but I know not what."
Faith fairly sat down to laugh at him.
"What do you think of having lunch, and then going after flowers?"
"I consider that to be a prudent, bird-like suggestion. Do you expect
me to cook this fish for you? or will you be content to take it home to
your mother, and let us feast upon--
"'Herbs, and such like country messes,
Which neat-handed Phyllis dresses'?"
"_Have_ you all the books in the world in your head?"--said Faith,
laughing her own little laugh roundly. "How plain it is Mr. Linden has
nothing to do to-day!--Would you like to help me to gather some sticks
for a fire, sir? I think you had better have something on your hands."
"Do you?" he said lifting her out of the boat in his curiously quick,
strong, light way,--"that was something on my hands--not much. What
next?--do you say we are to play Ferdinand and Miranda?"
Faith's eye for an instant looked its old look, of grave, intelligent,
doubtful questioning: but then she came back to Kildeer river.
"I haven't played that play yet," she said gaily; "but if you'll help
me find some dry sticks--your reward shall be that you shall not have
what you don't like! I can make a fire nicely here, Endecott; on this
rock."
"Then it was not about them you were reading in that focus of sunbeams?"
"What?--" she said, looking.
"Once upon a time--" Mr. Linden said smiling,--"when you and Shakspeare
got lost in the sunlight, and wandered about without in the least
knowing where you were."
"When, Endecott?"
"Leave that point," he said,--"I want to tell you about the story.
Ferdinand, whom I represent, was a prince cast away upon a desert
shore--which shore was inhabited by the princess Miranda, whom you
represent. Naturally enough, in the course of time, they came to think
of each other much as we do--perhaps 'a little more so' on the part of
Miranda. But then Miranda's father set Ferdinand to carrying wood,--as
you--acting conscientiously for Mrs. Derrick--do me."
"I wonder if I ever shall understand you!" exclaimed Faith desperately,
as her laugh again broke upon the sweet air that floated in from the
Mong. "What has my conscience, or Mrs. Derrick, to do with our lunch
fire? Why was the other prince set to carrying wood?"
"For the same reason that I am!" said Mr. Linden raising his eyebrows.
"To prove his affection for Miranda."
How Faith laughed.
"You are mistaken--O how mistaken you are!" she exclaimed. "It shews
that though you know books, you don't know everything."
And running away with her own armful of sticks and leaves, back to the
rock spoken of near where the vessel lay, Faith was stopped and
relieved of her load, with such an earnest--
"'No, precious creature,
I'd rather crack my sinews, break my back,
Than you should such dishonour undergo'--"
that she could do nothing but laugh, till the sticks were fairly on the
rock. Then Faith went to laying them daintily together.
"I hope you've no objection to my making the fire," she said; "because
I like it. Only, Endecott! the matches are in the basket. Could you get
them for me? Indeed I shall want the basket too out of the boat."
Whereupon Mr. Linden--
"'The very instant I saw you, did
My heart fly to your service: there reside,
To make me slave to it; and for your sake,
Am I this patient log man'!--"
But anything less like those two last words than the way in which he
sprang into the boat, and brought the basket, and got out what she
called for, could hardly be.
"How many matches do you want?" he said, looking demurely at her as he
gave her one.
"All of them,--basket and all, Endecott. You are so patient that you do
not hear."
"And you so impatient that you do not see--'basket and all' are at your
side, fair princess.--Stand back,--it may be very well for the winds to
'blow, and crack their cheeks,' but I think it should be confined to
them." And she was laughingly held back, where she could only use her
eyes about the fire.
"That's my province," said Faith. "I think any effort to make a
princess of me, will--fail. Did Miranda pick up any wood herself?"
"You can't help being a princess if I am a prince," said Mr. Linden.
"I don't see how it follows," said Faith. "Only let me get at that
fire, and the fancy will pass away. Endecott!--it is absolutely
necessary that some wood should be put on; and I don't believe princes
know how."
"Princes," said Mr. Linden, holding her a little off with one hand,
while with the other he replenished the fire, "are especially famed for
their power of doing impossible things in desert places. And the
princess will follow--whether you can see it or not. Is that blaze
aspiring enough for you?"
"Yes, but it needs to be kept up--I want a good bed of coals."
A fine fire was on its way at last, and while waiting for it to burn
down to the desired bed of coals, the temporary prince and princess sat
down on the rock to feast their eyes in the mean time. A little past
midday, it was not the picturesque hour for another season; but now, in
the freshness of Spring, the delicate beauties of colour and light
could bear the full meridian sun and not ask for shadows to set them
off; other than the tender shade under the half-leaved trees. It was a
warm enough day too, and those same leaves were making a great spring
towards their full unfolding. Birds were twittering all around, and
they only filled up the silence.
"Isn't it worth coming for!--" said Faith, when they had taken it all
in for a few minutes without interrupting the birds.
"More than that--and the 'it' is very plural. Faith, do you see that
butterfly?"--A primrose-winged rover was meandering about in the soft
air before them, flitting over the buttercups with a listless sort of
admiration.
"Poor thing, he has come out too soon," said Faith. "He will have some
frost yet, for so summery as it is to-day." But Faith gave a graver
look at the butterfly than his yellow wings altogether warranted.
"Among the ancients," said Mr. Linden, "the word for a butterfly and
the word for the soul were the same,--they thought the first was a good
emblem of the lightness and airiness of the last. So they held, that
when a man died a butterfly might be seen flitting above his head. I
was thinking how well this one little thing shews the exceeding lowness
of heathen ideas."
"Did they think the butterfly was his very spirit, in that form?"
"I suppose so--or thought they did. But look at that creature's
wavering, unsteady flight; his aimless wanderings, anywhere or nowhere;
and compare it with the 'mounting up with wings as eagles', which a
Christian soul may know, even in this life,--compare it with the swift
'return to God who gave it'--with the being 'caught up to meet the
Lord' which it shall surely know at death."
"And the butterfly isn't further from that," said Faith clasping her
hands together,--"than many a real, living soul in many a living
person!"--
"No, not further; and so what the old Greeks made an emblem of the
immortal soul, gives name, with us, to those persons who are most tied
down to mortality. What were you thinking of, a minute ago, when I
shewed you the butterfly?"
"I was thinking of somebody that I am afraid a butterfly will always
remind me of,"--Faith answered with a slight colour;--"and of the time
he got the name."
"He got it by favour of his office, you know--not otherwise."
"I know--"
But with that, Faith jumped up to see to the state of the fire; and
then after some conjuration in her basket produced a suspicious-looking
tin vessel, for which the proper bed of coals was found. Leaving it and
the fire to agree together, Faith came back to the rock and Mr. Linden
and stood a little while silently looking and breathing the sweetness.
"I always did love everything in the world, that my eyes could see,"
she said gravely. "But I love them so much more now!--now that the hand
that made them is not such a strange far-off hand to me. It makes a
kind of new world to me, Endecott."
"Yes--and you can understand how--even without physical changes--when
we 'shall know as we are known,' the 'heavens and earth wherein
dwelleth righteousness' may be preëminently 'new'."
Faith stood without reply a few minutes longer, then ran back to her
fire; and after a short space called to Mr. Linden to ask if he would
like to come and see what the prince had been picking up wood for?
To which the prince responded with very un-royal alacrity, bringing a
well-put-together knot of buttercups to adorn one side of Miranda's
head; which he declared looked better than gold beads, if they didn't
cost as much.
A napkin was spread on the rock, conveniently near to the fire; on
which plates and bread and a bottle of cream and a dainty looking pasty
were irregularly bestowed. Mr. Linden threw himself down on the moss;
and Faith had got a cup and saucer out of her basket and was just
sugaring and creaming the prince's reward before applying to her dish
on the fire for the crowning coffee; when her eye was caught by a
spectator lately come upon the scene. No other than a somewhat ragged
little boy, who eyeing them from the bank had been irresistibly lured
nearer and nearer, by the grace of the preparations and the steam of
the hot coffee perhaps, till he now stood by the trunk of the nearest
tree.
"What are you doin'?" he said.
"What are you?" said Mr. Linden, turning to look at the boy--not just
as _he_ looked at the coffee, but very much as the coffee looked at
him. "Did you never see people eat dinner?"
The boy stood his ground with, "What you got?"
"When was the last time?" said Mr. Linden. ("Princess--this may turn
out to be a subject!")
"Last time _what?_" said the "subject" stoutly.
"The last time you saw people eating dinner," said Mr. Linden. "Did you
ever go to the Museum?"
"I've went to Pettibaug!"--
"When is the last time you saw people eating dinner?" said Faith.
"We haint got none to our house."
"What's the matter?"
"Mintie said there warn't nothin' to eat and I might go a
blackberryin'."
"You've come to the right place," said Mr. Linden,--"I don't believe
they're ripe anywhere else. Who is 'Mintie'? and who stays with her
while you're after blackberries?"
"Mintie's sissy. There aint nobody stayin' with her--she's stayin'
along o' mother--when she's up."
"Where is she?--I mean where does she live--and you, and Mintie. Where
is your house?"
"Round there--'Taint fur. What you got?"
Faith set down her cup and looked at Mr. Linden.
"What is the matter with your mother?"
"She's sick."
"Well if I give you a basket, and this lady puts some dinner in it for
your mother and Mintie and you, do you think you can carry it home?"
"Is your sister sick too?" said Faith.
"She's got the fever nagur."
"Endecott," said Faith softly,--"shall we go and see them?"
"Yes, of course. What's your name, child?"
"My name's Bob Tuck."
Mr. Linden looked at him.
"How comes it that you and Dromy are no more alike?" he said.
"Mother says Dromy aint like nothin' _I_ be."
"Well Bob Tuck," said Mr. Linden smiling, "have you got a broom at
home?"
"There's two old ones."
"Then if you will go home and sweep the floor as well as you can, with
the two old brooms, and set the table, I'll bring this lady to see you
and we'll carry the basket--(which means, Princess, that _I_
will!)--and you can let the blackberries hang on till they get ripe. Do
you understand?"
"If I'll sweep the floor, you'll fetch the basket?" said Bob.
"Yes. And you can wash your hands nicely and be ready to help me take
the things out of it."
Bob started. "How soon 'll you come?"
"As soon as I finish my dinner."
"How good it is I brought the whole pie!" said Faith, as she poured the
delayed coffee upon the cream and sugar. "And there's your shad,
Endecott! unless you prefer to take that home, and we'll send something
else.--Now you see what you picked up sticks for?"
"I see--" Mr. Linden said, looking at her. "And you see, Princess, what
royalty is apt to meet if it will go wandering round the world."
"What?"
"Bob Tuck!--"
"Well--it's a good thing for Bob Tuck to meet with royalty,"--said
Faith, looking at the pie Mr. Linden was cutting.
"Princess," said Mr. Linden, "have you any 'Queen Anne' in your basket?"
Faith looked, her merry, puzzled, grave look of inquiry,--and then
there was nothing for it but a ringing laugh again.
"I would rather have that at a venture, if I were the sick one," said
Mr. Linden. "But the specific most prized by that class of the
population who have 'fever nagur', is called in their vernacular 'Queen
Anne'--anglice, quinine. Faith, you have no idea how those buttercups
are beautified!"
"Flowers always are, that you handle," said Faith.
"You see how appropriate they are to my Sunbeam--for
'The buttercup catches the sun in his chalice'."
"What is a chalice?"
"A sort of cup--a church service cup, generally. Did you admire so much
the head of clover I gave you once down at the shore?"
Faith gave him a curious glance of recollection; but though there was a
half smile on her face too, she remained silent.
"Well, little bird?" he said smiling. "Of what is that look compounded?"
"Various things, I suppose. Let me have your cup, Endecott?"
"Do you know," he said, "that for a scholar, you
are--remarkably--unready to answer questions?"
"I didn't know it."
"Are you not aware of any class of recollective remarks or inquiries
which now and then break forth, and which you invariably smother with a
thick blanket of silence?"
There was another quick glance and smile, and then Faith said as she
handed him his cup,--
"What do you want to know, Endecott?"
"I want to know where there was ever just such another princess. And by
the way, speaking of the shore--I have something that belongs to her."
"To me?"
"Oui, mademoiselle."
"May I know what?"
"You may, yet not just now. You may guess what it is."
But Faith gave up guessing in despair at one of Mr. Linden's puzzles.
The basket was repacked when the lunch was done; and they set out on
their walk. The way, following Bob's direction, led along the bank
under the trees, turning a little before the Mong was reached. The
house was soon found; standing alone, in an enclosed garden ground
where no spade had been struck that season; and at the end of a farm
road that shewed no marks of travel.
Bob had not only swept the room, but his tidings had roused apparently
his sister to prepare herself also; for Mintie met them as they came
in. She was a handsome girl, with a feverish colour in her cheeks that
made her appearance only more striking. There was pride and poverty
here, clearly. Faith's simple words neither assumed the one nor
attacked the other. The girl looked curiously at her and at the other
visiter.
"Who be you?"
"We do not live in this neighbourhood," said Faith. "We came up to
Kildeer river to-day, and met your little brother down by the shore."
"What did he say to you?"
"He told us you were sick and in want of help."
Another look laid the girl's jealousy asleep. She told her story--her
father had died six months ago; she and her mother and brother lived
there alone. It was an "unlikely place to get to," and no neighbours
very near. Her mother had been sick abed for a number of weeks; and she
had had all to do, and now for a week past had been unable to do
anything, go to Pettibaug or anywhere else, to get what they wanted.
And so they "had got out of 'most everything." Dromy Tuck, Mr. Linden's
scholar, lived at Farmer Davids' in the capacity of farm-boy; Mrs.
Davids being a far-off connexion.
So much was all pride permitted to be told. Without much questioning,
her visiters contrived to find out what they could do for her. Faith
put the coffee-pot on the fire, declaring that it would do Mintie good
like medicine; and served it to her when it was hot, with some bread
and chicken, as if it had been indeed medicine and Faith a doctor. Then
while Bob and she were dining, Faith went in to see the sick woman.
_She_ was much more communicative, and half avowed that she believed
what she wanted now was "nourishing things"--"but with me lyin' here on
my back," she said, "'taint so easy to find 'em." Faith gave her a cup
of coffee too and some bread; she had hardly drunk any herself at
lunch; and leaving her patient much inspirited, came back to Mr. Linden
in the other room. Apparently his words and deeds had been acceptable
too,--Bob's face was shining, not only with dinner but with the
previous cold water applications which Mr. Linden had insisted on, and
Mintie's mind was evidently at work upon various things. The basket was
soon emptied of all but its dishes, and the prince and princess went on
their way down the hill.
"Faith," said Mr. Linden, "shall we go and sit in the boat for half an
hour, considering various things, and then have our wild flower hunt?
Or would you prefer that first?"
"O no! I would rather have the half hour in the boat."
It was good time yet in the afternoon, and though the little boat now
lay partly shadowed by the hill, it was none the worse resting place
for that. Again Faith was seated there in all the style that shawls and
cushions furnished, and just tired enough to feel luxurious in the soft
atmosphere. Mr. Linden arranged and established her to his liking; then
he took out of his pocket a letter.
It was one which had been opened and read; but as he unfolded it, there
appeared another--unopened, unread; its dainty seal unbroken, and on
the back in fair tracery, the words, "Miss Faith Derrick." As Faith
read them and saw the hand, her eye glanced first up at Mr. Linden with
its mute burden of surprise, and then the roses bloomed out over her
cheeks and even threw their flush upon her brow. Her eye was cast down
now and fixed on the unopened letter, with the softest fall of its
eyelid.
"Shall I read you a part of mine first?"
"If you please. I wish you would."
"Only a little bit," he said smiling--thinking perhaps that she did not
know to what she gave her assent so readily,--"you shall read the whole
of it another time." The "little bit" began rather abruptly.
"'I have written to your darling, Endy--Not much, tell her; because
what I have in my heart for her cannot be told. I know how precious any
one must be whom you love so much. But make her love me a little before
she reads my letter--and don't let her call me anything but Pet--and
then I shall feel as if I had a sister already. And so I have, as you
say. What a glad word!--I could cry again with the very writing of it.
'Endy--I did cry a little over your letter, but only for joy: if it had
been for sorrow I should have cried long ago; for I knew well enough
what was coming. Only I want more than ever to be at home,--and to see
you, and to see Faith--don't let her think I am like you!
'My letter wouldn't hold much, as I told you. But I give you any number
of (unspeakable!) messages for her, John Endy. I suppose you will take
charge of them? I may feel sure they have all reached their
destination?'"
Long before the reading was finished, Faith's head had sunk--almost to
the cushions beside her. The reader's voice and intonation had given
every word a sort of ring in her heart, though the tone was low. One
hand came round her when she put her head down, taking possession of
her hand which lay so still, with the unopened letter in its clasp. But
now she was gently raised up.
"Precious child," Mr. Linden said, "what are you drooping your head
for?"
"For the same reason she had, I suppose,--" said Faith half laughing,
though witnesses of another kind were in her eyes.
"Who are you talking about?"
"Your sister."
"Why don't you begin to practise your lesson?"
Perhaps Faith thought that she _was_. She looked at nothing but her
letter.
"Will you wait for your messages till we get home?--this place not
being absolute seclusion."
"Shall I read this now?" said Faith rather hastily.
"I should think there would be no danger in that."
With somewhat unsteady fingers, that yet tried to be quiet, Faith broke
the seal; and masking her glowing face with one hand, she bent over the
letter to read it.
"My very dear, and most unknown, and most well-known little sister! I
have had a picture sent me of you--as you appeared one night, when you
sat for your portrait, hearing Portia; and with it a notice of several
events which occurred just before that time. And both picture and
events have gone down into my heart, and abide there. Endecott says you
are a Sunbeam--and I feel as if a little of the light had come over the
water to me,--ever since his letter came I have been in a state of
absolute reflection!
"I thought my love would not be the first to 'find out the way'--even
then when I wrote it! Faith--do you know that there is nobody in the
world just like him? because if you do not--you will find it out!--I
mean! like Endecott--_not_ like Love. My dear, I beg pardon for my
pronoun! But just how _I_ have loved you all these months, for making
him so happy, I cannot tell you.
"And I cannot write to-day--about anything,--my thoughts are in too
uneven a flow to find their way to the end of my pen, and take all
possible flights instead. Dear Faith, you must wait for a _letter_ till
the next steamer. And you cannot miss it--nor anything else, with
Endecott there,--it seems to me that to be even in the same country
with him is happiness.
"You must love me too, Faith, and not think me a stranger,--and let me
be your (because I am Endy's)
"PET."
Faith took a great deal more time than was necessary for the reading of
this letter. Very much indeed she would have liked to do as her
correspondent confessed she had done, and cry--but there was no sign of
such an inclination. She only sat perfectly moveless, bending over her
letter. At last suddenly looked up and gave it to Mr. Linden.
"Well?" he said with a smile at her as he took it.
"You'll see--" she said, a little breathlessly. And still holding her
hand fast, Mr. Linden read the letter, quicker than she had done, and
without comment--unless when his look shewed that it touched him.
"You will love her, Faith!" he said as he folded the letter up
again,--"in spite of all your inclinations to the contrary!"
"Do you think that is in the future tense? But I am afraid," added
Faith,--"she thinks too much of me now."
"She does not think as much of you as I do," Mr. Linden said, with a
look and smile that covered all the ground of present or future fear.
"And after all it is a danger which you will share with me. It is one
of Pet's loveable feelings to think too much of some people whom she
loves just enough."
Humility is not a fearful thing. Whatever had been in Faith's speech,
her look, bright, wistful, and happy, had no fear, truly bumble though
it was. "There is no danger of my loving this letter too much"--she
said as she carefully restored it to its envelope; said with a secret
utterance of great gratification.
The promised half hour was much more than up, and the broadening shadow
on Kildeer river said that the time which could be given to wild
flowers was fast running away. Perhaps, too, Mr. Linden thought Faith
had mused and been excited enough, for he made a move. Everything in
the boat was put up in close order, and then the two went ashore again,
flower basket in hand.
The long shadows heightened the beauty of the woods now, falling soft
and brown upon the yet browner carpet of dry leaves, and the young
leaves and buds overhead shewed every tint, from yellow to green. Under
the trees were various low shrubs in flower,--shad-blossom, with its
fleecy stems, and azalia in rosy pink; and the real wild flowers--the
dainty things as wild in growth as in name, were sprinkled everywhere.
Wind flowers and columbine; orchis sweet as any hyacinth; tall
Solomon's seal; spotless bloodroot; and violets--white, yellow, and
purple. The dogwood stretched its white arms athwart hemlock and
service; the creeping partridge berry carried its perfumed white stars
over rocks and moss in the deep shade below. Yellow bellwort hung its
fair flowers on every ridge; where the ground grew wet were dog's-tooth
violet and chick wintergreen. There the red maples stood, with bunches
of crimson keys,--at the edge of the higher ground their humbler
growing sister the striped bark, waved her green tresses. There seemed
to be no end to the flowers--nor to the variety--nor to the pleasure of
picking.
"Faith--" said Mr. Linden.
Faith looked up from a bunch of Sanguinaria beside which she was
crouching.
"I find so much Mignonette!--do you?"
Faith's eye flashed, and taking one of those little white stars she
threw it towards Mr. Linden. It went in a graceful parabolic curve and
fell harmlessly, like her courage, at his feet.
"What has become of the princess?"
"You ought rather to ask after the prince!" said Mr. Linden, picking up
the Sanguinaria with great devotion. "Is this the Star of the Order of
Merit?"
"I am not Queen Flora. I don't know."
"As what then was it bestowed?"
"It might be Mignonette's shield, which she used as a weapon because
she hadn't any other! Endy, look at those green Maple flowers! You can
reach them."
He gathered some of the hanging clusters, and then came and sat down
where she was at work and began to put them into her basket, arranging
and dressing the other flowers the while dextrously.
"Do you know, my little Sunbeam," he said, "that your namesakes are
retreating?"
"I know it, Endy," she said hastening her last gatherings--"and I am
ready."
They began their homeward way to the boat, wandering a little still,
for flowers, and stopping to pick them, so that the sun was quite low
before Kildeer river was reached. There Mr. Linden stood a moment
looking about.
"Do you see the place where we sat, Faith?" he said,--"over on the
other bank?"
She looked, and looked at him and smiled--very different from her look
then! A glance comprehensive and satisfactory enough without words, so
without any more words they went on their way along the shore of the
river. As they neared their boat, the rays of the setting sun were
darted into Kildeer river and gilded the embayed little vessel and all
the surrounding shores. Rocks and trees and bits of land glowed or
glistened in splendour wherever a point or a spray could catch the sun;
the water in both rivers shone with a long strip of gold. They had had
nothing so brilliant all day.
In the full glow and brightness Faith sat down in the boat with her
flowers near her, and Mr. Linden loosened the sail. How pretty the bank
looked as they were leaving it! the ashes of their fire on the rock,
and the places where they had sat or wandered, and talked--such happy
words!
"I shall always love Kildeer river," said Faith with little long
breath, "because I read my letter here."
"And so shall I," said Mr. Linden,--"but my love for it dates back to
the first piece of reading I ever did in its company." He looked back
for a minute or two--at the one shore and the other--the sunlight, the
trees, the flowery hillside, and it was well then that his face was not
seen by Faith--there fell on it such a shadow of pain. But he presently
turned to her again with just the former look.
"Now," he said, "do you think you can steer home in the twilight?"
"I don't know. Can I? I can follow directions."
"And I can give them."
And with that arrangement they ran out from the clean woody shores of
Kildeer river, and set their sail for Pattaquasset. How fair, at that
point of weather and day! a little quieter than the morning spring-tide
of everything, but what was less gay was more peaceful; and against a
soft south wind the little boat began to beat her way down, favoured
however by the tide. These tacks made Mr. Linden's counsels more
especially needed, but the short swift runs back and forth across the
river were even more inspiriting than a steady run before the wind, and
the constant attention which helm and sail required made talk and
action lively enough.
"This is good, Endecott!" said Faith as the little boat came about for
the fifth or sixth time.
"Faith," he said, smiling at her, "you look just as fresh as a
rose!--the day does not seem to have tired you one bit."
"Tired!" she said,--"yes, I am a little bit tired--or hungry--but was
there ever such a day as we have had?--since the first of January!"
"My dear little Mignonette!" Mr. Linden said--but if it was a "message"
Faith had then, it came from somewhere nearer than across the water.
"If you are tired, dear child, give up the rudder to me, and lay down
your head and rest. Do you see after what a sleep-inviting fashion the
lights are twinkling all down the shore?"
"I'm not sleepy a bit;" said Faith,--"nor tired, except just enough;
and I like this small portion of power you have put in my hands. How
beautiful those lights look!--and the lights overhead, Endy. How
beautiful every thing is!"--
"Yes," said Mr. Linden, "when there is light within.--
'He that hath light within his own clear breast,
May sit i' the centre and enjoy bright day.'"
"That's beautiful!" said Faith after a pause.
And now the brush and stir of "coming about" again claimed their
attention, and in a minute more they were stretching away on a new
tack, with another set of constellations opposite to them in the sky.
The breeze was fresh, though as mild as May; the boat made good speed;
and in spite of beating down the river the mouth of the Mong was neared
fast. Pattaquasset lights, a little cluster of them, appeared
unmistakably; for down by the point there was a little knot of houses,
variously concerned in trade or fisheries. Mr. Linden had to put his
hand upon the tiller sometimes then, till they got in. Mr. Skip and
Jerry were in waiting; had been, "a sight o' half hours," the former
stated. Baskets and shad and passengers were transferred to the wagon,
and within a moderate time thereafter welcomed (the latter) by Mrs.
Derrick and supper--wherein, after a little delay therefor, the shad
played a conspicuous and most satisfactory part.
Now there are no shad like the shad that come out of the Mong.