WHAT BECAME OF NOAH'S ARK AND ALL ITS BEASTS.
"I must tell you a little about the hands that first made us, and to do
so I must take you in fancy to the high Alps in Switzerland. There,
during the long bright summer months, according to the practice of the
country, the flocks and herds are pastured, only descending to the
villages in autumn, when food and fodder grow scant. A temporary
dwelling is erected, in which the Sennerin, the young girl who usually
takes charge of them, lives for the season, and where she follows the
dairy business peculiar to her calling. The long summer days pass so
calmly and pleasantly there, while the cows and their young ones crop
the juicy herbage of these mountain pastures. Meanwhile the shepherd
lads, and those who are not busied in more active labours, often pass
their leisure hours, while guarding their flocks with the help of their
intelligent dogs, in carving cleverly some pretty little toys in the
light wood peculiar to their province. These find a ready sale with the
travellers, who climb these lofty heights to feast their eyes on the
ranges of distant peaks and Alpine passes, that seem almost reaching up
to the sky.
"Sitting on the grass, with their quaint, old-fashioned knives, these
lads carve elegant and graceful trifles, that often eventually find
their way into royal palaces, and are used by many dainty fingers. My
maker, however, was more given to the construction of toys for children;
he preferred fashioning all kinds of animals and reptiles, to making
flower bestudded paper knives or perforated work baskets; and he found a
very good and ready sale for all he had time to manufacture. By his
patient and incessant industry, he had earned a comfortable living for
many years for his blind and aged mother, to whom he was a most dutiful
and tender son. Never a penny of Fritz's money was spent in idle folly,
for neither gay ribbons for his hat nor silver buckles for his shoes
ever wiled away his earned money from its pious purpose. He certainly
was a true but very humble admirer of our Sennerin, who was the only
daughter of a rich farmer of the village; and I had a few opportunities
for noticing that she always prized more the simple Alpine roses, for
which Fritz had climbed many a dangerous spot, than she did the
elaborate carvings or purchased trinkets which were offered to her by
others. I hope long ere this, Fritz, the good son and industrious
villager, is the owner of the goodly farm, and the happy husband of the
pretty Sennerin. But I did not remain long enough to know much of the
progress of his affairs; for although it took him half the summer to
make me and two similar Arks, we were readily disposed of at once, on
his return to the village. The toy merchant made his yearly visit then,
and carried us all off with a host of other articles of similar
manufacture.
"I hope I may be excused for a little pardonable vanity in describing
our personal appearance to you; for, in common with you all, I have been
also divested by time and rough usage of most of my early charms. When I
was first springing from beneath the skilful fingers of Fritz, I was the
prettiest specimen of a model Swiss cottage set upon a boat floor, that
ever was made. My walls were formed of the pretty very white species of
wood, used by these deft shepherd carvers, and light, graceful openwork
patterns were formed on them, by delicately cut cross pieces of a darker
shade. The roof, with wide projecting eaves, after the regular chalet
pattern, had its cross beams, and here and there the usual stones, laid
on it, which, in the original structures, are placed there to add some
weight of resistance to the furious mountain gales that come sweeping
down the deep gorges. There was a row of windows, which were really cut
out and glazed, through which you might obtain a view of the jumble of
animals huddled together inside. A perforated gallery of light wood ran
all round the walls half way up, from whence a staircase, general to
these Swiss cottages, led down, and in this case terminated on the floor
of the flat wooden boat, which of rather unusual depth, formed the
bottom of the Ark.
"As to my contents, they were of a rather miscellaneous character, for
although Fritz had a natural love for animals, and considerable success
in copying those with which he was acquainted, his knowledge of the more
distant creation was limited to the quaint old woodcuts in his mother's
Bible, in which they were drawn with more spirit and imagination than
correctness. And so Fritz's horses, oxen, pigs, sheep, dogs, and goats
were characteristic and good, but his elephant and camel, though
original, were eccentric, to use a mild term. They were all executed,
however, with great pains, and the wood from which they were carved was
specially selected with a view to their colour and marks. Thus, for
example, the tiger, though his outline and shape were rather doubtful,
and he partook more than he should of the square frame of a cow, was cut
out of a bit of wood where a knot had been, which caused it to be
streaked in a manner very suitable to the stripes of that animal. The
birds generally were a greater success, for with most of these Fritz was
tolerably familiar. We had certainly all spent a very pleasant summer,
high up in the Alps, with the most delicious clear sky overhead and the
fragrant herbage beneath. It was so calm and clear, that the silence was
broken alone by the far off sheep and goat bells, the faint low of the
drowsy cattle, or the sweet song of distant birds. How often I have
recalled that pleasant early life, which was so very speedily
terminated.
"The toy merchant soon packed up his wares and departed, and we saw and
heard nothing more, until we were unpacked from a huge case of other
toys, and placed in the window of a famous toyshop in St. Paul's
Churchyard. In the window there, for some months, we attracted
numberless groups of delighted little admirers, but our high price
placed us beyond the reach of most people. Our turn came at last; we
were selected by a doating grandpapa for his pet little grand-daughter,
and carefully packed up and taken to the abode of our future owner. The
pretty little child was too young as yet to have such a beautiful and
costly toy in her own charge, so her Mamma undertook the care of us, and
Beatrice was allowed to play with us occasionally.
"She was a queer little mortal, this new mistress of ours, and not
particularly fond of toys in general. She was highly delighted at first,
and twice or thrice when she was allowed to play with us, she arranged
us carefully in pairs on the table. But when Nurse or Mamma tried to
improve her knowledge, and give her a sly object lesson on zoology, Miss
Beatrice grew refractory, and cared for us no more. Unfortunately on one
occasion when her Mamma was seriously ill, the nurse gave us to her to
play with, to keep her quiet, and the whole house being somewhat upset
by the illness, the child was not taken much notice of. Alas, when Nurse
came in the evening to collect my animals and put me away, she found a
most deplorable state of things. Beatrice had been dragging me about as
a carriage for her doll, and had thus damaged my pretty railed gallery
and staircase past all mending. My roof was in three pieces, and the
reckless little savage had first strewn all my beasts over the floor,
and then as deliberately walked over them. Oh, what a havoc was there!
My poor dear cows and sheep, that had cost the ingenious Fritz so much
time and trouble, had not three legs to boast of between them, and as
for the birds, they were most of them pounded to pieces and bits. I
thought with bitter regret of the green mountain heights where we had so
merrily proceeded under Fritz's laborious fingers, and had been the
admiration of the whole little Swiss village.
"When Beatrice's mother was better, she was much vexed to hear what had
happened to us, and was very angry indeed with Beatrice for her wilful
mischief. I believe from that time, the child took a dislike to us, for
she was a capricious, odd-tempered little thing, and certainly never
played with us without doing us some further injury. As for the animals,
they were left and dropped all over the house. Poor old Grandmamma
coming to spend the day, fell down and sprained her ancle by treading on
the elephant. The camel was thrown through one of the windows by a
little boy visitor during a romp with Beatrice, and Aunt Priscilla was
almost irreparably offended the last time she stayed there, by finding a
wooden pig in her fur-lined slipper. She put her foot hastily in without
seeing it, and hurt it so, that she declared she was lame for a month
afterwards. In short, we were always in trouble in some way or other,
and Beatrice's mother more than once threatened to give us away.
"It would have been a small consolation to us if our young owner had
played with us sometimes, or taken ever so little pride in us. But no;
she only took us out to bring more shame and disgrace on us, and on
herself. For instance, once when her Godmother took her to church for
the first time, Beatrice took her handkerchief out of her pocket, and
with it a number of wooden animals, which fell in a pattering shower on
the pavement. Naughty Beatrice would stop in the middle of the aisle and
pick us all up, to the astonishment of the congregation, the horror of
her Godmother, and the utter scandal of the grave old clerk. Nay, worse
even, for when the sermon commenced, she rushed out of her seat, and
began to hunt about under the people's feet in the free benches for a
missing camelopard!
"After this terrible mishap, Nurse laid hands on all the stray animals
she could find, and clapped them all hastily into my box, shutting down
the lid decidedly, and promising Beatrice she should see us no more. She
was as good as her word, and hid us behind a great pile of clean dimity
curtains in the linen closet, where we remained snugly packed away for
some time. But, alas! one day our mischievous little mistress, during
one of her prowls, chanced to see the open door of the linen closet, and
could not resist a sudden raid upon it. To her great joy, she found us,
and carefully lugging us out, she hid us in her little cot till bedtime.
"It happened to be the day of a dinner party, and all the servants were
very busy with the preparations for it, while the lady of the house was
equally engaged in superintending the arrangements. In the evening,
while dinner was proceeding, Beatrice, well-dressed for the occasion,
was taken down into the drawing-room, to wait till she could go in to
dessert. Her nurse, no doubt, was using her ears and eyes in other
matters, and so the mischievous little maid was left to her own devices.
The results, however, were very unpleasantly visible to her Mamma, when
having helped a lady to some trifle, she observed her become very red,
and lay down her spoon. On enquiry, she found that she had met with a
wooden frog in the trifle, and on further search, some more of my
unlucky animals were found located among the sweet dishes. A huge dog
was floundering in the jelly, and a regular flight of birds had got
about the blancmange.
"The end of this disagreeable affair was, that Miss Beatrice was sent to
bed in dire disgrace, and the poor innocent animals, all sticky from
their sweet bath, were consigned to the fire. The few remaining
creatures that were left of all the numerous flock Fritz had so proudly
made, were hastily gathered together, and with me, given away next
morning.
"Our next owner was a little boy, a very quiet little fellow, to whom we
became the greatest treasure in the world. He thought me the most
beautiful toy that was ever made, although I was in such a sadly damaged
condition. His only grief was, that my stock of animals had now dwindled
down to about twenty, and of these, most were maimed or deficient in
some way. However, he wisely made the best of a bad matter, and set to
work to repair the damage as well as he could. With his elder brother's
kind help, and the loan of a glue-pot, he repaired, as neatly as
possible, the breakage of my gallery and staircase. With pins, cork, and
sealing-wax, he next proceeded to tinker-up the poor mutilated animals,
and succeeded in making them all stand pretty firmly once more. It would
have done Fritz's honest heart good to see how carefully the little
fellow handled his masterpiece, and how very conscientiously he tried to
put all to rights again. And if the horse _had_ two odd scarlet legs
made out of sealing-wax, it was better than going a cripple for life;
and as for the squirrel, he need not have grumbled, for a black pin for
a tail was better than none. To be sure, he did stick the bear's head on
the wrong way, but then it did not much matter, it only looked as if he
had met with a tree he wanted to climb, and was looking up it.
"And so once more we were patched up into ordinary respectability, and
so pretty did we look, even in our less bright condition, that at last,
as Harry was a little too old to play with such toys, and cared much
more for making and mending them, we were laid out in great style, and
to as much advantage, on the little chess table in the bow window, and
covered with a glass shade to preserve us from the dust!
"Here we dwelt in state for some years, while Harry grew up and went to
school, and after that to college, and ceased to care for such trifles.
And then his mother gave us to Celia Spenser, on her birthday, who was
much delighted, and for a long while we were a very favourite toy of
hers; but her little brothers and sister made fresh ravages on our
impaired value, although it is but fair to say the misfortunes were
unintentional, and they were really sorry when they had broken any of my
beams, or lost an animal. And now our turn has come to be cast aside,
and so here we are with the rest of the old pensioners!"
And having said this, the Ark creaked his lid down again, and finished
his story, for which he received the thanks of all the assembled party.
"Now," said the Ball, musing gravely, "I shall call next in order on the
Marbles to relate their general history, and as I don't know which of
them to ask first, I must call upon them collectively."
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