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AMY HARRISON
OR
HEAVENLY SEED AND HEAVENLY DEW.
[Decoration]
LONDON
T. NELSON AND SONS, PATERNOSTER ROW
EDINBURGH; AND NEW YORK.
[Illustration: A NEW FEELING.
_Page 57._]
CONTENTS.
I. THE WALK, 7
II. AT SCHOOL, 15
III. AT HOME, 30
IV. A NEW LEAF, AND HOW IT WAS FILLED, 34
V. TRY AGAIN, 41
VI. THE TRUTH SETTING FREE, 46
AMY HARRISON.
CHAPTER I.
THE WALK.
One fine Sunday morning two little girls, called Amy and Kitty
Harrison, set out from their mother's cottage to go to the Sunday
school in the neighbouring village. The little hamlet where they lived
was half a mile from the school. In fine weather it was a very
pleasant walk, for the way lay by the side of a little chattering
stream, which fed the roots of many pretty wild flowers; and then,
leaving the valley, the path struck across some corn-fields, which
were now quite yellow for harvest. And even in wet weather the little
girls seldom missed the school; for their mother was a careful woman,
and they themselves loved their teacher and their lessons. Mrs.
Mordaunt, the wife of the clergyman, taught them on Sunday, for both
Amy and Kitty were in the first class.
Amy was tripping lightly along, enjoying the sunshine. Every now and
then she bent down and gathered a wild flower,--the four-leaved yellow
potentilla, or the meadow-sweet, or a spike of golden rod, or a
handful of forget-me-nots, watered by the stream, to make a little
nosegay for her teacher; for Mrs. Mordaunt loved flowers and would
sometimes take the lesson for the day from them. And she loved better
still the affectionate remembrances of her children.
Kitty, meanwhile, was walking very soberly along, reading her
hymn-book. Perhaps from this you may think that Kitty was the more
industrious and thoughtful of the two; but it was not so. Amy had
risen early that morning, and got her lessons all ready, and so she
could enjoy the pleasant walk freely; for you know, or if you do not
know I hope you will learn, that it is always those who are busiest at
their work that can be merriest in their hours of leisure. Nothing
gives us such an appetite for enjoyment as hearty work. So Amy tripped
on, humming a cheerful hymn, while poor Kitty kept on saying over and
over again the words of her hymn, and vainly trying to stop her ears
from hearing and her eyes from seeing all the pleasant sights and
sounds around her. But the birds were so busy singing, and the fish
kept springing up from the stream, and every now and then a bright
butterfly would flit across, or a little bird perch on a spray close
to her, and everything around seemed trying so mischievously to take
her attention from her book, so that they had reached the gate at the
end of the wood before Kitty had learned two verses of her hymn.
You see, these two little girls were not quite like each other,
although they had the same home, and the same lessons, and the same
plays. If you sow two seeds of the same plant in the same soil, you
know they will grow up exactly like each other. The flowers will be of
the same colour, the same smell, the same shape; the roots will suck
up the same nourishment from the soil, and the little vessels of the
stems and leaves will cook it into the very same sweet, or sour, or
bitter juices. But with little children it is quite different. You may
often see two children of one family, with the same friends, the same
teaching, the same means of improvement, as different in temper and
character from each other as if they had been brought up on opposite
sides of the world. Indeed, it is as strange for children of one
family to be alike, as for flowers to be unlike. Why is this? Among
other reasons one great one is, that God has given to children a
_will_--a power of choosing good or evil. Flowers have no will; they
cannot help being beautiful, and being what God meant them to be. The
earth feeds them, and the rains water them and make them grow without
any choice or will of theirs; but with you, children, it is quite
otherwise. God has given you _wills_; and it is in your own power to
choose whether you will be good and happy children, and a blessing to
all around you, and turning everything around you into a blessing,
every year growing wiser and better; or whether you will yield to the
evil within and around you, and turn health, and time, and Christian
teaching, and all the good things God sends to feed your souls, into
food for your selfish and idle natures, and so grow every year worse
and worse. You must do one of these two things,--you may do the best.
Remember I do not say you can do them _for_ or _by yourselves_, but
you _can do_ them. God has said so. The flowers cannot choose or ask
for food, and so God chooses for them and gives without asking. You
are higher creatures than they, and can choose and ask, and so God
will wait for you to ask before he gives; but he is only waiting for
this, and he is always ready to hear.
Mrs. Mordaunt had told the children something of this last Sunday, and
Amy thought of it as she walked, and did ask God to bless her
teacher's words to her that day.
Now you have seen how Amy and Kitty Harrison used their power of
choice. The sun had beamed into the room for Kitty as well as for Amy
that morning. God had given them both the pleasant morning hours of
his day to use as they liked best. Kitty had chosen to spend them in
dozing lazily in bed, while Amy had jumped out of bed and dressed
quickly, and gone out to her favourite seat under an old cherry tree
to learn her lessons.
So the little girls reached the gate at the end of the wood. Outside
was a road, across which lay the corn-fields leading to the church,
and beside it stood a cottage where Amy and Kitty used to stop to call
for little Jane Hutton, one of their school-fellows. Jane's father was
a blacksmith; and the Huttons were richer than the Harrisons, so that
Jane had gayer bonnets and smarter dresses than Kitty and Amy. This
morning she had such beautiful new ribbons that Kitty's attention was
quite caught by them. And Jane too was not a little proud of them; her
mother had given a shilling a yard for them at the next town. If
Kitty had found it difficult to learn her lessons before, she now
found it quite impossible; for in the midst of every line she could
not help reckoning how many weeks' halfpence it would take, and how
many times she would have to open the gate for travellers who came to
see the waterfall near the cottage, before she could buy a ribbon like
that.