THE CARPET OF HISTORY.
Mr. Learning now stood at the top of hill Puzzle, watching Dick, Lubin,
and Nelly, returning laden with carpets from History's shop. Though the
carpets, like the rooms, were but small, they were rather heavy burdens
for children in wet and slippery weather.
Learning smiled his own quiet smile, to see the different and
characteristic movements of his young charges, the Desleys. Dick, the
quick and energetic Dick, was half-way up hill Puzzle when his brother
and sister were only beginning to ascend. His bright young face was
flushed, but rather with pleasure than fatigue; he sped on with a light
elastic tread, neither panting nor pausing, but bearing the carpet of
History as though he felt not its weight. He moved all the more swiftly
for seeing that his guardian's eye was upon him, and on reaching the
crown of the hill, saluted Mr. Learning with a very self-satisfied air.
"You make good progress," observed the sage, politely returning his
salute.
"Oh, I get over everything with a hop, skip, and jump," replied the
laughing boy, forgetting his flounder in Bother, "and you'll soon have
the pleasure of presenting me with the silver crown of Success. It's
nearly time, I should think, for you to introduce me to all your learned
friends the Ologies! But there's one gentleman in Education whom I fancy
more than all--the glorious old fellow who keeps a shop filled with jars
of different colours, retorts, electric-machines, and bottles of powders
and gases; I've heard that he sells such fireworks as would set all the
world in a blaze!"
"You mean, of course, Mr. Chemistry," replied the sage; "he is my much
valued friend; there is not a more pleasing companion to be found in the
whole town of Education than he. But you are yet far too young, Master
Dick, to make the acquaintance of so superior and intellectual a man.
His goods are not yet for you, though in time you may make them your
own. Attend at present to your carpets and your grates; furnish your
cottage with facts from General Knowledge; a day perhaps may arrive when
you will be ready for things more abstruse, and then I'll introduce you
myself both to the Ologies and to Mr. Chemistry, which latter will, I
have no doubt, display to you all his magazine of wonders."
"Always putting off!" muttered Dick between his teeth; "always treating
one like a mere child. I shall have long enough to wait if I wait for
the introduction of slow Mr. Learning. I can do very well without it,
and shall certainly try some day whether, by putting a bold face on the
matter, I am not able to make my own way to the favour of Mr.
Chemistry!"
These last words were only overheard by Pride, for Dick had already
entered his cottage. In a few minutes more the sound of his busy hammer
told that he was already setting vigorously to work to nail down his
History carpet.
"How comparatively slowly the two other children make their way up the
hill!" said Learning, who stood watching Lubin and Nelly. "Why, the boy
has twice sat down to rest on his bundle; and now, surely my spectacles
must be at fault, can he be rolling his carpet up the hill, instead of
carrying it on his shoulder! In a fine miry state it will be by the time
that he reaches his dwelling!"
Surely enough the lazy boy was getting on with his History carpet in the
laziest of ways, pushing instead of bearing, rolling it along as if it
were a snowball, and seeming to be quite regardless of the fact that the
path was covered with mud! Have none of my readers done the same, been
content to get up a task in _any way_, however slothful and careless?
"Are you not ashamed of that?" exclaimed Mr. Learning, pointing to the
dirty roll of carpet, as Lubin gained the top of the hill.
"Oh, sir, the mud will rub off when it is dry," said the boy with an air
of unconcern; "the inner side, where the pattern is, cannot be soiled in
the least."
"Unroll it and see," said stern Mr. Learning.
Lubin slowly obeyed, and had certainly little cause to be pleased with
the condition of his new purchase. The pattern, which was full and rich,
represented a hundred different scenes of interest. There was the wooden
horse of old Troy; here appeared the gallant sons of Sparta defending
the pass of Thermopylæ; great men of Greece and of Rome, British
monarchs and statesmen in varied costumes and different attitudes,
adorned the History carpet. Adorned, did I say? rather once had adorned,
for all was now a jumble of confusion! There was a great blot of mud
just over the face of Julius Cæsar, and not a single Roman emperor
stood out clear and distinct. In silent indignation Mr. Learning turned
away, leaving Lubin to do the best that he could with his poor soiled
History carpet.
Nelly Desley, weary, but cheerful, had just carried her burden home. She
was unrolling it now in her simple but beautifully neat little parlour,
and surveying with great delight the charming pattern upon it.
"Of all the purchases that I have made, this pleases me most!" she
cried. "What a wonderful variety of pictures, so amusing and
interesting! Ah, there is good Queen Philippa on her knees, begging for
the citizens of Calais; and there brave Joan of Arc leading on her
soldiers to battle! And there, oh, there are the holy martyrs tied to
the stake for the sake of the truth, looking so calmly and meekly
upwards, as though they had no fear of dying! I can never pass a dull
evening now with this wonderful carpet before me; it seems as though it
would take a lifetime to know all its various scenes."
"Yes," said Mr. Learning, who had entered her parlour unobserved, "that
beautiful carpet will serve as a constant feast for the mind. Fiction
may boast that his dyes are the brightest; this I utterly deny; no
colours are so vivid or so lasting as those that have been fixed by
Truth, and these should alone be employed in the carpets which History
produces."
Mr. Learning then graciously bestowed upon Nelly the gift of the hammer
and nails, and quitted the cottages of Head well satisfied with at least
one of his charges.