A cup of sweets, that can never cloy Part 7

"Come, Miss Dorothy," cried Susan, "do pray walk a little faster. Dear me! how heavy do you trudge along, with your arms hanging down by your sides! Why, you will not take the trouble to lift your feet from the ground--pray look what a dust you raise at every step. Come, take me by the arm--look, what a pretty wood this is we are got into, and--oh dear!

what a quant.i.ty of strawberries there are upon that bank. Do you see how beautiful and red they appear among the brambles and dry sticks which lie over them?"

The very idea of something to eat was sure to rouse Dorothy. Constance and Julia also advanced to look at the strawberries; they were very tempting, and they each wished to taste them, but there were difficulties in the way not likely to be conquered.

Julia's desire for them soon vanished, for she recollected that she had neither cream nor sugar, without which she did not think them eatable.

Dorothy said they were very good without either, and she wished she had a good basket-full, she would soon shew them how well she liked them; but they could not be got at without removing the brambles and wood, which appeared to have been purposely laid over them, to preserve them till they were ripe; and Dorothy, after taking away three or four sticks, and a bush or two, began to puff and blow, as if she had been running a race, and declared she could do no more, much as she wished for the strawberries, if it would save her life.

"How can you be so extremely lazy?" exclaimed Constance, eager to get at the tempting fruit. "You cannot bear to take the least trouble, Dorothy--come, let me help you; I should be sorry to leave them. What a beautiful scarlet they are, and how finely they smell!--Come, come, let us remove these brambles."

Dorothy had thrown herself upon the gra.s.s, declaring she could not stir; and Susan, who was well acquainted with the dispositions of her three young ladies, determined not to interfere.

Constance began very briskly to take away the brambles; but she had scarcely uncovered a few of the strawberries, when a small insect, which she had disturbed, flew out of a bush directly against her, entangled its little wings in her hair, and almost frightened her into fits. She ran to Susan in the most terrible alarm, insisting that a hornet had got into her hair, and that she should be stung to death in an instant.

She prevailed upon her sisters to leave the spot immediately, and n.o.body could persuade her but that she had disturbed a hornet's nest, and had had a most miraculous escape.

They spent the afternoon with their young friend much in the usual manner; each of them constantly meeting with something or other to disturb them and spoil their pleasure.

Returning in the evening through the wood, they saw a group of little boys and girls sitting under the trees, and eating strawberries; some had their hats full, some held them in their hands, and others in little baskets of their own making.

Susan asked them where they had gathered so many strawberries. "Why there," answered one of the boys, "where you see the bushes and brambles all in a heap. We covered them up above a week ago, to let them ripen; but I wonder we did not lose them all, for somebody has been here, I am sure, though I suppose they did not see the nice strawberries, or they never would have been such fools as to leave them: but it was well for us that they were so blind."

"And whom did you get to take the trouble to remove all those things for you?" inquired Dorothy, as she hung on Susan's arm with all her weight.

"Lauk-a-day! Miss," said the boy, grinning in her face, "to be sure you be joking. Do you call that trouble?"

Constance said he was very right; that it certainly could be _no trouble_; but she really wondered they had not been terrified from attempting to get at the strawberries, when they saw what a number of frightful and dangerous creatures were creeping and flying about them.

And now the whole party not only grinned, but laughed aloud; and Julia told her sisters they had better not make such foolish observations, which only served to make the children laugh at them: that it was ridiculous to suppose they should think it a labour to remove a few brambles, or that they should be so weak as to be afraid of harmless flies and worms; but she must say, she was a little surprised that they did not go home with their strawberries, and get some cream and sugar to eat with them: no house in the country was without cream; there could be no difficulty in getting a bit of sugar, and it would make them so nice, that they would never afterwards relish them alone.

"That would be very unfortunate," replied a girl some years older than the others (who only noticed Julia's speech by redoubled peals of laughter), "for we should lose many such a treat as we are now enjoying, if we were to take such a foolish whim into our heads. Pray, Miss, do you imagine that my mother keeps a cow, to give us the cream to eat with strawberries? No! no! she sells her b.u.t.ter, and buys us clothes with the money. I wish you could all three spend a month in our cottage, you would learn to be glad enough of having one nicety, without wishing to add another to it; and to know that those who choose to eat must learn to work, and not call trouble that which is no more than play. You would also perceive, after spending two or three days on your knees in weeding the corn or the garden, that you are in no danger of being either stung or bit by innocent flies or caterpillars, and that till you get rid of all your foolish fancies, you will have no pleasure in any thing in the world, but that all your happiness and comfort will be sacrificed to whim, indolence, and weakness?"

THE END.