Caleb in the Country Part 14

"Yes," said Caleb, "I wish you would."

"But I cannot tell how pleasant in mind you have been all day, unless I know what you have had to try you."

"To try me?" asked Caleb.

"Yes, I want to know what troubles, or difficulties, or disappointments you had to bear, and did bear patiently and pleasantly."

Caleb looked a little perplexed.

"You know, Caleb," she continued, "there is no merit in being pleasant unless things go wrong."

"Isn't there?" said Caleb.

"Why, no," said Mary Anna, as she shut up her work-table drawer, "is there?"

"Why no," said Caleb, smiling; for he could not help smiling, while yet he was a little disappointed at finding all his fancied goodness melted away.

"Now, did you have a good time in the woods to-day?"

"Yes," said Caleb.

"Did Raymond take good care of you?"

"Yes," said he.

"And did you have a good dinner?"

"Yes; and a n.o.ble great fire," said Caleb.

"You little rogue, then!" said Mary Anna, laughing, and stabbing at his sides with her finger; "here you have been having a beautiful time in the woods, amusing yourself all day, and had every thing to please you; and now you come to me to pay you for not having been impatient and fretful! You little rogue!"

Caleb turned, and ran laughing away, Mary Anna after him, and pointing at him with her finger. Caleb made his escape into the front entry, and hid behind the door. Mary Anna pretended to have lost sight of him, and not to know where he was; and she went about, saying,

"Where is that little rogue? He came to get away one of my picture-books for nothing. He wanted to be paid for bearing happiness patiently. The rogue! I'll pinch him if I can only find him."

So saying, Mary Anna went and sat down to supper, and soon after Caleb came and took his seat too; Mary Anna roguishly shaking her finger at him all the time. He had to hold his hand over his mouth to keep from laughing aloud.

Perhaps some of the readers of this book may smile at Caleb's idea of his merit in having been a pleasant boy all day, when he felt vexed and unsubmissive in the only case which brought him any trial; but it is so with almost all children, and some grown persons too. A great deal of the goodness upon which we all pride ourselves, is only the quiescence of bad propensities in the absence of temptation and trial.

CHAPTER XII.

THE WALK.

Outside of the window in Madam Rachel's bedroom, where the children used to sit and talk with her just before going to bed, there was a little platform, with a plain roof over it, supported by small square posts, altogether forming a sort of portico. Below this window there were two doors, opening from the middle out each way, so that when the window was raised, and the doors were opened, a person could walk in and out. There were seats in the portico, and there was a wild grape-vine growing upon a plain trellis, on each side. In front of the portico was one of the broad walks of the garden, for on this side the garden extended up to the house. At least there was no fence between, though there was a small plot of green gra.s.s next to the house; and next to that came the trees and flowers.

One pleasant evening Dwight and Caleb were playing on this gra.s.s, waiting for Madam Rachel to come and call them in to the sofa. It was about eight o'clock, but it was not dark. The western sky still looked bright; for though the sun had gone down, so that it could no longer shine upon the trees and houses, it still shone upon the clouds and atmosphere above, and made them look bright.

Presently Madam Rachel came, and stood at the window.

"Where's David?" said she.

"Out in the garden," said Dwight, "and mother," he continued, "I wish you would walk in the garden to-night."

At first, Madam Rachel said she thought she could not very well that evening, for she had a difficult text to talk about; but the boys promised to walk along quietly, and to be very sober and attentive; and so she went and put on her garden bonnet, and came out.

The garden was not large, it extended back to some high rocky precipices, where the boys used sometimes to climb up for play.

"I am afraid," said Madam Rachel, as she sauntered along the walk, the children around her, "that you will not like the verse that I am going to talk with you about this evening, very well, when you first hear it."

"What is it mother?" said Dwight.

"'And you hath he quickened, who were dead in trespa.s.ses and sins.'"

"What does _quickened_ mean?" asked David.

"Made alive, or brought to life. _Quick_ means _alive_, sometimes; as for instance, the quick and the dead, means the living and the dead. And so we say, 'cut to the quick,' that is, cut to the living flesh, where it can feel."

"Once I read in a fable," said David, "of a horse being stung to the quick."

"What, by a hornet?" said Dwight.

"No," said David, "by something the a.s.s said."

"O, yes," said Madam Rachel, "that means it hurt his feelings. If a bee should sting any body so that the sting should only go into the skin, it would not hurt much; but if it should go in deep, so as to give great pain, we should say it stung to the quick, that is, to the part which has life and feeling. So I suppose that something that the a.s.s said, hurt the horse's feelings."

"What was it, David, that the a.s.s said?" asked Dwight.

"Why--he said, I believe that the horse was proud, or something like that."

"No matter about that fable now," said their mother; "you understand the meaning of the verse. It was written to good men; it says that G.o.d gave them life and feeling, when they _were_ dead in trespa.s.ses and sins. But I must first tell you what _dead_ means."

"O, we know what '_dead_' means, well enough," said Dwight.

"Perhaps not exactly what it means here," said Madam Rachel.

"_Dead_ means here _insensible_."

"But I don't know what _insensible_ means," said Caleb.

"I will explain it to you," said she. "Once there were two boys who quarreled in the recess at school; and the teacher decided that for their punishment they should be publicly reproved before all the scholars. So, after school, they were required to stand up in their places, and listen to the reprimand. While they were standing, and the teacher was telling them that they had done very wrong,--had indulged bad pa.s.sions, and displeased G.o.d, and destroyed their own happiness, and brought disgrace upon the school,--one of them stood up with a bold and careless air, while the teacher was speaking, and afterwards when he took his seat, looked round to the other scholars, and laughed. The other boy hung his head, and looked very much ashamed; and as the teacher had finished what he was saying, he sunk into his seat, put his head down upon his desk before him, and burst into tears. Now, the first one was _insensible_, or as it is called in this text, _dead_ to all sense of shame. The other was _alive_ to it. You understand now?"

"Yes, mother," said the boys.

The party walked on for a short time in silence, admiring the splendid and beautiful scenery which was presented to view, in the setting sun, and the calm tranquility which reigned around.