Little Ferns For Fanny's Little Friends Part 14

"Sweep, ho--sweep, ho! want any chimneys swept, ma'am?"

"No, indeed! not if that poor child behind you has got to crawl up the chimney to do it. Why, he can't be more than five years old."

"He's used to it--it don't hurt his _complexion_."

Very like, poor little African; but it would hurt my _feelings_; besides I haven't got any chimney--no, nor a house;--don't own _anything_, I'm happy to say, but a bandbox and a tooth-brush; don't care a snap of my thumb for the "first of May" in New-York; it don't _move_ me!

There's a little boy, under the window, holding up his hand for a penny. He's trying to _cry_; but it is very hard work. Never mind, Johnny, or Sammy, or whatever your name is, don't shed a tear for me, for mercy's sake; but there's a penny for making up such an awful face.

I'll send you to puzzle the barber in the avenue, who advertises to "_cut hair to suit the countenance_!"

CRAZY TIM.

What in the world is that?--a poor old man, almost bent double, drawing a little wooden horse upon the pavement, and laughing and talking to it as if he were seven years old, instead of seventy! How white his hair is; and see--his hat is without a crown, and one of the flaps of his coat is torn off. Now one of the boys has pelted him with a stone, that has brought the blood from his wrinkled cheek; another asks him "how much he will take for his hat," while all the rest surround him, shouting, "Old crazy Uncle Tim--old crazy Uncle Tim!"

Come here, boys, won't you?--and let poor Uncle Tim go home, while I tell you his story.

Uncle Tim used to be the village shoemaker, hammering away at his lap-stone in that little shop with the red eaves, as contentedly as if he owned a kingdom. He always had a pleasant smile and a merry story for his customers, and it was worth twice the money one paid him, to see his sunshiny face and hear his hearty laugh.

[Ill.u.s.tration: CRAZY TIM.]

But the light of Uncle Tim's eyes was his little daughter Kitty. Kitty was not a beauty. No--her little nose turned right up, like a little dogs; her hair was neither soft nor curly; and her little neck and arms were almost as brown as the leather in her father's shop,--still, everybody loved Kitty, because she had such a warm, good heart, and because she was so kind to her honest old father.

Uncle Tim had no wife. She had been dead many years. I shouldn't wonder if Uncle Tim didn't grieve any, for she was a very cross, quarrelsome, disagreeable person, and made him very unhappy.

Little Kitty was his housekeeper now, although she was only seven years old. She and her father lived in a room back of the shop, and Uncle Tim did the cooking, while Kitty washed the dishes, made the bed, and tidied up the small room with her own nimble little fingers. When she had quite done, she would run into the shop, steal behind her father, throw her chubby brown arms about his neck, and give him a kiss that would make him sing like a lark for many an hour after.

While his fingers were busy at his lap-stone he was thinking--not of the coa.r.s.e boots and shoes he was making, but of little Kitty--how he meant to send her to school--how he meant she should learn to read and write, and know a great deal more than ever _he_ did, when he was young--and how he meant to save up all his money in the old yarn stocking, till he got enough to put in the bank for Kitty,--so that when he died she needn't go drifting round the world, trying to earn her bread and b.u.t.ter among cold, stony-hearted strangers.

Uncle Tim found some time to play, too. When it came sundown, he and Kitty, and the old yellow dog Jowler, would start off on a stroll. It was very funny to see little Kitty fasten down the windows with an old nail, before she started, like some old housekeeper, and put the tea-kettle in the left-hand corner of the fire-place, and take such a careful look about to see if everything was right, before turning the key. When they got out into the fields they both enjoyed the fresh air as only industrious people can. Every breath they drew seemed a luxury; and as to Uncle Tim, I don't know which was the younger, he or Kitty. I am sure he went over fences and stone walls like a squirrel; and as to Kitty, her merry laugh would ring through the woods till the little birds would catch it up and echo it back again.

Then, when they reached home, they had such a good appet.i.te for their brown bread and milk. Oh! I can tell you, Uncle Tim and Miss Kitty wouldn't have thanked Queen Victoria for the gift of her scepter, they were so happy.

One day Kitty asked Uncle Tim to let her go huckleberrying. She said she knew a field where they were "as thick as blades of gra.s.s." Uncle Tim couldn't go with her, because Sam Spike, the blacksmith, was in a hurry for a pair of boots to be married in, and of course Sam couldn't wait for all the huckleberries in creation; so Tim staid at home, humming and singing, and singing and humming, while Kitty tied on her calico sun-bonnet, slung her basket on her little brown arm, and trudged off with her dog Jowler.

Jowler was very good company. Kitty and he used to have long conversations about all sorts of things. Kitty always knew by the way he wagged his tail whether he agreed with her or not. When any other dog came up to speak to him, he'd look up into Kitty's little freckled face, to see if she considered the new dog a proper acquaintance, and if she shook her head, he'd give him a look out of his eyes, as much as to say, "It's no use," and trot demurely on after Kitty.

Well, Jowler and she picked a quart of huckleberries, and then Kitty started for home, Jowler carrying the basket in his mouth part of the way, when Kitty spied any flowers she wished to pick. When she had plucked all she wanted she concluded to take a shorter cut home across the fields, and down on the railroad track. So they trotted on, Kitty singing the while.

By and by they reached the track. Kitty looked,--there were no cars coming as far as she could see. To be sure there was a curve in the road just behind her, (round which the eye couldn't look,) but she wasn't afraid. Just then Jowler dropped the basket and spilt her huckleberries. Kitty was _so_ sorry,--but she stooped down to gather them up, when a train of cars whisked like lightning round the curve on the road, and poor little Kitty was crushed to death in an instant!

Jowler wasn't killed--faithful Jowler,--he trotted home to Uncle Tim, who sat singing at his work, and leaped upon him, and whined, and tugged at his coat, till Uncle Tim threw down the blacksmith's boots and followed him, for he knew something must be the matter. Perhaps Kitty had fallen over a stone wall, and lamed her foot--who knew? So Jowler ran backwards and forwards, barking and whining, till he brought Uncle Tim to the railroad track.

Was _that_ crushed ma.s.s of flesh and bone little Kitty?--_his_ Kitty?--all he had in the wide earth to love?

Uncle Tim looked once, and fell upon the earth as senseless as a stone.

Ever since he has been quite crazy. All he cares to do is to draw up and down through the road that little wooden horse that Kitty used to play with, hoping to coax her back to him.

Poor old Tim! Would you throw another stone at him, boys? Would you hunt the weary old man through the streets like some wild beast? Would you taunt, and sneer, and shout in his ears, "Old crazy Tim"--"Old crazy Tim?" Oh, no--no! Pick a flower and give him, as Kitty used; take his hand--poor, harmless old man--and walk along with him; maybe he'll fancy that you are little Kitty, (who knows?) and smile once more before he dies. Poor Uncle Tim!

CICELY HUNT;

OR,

THE LAME GIRL.

What a holy and beautiful thing is a mother's love!

Every morning, about eight o'clock, I have noticed, limping past my window to school, a little lame girl. A woman goes with her; supporting her gently by the arm and carrying her satchel of books.

The girl is very poorly clad. Sometimes her dress will be patched with two or three different colors; but it is always very clean; and I have observed that her stockings, though coa.r.s.e, are always whole, and that her shoes are neatly tied up. The woman who goes with her looks tidy, too; though she wears a rusty black bonnet, of an old-fashioned make, and a faded shawl.

Cicely's little school-mates bound past her; skipping, hopping, jumping and running, as if they could not exercise their legs enough. The lame girl looks at them, smiles a sad, quiet smile, and looks up tearfully in her mother's face. The mother answers back with a look so _full_ of love, and lays her hand upon her child's arm, as much as to say, "I love you all the more, because you are a poor, little helpless cripple."

And so they travel over the icy pavements to school; (stepping very carefully, for it would be a sad thing if Cicely should slip and fall;) until, at last, they reach the school house.

What a blessing are free schools! What a difference it makes in the life of that poor girl, to be able to read! How many weary hours of pain will a nice book beguile! And, beside, if one has not a cent in the world, if one has a good education, it is worth as much as money in the bank,--and more, too, because banks often turn out great humbugs, and then people lose all the money they have placed in them.

Cicely was not always poor. She can remember (just as you can a dream, when you first rub open your eyes in the morning) a great big house with richly carpeted halls, and ma.s.sive chandeliers, and rich sofas and curtains, and gilded mirrors, and silver vessels, and black servants.

She remembers that her father carried a gold-headed cane, that he used to let her play horse with; and that he used to sit a long while at the table with gentlemen, drinking wine and eating fruit after dinner; and that often, he would ring for the nurse to bring _her_ in, to show her to the gentlemen when her curls had been nicely smoothed and her little embroidered frock put on; and that then he would stand her up on the table and make her sing a little song, and that the gentlemen would clap their hands and laugh, and grow very merry about it.

Then she remembers that one day there was a great running to and fro in the house; and she saw her father lifted from a carriage in the arms of two gentlemen, and that blood was flowing from his side; and then her nurse caught her up, and carried her into the nursery, and she didn't go down stairs or see her papa again for many days; and she remembers that one day, getting tired waiting for him to come up and see her, she crept down _by herself_ to his room, and found him lying on the bed, with his hands crossed over his breast, and only a linen sheet thrown over him, though it was very cold weather; and she said, "Papa?"--but he didn't answer; and she got a chair and climbed up in it to put her hand on his face, to wake him, but he was as cold as the marble image in the hall; and then her nurse called, "Cicely!--Cicely!" and seemed frightened, when she found her _there_; but wouldn't tell her _why_ her papa laid there so still, or _why_ he wouldn't speak to his little girl.

And then she remembers going away from the big house, and bidding good-bye to her black nurse; and ever since that they had lived in poor places, and people spoke harshly to them; and though her mamma never answered them back, she sighed heavily, and sometimes leaned her head on her hand and wept.

And one night it snowed in on the bed, and Cicely caught cold and had a fever, which left her with the dreadful lameness that I told you about; and then Cicely's mother groaned because she had no money; for she thought some of the great doctors, if they were well paid for it, might think it worth their while to try and cure Cicely.

Cicely's limb was less painful now than it had been for two years, although it was quite useless; but her mother, as I told you, helped her to limp to school. Cicely kept hoping it would get _quite_ well, and she wanted to learn as fast and as much as she could; because she thought if she got all the medals, the Committee might say, "Cicely, we must have you for a teacher here, some day."

Yes; why not? Stranger things than that have happened; and then, perhaps, she could earn enough to (and here Cicely had to stop to think, because there were so _many_ things they wanted,)--earn enough to buy a pair of warm blankets for their bed; and enough to have a cup of tea Sunday nights; and enough to keep a fire and a light through the long winter evenings, and not have to go to bed because they were so cold, and because candles were so dear.

Yes; Cicely was looking forward to all that, when she limped along to school. She thought it would be so delightful to empty her purse in her kind mother's lap, and say: "Dear mother, you needn't work any more.

_I_ will support you, now."

Oh, what a nice thing hope is! Sometimes, to be sure, she leads us a long dance for nothing; but I am very certain that were it not for hope, we shouldn't be good for much. Many a poor groaner has she clapped on the back, and made him leap to his feet and set his teeth together, and spring over obstacles as if he had on "seven league boots." She is a little coquettish, but _I_ like her. She has helped _me_ out of many a hobble.

Well, as the great speakers say, this is a digression. Do you know what that is? It is leaving off what you are about, to dance off to something else--just as I did up there about hope. Now I'm going on!

One day the committee came to Cicely's school, to hear the scholars recite; and Cicely stood up in her patched gown as straight as she could, and recited her lessons.