Little Ferns For Fanny's Little Friends Part 7

TOM, THE TAILOR.

Tell you another story, Charley? Bless your blue eyes, how many stories high do you suppose I am?

Who made that jacket for you, hey?

"A tailor."

Do you like to see a _man_ sewing, Charley? I don't. I don't believe that their great muscular arms were intended to wield a needle, especially when so many feminine fingers are forced to be idle for want of employment; so I never like to see a tailor.--Oh, yes, I do, too. I came very near forgetting Tom Willcut.

Who was _he_? I don't know, any more than you do. The first time I saw him, was in an old tumble-down building, where the wind played hide and go seek through the timbers; and where more men, women, dogs and children were huddled together, than four walls of the like size ever held before.

In one of the smallest of these rooms, I first saw Tom; sitting, with a white cotton cap upon his head, cross-legged on the floor, st.i.tching away by the dim light of a tallow candle. A line stretched across the room, on which hung some coa.r.s.e pea-jackets and trousers which he had finished, while at his side stood a rough table, with the remains of some supper, and two unwashed cups and saucers.

_Two_ cups and saucers, thought I: pray, who shares this little room with that poor, pale tailor?

Ah, I see! In yonder bed, which I had not noticed, lies a woman, and on her breast a little wee baby. Well may Tom sit drawing out his thread, hour after hour, by that dim candle.

1 coughed a little bit. Tom shaded his eyes with his hand, looked up, and invited me in. That was just what I wanted, you know. Then, he dusted off a chair with the tail of his coat, and I sat down.

"Is that your baby?" said I.

"It is _ours_," said he, looking over, with a proud smile, at his wife.

I liked Tom from that very minute. Of course, his wife wanted to own half of such a nice little baby--and the first one, too--and it was very gallant of tailor Tom, to say "_ours_," instead of "mine:" it showed he had a soul above b.u.t.tons. Ask your mother if it didn't.

Then I asked Tom if he got good pay for making those jackets. He clipped off his thread with his great shears, and, shaking his head, said, "My boss is a Jew, Missis."

What did he mean by that? Why, "boss" means master, and Jew, I am sorry to say, is but another name for a person who gets all the work he can out of poor people, and pays them as little for it as possible.

Tom's answer made me feel very bad,--he said it in such a quiet, uncomplaining way, as if, hard as it was, he had quite made up his mind to it, for the sake of that new baby and its mother.

I wanted to jump right up and take him by the hand, and say, "Tom, you are a hero!" but, I dare say he wouldn't have understood that. Your father, Charley, would probably call him a "philosopher," but you and I, who can't afford to use up the dictionary that way, will say he is a clever, good-hearted fellow.

When Tom was first married, he had a little shop of his own, and was "quite before-hand," as he called it; but one unlucky night it caught on fire, and burned up all his coats, and trousers, and jackets, and all the stuff he had laid in to make them of; and then his wife was taken sick; and, what with doctoring, and one trouble and another, although poor Tom was honest, temperate and industrious, he came down to that poor, miserable little room, after all.

But Tom was not a man to whine about his bad luck. No; he looked at that new baby, and made his fingers fly faster than ever, and wore a cheerful smile for his sick wife, beside. That's why I called him "a hero;" for, Charley, anybody can be courageous and endure a great deal when all the world are looking on and clapping their hands, and admiring them; but it is another thing, in an obscure corner, without food, without friends, without hope, to struggle--struggle--struggle on, fighting off Temptation, fighting off grim Want, day after day, with none to say, "G.o.d speed you."

That's why I said the poor tailor had a good, _brave_ heart; that's why I honored him; that's why I prayed G.o.d a brighter day might dawn for him.

Did it? Yes! I tell you, Charley, _never despair!_ no matter how dark the cloud is overhead, work on, and look up; the sun will shine through, by and by;--it did for poor Tom.

One day a gentleman called to see him, and asked him to go with him and look at some cloth for making jackets. Tom thought it was very odd;--he didn't remember that anybody ever asked his opinion before;--he didn't know what to make of it. However, he dropped his shears, pulled off his cotton cap, kissed his little baby, and followed the gentleman.

They went along through a great many streets, till they came to the business part of the town. The gentleman opened the door of a small shop, and Tom followed him in. There were cloths of all kinds on the shelves, and the gentleman took some down and asked Tom if they were the right sort for such jackets as he had been making; and Tom said it was "prime cloth."

And then the gentleman showed him a little room, divided off at the end of the shop, and asked Tom if it was light enough to work in, and Tom said it could not be better; and then the gentleman clapped him on the shoulder, and told him to go to work in it as soon as he pleased, for these were his goods, and that was his shop!

Poor Tom looked as if he were dreaming. He tried to speak two or three times, but failed. Then, great tears dropped over his cheeks, and he said, "G.o.d bless you, sir, but I don't know what to say."

"I'm very glad of it," said the gentleman, smiling; "because I don't want you to say anything; only go home and bring your wife and baby, because there is a nice parlor and bed-room overhead, and I want to see how they look in it."

Well, the amount of it was, that the poor tailor's wife was as crazy as the tailor himself; the baby crowed, and the little terrier dog barked; and, altogether, they had a _moving_ time of it, that day.

I can't tell you the kind gentleman's name, because he never does a charity to have it published; but, sure I am, the recording angel has written it in the "Book of Life."

BETSEY'S DREAM.

It was very weary, lying there so long. Betsey had counted all the squares, and three-cornered pieces, and circles, in the patch-work quilt upon her bed; she knew there were six more red than green ones, and that one of the circles was pieced seven times.

Yes, poor lame Betsey was very tired; not that she was unused to lying there, day after day, while her mother went out washing; but, somehow, _this_ day had seemed longer and more tedious than any which had gone before. To be sure she had last year's almanac, and a torn newspaper, but she knew them both by heart. Betsey wished she "only had a little book," but she knew mother couldn't buy books, when she had not money enough for bread; so she twisted and turned, and rubbed her lame foot, and lay and looked at the mantel with its pewter lamp, and the shelf with its two earthen bowls, and its wooden spoons and platters, and the bench with her mother's wash tub on it and a square of brown soap, and the brown jug full of starch, and the old worn-out broom and mop.

Betsey could have seen them just as well had her eyes been shut, she had looked at them so many times.

Did I tell you Betsey was "alone?" Oh no--there were four or five families in the some entry. There was Mrs. O'Flanigan with her six red-headed, quarrelsome children and a drunken husband, who beat her everyday till she screamed with pain; and then the six little Flanigans all screamed, too, till Betsey would put her fingers in her ears to shut out the dreadful sounds.

Then, there was Mrs. Doherty, who had twin babies and one room, and took boarders in the corners. Then, there was black Dinah, who got her living by sc.r.a.ping the gutters, and came home every night with a great tow-cloth bag upon her back, and emptied the old bones and rugs and papers on the floor of her room, and kept a broom handle to whip the little Flanigans, who ran in to steal them, when she went to the pump in the alley to get a drink of water.

Then, there was little Pat Rourke, who lived up the alley, and kept a little black dog named Pompey. When Pat didn't know what else to do, he would open Betsey's door, and put the dog in to worry her cat, and enjoy Betsey's fright.

Pompey would chase p.u.s.s.y all round the room, and then p.u.s.s.y would spit at him, and hump up her back and hide behind the wash-tub; and then Pompey would turn over the wash-tub, and seize p.u.s.s.y by the neck; and then her eyes would turn all green; and then Betsey would scream and beg Pat to drive Pompey off; and then Pat would point to her lame foot and say, "Let's see you do it _yourself_, honey;" and then Betsey would hide her face under the coverlid and cry; and then Pat would run off, leaving the door wide open, and the cold air blowing right upon the bed. Yes, Betsey had all this to amuse her, besides the torn newspaper and the old almanac.

But why _didn't_ her mother come home?--that was the question. It must be late in the afternoon;--Betsey knew _that_, for the sun had crept round to the west window long since. They must have a great wash to do up at the big house. Betsey hoped the lady wouldn't go out to ride in her carriage, and forget, as she sometimes did, to pay her mother; and she hoped the cook would give her some cold tea to warm for their supper, and perhaps a bit of meat, or some potatoes. The lady herself never gave Betsey's mother anything, except an old gauze ball dress "to make over for her little girl," which Betsey's mother sold for twenty-five cents, to buy some tea.

And then Betsey wondered if rich people were always born without hearts, and if her foot would _always_ be lame, and she should never be able to help her mother, but must always be a burden; and then she thought it would be better if she died; and then she thought _not_, because when her mother came home at night ever so weary, she remembered that she always kissed her cheek, and called her "a little darling," and divided her piece of bread with her, and smiled just as sweetly as if she hadn't worked ever since the sun rose, for a mere penny.

Then Betsey was so weary that she fell asleep, and dreamed she was an angel. She was not lame any longer; she had bright wings, and a pure white robe, and a golden harp. There was no misery there, and night and day she sang, "Worthy, worthy, worthy the Lamb!" and thousands of bright winged angels echoed it back; and then--poor little Betsey woke, crying because it was only a dream, and found herself again in the little old room all alone,--all but p.u.s.s.y, who was rubbing her lank sides against the bed post and the wicker chair, and looking wistfully up into Betsey's face, as much as to say, aint you _very_ hungry, Betsey?

"Rein up--rein up! Stop your horses, I say! It's no use--she's down."

"Move your omnibus,"--"Get out of the way, there,"--"Go ahead"--"What do you block up the street, for?"--"What's to pay?"--"Who's killed?"

"Only a beggar woman," said the omnibus driver, gathering up his reins; "she slipped on the wet pavements, yonder, and the horses went over her, and killed her. Can't be helped, you know,--there's enough beggars left--everybody knows _that_," and he whipped up his horses, and drove on.

Then a police-man picked up Betsey's dead mother and carried her to the watch house; while some little Irish boys ran off with her basket and ate up Betsey's supper.

There was n.o.body to take care of lame Betsey, so she was carried to the poor-house. It didn't matter much to her, when she found her mother was dead, where they took her. She was used to seeing misery; so the groans of the poor creatures on the hospital cots about her was nothing new.

But she grew very weak, day by day, and couldn't eat the food they brought her; and one morning the old nurse found her lying with her little cheek in her hand, and a smile upon her face. Betsey's dream had come true: she was an angel!