The Angel Children Part 3

"Let us give her rest and comfort," said the angel-children; and, waving their wings over her, she fell to sleeping.

The nurse said, then, there might be hope. Listen and hear,--what bright hope there was, indeed!

They whispered to her, that soon her pain should cease, and that, for her trust and patience, she should go to G.o.d's beautiful garden. They showed her the fountains and the birds; they told her how she should again ride upon the clouds, and study from the great books of G.o.d. Then in her sleep she smiled, and the nurse, who was watching her face, wept for joy, and exclaimed,

"There is hope! there is hope!"

Yes, there was hope!

When the little girl awoke, there was a more heavenly patience still, in her soul, and a longing to meet the loving glances of the angel-children again.

As the children wended their flight back to the gardens, and sat down beneath the green trees, and ate of their delicious fruit, they strove in vain to bring back the brightness to the face of the earth-baby.

"Ah, it would be so beautiful to stay with you!" he said. "I would like always to comfort these afflicted ones; but, alas! I shall need comfort myself, and you will come to me, as we have been to others. When I am on the earth there seems something gone and lost, and what is before me is confused and dim. I find myself so weak and helpless, when here I am so sprightly and strong! I cannot move myself at all, and when I remember these gardens I have left, and you with whom I have played, I can but cry all the time! It looks cold and bleak there, as it never does here.

Then, should I grow up to be wicked, like those children we have seen, and so go far away from heaven, how wretched should I become,--how much better that I never had left these gardens!"

Thus he complained, and the other children were silent, for they knew how they, too, at some time, must go down and try their fortunes upon the earth; and, too, they sorrowed to lose their companion, for they knew that soon he could not come to them any more;--and while they told him, very eagerly, how they would come to watch over him, a soft tread fell on their ears, and their dear teacher approached them.

Her hair floated in long curls upon the cool air, and her eyes were bent down in sorrow upon the earth-child.

"Have you so soon forgotten the lessons you have learned from the book of G.o.d?" she asked; and the tones of her voice were like the soft harmonies of heaven. She held in her hand a book, along whose pages the letters sparkled in the brightness of gold and silver. At the sight of her, the earth-child threw himself at her feet, and besought her thus:

"Keep me with you, dear teacher, and teach me from your book! Why should I go to the earth-home again?"

Tenderly did the angel-teacher embrace and uplift the imploring child.

She pointed to a distant part of the garden, towards a grate of lattice-work, in gold, silver and pearls, whence issued a glorious light. Beyond this they saw angels walking, in their hands bearing still more glorious books than the one she held.

"When I taught you, long ago, how beautiful was the life there, how _pure_ the love, did you not long to go thither? And when I told you that the way thither was only through the earth,--that it was long and difficult and narrow,--that many troubles must make you strong to walk in it,--did you not long to go, promising not to complain? Do you so soon falter? Have I not told you that the book you carry in your hands there must first be formed on the earth?--that there you shall pick up one by one the shining letters which compose it? Why do you complain?--have you forgotten that your home is better than those miserable ones which have been given to those who were your beloved playmates here? This is your last visit to the garden of G.o.d. The angel-children shall come and whisper to you in your dreams; and, when they in their turns go down to live upon the earth, hold your arms out to them, and, when their steps are weak, help them along. And when you see children with tattered clothes, in poor cottages, look not proudly on your own, but remember that here, in the garden of G.o.d, you played together in the same fountain, drank the same dew; and think no more of yourself or your beautiful earth-home, for G.o.d gave it to you for the same purpose he gave the wretched cottage to the other. Remember, too, the good mother, who has patiently hushed your cries, and will yet bear you through many dark places. She has never yet tired in caring for you, and you have given her little else but trouble. Go; be henceforth patient and loving."

Sorrow came into the heart of the child for his selfishness; and, as he thought of his beautiful mother, how she always smiled upon him, and would help him to heaven, his heart filled up with love to her.

At that moment he opened his eyes, and there by his side sat the mother, watching for his awaking; a heavenly smile stole over his features, and he held up his arms to her. The mother caught him from the cradle, and wept over him in the ecstasy of a new-found joy and love; for it was the _First Smile_ her baby had given her.

CYBELE, THE TAMBOURINE GIRL.

Cybele was a little girl; she had large gray eyes, and brown hair smoothly parted over her forehead, while there was a pitiful expression round her mouth, that pleaded with you so earnestly, you could scarce help stopping, as you met her, to give her a few pennies.

Her real home was not in this country. Long ago she had come over from the bright land of Italy,--from its warm, sunny skies and beautiful gardens, where the birds sang so joyfully, and gay music sounded on the air,--all which she longed to see and hear again; and as all things there had been so beautiful, and here so dreary, all beauty grew to be the same thing as that dear Italy, so that when she even saw flowers in the window of some lordly house, she would stand, gazing tearfully through them at the far-off home!

Cybele's mother had died in that beautiful land, and it was in one of its lovely gardens her body rested while her spirit soared heavenward.

The little girl knew this place so well;--the orange-trees grew about it, and the song of the waterfall, near by, played and sparkled in the tones of the birds. But Cybele's aunt had taken the little girl with her to this distant land, and the child could no longer go and weep over the grave where her mother's body had been laid; but her heart was there--it could not forget. She dreamed of it in the long nights; and, when she played upon her tambourine, the remembrance inspired her notes, making people love to listen to her.

Away down in an uncomfortable, out-of-the-way part of the city dwell a great many poor people, who have come from distant countries to find here some bread, which may keep them from starving. The streets where they dwell are dirty, and the houses look smoky and wretched. There are queer little shops, with oranges and cigars, bread and tobacco, in the windows, and if you go in you smell yeast, and see milk-cans standing about, while a man in a green jacket sells you what you ask for. To such shops do the people near by come for their bread and cent's worth of milk. To such a shop little Cybele came, early in the morning, and late at night; and so dingy looked the shops and people, that her aunt's room seemed bright and cheerful in comparison. This room, nevertheless, was small and quite dark, having but one window, which looked down into a brown back-yard; but her aunt kept the room neat and clean; the bed stood off by itself, in one corner, the two chairs on either side of the table, and in the cupboard were a few plates and cups, with which the scanty table was spread; yet was this room dear to the child, since the dreams she had dreamed there hung over her still with their light and love.

It chanced, one day, that her aunt fell sick--so sick as to be obliged to lie on the bed. For a long time she had not been able to do any hard work, but had sat at home and made little brooms for Cybele to take out with her when she went to play the tambourine about the streets. And Cybele had seen how her aunt grew pale, day by day, but she had not dreamed the time would come when her aunt must lay still on the bed for weariness.

With a heavy heart she took the brooms and the tambourine, and went out, hoping to get a few pennies, and bring home a doctor for her aunt.

But it was a sad day for Cybele. She was rudely sent away from the doors at which she stopped, and though she stood long before the windows of lordly houses, in which she felt were many persons, still the sashes were left down, and no kind group appeared to encourage her. So she pa.s.sed on, through quiet squares and noisy streets, but everywhere met with a repulse.

What should she do? It was impossible to go home without money. She thought of the poor aunt who was sick, and of the mother who lay away in the gardens of Italy, and new courage came into her soul. A gentleman came toward her, with ruddy cheeks and smooth, rich clothes. Surely he will not turn away from the little child. So she stepped forward, and, when he came near, she looked up in his face, saying,

"Please, sir, will you not buy one of my brooms?"

But he brushed by her, unheeding her gentle tones, and leaving her eyes filled with tears.

Then came along a careless boy, whistling a merry tune, and with his hands thrust into his pockets. Confidence and hope made her ask him also.

"Please, will you buy a broom?"

The boy stopped, and, still whistling, looked into her face, glanced over her dress, tambourine and brooms; and, as his eyes rested upon these last, he replied:

"Buy a broom! Pray, what think you I want with one of those flimsy things?" And then he looked at her as though he thought her so absurd!

Cybele was abashed by his manner, and began to think she had asked him to do a very foolish thing, so she hurried to reply:

"I don't know, I'm sure; but they brush away flies with them."

"Flies!" he repeated, contemptuously, at the same time taking one of the brooms from her little bundle, and thrusting it about him in all conceivable ways; pulling open the brush, and altogether ruining it.

"Flies! it is getting too cool for flies; and, besides, my mother never lets any get into the house; so it's no use any way. Why don't you go home? It's a shame to be walking round the streets so. You ought to be in school, or at work, or something else."

[Ill.u.s.tration: CYBELE THE TAMBOURINE GIRL.]

"I don't know how to do anything else," replied Cybele, the blood rushing to her cheeks; "my aunt is sick, and I want to get some money."

"Tush!--always sick!" replied the boy, contemptuously; "how silly! I wonder the beggars don't all die some day, they've been sick so long!"

"We are not beggars!" said Cybele, raising her head somewhat proudly, and preparing to move away. "If you don't want the broom, I'll take it, if you please."

The boy seemed half pleased, as he looked at her, and said:

"Proud, too--if it isn't funny! Here, don't go away--I want to hear your tambourine."

So she laid down her bundle of brooms, and, arranging her tambourine, played him some merry tunes.

"Can't you dance, too?" asked the boy, when she had finished. So she danced and played to him; and, when she stopped, he placed a penny in her hand, and coolly walked away.

She looked at the penny lying in her hand, and then after the boy, who was walking up the street, and she couldn't help thinking how very little it was, and how she hoped he would have given her more. She looked at the little broom he had ruined, and everything seemed sadder than before. Then, by some strange freak, her mind ran off to the gardens where her mother slept, as it always did when darkness gathered round her, and she longed, more than ever before, to throw herself on the ground there, and quietly sleep a long, long time. During the whole day she had received but a few pennies; so few, they would not induce a doctor to go down to her sick aunt. If she only could have met some kind heart, which would have gone home with her, and given kind words and soothing draughts to the sick one! But it was not brought into her path.

When she came home and saw how much worse her aunt was than when she had left her in the morning, her little heart grew sick; and Cybele, who had seen her mother grow thin and die, began to be terrified, lest the aunt too would be taken.

So, she went up to her gently, and kissed her brow, and the poor aunt opened her eyes and smiled mournfully; and when she heard how little money the tambourine had brought that day, she tried to conceal her sorrow lest the little child should be grieved.

Then Cybele lighted a small fire in their bit of a fireplace, and made a little tea for her aunt. It was the very last she had; but when she thought how much her aunt needed it, and how she would need still more on the morrow, hope whispered, quite cheerfully, that with the tambourine she would win from people's pockets many a bright cent. With these thoughts, she looked very lovingly towards the tambourine, which lay quietly upon the floor in the corner, its gay bells silent, as if it, too, felt sorrow for the aunt's sickness.