The Ontario Readers Part 29

But louder, shriller, more hopeless and more appealing, arose the childish voice, and the settler paused again, irresolute, and with deepening indignation. In his fancy he saw the steaming supper his wife would have awaiting him. He loathed the thought of retracing his steps, and then stumbling a quarter of a mile through the stumps and bog of the wood road. He was foot-sore as well as hungry, and he cursed the vagabond squatter with serious emphasis; but in that wailing was a terror which would not let him go on. He thought of his own little one left in such a position, and straightway his heart melted. He turned, dropped his bundle behind some bushes, grasped his gun, and made speed back for the cabin.

"Who knows," he said to himself, "but that drunken idiot has left his youngster without a bite to eat in the whole miserable shanty? Or maybe he's locked out, and the poor little beggar's half scared to death.

_Sounds_ as if he was scared;" and at this thought the settler quickened his pace.

As the hungry panthers drew near the cabin, and the cries of the lonely child grew clearer, they hastened their steps, and their eyes opened to a wider circle, flaming with a greener fire. It would be thoughtless superst.i.tion to say the beasts were cruel. They were simply keen with hunger, and alive with the eager pa.s.sion of the chase. They were not ferocious with any antic.i.p.ation of battle, for they knew the voice was the voice of a child, and something in the voice told them the child was solitary. Theirs was no hideous or unnatural rage, as it is the custom to describe it. They were but seeking with the strength, the cunning, the deadly swiftness given them to that end, the food convenient for them. On their success in accomplishing that for which nature had so exquisitely designed them, depended not only their own, but the lives of their blind and helpless young, now whimpering in the cave on the slope of the moon-lit ravine. They crept through a wet alder thicket, bounded lightly over the ragged brush fence, and paused to reconnoitre on the edge of the clearing, in the full glare of the moon. At the same moment, the settler emerged from the darkness of the wood road on the opposite side of the clearing. He saw the two great beasts, heads down and snouts thrust forward, gliding toward the open cabin door.

For a few moments the child had been silent. Now his voice rose again in pitiful appeal, a very ecstasy of loneliness and terror. There was a note in the cry that shook the settler's soul. He had a vision of his own boy, at home with his mother, safe-guarded from even the thought of peril. And here was this little one left to the wild beasts! "Thank G.o.d!

Thank G.o.d I came!" murmured the settler, as he dropped on one knee to take a surer aim. There was a loud report (not like the sharp crack of a rifle), and the female panther, shot through the loins, fell in a heap, snarling furiously and striking with her fore-paws.

The male walked around her in fierce and anxious amazement. Presently, as the smoke lifted, he discerned the settler kneeling for a second shot. With a high screech of fury, the lithe brute sprang upon his enemy, taking a bullet full in his chest without seeming to know he was. .h.i.t. Ere the man could slip in another cartridge the beast was upon him, bearing him to the ground and fixing keen fangs in his shoulder. Without a word, the man set his strong fingers desperately into the brute's throat, wrenched himself partly free, and was struggling to rise, when the panther's body collapsed upon him all at once, a dead weight which he easily flung aside. The bullet had done its work just in time.

Quivering from the swift and dreadful contest, bleeding profusely from his mangled shoulder, the settler stepped up to the cabin door and peered in. He heard sobs in the darkness.

"Don't be scared, sonny," he said, in a rea.s.suring voice. "I'm going to take you home along with me. Poor little lad, _I'll_ look after you, if folks that ought to don't."

Out of the dark corner came a shout of delight, in a voice which made the settler's heart stand still. "_Daddy_, Daddy," it said, "I _knew_ you'd come. I was so frightened when it got dark!" And a little figure launched itself into the settler's arms, and clung to him trembling. The man sat down on the threshold and strained the child to his breast. He remembered how near he had been to disregarding the far-off cries, and great beads of sweat broke out upon his forehead.

Not many weeks afterwards the settler was following the fresh trail of a bear which had killed his sheep. The trail led him at last along the slope of a deep ravine, from whose bottom came the brawl of a swollen and obstructed stream. In the ravine he found a shallow cave, behind a great white rock. The cave was plainly a wild beast's lair, and he entered circ.u.mspectly. There were bones scattered about, and on some dry herbage in the deepest corner of the den, he found the dead bodies of two small panther cubs.

CHARLES G. D. ROBERTS: "Earth's Enigmas."

(Adapted)

So nigh is grandeur to our dust, So near is G.o.d to man, When Duty whispers low, "_Thou must_,"

The youth replies, "_I can_."

EMERSON

A SONG OF THE SEA

The Sea! the Sea! the open Sea!

The blue, the fresh, the ever free!

Without a mark, without a bound, It runneth the earth's wide regions 'round; It plays with the clouds; it mocks the skies; Or like a cradled creature lies.

I'm on the Sea! I'm on the Sea!

I am where I would ever be; With the blue above, and the blue below, And silence wheresoe'er I go; If a storm should come and awake the deep, What matter? _I_ shall ride and sleep.

I love (oh! _how_ I love) to ride On the fierce, foaming, bursting tide, When every mad wave drowns the moon, Or whistles aloft his tempest tune, And tells how goeth the world below, And why the south-west blasts do blow.

I never was on the dull, tame sh.o.r.e, But I loved the great Sea more and more, And backwards flew to her billowy breast, Like a bird that seeketh its mother's nest; And a mother she _was_ and _is_ to me; For I was born on the open Sea.

The waves were white, and red the morn, In the noisy hour when I was born; And the whale it whistled, the porpoise rolled And the dolphins bared their backs of gold; And never was heard such an outcry wild As welcomed to life the Ocean-child!

I've lived since then, in calm and strife, Full fifty summers a sailor's life, With wealth to spend, and a power to range, But never have sought nor sighed for change; And Death whenever he comes to me, Shall come on the wide unbounded Sea!

B. W. PROCTER: ("Barry Cornwall")

LITTLE DAFFYDOWNDILLY

"I slept, and dreamed that life was beauty; I woke, and found that life was duty."

Daffydowndilly was so called because in his nature he resembled a flower, and loved to do only what was beautiful and agreeable, and took no delight in labour of any kind. But while Daffydowndilly was yet a little boy, his mother sent him away from his pleasant home, and put him under the care of a very strict schoolmaster, who went by the name of Mr. Toil. Those who knew him best affirmed that this Mr. Toil was a very worthy character; and that he had done more good, both to children and grown people, than anybody else in the world.

Certainly he had lived long enough to do a great deal of good; for, if all stories be true, he had dwelt upon earth ever since Adam was driven from the garden of Eden.

Nevertheless, Mr. Toil had a severe and ugly countenance, especially for such little boys or big men as were inclined to be idle; his voice, too, was harsh; and all his ways and customs seemed very disagreeable to our friend Daffydowndilly. The whole day long this terrible schoolmaster sat at his desk overlooking the scholars, or stalked about the school-room with a certain awful birch rod in his hand. Now came a rap over the shoulders of a boy whom Mr. Toil had caught at play; now he punished a whole cla.s.s who were behindhand with their lessons; and, in short, unless a lad chose to attend quietly and constantly to his book, he had no chance of enjoying a quiet moment in the school-room of Mr. Toil.

"This will never do for me," thought Daffydowndilly.

Now the whole of Daffydowndilly's life had hitherto been pa.s.sed with his dear mother, who had a much sweeter face than old Mr. Toil, and who had always been very indulgent to her little boy. No wonder, therefore, that poor Daffydowndilly found it a woeful change to be sent away from the good lady's side and put under the care of this ugly-visaged schoolmaster, who never gave him any apples or cakes, and seemed to think that little boys were created only to get lessons.

"I can't bear it any longer," said Daffydowndilly to himself, when he had been at school about a week. "I'll run away and try to find my dear mother; and, at any rate, I shall never find anybody half so disagreeable as this old Mr. Toil!"

So the very next morning, off started poor Daffydowndilly, and began his rambles about the world, with only some bread and cheese for his breakfast, and very little pocket-money to pay his expenses. But he had gone only a short distance when he overtook a man of grave and sedate appearance, who was trudging at a moderate pace along the road.

"Good-morning, my lad," said the stranger; and his voice seemed hard and severe, but yet had a sort of kindness in it. "Whence do you come so early, and whither are you going?"

Little Daffydowndilly was a boy of a very ingenuous disposition, and had never been known to tell a lie in all his life. Nor did he tell one now.

He hesitated a moment or two, but finally confessed that he had run away from school, on account of his great dislike for Mr. Toil; and that he was resolved to find some place in the world where he should never see or hear of the old schoolmaster again.

"Oh, very well, my little friend!" answered the stranger. "Then we will go together; for I, likewise, have had a good deal to do with Mr. Toil, and should be glad to find some place where he was never heard of."

Our friend Daffydowndilly would have been better pleased with a companion of his own age, with whom he might have gathered flowers along the road-side, or have chased b.u.t.terflies, or have done many other things to make the journey pleasant. But he had wisdom enough to understand that he should get along through the world much easier by having a man of experience to show him the way. So he accepted the stranger's proposal, and they walked on very sociably together.

They had not gone far, when the road pa.s.sed by a field where some haymakers were at work, mowing down the tall gra.s.s and spreading it out in the sun to dry. Daffydowndilly was delighted with the sweet smell of the new-mown gra.s.s, and thought how much pleasanter it must be to make hay in the sunshine under the blue sky, and with the birds singing sweetly in the neighbouring trees and bushes, than to be shut up in a dismal school-room, learning lessons all day long, and continually scolded by old Mr. Toil. But, in the midst of these thoughts, while he was stopping to peep over the stone wall, he started back and caught hold of his companion's hand.

"Quick, quick!" cried he. "Let us run away, or he will catch us!"

"Who will catch us?" asked the stranger.

"Mr. Toil, the old schoolmaster!" answered Daffydowndilly. "Don't you see him amongst the haymakers?"

And Daffydowndilly pointed to an elderly man, who seemed to be the owner of the field, and the employer of the men at work there. He had stripped off his coat and waistcoat, and was busily at work in his shirt sleeves.

The drops of sweat stood upon his brow; but he gave himself not a moment's rest, and kept crying out to the haymakers to make hay while the sun shone. Now, strange to say, the figure and features of this old farmer were precisely the same as those of old Mr. Toil, who, at that very moment, must have been just entering his school-room.

"Don't be afraid," said the stranger. "This is not Mr. Toil, the schoolmaster, but a brother of his, who was bred a farmer; and the people say he is the more disagreeable man of the two. However, he won't trouble you unless you become a labourer on the farm."

Little Daffydowndilly believed what his companion said, but he was very glad, nevertheless, when they were out of sight of the old farmer, who bore such a singular resemblance to Mr. Toil. The two travellers had gone but little farther, when they came to a spot where some carpenters were erecting a house. Daffydowndilly begged his companion to stop a moment; for it was a very pretty sight to see how neatly the carpenters did their work, with their broad-axes and saws, and planes, and hammers, shaping out the doors, and putting in the window-sashes, and nailing on the clap-boards; and he could not help thinking that he should like to take a broad-axe, a saw, a plane, and a hammer, and build a little house for himself. And then, when he should have a house of his own, old Mr.