A cup of sweets, that can never cloy Part 4

"Rob their parents!" exclaimed George. "Yes, rob them," replied the old man. "Would it not be robbing their father and mother, if they allowed them to squander their money upon them in paying for their schooling to no purpose?"

George wiped the tears from his eyes, and said he was afraid he was a very bad boy; but he was sorry for it, and would endeavour to mend, if his papa could be prevailed on to pardon what was past. He then told the old man all that had happened, and how the wicked Robert had enticed him to run away from school; but he was so hungry, and so fatigued, that he could hardly speak or hold up his head. The young woman gave him a large bowl of milk and bread, and put him into a neat, clean bed, where he slept soundly till eight o'clock the next morning, when, after a comfortable breakfast, the good peasant accompanied him to his father's house, and said so much in his favour, and of the sorrow he had shewn for his ill behaviour, that he was immediately forgiven.

He was, at his own desire, taken back to school, where he entreated his master to pardon the little attention he had paid to his books, and the instruction he had been so good as to give him; as also his elopement, a fault he had, he said, repented of almost as soon as he had committed it.

The master readily forgave him upon his acknowledging his error, and a.s.sured him, that, though he always punished those who deserved it, he knew very well how to distinguish the innocent from the guilty, and that, whilst he behaved like a good boy, he would have no reason to fear his anger.

JEALOUSY.

Rose was eight years of age when her sister Harriet was born: she was extremely fond of the baby, watched its cradle whilst it slept, and was never tired of looking at it, and admiring its little features; but she could not, without pain, observe, that she was no longer, as she had been accustomed to be, the _sole_ object of her mamma's care and attention.

Harriet must not be left a moment! Harriet must not be disturbed! And even if her mamma had the head-ach, and Rose was not suffered to go into her room, the little stranger was admitted. She concluded that she was no longer loved by any body, for even the servants were, she fancied, more occupied with her little sister than with her, or any thing which concerned her; and before she was ten years of age, she was become so very jealous and fretful, that she took no pleasure in any thing, nor was it in the power of any one to please or amuse her.

One day walking in the garden with her mamma, who carried the little Harriet in her arms, and coming to a part of it where several tall and far-spreading trees afforded them a pleasant shade from the heat of the sun, they stopped to enjoy its coolness. The gardener was ordered to bring them some cherries, and they sat down on the gra.s.s to await his coming: the little one, however, had no inclination to be so long still, and her mamma, to please and keep her quiet, lifted her up, and seated her on the bough of a tree which spread above their heads.

Rose immediately changed colour; her countenance, which a moment before was tolerably cheerful, now became gloomy and sullen; she leaned her cheek upon her hand, and her eyes followed them, expressing nothing but discontent and jealousy.

Her mamma was not long before she perceived the angry glances thrown upon her, and asked her, in a tone of displeasure, what they signified?

"I cannot help fearing," said Rose, "that you no longer love me, now that you have another little girl. I remember, when you played with me all day; I was then continually on your knee, and every thing you had was brought out to amuse me; the servants also thought of nothing but how to give me pleasure; but now I go neglected about the house, and n.o.body minds me: it is true, I have every thing I want, and my papa and you are always buying me toys and pretty things of one kind or another; and I have often some of my little friends, whom you allow me to invite to drink tea, and spend the afternoon with me; but----"

"But," interrupted her mamma, "I no longer take you upon my knee like a baby, or carry you in my arms; nor have I strength sufficient to lift you up, and place you upon the bough of a tree, to please and make you quiet, as I have done by your little sister. You forget, I imagine, that you are ten years old, and that if I were to treat you in the same manner as I do a child of two, we should both be laughed at by every creature who might happen to see us. Reflect, my dear Rose, and do not suppose, that, because the helpless age of this little darling demands more care and attention than is necessary to you--because, being her nurse, I am obliged to have her often with me, when the company of another would be troublesome and inconvenient to me--do not fancy, my love, from these circ.u.mstances, that you are less beloved by either your papa or myself; but that as you increase in years, we shall shew our affection to you in a very different way to that in which we now do; as at present we treat you much otherwise than we did when you were of the age of your sister Harriet.

"I have long observed, with much uneasiness and concern, the fretfulness and discontent you have exhibited in your countenance at every mark of tenderness and care shewn to your sister. If you suffer this humour to grow upon you, it will be observed by every body, and you will then, in reality, be disliked and shunned by all your acquaintance, though at present it is only in your own fancy that you are so. Recollect yourself in time, re-a.s.sume your cheerfulness, a.s.sist me in taking care of this sweet child, instead of being angry at the attention I shew her; and be a.s.sured that we feel an equal affection towards you both, though we do not think it proper to treat you, my dear Rose, as we do a baby of two years old."

EDMOND.

"What an unlucky boy I am!" said Edmond, running towards his papa, whom he had been seeking over all the house and gardens. "My grandmamma has changed her mind about going to my uncle's, and, instead of taking me with her to spend a fortnight at his house, when I had set my heart upon it, I must content myself at home, she says, and wait for another opportunity. Every thing goes wrong with me--it was but last week that the pigs got into my little garden, and destroyed every thing in it."

"Stop! stop!" interrupted his papa, "and, before you complain of your evil destiny, recollect, that if you had not heard the pigs in your garden, and ran in haste to drive them out of it, you would not have seen your little brother, whom you seized by the arm on the very edge of the pond, and who, in another moment, would probably have fallen into it, and would have been drowned before any of the family had missed him.

It is not impossible but that you may have cause to rejoice some time hence at what now appears to you such a mighty disappointment."

His papa's words were soon verified: for not more than ten days had elapsed after this conversation, when they received a letter which filled them with the severest affliction. A servant belonging to his uncle had caught a dreadful putrid sore throat and fever, of which he died almost immediately, and which had infected the whole family. Edmond heard with the utmost grief, that one of his cousins was no more, and that the other lay in so dangerous a state, that his life was despaired of: and he did not fail to offer his unfeigned thanks to G.o.d for having preserved him from the danger to which he would have been exposed, if his grandmamma had not suddenly changed her intention of going to his uncle's: he determined also, that he would never, in future, complain of any trifling disappointments he might chance to meet with, or find fault, as he had too often done, with the arrangements of Providence; but conclude, that, however extraordinary many things might appear to him, being ordered by Him who knows best what is fit for us, they must, some way or other, sooner or later, turn to our advantage and happiness.

Edmond, in the long walks he took with his papa, often met with things which appeared to him very strange, and which (notwithstanding the resolution he had made, and the rule he had laid down never to find fault) made him thoughtful, and wish to know why they were permitted.

An old man, who was universally esteemed in the village, had been involved in perplexity and trouble, as it appeared to him, very unjustly. He was tenant to a rich man, and had been long and comfortably settled in a prosperous way in a little farm, which lay in a fertile and beautiful valley belonging to his large estate.

The rich man was hard-hearted and revengeful, and, taking a dislike to poor old Davis on some very trifling occasion, had turned him out of the farm at so short a notice, that he had had the utmost difficulty to find a place to take shelter in. He had a great deal of trouble in removing his cattle and his poultry, his corn and his hay-mows, and every thing belonging to his farm; and said he was sure it would be a couple of years before he should be able to recover the expense and loss of time; and Edmond, who never went into the village without paying him a visit, and loved to chat with him and his old dame, never heard them talk of it without thinking is was, at least, _a pity_ that he had met with so great a misfortune.

The winter was very severe, the snow fell fast, it was deep, and lay very long on the ground. Davis was obliged to take his cattle in from the fields, and feed them entirely on hay; his poultry required the utmost care and attention, and every thing in his garden was in danger of peris.h.i.+ng. "This is a sad winter for poor old Davis," said Edmond to his papa; "I am afraid it will put him another year behind hand; I wish he had not been driven from that flouris.h.i.+ng farm in the valley."

"I wish so too," replied his papa, "if it would have been more for his good to have remained there--but G.o.d knows best!"

The spring returned, the snow melted, torrents of water fell from the hills--the brooks swelled, and overflowed the meadows--every thing was inundated: the farm in the valley was entirely destroyed, and all the cattle with which the rich man had stocked it were drowned. Davis, on his hill, had felt the sharpness and biting frost of winter; he had heard the wind roar, and the rain beat against his cas.e.m.e.nt: but when the snow melted, he felt no ill effects from it, but turned out his cattle, which he had sheltered whilst it lay on the ground, to feast on the fresh herbage which had been preserved under it.

"I perceive now," said Edmond, "that I have been once more mistaken, and that, instead of thinking Davis an object of pity, I should look upon him as a fortunate man. If he had remained in the valley, his whole property would have been destroyed, and he would have been a beggar: now he has but to be doubly attentive to his labour, and he will soon recover the expense of his removal: he will then be just as well as he was, and he might this day have been without a morsel of bread, or a s.h.i.+lling to purchase one."

THE GHOST AND THE DOMINOS.

Sophy Benson, when she was only eleven years old, could write, read, draw, and play on the piano-forte, better than any little girl of her age in the whole neighbourhood; she was obedient to her papa and mamma, affectionate to her brothers and sisters, and would do any thing to oblige her friends, except going up stairs after night, staying in the garden alone a moment after the dusk of the evening, or going to bed before her sister. On these points, though she really wished to shew a readiness to do as she was desired, and had often attempted to do so, she never had been able to find resolution sufficient to carry her through with it; for she had heard of ghosts, giants, fairies, and monsters of divers kinds, and was never an instant alone in the dark, without expecting to see one or the other; concluding, it must be imagined, that it was customary with those gentlemen and ladies to pay their visits, each with a wax taper in their hands, to exhibit their persons by.

Sophy had a brother, a good-natured boy, one year younger than herself, whom she always contrived to get to accompany her when she had any thing to fetch from her chamber after night; but unfortunately, she had repeated so many terrible stories to him (to shew that she was not afraid without reason), that poor Harry soon became almost as great a coward as his sister; and they found, that whenever they had occasion to go out of the parlour after candlelight, it was necessary to procure a third person to be of their party, for they no longer thought themselves in safety together.

It may be thought a fortunate circ.u.mstance, that the infection did not spread, or the whole family would soon have been obliged to move in a body; but there was little danger of any thing so ridiculous: it was, on the contrary, much to be wondered at that a sensible girl, like Sophy Benson, should have been capable of such a weakness, and that she never gave herself time to reflect, that there could not be the smallest foundation for the silly fears with which she had filled her head.

Her mamma had taken a great deal of pains to endeavour to convince her of the folly of indulging herself in such ridiculous fancies, but it was to no purpose; her imagination was continually making her see strange sights, and hear extraordinary noises; and though she exposed herself to the ridicule and laughter of her elder brothers and sisters, when her giant proved to be a tree, and her dismal groans to be occasioned by the noise of a door or a window-shutter on a stormy night: still she went on in the same way, and had made poor little Harry as foolish as herself.

Whenever she was alone, either in the house or garden, a moment later than she liked to be, her heart immediately began to beat, and she flew like lightning to seek protection; her hands clasped, her elbows squeezed close to her sides, and her head hung down--and in this way, every object she glanced her eyes upon appeared to her fancy something extraordinary: had she but summoned resolution to take a second look, she must have laughed at her own folly.

One evening she came screaming into the parlour, and a.s.sured her mamma that she had had the greatest difficulty to escape from a hideous creature, who, with outspread arms, was on the point of seizing her, and begged the door might be locked immediately. Her mamma, and her brothers and sisters, laughed immoderately at her strange story, which mortified her extremely; but they could not prevail on her to _shew_ them where she had seen the terrible creature: she could, however, tell them the exact spot, though she endeavoured to dissuade them from venturing to go to it; but she could not prevail on any of them to be frightened, and they soon discovered the monster, with its outspread arms, to be nothing more than the horse on which the servant had been beating her papa's coat.

One evening, when the moon shone bright and fine, and Sophy and Harry had a very great desire to fetch a box of dominos which was in the nursery, and which they well knew they should not have, unless they went themselves to fetch it, after sitting half an hour, whispering and endeavouring to a.s.sume sufficient courage for so great an undertaking, they at length determined to go, for they were tired of having nothing to amuse themselves with, and had still a long winter evening before them.

Quaking through fear, and holding as fast as they possibly could by each other's hand, they ascended the stairs, got into the pa.s.sage which led to the nursery, and were just going to open the door, when Sophy recollected, that if Harry was seen by her maid, she should be finely laughed at, and asked if she dared not venture to take a step without having him to protect her; she therefore begged he would wait at the door whilst she went into the nursery to fetch the dominos; but Harry would not hear of such a thing, and said he would not stay in the pa.s.sage alone on any account whatever.

Sophy was so desirous of appearing courageous to her maid, that she tried every means she could think of to engage Harry to wait for her; told him she would not be a moment, that the moon shone as bright as day--but all was to no purpose, till by promising to give him her little box of colours, and her ivory cup and ball, she at length prevailed upon him to consent.

She walked into the nursery with an air of unconcern and boldness not at all usual to her; but it was quite lost, for Mary was not there and she knew not how to venture so far as a closet at the other end of it, to take out the box of dominos, but was on the point of calling Harry to come to her, when thinking the maid might be in the next room, she wished, if possible, to save her credit. With trembling steps she advanced towards the closet, reached it without any _terrible accident_, and having opened the door, began to grope about for the box: it was neither on the first shelf nor the second, and pa.s.sing her hand along the third, it fell upon something colder than stone.

Afraid of being laughed at, she determined not to scream, but with the utmost expedition quitted the nursery, without thinking of the dominos, and went to join her brother; but she had no sooner reached the pa.s.sage, than she saw (too plainly she saw it to believe it to be the effect of fear) a figure dressed in long white robes, having one arm extended towards her, entirely covered with black, and in a low tremulous voice, it called "Sophy, Sophy, Sophy."

This was the most alarming and terrible adventure she had ever met with; and if she had command enough over herself not to scream when she touched the unaccountable cold thing in the closet, she now could shew no such fort.i.tude; but sinking on the floor, for her knees could no longer support her weight, she screamed so loud, that the poor ghost, who had been as much terrified as herself, throwing aside his white robes, ran towards her for protection, crying, "Sophy, Sophy! my dear Sophy! is it you?--Oh dear! I thought it was all over with me; I have been almost smothered since you left me, and really thought I was going to be buried alive."

Mary, who heard the bustle, now made her appearance with a light, and, perceiving what had happened, became extremely angry, asking them if they imagined she had nothing to do but to wash their linen, to have it pulled about the dirty pa.s.sage. "And here is my black silk handkerchief!" exclaimed she in a violent rage.--"Did I wash it so well in small beer, to make it look nice and fresh, for you to twist it about your arm, master Harry? Pray look what a condition you have made it in."

Harry looked extremely foolish, when he discovered that the only danger with which he had been menaced, was that of taking cold by having been covered with wet linen. The truth was, that, when his sister left him, he was so much afraid of being alone, that though he longed for the colours, and the cup and ball, he thought he was paying much too high a price for them, and almost repented of his promise. Willing, however, to gain the two things he most wished for, he determined to bear the lonely situation he was left in, but fancied if he could get away from the door, and place his back against the wall, he should be much safer, and more out of the way of danger.

Endeavouring by these means to secure himself, and shutting his eyes, that he might not see any thing disagreeable by the light of the moon, whose beams reflected different objects along the wall, he unfortunately stepped upon the end of a line, on which Mary had hung to dry the whole labour of the day, and having entangled his feet in it, by some means or other gave it such a jerk, that the nail sprung out, and in an instant poor Harry was half smothered under the weight of a quant.i.ty of wet linen, which he concluded (agreeably to the wonderful and surprising histories his sister had recounted to him) could be nothing less than some giant, who was going to bury him alive.

When Mary visited the closet, her anger rose to a prodigious pitch; for Sophy, in groping about for her box of dominos, had not only dirtied her fingers and hands, but had left the marks of them on Mary's new-washed caps and handkerchiefs, which she had put aside on a plate, till she could find time to iron them.

The whole story was repeated in the parlour, and the evening spent in mirth at the expense of the cowards.