From
“THE PANSY”
A Day in the Country
They were on their way to Sabbath-school that pleasant September morning. Maggie and Lottie Barnes, Delia and Sallie Shaw. They lived in the city of Boston.
Because they lived in a large city, do not go and make a picture in your mind of four little ladies with new fall suits of silk or velvet, or soft cashmere, and new hats with nodding plumes or flying ribbons, and trim boots, very high, and trim gloves very long, and many buttons everywhere, because that will not be at all a true picture.
Their dresses were all faded and worn. Maggie wore an old black shawl of her mother’s, that trailed a little on the ground. Delia considered herself royally arrayed in a rusty old black velvet sack much too large for her, while Lottie had no protection front the cool autumn air but a soiled and faded blue silk handkerchief spread over her shoulders, her hat, in spite of being loaded down with purple ribbon and red roses, went sailing off her head with every gust of wind that came along, because it had no rubber on it. Then poor Sallie had on low shoes much too large for her. They would keep getting down at the heel and coming off as she clattered along, and she had often to stoop over and adjust them. With these hindrances of hat and shoes of course they could not, you see, go on in a very orderly manner.
They were discussing something in very loud tones. Nobody had ever told them it was rude to talk loud in the streets.
They were bemoaning the fact that all the girls they knew except themselves, had been to the country to spend a few days.
“I wanted to go so much,” little Sallie said, tugging at her shoe as she spoke; “I wanted to see some flowers growing. I should think we might have gone as well as the rest,” said Delia. “I think it’s mean to skip us.”
“The money give out,” said Lottie, clutching at her hat to prevent its escape.
“Money is the matter with most everything,” Maggie said, drawing her shawl closer about her with a grown-up air, and a grown-up sigh.
The money of which the children talked was “The Fresh Air Fund,” a sum of money that good men and women raised to give poor children who live in the great city a chance to go into the country for a few days, and breathe the sweet air, run on the grass, pick flowers, and drink fresh milk, all about which they knew nothing. This Mission School was very large, but nearly all had been to the country; some for two whole weeks.
By some means these little girls had been overlooked.
Mrs. Eastman, their teacher, had been absent from her class for six weeks, and all were glad to see her pleasant face in the teacher’s chair this morning.
“Now I suppose you must first tell me what a fine time you had in the country,” she said “but as our class is so large, we shall not be able to hear a story from each one. Let all who had a good time in the country raise their hands.”
The hands went up instantly—all except four.
They sat together, so Mrs. Eastman had no trouble in seeing their hands were not raised, and that they did not wear the bright look of the other children.
“What is the matter here?” she asked kindly. “No hands up this end of the class? Maggie, Lottie, how is it? Did you not like the country?”
“We never went to no country,” the little girls responded in a chorus.
After Mrs. Eastman had inquired all about it, and heard how much they wished to go, and said how sorry she was that it had happened so, she wrote down very carefully their names, and just where they lived.
Then she asked them if they had ever told Jesus about it.
“No, we never did,” they said.
“Well, my dear little girls,” she said, “don’t you know when you have trouble, there is where you must take it? You must tell Jesus to-night how much you want to go to the country, and ask him to send you. You know it would not be a good thing for you to go for a long visit, now that your schools have opened, but if you could go for one day, would you not like it?”
“Oh, yes, yes!” they all answered again.
“Well you ask him, and then wait and see what he will do.”
It was almost as good as going to the country to have such loving eyes look into theirs, and say, “My dear little girls!” They all promised to do as she wished them to.
“I don’t see how it’ll be done,” Maggie said, on the way home, “when the money is all gone; but teacher said Jesus could do hard things.”
Monday was a long day, because these little girls were expecting something to happen. For had not teacher said, “Ask Jesus, and see what he will do for you?”
Sun enough, great news was waiting them when they got home. Maggie and Lottie came running over to Mrs. Shaw’s all out of breath.
“Look at that!” said Maggie, holding out a note written on rose tinted paper, in letters almost as plain as print.
“Look at that!” said Sallie, holding up the mate to it.
“Teacher’s been to our house,” said Maggie.
“And teacher’s been to our house!” Sallie responded triumphantly.
These notes from “Teacher” were invitations for the little girls to spend the day with her at her country home on Saturday. They were to take the seven o’clock train at the Old Colony station, and ride about fifteen miles, and there Mrs. Eastman would be waiting with her carriage.
Think of that! A carriage waiting for them!
The day came at last. Great had been the preparations all the week; each Sunday dress had been made as nice as washing, ironing and mending could make it. And they were all at the-depot by half-past six, in a high state of excitement.
The day was perfect. They enjoyed every minute of the ride in the cars. The conductor had orders to leave them at a certain station. No sooner had they stepped from the cars, than they saw the smiling face of their teacher. They were soon seated in a handsome carriage and rolling over a smooth road. The air was sweet and pure, the birds sang, the squirrels skipped about in the trees, and the golden October sunshine made the world beautiful that morning.
“So you told Jesus about it, did you?” Mrs. Eastman asked.
“Yes’m, we did,” said little Sallie. “We told him Sunday night, and he ’tended to it the first thing Monday morning.”
MAKING WREATHS FOR THEIR HATS.