Various
Our Boys
"Drink, I say," he repeated impatiently. "Do you hear?"
"I have promised mamma never to drink wine," was the low response.
It seemed to poor Arthur as though everything had combined against him. It was bad enough to have to say no to the question about the uniform, and now here was something else that would make the men still more angry with him. But the officer did not push his command; he simply thrust the glass one side and said, "Now, my boy, we're going to get that American spy and hang him. You know where he is and you've got to tell us, or it will be the worse for you. Do you want to see your mother again?"
Arthur did not answer. He could not have answered just then. A big bunch came into his throat. Cry? Not before these men. So he kept silence.
"Obstinate little pig! speak!" thundered the officer, bringing his great brawny fist down upon the table with a blow that set the glasses dancing. "Will you tell me where that spy is?"
"No, sir," came in very low, but very firm tones. I will not tell you the dreadful words of that officer, as he turned to his servant with the command, "Put him down cellar, and we'll see to him in the morning. They're all alike, men, women and children. Rebellion in the very blood. The only way to finish it is to spill it without mercy."
Now there was one thing that Arthur, brave as he was, feared, and that was—rats! Left on a heap of dry straw, he began to wonder if there were rats there. Presently he was sure he heard something move, but he was quickly reassured by the touch of soft, warm fur on his hand, and the sound of a melodious "pur-r." The friendly kitty, glad of a companion, curled herself by his side. What comfort she brought to the lonely little fellow! He lay down beside her, and saying his Our Father, and Now I Lay Me, was soon in a profound sleep, the purring little kitty nestling close.
The sounds of revelry in the rooms above did not disturb him. The boisterous songs and laughter, the stamping of many feet, continued far into the night. At last they ceased; and when everything had been for a long time silent, the door leading to the cellar was softly opened and a lady came down the stairway. I have often wished that I might paint her as she looked coming down those stairs. Arthur was afterwards my great-grandfather, you know, and he told me this story when I was a young girl in my teens. He told me how lovely this lady was.
Her gown was of some rich stuff that shimmered in the light of the candle she carried, and rustled musically as she walked. There was a flash of jewels at her throat and on her hands. She had wrapped a crimson mantle about her head and shoulders. Her eyes were like stars on a summer's night, sparkling with a veiled radiance, and as she stood and looked down upon the sleeping boy, a smile, sweet, but full of a profound sadness, played upon her lips. Then a determined look came into her bright eyes.
He stirred in his sleep, laughed out, said "mamma," and then opened his eyes. She stooped and touched his lips with her finger. "Hush! Speak only in a whisper. Eat this, and then I will take you to your mother."
After he had eaten, she wrapped a cloak about him, and together they stole up and out past the sleeping, drunken sentinel, to the stables. She lead out a white horse, her own horse, Arthur was sure, for the creature caressed her with his head, and as she saddled him she talked to him in low tones, sweet, musical words of some foreign tongue. The handsome horse seemed to understand the necessity of silence, for he did not even whinny to the touch of his mistress' hand, and trod daintily and noiselessly as she led him to the mounting block, his small ears pricking forward and backward, as though knowing the need of watchful listening.
Leaping to the saddle and stooping, she lifted Arthur in front of her, and with a word they were off. A slow walk at first, and then a rapid canter. Arthur never forgot that long night ride with the beautiful lady on the white horse, over the country flooded with the brilliancy of the full moon. Once or twice she asked him if he was cold, as she drew the cloak more closely about him, and sometimes she would murmur softly to herself words in that silvery, foreign tongue. As they drew near Hartland, she asked him to point out his father's house, and when they were quite near, only a little distance off, she stopped the horse.
"I leave you here, you brave, darling boy," she said. "Kiss me once, and then jump down. And don't forget me."
Arthur threw his arms around her neck and kissed her, first on one cheek and then on the other, and looking up into the beautiful face with its starry eyes, said:
"I will never, never forget you, for you are the loveliest lady I ever saw—except mamma."
She laughed a pleased laugh, like a child, then took a ring from her hand and put it on one of Arthur's fingers. Her hand was so slender it fitted his chubby little hand very well.
"Keep this," she said, "and by and by give it to some lady good and true, like mamma."
"Will you be punished?" he said, keeping her hand. She laughed again, with a proud, daring toss of her dainty head, and rode away.
Arthur watched her out of sight, and then turned towards home. Mrs. Heath was still keeping her lonely watch, when the latch of the outer door was softly lifted—nobody had the heart to take in the string with Arty outside—the inner door swung noiselessly back, and the blithe voice said, "Mamma! mamma! here I am, and I didn't tell."
All that day, and the next, and the next, the Heath household were in momentary expectation of the coming of the red coats to search for the spy. Dorothy and Arthur, and sometimes Abram, did picket duty to give seasonable warning of their approach. But they never came. In a few days news was brought that the British forces, on the very morning after Arthur's return, had made a rapid retreat before an advance of the Federal troops, and never again was a red coat seen in Hartland. The spy got well in great peace and comfort under Basha's nursing, and went back again to do service in the Continental army, and Dotty used to say, "You did learn, didn't you, Arty, how a person, even a little boy, can be a hero without fighting, just as mamma said?"
Teddy the Teazer
A Moral Story with a Velocipede Attachment
He wanted a velocipede,
And shook his saucy head;
He thought of it in daytime,
He dreamed of it in bed,
He begged for it at morning,
He cried for it at noon,
And even in the evening
He sang the same old tune.
He wanted a velocipede!
It was no use to say
He was too small to manage it,
Or it might run away,
Or crack his little occiput,
Or break his little leg—
It made no bit of difference,
He'd beg, and beg, and beg.
He wanted a velocipede,
A big one with a gong
To startle all the people,
As they saw him speed along;
A big one, with a cushion,
And painted red and black,
To make the others jealous
And clear them off the track.
He wanted a velocipede,
The largest ever built,
Though he was only five years old
And wore a little kilt,
And hair in curls a-waving,
And sashes by his side,
And collars wide as cart-wheels,
Which hurt his manly pride!
He wanted a velocipede
With springs of burnished steel;
He knew the way to work it—
The treadle for the wheel,
The brake to turn and twist it,
The crank to make it stop,
My! hadn't he been riding
For days, with Jimmy Top?
He wanted a velocipede!
Why, he was just as tall
As six-year-old Tom Tucker,
Who wasn't very small!
And feel his muscle, will you?
And tell him, if you dare,
That he's the sort of fellow
To get a fall, or scare?
They got him a velocipede;
I really do not know
How they could ever do it,
But then, he teased them so,
And so abused their patience,
And dulled their nerves of right,
That they just lost their senses
And brought it home one night.
They bought him a velocipede—
O woe the day and hour!
When proudly seated on it,
In pomp of pride and power,
His foot upon the treadle,
With motion staid and slow
He turned upon his axle,
And made the big thing go.
Alas, for the velocipede!
The way ran down a hill—
The whirling wheels went faster,
And fast, and faster still,
Until, like flash of rocket,
Or shooting star at night,
They crossed the dim horizon
And rattled out of sight.
So vanished the velocipede,
With him who rode thereon;
And no one, since that dreadful day,
Has found out where 'tis gone!
Except a floating rumor
Which some stray wind doth blow.
When the long nights of winter
Are white with frost and snow,
Of a small fleeting shadow,
That seems to run astray
Upon a pair of flying wheels,
Along the Milky Way.
And this they think is Teddy!
Doomed for all time to speed—
A wretched little phantom boy,
On a velocipede!
M.E.B.
JOJO'S PETITION
Golden-haired Jojo, at his mother's knee,
Nestles each night his baby prayer to say:
"Bless papa and mamma! make Ned and me
Good little boys!" he has been taught to pray.
Grandmamma was very sick one weary day,
And Jojo shared with us our anxious care;
So the dear child, when he knelt down to pray,
Seemed to think Grandma must be in his prayer.
And sure the dear Lord did not fail to hear
Sharer alike of sorrows and of joys—
When he said, "Bless papa and my mamma dear,
And make me an' Gran'ma an' Neddy good boys!"
RUTH HALL.