sleep, they trust them to strange hands to dress them for their grave, as they have always hitherto done in life. Now, thanks to the good Lord, I have never been too ill or feeble to work for our dear one. I have been able to get her food ready, and make her little bed, with my own hands. All the comforts and pleasures she has had in her short life, that good Lord has sent her through our hands, and now you have made her last bed, and I am finishing her last garment! We have done all we could for her, while she was lent to us, and now she is gone home, and we must try to follow her!' "She laid her thin hand on her husband's shoulder, and led him into the house. By and by, after she had set out his frugal meal for him, she went out again, and gathered up the shavings that were lying about, and took them into the house. "You can earn more than enough to keep us now, John,' she said gently; and the little we used to set aside for our child's use, we can now lay by, if you have no objection. We shall have buried her decently but humbly, and the expense will be but small. The money we save might go to pay for a little stone with her name and age, and a few words, "She is not dead, but sleepeth!" to remind us that the good Lord, who raised up the ruler's child, is still in heaven, to give us back to ours. And we will go in the summer evenings and plant some daisies and violets there; dear heart, she loved flowers so well.' "Here the poor mother's resignation melted in a flood of tears as her eyes fell on a few withered wallflowers in an old child's mug. She had seen them put there carefully by the tiny wan fingers that were now folded so quietly across the little coarse shroud. "It was now the father's turn to be the consoler, and to divert her mind he asked her if she was going to light the fire with those shavings, and then she told him her little humble plan. She wanted to earn something herself to add to the fund for her little child's stone; and as she was too feeble to go out to work or wash, she was going to make a few Hassocks for sale. She bought some cheap remnants of drugget at the upholsterer's, and stuffing them with the shavings, made them into pretty round or square Hassocks. Her husband, thankful to see her busy, and thinking she would have less time to fret for her child, encouraged the plan with all his might. She made them so neatly and firmly that she soon found customers for them, and rarely took any home. Her pale, uncomplaining face interested many people, for it bore such an expression of patient suffering, and you could not look into her dark eyes without seeing that they must have shed many quiet tears. "I am stuffed with the very same shavings that came from the wood of which her little child's coffin was made," said the Hassock, "and the tears of both have fallen on me, so that I am endued with the power of telling their story. At the door of this house stood a gentle old lady, who was just going for her evening walk, when the poor carpenter's wife came up and offered four or five Hassocks for sale. Something in her face and manner took the kind old lady's fancy, and she bought me directly, and in the course of conversation drew the poor woman's simple tale from her. "You must all know your good old mistress better than I do," said the Hassock, looking round; "and I need hardly tell you that the poor woman went home lightened of her load, but bearing with her a few kind and thoughtful gifts, and a great many words of tender pity and sympathy, that cheered her little lowly home for many a day. I am sure if people knew the real value of a kind, gentle word in good season, they would not be so chary as they are of what costs so little. "These little Stools will be just the thing for my dear grandchildren,' said the old lady; they can H each take one home to sit on by their dear mother's knee to say their lessons, and she shall tell them their history; but this one that I chose first I shall keep myself as a remembrance, and it shall stand before my arm-chair in my breakfast-room, so that I can kneel down on it when we say our morning and evening prayers.' "The dear old lady carried me in here with her own hands, and that is how I come here. I know I am not handsome, nor of any great value in a worldly point of view, but many common things can tell some story, or show some lesson of patience or humility, if we only know how to look for it." Here the Hassock made an end of his story, and there was a general silence. No one made any disagreeable remarks, for they all felt touched by it. Even the bright varnished Cheffonier felt a sort of mist before him, and he did not look so cold and bright as usual; and before they all recovered their usual spirits, Mary, the housemaid, brought in the fine white table-cloth and the boiling tea-urn. THE END. |