LESSON XXVIII
Make Good Use of your Time.—Emma C. Embury.
"To everything there is a season, and a time for every purpose under heaven."
1. "My dear Anna," said Mrs. Elmore, as she bade her little girl farewell, "I shall be absent ten days; and as you have already had so many lessons from me respecting the manner of distributing your hours of amusement and study, I will only say to you, now, 'Make good use of your time.'"
2. Anna's eyes filled with tears as the carriage drove off, and she felt very lonely when she returned to the parlor without her mother. She thought over her mother's parting words, until she felt quite proud of the confidence reposed in her, and resolved not to abuse it by neglect.
3. She accordingly took her books and sat down to her studies, as attentively as if her mother had been waiting to hear her recitation.
4. Anna was an affectionate, intelligent child. She would have made any sacrifices to please her mother, and she really loved her studies; but her one great fault was a disposition to loiter away time.
5. This her mother well knew; and after trying admonition, until she almost feared she was increasing the evil by allowing Anna to depend too much upon her guidance, she determined to test the effect of leaving her to her own responsibility.
6. For an hour after her mother's departure, Anna sat in close attention to her studies. All at once, she started up. "I am so hungry," said she, "I must go to Betty for some luncheon;—but stop—I will finish my exercise first."
7. She wrote a line or two; then throwing down her pen, petulantly exclaimed, "There! I have made two mistakes, because I was in such a hurry;—I will not finish it till I come back."
8. So away ran the little girl to her old nurse, and the next half-hour was spent in satisfying her hunger. As she was returning, with laggard step, she happened to spy, from the window, a beautiful butterfly fluttering about the rose-bushes in the garden; and, quite forgetting her unfinished exercise, away she flew in chase of the butterfly.
9. But, agile as were her movements, the insect was too nimble for her; and after an hour's race beneath the burning sun, she returned, flushed and overheated, without having succeeded in its capture.
10. Again she applied herself to her books; but study was not so easy now as it would have been a little earlier. Anna was too tired to apply her mind to her lessons; and after loitering a while over her desk, she threw herself on the sofa, and fell into a sound sleep, from which she was only awakened by a summons to dinner.
11. After dinner, Betty proposed taking her out to walk; and though conscious that she had not performed half her duties, she had not resolution enough to refuse to go. Tying on her bonnet, she took a little basket on her arm, and set out with Betty to gather wild-flowers.
12. When they reached the woods, Betty sought out a mossy seat under an old tree, and, taking her work from her pocket, began to sew as industriously as if she had been at home.
13. "O Betty!" exclaimed Anna, "how can you sit and sew, when there are so many pleasant sights and sounds around you?"
14. "I can hear the pleasant sounds, my child, without looking round to see where they come from," replied Betty; "and as for the pretty sights, though I can enjoy them as much as any one, I cannot neglect my work for them.
15. "I promised your mother to have these shirts finished when she came home, and I mean to do so."—"Dear me!" said the little girl, "I wish I had brought my book, and I might have studied my lesson here."
16. "No, no, Anna," said the old woman; "little girls can't study in the woods, with the birds singing and the grasshoppers chirping around them. Better attend to your books in-doors."
17. Betty continued her sewing; and towards sunset, when they arose to return, she had stitched a collar and a pair of wristbands, while Anna had filled her basket with flowers.
18. As they approached the village, Betty called at a poor cottage, to inquire after a sick child, and Anna was shocked at the poverty and wretchedness of the inmates. The little children were only half clothed, their faces were covered with dirt, and their rough locks seemed to bid defiance to the comb.
19. Pitying the condition of the poor little girls, Anna determined to provide them with some better clothing; and she returned home full of benevolent projects.
20. The next morning, as soon as she rose, she began to look over her wardrobe; and selecting three frocks which she had outgrown, she carried them to Betty, to alter for Mrs. Wilson's children.
21. "I shall do no such thing," said Betty; "Mrs. Wilson's children are not suffering for clothes; the weather is warm, and they are as well clad as they will be the day after they are dressed up in your finery.
22. "Mrs. Wilson is an untidy, slovenly woman; and though your mother charged me to look after her sick baby, she did not tell me to furnish new clothes for the other dirty little brats!"
23. "Well, Betty, if you don't choose to do it, I'll try it myself."—"Pretty work you'll make of it, to be sure! you will just cut the frocks to pieces, and then they will fit nobody."
24. "Well, I am determined to fix them for those poor little ragged children," said Anna; "and if you will not help me, I will get Kitty the chambermaid to do it."
