COACHY.
BY ELINOR VEY.
The first time I ever saw Coachy she was scratching about on the garden walk, kicking the dirt out in two ways behind her, and then nimbly hitching back a step or two and staring and pecking at the hole that she had made. Every little while she said something to herself in a comical drawling tone, standing on one foot, and looking up at me with curious eye, as if wondering who I was, and what in the world I was there for. But who was Coachy?—an old yellowish-brown hen, all tousled and sort of round-shouldered. As I was laughing quietly at this old hen scratching, and kicking, and pecking, and crooning about on the garden walk, it occurred to me to toss the least bit of a stone at her. So picking one up, I took aim, when, click! click! upon the porch I heard a pair of slippers. They were down the steps in no time, with their cunning toes pointing straight toward mine. I put that stone into my pocket, and took off my hat to "little slippers." They were blue as the softest blue sky—little slippers—and ever and ever so small. Mine had purple worsted flowers all over them, big flat heels, and were ever and ever so large. Inside those little slippers stood the sweetest mite of a lady the world ever saw; while inside old "flat heels" was the fattest and fondest Uncle John.
Bessie Rathbun's cheeks were about the color of an oleander blossom, her small red mouth was about the color of a cranberry, and her two wide-open eyes about the color of her slippers. Her hair hung in yellow fuzzy curls away down to the strings of her apron; and it always seemed to me there must be a gold dollar rolling off the end of each curl, each end was so round and gold yellow. Dainty Bessie!—and what do you suppose? Why, she was deep in love with that old brown hen. Many and many a time she had sent me scraps of news about her wonderful Coachy, and had wished and wished that I would come and see her for myself. So when, one day, a letter came from Bessie's father, asking me if I would please hurry over to Featherdale to take charge of his house, and his silver spoons, and his little daughter, while he took a journey with his wife to visit a sick friend, I just threw my papers and pens into my valise (I was writing a lecture then), jumped aboard the first train, and went. So here we were together, on a breezy bright June morning—Bessie and Coachy and I.
"There she is, uncle—there's my Coachy!" cried Bessie, as she slipped from my arms. "Come, darling, come;" and Coachy spread out her wings, and rushed toward her little mistress, who eagerly bent down and took her. She kissed her brown back, and from a snowy apron pocket gave her corn, and even while eating, this funny old hen brokenly hummed a tune.
"Let's go on the porch with her," said Bessie at last. So we settled on the porch, with Coachy nestling between us.
"She isn't what you may call a very handsome hen—now is she, Bessie?" laughed I.
But Bessie scarcely smiled. "If you knew something that I know," said she, "you wouldn't make fun of her."
"Why—what?"
"Why, she was a poor orphan chicken—an' a dog killed her mother—an' she had a dreadful hard time getting grown up as big as she is now. She's fallen into the well, an' had two of her toes froze off—"
"What! in the well?"
"No; in the winter," said Bessie, gravely. "And she's been so lonesome down here, without any other hens to talk to, that papa says she'll have to go out to the farm, where the other hens are, real soon, or she'll die."
"Is that so?" said I, feeling sorry and a trifle awkward.
The little maid smoothed the rumpled feathers this way and that. "Yes, that's so," she sighed. "Our farm is more'n a mile from here, but I'm going to let her go."
"You can see her very often, can't you?" I asked.
"Yes; but, oh dear!" and there was another kiss put upon the brown back. Perhaps that is what made Coachy look round-shouldered—carrying such a load of sweet kisses on her back.
Just at this moment Bridget came out, and picked up the door-mat. I have never known for certain what Bridget did to the door-mat. Maybe it was taken off somewhere, like a bad child, for a shaking. Anyway, she picked it up quickly, and went back to the kitchen. And right where the mat had lain—so near that we could reach out and take it—was a letter; and the letter was addressed, in big scrawling characters that looked very much indeed like "hen tracks," to
Miss Bessie Rathbun,
Featherdale.
The little lady's eyes and mouth grew perfectly round; she gave a little scream, and Coachy, half scared, went hopping down the steps. I opened the letter, and this is what we found:
"My dear Mistress,—You can't guess how sad I am at the thought of leaving you, even for a few short months; but I do believe my general health and spirits would be much improved if you would kindly take me out to the farm to spend the balance of the summer. I miss the Brahmas, and the Shanghais, and the Plymouth Rocks, and even the pert little Bantams, more than I can tell. I get very downhearted somehow, thinking of the merry times they must be having all together in the fields or on the old barn floor. You are very, very good to me, and I love you dearly; but oh! please take me back to the farm. I shall be so happy whenever you come out there to see me, and will thank you as long as I live. Answer soon.
"With one peck at your sweet lips,
"Coachy.
"P. S.—Please don't ever hug me again as you did on the lawn last Sunday. I thought I should choke."
Bessie was smiling; still in the same moment she had to put up her hand and whisk something away from her cheek. I knew what it was—a tear.
"Uncle," she said, putting both hands into her apron pockets, "let's take Coachy to the farm to-morrow;" and we did.
Early next morning we drove out of town, the dear old hen in Bessie's arms, and Bessie and I in the phaeton. Bessie talked softly to her favorite all the way; and when we reached the farm, I have an idea that, in spite of the request in the postscript, Coachy was hugged as hard as she ever was hugged in her life. Down the lane we went toward a group of noisy fowls. The nearer we came to them, the harder was Coachy hugged. I began to be anxious. Her mouth was open, and each particular toe was standing out stiff and straight. Bessie's nose and lips were out of sight in the ruffled back, and Coachy had closed her eyes.
"Darling," said the little girl, steadily, "good-by," and she bravely dropped her pet beside the old companions.
We saw her shake herself, eye the others a moment, and walk quietly into the crowd.
The man who lived on Bessie's papa's farm was named Beck. We hunted all over for Mr. Beck to tell him there was a guest among the poultry; but he was not to be found. So we got into the carriage and started for home.
My little niece was silent during nearly all of our drive back to Featherdale. Her mind was still filled full of Coachy.
By-and-by, though, the cherry lips opened.
"Uncle John," she said, "do you s'pose there'll be room?"
"On the roost?"
"Yes."
"Why, plenty of it—plenty!" said the reckless Uncle John.
I was out of bed an hour before Bessie next morning to take a horseback ride. "Guess I'll go over to the farm," said I to myself, "and see how Coachy is doing." So off to the farm I cantered.
I hitched my horse to a post by the farm-house door, and walked out where the chickens were picking up a breakfast. I looked them all over, and—and—well, Coachy was not there.
Seeing a man coming down the path, and feeling quite sure it was Mr. Beck, I waited. A narrow-faced, fair-haired, frail-looking man—not at all like a farmer, I thought.
"Good-morning, Mr. Beck," said I.
"Morning," said Mr. Beck, looking puzzled.
"My name is Rathbun. I was just looking around for a hen I brought up from my brother's house yesterday. I don't seem to find her," I said, still peering about.
"Did you bring that hen?" asked the man.
I turned and looked at him then.
"That old yellowish-brown hen?" he went on.
"Yes," said I, sharply. "Why?"
"Why, I didn't know where she come from," he drawled. "She was cluckin' round the cows' heels while I was milkin', an' I took 'er an' chopped 'er head off."
It seems to me that for one whole minute I never drew a breath. I just stood there, dumb and glaring, till I was conscious the man was shrinking away from my eyes and clinched hands.
"What's the fuss?" said he.
"What's the fuss?" I roared. "Why, you confounded idiot, do you know what you've done? Do you know that you've killed Bessie Rathbun's pet hen?"
"Wa'al," he growled, with his hands in his pockets, "I didn't know whose hen it was."
"Well, that's a fine excuse, isn't it?—a fine excuse, Mr. Beck," I went on, hotly.
"Why, I wouldn't have touched 'er 'f I'd known 'er," argued Mr. Beck. "I didn't know where she come from."
"And that's your way, I take it—to lay hold and kill a thing when you don't know where it comes from. I wonder if you killed a horse as you came along. I tied one at your door ten minutes ago."
I walked off a few steps to calm myself a little. I thought of poor Bessie. Mr. Beck mumbled something, and started for the barn.
"Mr. Beck," I called after him, "what have you done with her?"
"How say!"
"Where is she—Coachy—the hen?"
He pointed with his thumb toward the barn, and went in.
I thought he would be out in a minute. As he did not appear, I followed to the door, and looked in. I could neither see nor hear the man: he had vanished.
It was a hint for me to go, certainly. With a troubled heart I rode slowly back to town, and as I rode I pondered, asking myself what I should say to Bessie. Should I tell her Coachy was lost? "Get on, pony," I said at length; "we must tell her the truth."
Upon entering the driveway I noticed Bessie in the garden picking flowers. She saw me, and beckoned; but I could not go to her then. I unsaddled the horse, led him into his stall, and fed him, and then I stole into the house. A box was standing at one corner of the porch, with a perch, and a nest, and a little trough for corn, and a little cup for water. It was waiting to go to the farm.
I was drinking a cup of coffee when Bessie came skipping into the breakfast-room. When she saw trouble in my face she put away her smile, and crept softly up to me. She told me she had been hunting and hunting for me. She rubbed her pink cheek against my whiskers, declaring that she couldn't make me out at all. She said it was time now to go to the farm.
"Bessie dear," I said, as I took her hand, "I wouldn't go up to the farm to-day."
Surprise came over her face; then trouble with surprise. "Why, uncle?" she said, softly.
"It isn't nice at the farm," I went on, vaguely; "don't go. I just came from there. Don't go, Bessie."
"Why, uncle?" she said again, softly—"why, uncle?" Then all in a breath her fingers bound themselves tight about mine. "Did you see my Coachy?—did you see her?" she hurriedly asked.
I stooped and held the little form just one moment, then said, "No," and then, somehow, I told her.
I did not have a great deal to tell; she guessed over half; and then what a shivering, sobbing little burden it was that I held in my arms!
I don't believe I will try to tell you how she cried, or all she said, as we sat in the parlor that forenoon; it might make me cry to talk it over. Her tiny pocket-handkerchief soon got wet through, and she had to have my great big purple silk one; and more than once did I hear her moan, "Oh, Coachy is dead! my Coachy is dead!" When at last she strove to dry her eyes—poor, swollen eyes—it was truly a difficult matter. At first it seemed of no use to try, for again and again they would fill up, and spill the tears over her cheeks. We had to go and bathe them finally, and then Bessie walked into the kitchen and brokenly told Bridget the news.
A moment later I found her in the hall, tying on her hat. "I must go and bring her home," she said, hurriedly.
She was out of the house, and had called on Dennis to harness the horse, before I had time to consider.
"Dear Bessie, won't you stay here, and let me bring her home alone?" I coaxed.
"No! no! no!" she cried; and so we started together.
"Don't cry, dear," I was saying, as we drove into the farm-yard—her cheeks were all wet again—"don't cry, dear."
When I knocked at Mr. Beck's door, a voice called out, "Come in."
I opened the door, and found Mrs. Beck. I told her we had come to take Coachy home.
Mrs. Beck walked a little toward her hot cook-stove before she spoke:
"Well, we'll give her a live one to take home. I'm certain she can't take the dead one."
"Can't take her!—why?"
"I've got her a-boiling," answered Mrs. Beck.
Boiling!— Coachy boiling! I had been there all this while and hadn't smelled chicken. I felt like talking to Mrs. Beck; but I didn't. I shut my teeth, made her a slight bow, and went out to Bessie.
"I haven't got her, darling."
She was back among the cushions, with her hands over her eyes.
"Haven't got her?"
"No, and I can't get her."
"Why, we must get her!" she cried, straightening up. "Why can't we get her?"
"Why," said I, gently as I could—"why, they are—cooking her."
Bessie's cheeks flamed. In less time than it takes to tell it she sprang from the carriage, burst open the kitchen door, ran against a toddling boy, blindly knocked him over, and faced Mrs. Beck.
"How did you dare do such a thing!" she almost screamed, seizing the astonished woman by her dress skirt. "She's mine! my own Coachy! and I'll carry her home in a pail!"
Jumping on a stool, she reached up to a shelf of tin-ware. Grasping a good-sized pail, she pulled it from its place in such a hurry that half a dozen milk-pans were dragged off with it. Clattering like crazy things they whirled to the floor.
"Put my Coachy in there!—put her in!" she commanded, setting the pail down hard on the stove, and twisting the cover off.
Such a din I never heard. Those tin pans banged and rattled, Bessie's voice piped high, the boy on the floor broke into a hoarse scream, and our horse shied and started for home.
"Whoa! whoa!" I shouted, leaping off the steps, and bringing him round into place again.
Turning to go back to the tragedy in the house, I nearly collided with Bessie. She was running out with the pail in her hand, and with all the Beck children following. Thrusting it upon me, she hurried into the carriage; then reaching after it, she wrapped it in the lap-robe, and leaned back with a sigh of relief.
During the few minutes that it took us to rattle home I wondered what was to be done with poor Coachy. I didn't have long to wait. I led the horse into the stable, and as I was returning I discovered my little girl sitting on the grass by a rose-bush, with what we had brought at her feet.
In a trembling voice she asked me if I would please find a shovel. I found one, and soon stood obedient beside Bessie and the pail.
"Right here, Uncle John," she whispered, flattening the tender grass beneath the rose-bush with her two dimpled hands—"right here where the sun shines."
So we dug a grave, and poured in that hot dinner. In it went, gravy and all—white meat, dark meat, legs, wings, and wish-bone!
Some months went by, and Uncle John came to Featherdale again. As he strolled through the garden in his purple-flowered flat-heeled slippers the morning after his arrival, he came to a little lonely mound. A small white board with scraggly letters on it stood there now. Uncle John stooped down, held aside the grass, and read, "Coachy," and "Forgive us our trespasses as we forgive them that trespass against us."
BAPTIZING COPTIC BABIES.
BY SARA KEABLES HUNT.
You have often witnessed the ceremony of infant baptism, when some sweet baby friend of yours has been brought forward to be christened, and have thought it a beautiful sight, as it indeed is; but the babies that I am going to tell you about now were less fortunate in their birth, for they were born of Egyptian parents—children of the Nile.
Would you like to hear of the strange ceremony?
We had been sailing all day, and at twilight had moored our diahbieh to the bank near a Coptic village. The Copts are said to be the native Egyptians, and pride themselves very much on their antiquity. As we looked out through the brilliant sunset tints that were flushing all the Nile Valley, the walls of an ancient convent rose before us, sharp and well defined in the clear atmosphere, its usual gloom banished by the bright and gorgeous coloring of the Egyptian sunset.
Somebody said, "There is to be a service in the old convent to-night; shall we go?"
It had been a monotonous day, and the walk and change looked attractive; so we were soon scrambling up the steep bank, and walking swiftly toward the old convent walls. The town consisted of a collection of square brown huts, their flat roofs covered with the nests of countless pigeons that are always swarming and cooing around every Egyptian dwelling-place. Quantities of water-jugs lay piled together by the side of the road, waiting to be sent down the river. As we came out into the open field, and on to the narrow beaten path which is raised slightly above the level to keep in the water of the inundation, we threw back our hats, and turned our faces to the glory of the sky and the cool refreshing breeze. All the air was sweet with growing grain. Away in the west the Libyan hills seemed quivering with the flush of the sunset, and the whole plain was wrapped in a glow of light. A short walk brought us to the church, and following the crowd which was rapidly assembling, we mingled with them and obtained seats.
The convent is a lofty inclosure, the roof formed by numerous small domes numbering nearly two hundred. Within is a small open court, an ordinary-sized church surrounded with many small chapels, and the apartments of the monks. Cleanliness is not one of the virtues of the Copts, so we may expect to find everything dirty and in need of repair.
I shall not tire you with a long account of the general services, of the clashing of cymbals and the loud voices of the priests, of the Coptic prayers and long masses, of the blessing of the water when the priest stirred it with a long stick as he prayed, then, dipping a cloth into it, applying it to the wrists, insteps, and foreheads of all the men who came forward to receive it. Time would not permit me to describe this in detail; but the baptism of the children, which immediately followed in another part of the church, was a novel though pitiful sight, and one that will make you realize what a blessing it is to be born in an enlightened land.
The women's department is separated from that of the men; they are never allowed to enter the upper places, and in the ceremony of baptism of children the fathers do not appear.
When all was ready, three little creatures were brought in, their dark eyes looking wonderingly around. Turning to the west, and holding her child, the mother promised to renounce the devil and all his works; then, facing the east, she held it forth to signify her acceptance of Christ for the child, after which it was sprinkled by the priest. But the ceremony did not end here, for the poor babes were taken to a font, and in the midst of long Coptic prayers they were disrobed and immersed three times. Then came the anointing with holy oil, the priest roughly and awkwardly—for he was very old—rubbing it over all the members and joints of the child from its wrist.
It was a cruel sight, for the church was quite cold, and as at last the poor little victims were dressed and handed back to their mothers, we hurried away. I lay for some time in my narrow berth that night unable to sleep and thinking of the ceremony I had just witnessed. At last I fell asleep, but only to see the faces of countless babies calling to me in vain for help, and when I awoke from my troubled dreams it was with a firm determination never again to see a Coptic baptism.