MOTHER AND SON.—Page [190].
They sat down on a grassy bank, and let the horse graze. While the mother plucked a daisy, and played with it in her hand, she said, “Yes, this is something of consequence. Observe whether she tends her flowers carefully. There is more in this than one would believe.”
They heard from a distance maidens singing. The mother said, “Remark also, whether, in singing, she willingly takes the second part. It signifies something when one would always give the key. Look, there come the school children, and this reminds me of something. If you can find out whether she has preserved her writing-books from her school-days. This is of importance.”
“Yes, mother, I will take the whole world as witnesses; but what her writing-books have to do with it, I cannot imagine.”
“That you ask, shows that you have no experience. A young girl who does not gladly preserve every thing she has once valued has no true heart.”
During this conversation, the young man had been trying to untie a knot in the lash of his whip; now he took a knife from his pocket and cut it in two, his mother said, pointing with her finger, “That you may do, but not a young girl. Observe whether she cuts a hard knot; there is a secret in this.”
“That I can guess,” said her son, “but your shoe-string is untied, and it is time to part.”
“Yes, and now you remind me of something; of one of the best signs. Observe whether she treads evenly, or on one side or the other, and whether she wears out many shoes.”
“For that, I must run to the shoemaker,” said her son laughing. “But, mother, all this can never be found out of another.”