Ella, a little schoolgirl of the sixties

by Eva March Tappan

Another flower that Ella saw for the first time was the yellow daisy, the golden rudbeckia. She had no dream of fairyland about this, for it was a gorgeous, rollicking yellow blossom, ready to be picked and go wherever any one might wish to carry it and to make friends with anybody. It was away off in the middle of a field; and although Ella had been taught never to trample down the tall grass, she could not resist the temptation to plunge into the midst of it and secure the wheel of gold that might have come from the end of the rainbow.

These were the rarities in flowers, but everywhere there were violets and daisies and anemones and hardhack and Quaker ladies, and swamp azaleas, and dandelions and clover and all the other “common flowers” that are beloved by children. Nestled on the sunny side of a stone wall at the north of the seminary there was what had once been a flower bed. Little of the bed remained except a merry row of white narcissi, who perked up their red-edged ruffs and nodded their heads in friendly fashion as the child and the dog drew near.

Between the narcissi and the gray old stone wall behind them was Ella’s little burial ground. It happened sometimes that birds flew against the lighted windows of the seminary so violently that they were killed. Ella was always grieved when she found one lying on the grass, and she chose this bit of ground as a resting place for them. “Ponto,” she said to the big shaggy dog, “it was in our Sunday school lesson yesterday that God always noticed when a little bird fell to the ground. The teacher said the verse didn’t mean exactly what it said, because God wouldn’t care for birds; but I think it did; and I think He would like it if you and I made a pretty place for them to lie in. We’ll do it, won’t we, Ponto?” She held out her hand to the dog, and he laid his shaggy paw into it. “I knew you would understand,” said Ella. “I wonder why dogs and cats and birds and horses understand so much better than people!”

After this, whenever Ella picked up a little dead bird, she dug a tiny grave and lined it with fresh green ferns. She smoothed down the soft feathers, kissed the pretty little head, and laid the bird softly into its ferny bed. “A person would have to have a stone with poetry on it,” she said to Ponto, “but I think a lovely white narcissus is much prettier for a little bird. Remember that this is all a secret, Ponto. Nobody must know anything about it except you and me and God.”

Down over the hill below the little cemetery was the island. This was really nothing more than a tussock just big enough to hold a few bushes, and the “body of water” which surrounded it was only a bit of swamp. Ella could easily step across from what she called the “main land,” but a bridge made the place seem more like an island, so she laid a board across the narrow strait. When she was once across she always drew the board over after her; and then she stood in a kingdom that was all her own. There were white violets growing in this island kingdom, there were ferns and rushes and wild lilies of the valley. There was just one Jack-in-the-pulpit, and on its seminary side Ella had drawn the ferns together so as to screen it from the eager hands of passers-by.

Then, too, there was the secret, and no one knew of this save the mother and the professor. On the highest part of the tiny island, just where the bushes were thickest, there was a bird’s nest with real eggs, and a little later, real birds in it. Mother birds are shy of grown folk, but there are sometimes children of whom they feel no fear, recognizing perhaps some “call of the wild” that makes them akin. However that may be, these birds were not afraid of the little girl who always spoke to them softly and touched the young ones as gently as the mother bird herself. They made no objection when the child carefully lifted the half-grown fledglings out of the nest; and while she sat holding them and talking to them, the parent birds made little flights here and there as if, having now a reliable nurse for their children, they might allow themselves a little recreation.

When Ella first saw the young birds with their wide-open mouths, she was sure that they were dying of hunger. But what could she give them? She had no more idea how to feed young robins than young fairies. There was just one person in the seminary who could tell her, for he always knew everything; but he was in a class, teaching some of the big boys algebra. What algebra was, Ella had no idea; but she was absolutely certain that it could not be half so important as saving the life of a starving bird. She hurried to the house, and up stairs, then crept silently as a shadow along the corridor to the recitation room. The door was wide open. She stood on the threshold a moment, trying to get her courage up. The young men of the class smiled, for they were always interested in Ella’s exploits and wondered what was coming now. The professor was standing at the board with his back to the door.

Ella was a little frightened, but she screwed her courage up and said in a weak, thin little voice,

“Professor, please may I see you only just one minute? It’s very important.”

The professor came out, and closing the door behind him, which the students thought was a little unkind, he asked the visitor what he could do for her.