Over the Garden Wall.
Leaning over a garden wall is a delightful little person. She has a very short way to go home and knows that tea will not be ready yet. So she stops as soon as she is inside the wicket to indulge in a further look at the “busy world,” of the lane in which she lives, and to seize any chance there may be of a gossip. The garden ground inside the wall is considerably above the level of the road—a most convenient thing for this sturdy little lady of five, for it enables her to lean her arms upon the wall and her face upon her arms, and so to survey the world in much comfort.
Should any one approach whom she wishes to avoid, nothing is simpler than to crouch down and hide until the undesirable passer-by is out of sight. Should, however, a friend appear who is welcome, but whose presence causes a sudden fit of shyness, the rosy cheeks are quickly hidden in the dimpled arms and a cloud of dark curls tossed over all until a finger judiciously inserted somewhere where the crease of the fat little neck may be supposed to be causes a chuckle of delight, and a crimson face and two great blue eyes are momentarily lifted to be buried again in an instant beneath the mass of soft dark hair. But this is a regulation bit of by-play which never lasts long. Confidences are soon exchanged and news imparted about the sort of day it has been in school and the health of a doll which fell to her lot at the last treat. Then sometimes—when she is in her tenderest humour—a pair of bright red lips are put up for a kiss, and she trots off down the path to where mother is waiting under the porch of clematis.
And so it would be possible to go on for long enough.
In the Country.
By the roadside, in the field ways, by the pathway near the brook, at many a cottage doorway, by many a wicket-gate, our country children, in the beauty of healthfulness and youth, add a hundredfold to the happiness of those who passing by have eyes to see and hearts to understand.
And in the Town.
But there are others. It is impossible to pass along the side streets of our many towns without finding the little wayside children. They are mostly those who are of that specially attractive age which makes them just too young to go to school and just too old to be kept in the house, so they get somewhere between the two places, and are generally playing in the gutter.
They have not often the same beauty as the country children, and they have not the same readiness to accept the approaches of “grown-ups.” Their surroundings almost from their birth make them suspicious and on their guard against possible dangers. But they are children for all that. They will notice and respond to a friendly smile. It is wonderful how a sharp and anxious little face is beautified by the smile that after a moment of doubt will come in answer.
Go down a long street of mean houses, each one the counterpart of every other, and see if there be anything to brighten the way that can compare with the laughter and the play of the wayside children. It is more difficult perhaps to appreciate these little ones, but it should be remembered that a friendly greeting is worth more to them than to a country child who gets a dozen such on its way from school. The reflected light, the responsive happiness is not so evident at first sight as in the case of country children, but it is even more real when once confidence has been established.