God be praised!—health comes at last! What joy to see the rosy flush mantle on the pallid cheek!—what joy to see the shrunken limbs grow round with health!—what joy to see the damp, thin locks grow crisp and glossy!
What matter though the knitting lie neglected, or the spinning-wheel be dumb, so that the soaring kite or bouncing ball but please his boyish fancy, and prompt the gleeful shout? What matter that the coarser fare be hers, so that the daintier morsel pass his rosy lip? What matter that her robe be threadbare, so that his graceful limbs be clad in Joseph’s rainbow coat? What matter that her couch be hard, so that his sunny head rest nightly on a downy pillow? What matter that her slender purse be empty, so that his childish heart may never know denial?
Years roll on. That loving mother’s eye grows dim; her glossy locks are silvered; her limbs are sharp and shrunken; her footsteps slow and tottering. And the boy?—the cherished Joseph?—he of the bold, bright eye, and sinewy limb, and bounding step? Surely, from his kind hand shall flowers be strewn on the dim, downward path to the dark valley; surely will her son’s strong arm be hers to lean on; his voice of music sweeter to her dull ear than seraphs’ singing.
No, no!—the hum of busy life has struck upon his ear, drowning the voice of love. He has become a man! refined, fastidious!—and to his forgetful, unfilial heart, (God forgive him,) the mother who bore him is only—“the old woman!”
SUNDAY MORNING AT THE DIBDINS.
“Jane,” (suddenly exclaims Mrs. Dibdin,) “do you know it is nearly time for your Sabbath School to commence? I hope you have committed your hymns and commandments to memory. Put on your little jet bracelet, and your ruffled pantalettes. Now, say the third commandment, while I fix your curls. It does seem to me as if your hair never curls half as well on Sundays as on week days. Mind, you ask Letty Brown where her mother bought that cunning little straw hat of hers,—not in Sabbath School, of course—that would be very wicked—but after it is over, as you walk along to church.
“Jane, what’s the chief end of man? Don’t know? Well, it’s the most astonishing thing that that Assembly’s Catechism don’t stay in your head any better! It seems to go into one ear and out of the other. Now pay particular attention while I tell you what the chief end of man is. The chief end of man is—is—well—I—why don’t you hold still?—you are always putting a body out! You had better run up stairs and get your book. Here, stop a minute, and let me tie your sash straight. Pink is very becoming to you, Jane; you inherit your mother’s blonde beauty. Come away from that glass, Jane, this minute; don’t you know it is wicked to look in the glass on Sunday? See if you can say your ‘creed’ that your Episcopal teacher wants you to learn. Come; ‘I believe’—(In less than one week your toes will be through those drab gaiters, Jane.) Goodness, if there isn’t the bell! Why didn’t you get your lesson Saturday evening? Oh! I recollect; you were at dancing school. Well—you needn’t say anything about that to your teacher; because—because there’s ‘a time to dance,’ and a time to go to meeting, and now it is meeting time; so, come here, and let me roll that refractory ringlet over my finger once more, and then, do you walk solemnly along to church, as a baptised child should.