The Children of the Valley

by Harriet Elizabeth Prescott Spofford

If ye don’t, and if I do.”

At last another train came along, some people hurried in, and then Sally’s train went puffing and blowing on its way; and the joggle jolted the baby to sleep, and by and by Sally too. She roused herself to give the conductor her ticket—the man looking at her searchingly; but when he came back to question her he found her asleep again.

It was a long, refreshing slumber that Sally had; and when at last the little old conductor told her this was the place to which her ticket took her, she skipped off the car, happy-hearted to think of all the long distance that lay between her and the city and the ship. She edged through the little throng always waiting at a station, who if they thought at all about her thought she belonged to some poor French Canadians, and hurried down the first road she saw. Then spying a foot-path leading up a hill, among low bushes, to a wood, she was over the fence in no time, and following it up and out of sight.

Then at last Sally breathed freely. She never thought of being afraid in the green afternoon wood. She kept the half-visible path by a kind of instinct.

On and on, and up and up, Sally went. Then down and down on the other side, she made her way, sometimes in deep green gloom, and creeping under heavy branches; sometimes where a shimmer of leaves let her see a pale blue sky overhead. Once a young fawn looked at her through the boughs and fled away in a fright that made her laugh—as if anything need be afraid of her! Once a brood of little brown partridges scurried away under foot like a parcel of dead leaves. Once she stooped to smooth two little hairy things cuddled in a grassy hollow in the lee of a big, warm rock, who evidently did not like it; and it was well for Sally that their mother, who would not have liked it either, was off foraging and rolling in a berry-patch—for they were bear’s cubs.

All the way along Sally was conscious of a delicious sort of air, a scent of earth and flowers and spicy leaves that comforted her soul, although burrs and boughs and twigs and pebbles discomfited her feet, tough little feet though they were.

By and by the trees grew thin. She came out on a bright and open spot where a spring bubbled up and ran away in a tiny brook. A wooden trough, hollowed out of an old tree, stood beside the spring, half full of water in which the sun had lain all day.

As she sat down, Sally dabbled her fingers in the trough. The water was warm. In a moment she had off the baby’s poor little slip, and then gave him the most refreshing bath the little creature had ever had in his life. After it, she laid him down to kick and sprawl and crow and gurgle on a bed of soft warm moss, while she washed her own face and hands, and dipped her head in the spring, where the water made a glossy curl of every lock of her hair.

This done, Sally took the bottle of milk out of the big silk handkerchief, tasted it to find if it were still sweet, and proceeded to give the baby his supper. She put the bottle afterwards in the edge of the running water to keep cool, and then wrapped him over and over in the soft handkerchief, having spread his little gown on a bush to dry, and laid him down on the grass. She rambled about a little while, picking and eating berries. Afterward she lay down beside him, putting her arm over him. Tired out with her long tramp and all her cares and fears, Sally slept till the baby woke her in the broad sunlight of the next morning. She ran for the bottle in the brook; but alas the little drop of milk was sour. She stayed long enough to wash the bottle; and then, without stopping for any of the tempting berries, she took up her march again.