"How do you do, Mr. Bascom?" said this singular child, laying her hand respectfully on the venerable headstone. "Are your dandelions very troublesome this morning, dear sir?"
Her light fingers hovered over the mound like butterflies, and she began pulling up the dandelion roots, and smoothing down the grass over the bare places. Then she fell to work on the inscription, which was an elaborate one, surmounted by two cherubs' heads, one resting on an hour-glass, the other on a pair of cross-bones. Along every line she passed her delicate fingers, not because she did not know every line, but that she might trace any new growth of moss or lichen.
"Farewell this flesh, these ears, these eyes,
Those snares and fetters of the mind
My God, nor let this frame arise
Till every dust be well refined."
"You were very particular, Mr. Bascom, weren't you?" inquired Melody. "You were a very neat old gentleman, with white hair always brushed just so, and a high collar. You didn't like dust, unless it was well refined. I shouldn't wonder if you washed your walking-stick every time you came home, like Mr. Cuter, over at the Corners. Here's something growing in the tail of your last y. Never mind, Mr. Bascom, I'll get it out with a pin. There, now you are quite respectable, and you look very nice indeed. Good-by, and do try not to fret more than you can help about the dandelions. They will grow, no matter how often I come."
Melody, in common with most blind persons, always spoke of seeing, of looking at things, precisely as if she had the full use of her eyes. Indeed, I question whether those wonderful fingers of hers were not as good as many pairs of eyes we see. How many people go half-blind through the world, just for want of the habit of looking at things! How many plod onward, with eyes fixed on the ground, when they might be raised to the skies, seeing the glory of the Lord, which He has spread abroad over hill and meadow, for all eyes to behold! How many walk with introverted gaze, seeing only themselves, while their neighbor walks beside them, unseen, and needing their ministration!
The blind child touched life with her hand, and knew it. Every leaf was her acquaintance, every flower her friend and gossip. She knew every tree of the forest by its bark; knew when it blossomed, and how. More than this,—some subtle sense for which we have no name gave her the power of reading with a touch the mood and humor of those she was with; and when her hand rested in that of a friend, she knew whether the friend were glad or gay, before hearing the sound of his voice.
Another power she had,—that of attracting to her "all creatures living beneath the sun, that creep or swim or fly or run." Not a cat or dog in the village but would leave his own master or mistress at a single call from Melody. She could imitate every bird-call with her wonderful voice; and one day she had come home and told Miss Rejoice quietly that she had been making a concert with a wood-thrush, and that the red squirrels had sat on the branches to listen. Miss Vesta said, "Nonsense, child! you fell asleep, and had a pretty dream." But Miss Rejoice believed every word, and Melody knew she did by the touch of her thin, kind old hand.
It might well have been true; for now, as the child sat down beside a small white stone, which evidently marked a child's grave, she gave a low call, and in a moment a gray squirrel came running from the stone wall (he had been sitting there, watching her with his bright black eyes, looking so like a bit of the wall itself that the sharpest eyes would hardly have noticed him), and leaped into her lap.
"Brother Gray-frock, how do you do?" cried the child, joyously, caressing the pretty creature with light touches. "I wondered if I should see you to-day, brother. The last time I came you were off hunting somewhere, and I called and called, but no gray brother came. How is the wife, and the children, and how is the stout young man?"
The "stout young man" lay buried at the farther end of the ground, under the tree in which the squirrel lived. The inscription on his tombstone was a perpetual amusement to Melody, and she could not help feeling as if the squirrel must know that it was funny too, though they had never exchanged remarks about it. This was the inscription: