Child Life in Prose

by Unknown

It was a June morning. Roses and yellow jasmine covered the old wall in the Poet's garden. The little brown mason bees flew in and out of their holds beneath the pink and white and yellow flowers. Peacock-butterflies, with large blue eyes on their crimson velvet wings, fluttered about and settled on the orange-brown wall-flowers. Aloft, in the broad-leaved sycamore-tree, the blackbird was singing as if he were out of his senses for joy; his song was as loud as any nightingale, and his heart was glad, because his young brood was hatched, and he knew that they now sat with their little yellow beaks poking out of the nest, and thinking what a famous bird their father was. All the robins and tomtits and linnets and redstarts that sat in the trees of the garden den shouted vivas and bravuras, and encored him delightfully.

The Poet himself sat under the double-flowering hawthorn, which was then all in blossom. He sat on a rustic seat, and his best friend sat beside him. Beneath the lower branches of the tree was hung the canary-bird's cage, which the children had brought out because the day was so fine, and the little canary loved fresh air and the smell of flowers. It never troubled him that other birds flew about from one end of the garden to the other, or sat and sung on the leafy branches, for he loved his cage; and when the old blackbird poured forth his grand melodies, the little canary sat like a prince in a stage-box, and nodded his head, and sang an accompaniment.

One of the Poet's children, his little daughter, sat in her own little garden, which was full of flowers, while bees and butterflies flitted about in the sunshine. The child, however, was not noticing them; she was thinking only of one thing, and that was the large daisy-root which was all in flower; it was the largest daisy-root in the whole garden, and two-and-fifty double pink-and-white daisies were crowded upon it. They were, however, no longer daisies to the child's eyes, but two-and-fifty little charity children in green stuff gowns, and white tippets, and white linen caps, that had a holiday given them. She saw them all, with their pink cheeks and bright eyes, running in a group and talking as they went; the hum of the bees around seeming to be the pleasant sound of their voices. The child was happy to think that two-and-fifty charity children were let loose from school to run about in the sunshine. Her heart went with them, and she was so full of joy that she started up to tell her father, who was sitting with his best friend under the hawthorn-tree.

Sad and bitter thoughts, however, just then oppressed the Poet's heart. He had been disappointed where he had hoped for good; his soul was under a cloud; and as the child ran up to tell him about the little charity children in whose joy she thought he would sympathize, she heard him say to his friend, "I have no longer any hope of human nature now. It is a poor miserable thing, and is not worth working for. My best endeavors have been spent in its service,—my youth and my manhood's strength, my very life,—and this is my reward! I will no longer strive to do good. I will write for money alone, as others do, and not for the good of mankind!"

The Poet's words were bitter, and tears came into the eyes of his best friend. Never had the child heard such words from her father before, for he had always been to her as a great and good angel.

"I will write," said he, "henceforth for money, as others do, and not for the good of mankind."

"My father, if you do," said the child, in a tone of mournful indignation, "I will never read what you write! I will trample your writings under my feet!"

Large tears rolled down her cheeks, and her eyes were fixed on her father's face.