Well and so—don't you think, she crept along, crept along to the very edge of the green, slippery turf, on her hands and knees, half trembling with fear, and half laughing to think of that droll-looking fat fellow, with the big bell-mouth, and the yellow breeches, and the grass-green military jacket, turned up with buff and embroidered with gems, and the bright golden eye that had so frightened her before, and wondering in her little heart if he would show himself again; and singing all the while, as she crept nearer and nearer, "Nobody asked you, sir, she said! sir, she said! nobody asked you, sir, she said!" till at last she had got near enough to look over, and see the little fishes there tumbling about by dozens, and playing bo-peep among the flowers that grew underneath the bank, and were multiplied by thousands in the clear water, when, all at once, she felt the turf giving way, and she put out her arms and screamed for her mother. Goody gracious! how she did scream! and then something answered from the flowing waters underneath, and from the flowering trees overhead, with a mournful sweet sound, like wailing afar off, "Thrice! thrice!" and the flashing waters swelled up, saying, "Thrice! thrice!" and the flowering branch of the tree swept over the turf, and the sound was the same, "Thrice! thrice!" and in she went, headlong, into the deepest part of the pool, screaming with terror, and calling on her mother to the last: poor mother!

Well and so—when she came to herself, where do you think she was? Why, she was lying out in the warm summer air, on a green bank, all tufted with cowslips and violets and clover-blossoms, with a plenty of strawberries underneath her feet, and the bluest water you ever saw all round her, murmuring like the rose-lipped sea-shells; and the air was full of singing-birds, and there was a little old woman looking at her, with the funniest cap, and a withered face not bigger than you may see when you look at the baby through the big end of a spyglass: the cap was a morning-glory, and it was tied underneath the chin with bleached cobweb, and the streamers and bows were just like the colors you see in a soap-bubble.

"Goody gracious! where am I now?" said little Ruth.

"Yes, my dear, that's my name," said the little old woman, dropping a low courtesy, and then spinning round two or three times, and squatting down suddenly, so as to make what you call a cheese.

"Why, you don't mean to say that's your real name," whispered little Ruth.

"To be sure it is! just as much as— And pray, my little creature, what's your name?"

"Mine! O, my name is Ruth Page, only Ruth Page." And up she jumped, and spun round among the strawberries and flowers, and tried to make a courtesy like the little old woman, and then they both burst out a-laughing together.

"Well," said Goody Gracious, "you're a nice, good-natured, funny little thing, I'll say that for you, as ever I happened to meet with; but haven't you another and a prettier name, hey?"

"Why, sometimes they call me little Teenty-Tawnty," said Ruth.

"Fiddle-de-dee, I don't like that name any better than the other: we must give you a new name," said the little old woman; "but first tell me,"—and she grew very serious, and her little sharp eyes changed color,—"first tell me how you happened to be here, in the very heart of Fairy-land, with nobody to take care of you, and not so much as a wasp or a bumble-bee to watch over you when you are asleep."

"Indeed, and indeed, ma'am, I don't know," said little Ruth; "all I do know is, that I have been very naughty, and that I am drowned, and that I shall never see my poor dear mamma any more!" And then she up and told the whole story to the little old woman, crying bitterly all the while.

"Don't take on so, my little dear, don't, don't!" said Goody Gracious; and out she whipped what appeared to Ruth nothing but a rumpled leaf of the tiger-lily, and wiped her eyes with it. "Be a good child, and, after a trial of three days in Fairy-land, if you want to go back to your mother you shall go, and you may carry with you a token to her that you have told the truth."

"O, bless your little dear old-fashioned face," cried Ruth; "O, bless you, bless you! only give me a token that will make me always remember what I have promised my poor dear mother, and I shall be so happy! and I won't ask for anything else."

"What, neither for humming-birds, nor gold-fish, nor butterflies, nor diamonds, nor pearls, nor anything you have been wishing for so long, ever since you were able to read about Fairy-land?"

"No, ma'am; just give me a ring of wheat-straw, or a brooch from the ruby-beetle, if you like, and I shall be satisfied."

"Be it so; but, before I change you to a fairy, you must make choice of what you want to see in Fairy-land for three days running; for, at the end of that time, I shall change you back again, so that if you are of the same mind then, you may go back to your mother, and, if not, you will stay with us for ever and ever."

"For ever and ever?" said Ruth, and she trembled; "please, ma'am, I should like to go now, if it's all the same to you?"

"No! but take this flower," and, as she spoke, she stooped down, and pulled up a forget-me-not by the roots, and breathed upon it, and it blossomed all over; "take this root," said she, "and plant it somewhere, and tend it well, and at any time after three days, if you get tired of being here, all you have to do will be just to pull it up out of the earth, and wish yourself at home, and you will find yourself there in a moment, in your own little bed."

"Goody gracious! you don't say so!"

"But I do say so."

"I declare, I've a good mind to try!"

"What, pull it up before you have planted it? No, no, my dear. It must be left out threescore and twelve hours, and be watered with the dews and the starlight of the South Sea, where you are now, thousands and thousands of miles from your own dear country; but there is one thing I would have you know before you plant the flower."

"If you please, ma'am," said little Ruth.

"It is given to you, my dear, to help you correct your faults; you mean to do right, and you try pretty hard, but you are so forgetful, you say."

"Yes, ma'am,"

"Well, now, but just so long as you tend this plant with care, and water it every day at the same hour,—every day, mind you, and at the same hour,—you will be growing better."

Ruth was overjoyed.

"But," continued the fairy, "if you neglect it for a single day, it will begin to droop and wither, the leaves will change, and some of the blossoms will drop off, and your mother will begin to feel unhappy and low-spirited."

"O yes; but I never shall, ma'am,—never, never!"

"Don't be too sure; and if you neglect it for two whole days running, all the flowers will drop off but one, and your mother will take to her bed, and nobody but you will know what ails her."

Poor Ruth began to tremble, and the tears came in her eyes.

"But," continued the fairy,—"but if you should neglect it for three days running, my poor child,—but for three days running,—the last flower will drop off, and your mother will die of a broken heart."

"O mercy, mercy!" cried poor little Ruth. "O, take it! take it! I wouldn't have it for the world!" And she flung it down upon the loose earth, and shook her little fingers, just as if something had stung her.

"It is too late now. See, my dear, it has already taken root, and now there is no help for it. Remember! your mother's health, happiness, and life depend upon that flower. Watch it well! And now, daughter of earth," and, as she spoke, she stooped, and pulled up a whole handful of violets, dripping with summer rain,—and repeating the words, "Daughter of earth, away! Rosebud, appear!" shook the moisture all over her; and instantly the dear child found herself afloat in the air, with pinions of purple gauze, bedropped with gold, with millions of little fairies all about her, swarming like butterflies and blossoms after a pleasant rain, and welcoming their sister Rosebud to Fairy-land.

"Well," thought Rosebud,—we must call her Rosebud now,—"well, if this being a little fairy isn't one of the pleasantest things." And then she recollected that she had only three days to stay there and see the sights, and she looked round her to ask if there was anybody near to help her, and take charge of her, and tell her what to do and where to go.

"Daughter," said a sweet voice that she knew, though it appeared to come out and steal up from the leaves of another morning-glory,—"Daughter!"

"Mother," said Rosebud.

"You may have your choice to-day of these three things,—a butterfly-hunt, a wedding, or a play."

"O, a wedding, a wedding," said Rosebud. "O, I have always wanted to see a wedding."

"Be it so," said the voice; and instantly a sweet wind arose, and lifted her up, and swept her, and thousands more like her, over the blue deep so swiftly that nothing could be seen but a mist of sparkles here and there, till they all found themselves on the sea-shore, at the mouth of a deep sparry cave, all hung about with the richest moss, and lighted with pearls in clusters, and with little patches of glow-worms, and carpeted with the wings of butterflies. In the midst were a multitude of little fairies, hovering and floating over a throne of spider-net ivory, on which lay the bride, with a veil of starlight, interwoven with the breath of roses, covering her from head to foot, and falling over the couch like sunshine playing on clear water.

By and by a faint, strange murmuring was heard afar off, like the ringing of lily-bells to the touch of the honey-bees, growing louder and louder, and coming nearer and nearer every moment. Rosebud turned toward the sea with all the other fairies, and held her breath; and after a few moments a fleet of little ships, with the most delicate purple and azure sails, so thin that you could see the sky through them, came tilting along over the sea as if they were alive,—and so they were,—and drew up, as if in order of battle, just before the mouth of the cave; and then a silver trumpet sounded on the shore, and a swarm of hornets appeared, whizzing and whirring all about the cave; and then there was another trumpet, and another, about as loud as you may hear from a caged blue-bottle, and compliments were interchanged, and a salute fired, which frightened the little lady-fairies into all sorts of shapes, and made the little fairy-bride jump up and ask if her time had come, though, to tell you the truth, the noise did not appear much more terrible to Rosebud than her little brother's pop-gun; and then a sort of barge, not unlike the blossom of a sweet pea in shape, was manned from the largest of the fleet, and, when it touched the bright sparkling sand, out leaped a little prince of a fellow, with a bunch of white feathers in his hat, plucked from the moth-miller, a sword like the finest cambric-needle belted about his waist, and the most unimpeachable small-clothes.

This turned out to be the bridegroom; and after a few more flourishes, and not a little pulling and hauling among the bridesmaids, the bride and the bridegroom stood up together, and looked silly and sheepish, as if butter wouldn't melt in their mouths; and after listening awhile to an old droning-beetle, without hearing a word he said, they bowed and courtesied, and made some sort of a reply, nobody could guess what; and then forth stepped the master of ceremonies, a priggish-looking grasshopper, with straw-colored tights, and a fashionable coat, single-breasted, and so quakerish it set poor little Rosebud a-laughing, in spite of all she could do, every time she looked at his legs; and then! out ran the ten thousand trumpeting bumble-bees, and the katydid grew noisier than ever, and the cricket chirruped for joy, and the bridegroom touched the bride's cheek, and pointed slyly toward a little heap of newly gathered roses and violets, piled up afar off, in a shadowy part of the cave, just underneath a trailing canopy of changeable moss; the bride blushed, and the fairies tittered, and little Rosebud turned away, and wished herself at home, and instantly the bride and the bridegroom vanished! and the ships and the fairies! and the lights and the music! and Rosebud found herself standing face to face with the little withered old woman, who was looking mournfully at the drooping forget-me-not. The tears came into her eyes, and for the first time since the flower took root,—for the very first time,—she began to think of her mother, and of her promise to the fairy; and she stooped down, in an agony of terror and shame and self-reproach, to see how it fared with her forget-me-not. Alas! it had already begun to droop and wither; and the leaves were changing color, and the blossoms were dropping off, and she knew that her mother was beginning to suffer.

"O that I had never seen the hateful flower!" cried Rosebud; and then instantly recollecting herself, she dropped upon her knees, and kissed it, and wept upon it, and the flower seemed refreshed by her tears; and when she stood up and looked into the face of the good little fairy, and saw her lips tremble, and the color change in her sweet mournful eyes, she felt as if she never should be happy again.

"Daughter of earth! child of the air!" said the fairy, "two more days remain to thee. What wouldst thou have?"

"O nothing! nothing! Let me but go back to my dear, dear mother, and I shall be so happy!"

"That cannot be. These trials are to prepare thee for thy return to her. Be patient, and take thy choice of these three things,—a tournament, a coronation, or a ball!"

"Goody gracious! how I should like to see a coronation!" cried Rosebud; and then she recollected herself, and blushed and courtesied, and said, "if you please, ma'am."

"Call me mother, my dear; in Fairy-land I am your mother."

"Well, mother," said Rosebud, the tears starting into her eyes, and her heart swelling, as she determined never to call her mamma, no, never!—"well, mother, if you please, I would rather stay here and watch the flower: I don't want to see anything more in Fairy-land; I've had enough of such things to last me as long as I live. But O, if I should happen to fall asleep!"

"If you should, my dear, you will wake in season; but take your choice."

"Thank you, mother, but I choose to stay here."

At these words the fairy vanished, and Rosebud was left alone, looking at the dear little flower, which seemed to grow fresher and fresher, and more and more beautiful every minute, and wondering whether it would be so with her dear mamma; and then she fell to thinking about her home, and how much trouble she had given her mother, and how much better she would always be after she had got back to her once more; and then she fell asleep, and slept so soundly that she did not wake till the sun was up, and it was time to water the flower.

At first she was terribly frightened; but when she remembered what the fairy told her, she began to feel comfortable, and, lest something might happen, she took a little sea-shell that lay there, and running down to the water, dipped it up full, and was on her way back, thinking how happy her poor dear mamma would feel if she could only know what it was and who it was that made her so much better, when she heard the strangest and sweetest noises all about her in the air, as if the whole sky was full of the happiest and merriest creatures! and when she looked up, lo! there was a broad glitter to be seen, as if the whole population of Fairy-land were passing right over her head, making a sort of path like that you see at sunrise along the blue deep, when the waters are motionless and smooth and clear.

"Well," said she, looking up, "I do wonder where they are going so fast,"—and then she stopped,—"and I do think they might he civil enough just to let a body know; I dare say 'tis the coronation, or the butterfly-hunt, or the tournament, or the— O, how I should like to be there!"

No sooner was the wish uttered, than she found herself seated in a high gallery, as delicately carved as the ivory fans of the east; with diamonds and ostrich-feathers all about and below her, and a prodigious crowd assembled in the open air,—with the lists open,—a trumpet sounding,—and scores of knights armed cap-a-pie, and mounted on dragon-flies, waiting for the charge. All eyes were upon her, and everybody about was whispering her name, and she never felt half so happy in her life; and she was just beginning to compare the delicate embroidery of her wings with that of her next neighbor, a sweet little fairy who sat looking through her fingers at a youthful champion below, and pouting and pouting as if she wanted everybody to know that he had jilted her, when she happened to see a little forget-me-not embroidered on his beaver; and she instantly recollected her promise, and cried out, "O mamma! mamma!" and wished herself back again, where she might sit by the flower and watch over it, and never leave it, never! till her three days of trial were ended.

In a moment, before she could speak a word, or even make a bow to the nice little boy-fairy, who had just handed her up her glove on the point of a lance like a sunbeam, she found herself seated by the flower. Poor little thing! It was too late! Every blossom had fallen off but one, and that looked unhealthy, and trembled when she breathed upon it. She thought of her mamma, and fancied she could see them carrying her up to bed, and all the doctors there, and nobody able to tell what ailed her; and she threw herself all along upon the grass, and wished all the fairies at the bottom of the Red Sea, and herself with them! And when she looked up, what do you think she saw? and where do you think she was? why, she was at the bottom of the Red Sea, and all the wonders of the Red Sea were about her,—chariots and chariot-wheels and the skeletons of war-horses, and mounted warriors, with heaps of glittering armor, and jewels of silver and jewels of gold, and banner and shield and spear, with millions and millions of little sea-fairies, and Robin Goodfellows, and giants and dwarfs, and the funniest-looking monsters you ever heard of; and the waters were all bright with fairy-lamps that were alive, and with ribbons that were alive, and with changeable flowers that swam about and whispered to each other in a language of their own; and there were great heaps of pearl washed up into drifts and ridges, and a pile of the strangest-looking old-fashioned furniture, of gold and ivory, and little mermaids with their dolls not longer than your finger, with live fishes for tails, jumping about and playing hide-and-seek with the sun-spots and star-fishes, and the striped water-snakes of the Indian seas,—the most brilliant and beautiful of all the creatures that live there.

And while she was looking about her, and wondering at all she saw, she happened to think once more of the forget-me-not, and to wish herself back again! At that instant she heard a great heavy bell booming and tolling,—she knew it was tolling—and she knew she was too late—and she knew that her mother was dead of a broken heart,—and she fell upon her face, and stretched forth her hands with a shriek, and prayed God to forgive her! and allow her to see her mother once more,—only once more!

"Why, what ails the child?" whispered somebody that seemed to be stooping over her.

It was her mother's voice! and poor Ruth was afraid to look up lest it should all vanish forever.

"Upon my word, Sarah," said another voice,—it was her father's,—"upon my word, Sarah, I do not know; but the poor little creature's thoughts appear to have undergone another change. I have heard nothing to-day of the forget-me-not which troubled her so the first week, have you?"

"She has mentioned it but once to-day, and then she shuddered; but perhaps we had better keep it in the glass till we see whether it will bear to be transplanted, for she seems to have set her little heart upon having that flower live; I wish I knew why!"

"Do you, indeed, mamma?" whispered poor Ruth, still without looking up; "well, then, I will tell you. That flower was given me by a fairy to make me remember my promises to you, my poor, dear, dead mamma; and so long as I water that every day at the same hour, so long I shall be growing better and better, and my poor dear mamma,—boo-hoo! boo-hoo!" and the little thing began to cry as if she would break her heart.

"Why, this is stranger than all," said the father. "I can't help thinking the poor child would be rational enough now, if she hadn't read so many fairy-books; but what a mercy it was, my dear Sarah, and how shall we ever be thankful enough, that you happened to be down there when she fell into the water."

"Ah!" Ruth Page began to hold her breath, and listen with the strangest feeling.

"Yes, Robert; but I declare to you, I am frightened whenever I think of the risk I ran by letting her fall in, head first, as I did."

Poor Ruth began to lift her head, and to feel about, and pinch herself to see if she was really awake.

"And then, too, just think of this terrible fever, and the strange, wild poetry she has been talking, day after day, about Fairy-land."

"Poetry! Fudge, Robert, fudge!"

Ruth looked up, full of amazement and joy, and whispered, "Fudge, father, fudge!" and the very next words that fell from her trembling lips as she sat looking at her mother, and pointing at a little bunch of forget-me-nots in full flower, that her mother had kept for her in a glass by the window, were these, "O mother! dearest mother! what a terrible dream I have had!"

"Hush, my love, hush! and go to sleep, and we will talk this matter over when you are able to bear it."

"Goody gracious, mamma!"

"There she goes again!" cried the father; "now we shall have another fit!"

"Hush, hush, my love! you must go to sleep now, and not talk any more."

"Well, kiss me, mamma, and let me have your hand to go to sleep with, and I'll try."

Her mother kissed the dear little thing, and took her hand in hers, and laid her cheek upon the pillow, and in less than five minutes she was sound asleep, and breathing as she hadn't breathed before since she had been fished out of the water, nearly three weeks back, on her way to Fairy-land.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *



A FADED LEAF OF HISTORY.

BY REBECCA HARDING DAVIS.

One quiet, snowy afternoon this winter, I found in a dark corner of one of the oldest libraries in the country a curious pamphlet. It fell into my hands like a bit of old age and darkness itself. The pages were coffee-colored, and worn thin and ragged at the edges, like rotting leaves in fall; they had grown clammy to the touch, too, from the grasp of so many dead years. There was a peculiar smell about the book which it had carried down from the days when young William Penn went up and down the clay-paths of his village of Philadelphia, stopping to watch the settlers fishing in the clear ponds or to speak to the gangs of yellow-painted Indians coming in with peltry from the adjacent forest.

The leaves were scribbled over with the name of John,—"John," in a cramped, childish hand. His father's book, no doubt, and the writing a bit of boyish mischief. Outside now, in the street, the boys were pelting each other with snowballs, just as this John had done in the clay-paths. But for nearly two hundred years his bones had been crumbled into lime and his flesh gone back into grass and roots. Yet here he was, a boy still; here was the old pamphlet and the scrawl in yellowing ink, with the smell about it still.

Printed by Rainier Janssen, 1698. I turned over the leaves, expecting to find a sermon preached before Andros, "for the conversion of Sadducees," or some "Report of the Condition of the Principalities of New Netherland, or New Sweden, for the Use of the Lord's High Proprietors thereof" (for of such precious dead dust this library is full); but I found, instead, wrapped in weighty sentences and backed by the gravest and most ponderous testimony, the story of a baby, "a Sucking Child six Months old." It was like a live seed in the hand of a mummy. The story of a baby and a boy and an aged man, in "the devouring Waves of the Sea; and also among the cruel devouring Jaws of inhuman Canibals." There were, it is true, other divers persons in the company, by one of whom the book is written. But the divers persons seemed to me to be only part of that endless caravan of ghosts that has been crossing the world since the beginning; they never can be anything but ghosts to us. If only to find a human interest in them, one would rather they had been devoured by inhuman cannibals than not. But a baby and a boy and an aged man!

All that afternoon, through the dingy windows of the old building, I could see the snow falling soft and steadily, covering the countless roofs of the city, and fancying the multitude of comfortable happy homes which these white roofs hid, and the sweet-tempered, gracious women there, with their children close about their knees. I thought I would like to bring this little live baby back to the others, with its strange, pathetic story, out of the buried years where it has been hidden with dead people so long, and give it a place and home among us all again.

I only premise that I have left the facts of the history unaltered, even in the names; and that I believe them to be, in every particular, true.

On the 22d of August, 1696, this baby, a puny, fretful boy, was carried down the street of Port Royal, Jamaica, and on board the "barkentine" Reformation, bound for Pennsylvania; a Province which, as you remember, Du Chastellux, a hundred years later, described as a most savage country which he was compelled to cross on his way to the burgh of Philadelphia, on its border. To this savage country our baby was bound. He had by way of body-guard his mother, a gentle Quaker lady; his father, Jonathan Dickenson, a wealthy planter, on his way to increase his wealth in Penn's new settlement; three negro men, four negro women, and an Indian named Venus, all slaves of the said Dickenson; the captain, his boy, seven seamen, and two passengers. Besides this defence, the baby's ship was escorted by thirteen sail of merchantmen under convoy of an armed frigate. For these were the days when, to the righteous man, terror walked abroad, in the light and the darkness. The green, quiet coasts were but the lurking-places of savages, and the green, restless seas more treacherous with pirates. Kidd had not yet buried his treasure, but was prowling up and down the eastern seas, gathering it from every luckless vessel that fell in his way. The captain, Kirle, debarred from fighting by cowardice, and the Quaker Dickenson, forbidden by principle, appear to have set out upon their perilous journey, resolved to defend themselves by suspicion, pure and simple. They looked for treachery behind every bush and billow; the only chance of safety lay, they maintained, in holding every white man to be an assassin and every red man a cannibal until they were proved otherwise.

The boy was hired by Captain Kirle to wait upon him. His name was John Hilliard, and he was precisely what any of these good-humored, mischievous fellows outside would have been, hired on a brigantine two centuries ago; disposed to shirk his work in order to stand gaping at Black Ben fishing, or to rub up secretly his old cutlass for the behoof of Kidd, or the French when they should come, while the Indian Venus stood by looking on, with the baby in her arms.

The aged man is invariably set down as chief of the company, though the captain held all the power and the Quaker all the money. But white hair and a devout life gave an actual social rank in those days, obsolete now, and Robert Barrow was known as a man of God all along the coast-settlements from Massachusetts to Ashley River, among whites and Indians. Years before, in Yorkshire, his inward testimony (he being a Friend) had bidden him go preach in this wilderness. He asked of God, it is said, rather to die; but was not disobedient to the heavenly call, and came and labored faithfully. He was now returning from the West Indies, where he had carried his message a year ago.

The wind set fair for the first day or two; the sun was warm. Even the grim Quaker Dickenson might have thought the white-sailed fleet a pretty sight scudding over the rolling green plain, if he could have spared time to his jealous eyes from scanning the horizon for pirates. Our baby, too, saw little of sun or sea; for, being but a sickly baby, with hardly vitality enough to live from day to day, it was kept below, smothered in the finest of linens and the softest of paduasoy.

One morning when the fog lifted, Dickenson's watch for danger was rewarded. They had lost their way in the night; the fleet was gone, the dead blue slopes of water rolled up to the horizon on every side and were met by the dead blue sky, without the break of a single sail or the flicker of a flying bird. For fifteen days they beat about without any apparent aim other than to escape the enemies whom they hourly expected to leap out from behind the sky-line. On the sixteenth day friendly signs were made to them from shore. "A fire made a great Smoak, and People beckoned to us to putt on Shoar," but Kirle and Dickenson, seized with fresh fright, put about and made off as for their lives, until nine o'clock that night, when, seeing two signal-lights, doubtless from some of their own convoy, they cried out, "The French! the French!" and tacked back again as fast as might be. The next day, Kirle being disabled by a jibbing boom, Dickenson brought his own terrors into command, and for two or three days whisked the unfortunate barkentine up and down the coast, afraid of both sea and shore, until finally, one night, he run her aground on a sand-bar on the Florida reefs. Wondering much at this "judgment of God," Dickenson went to work. Indeed, to do him justice, he seems to have been always ready enough to use his burly strength and small wit, trusting to them to carry him through the world wherein his soul was beleaguered by many inscrutable judgments of God and the universal treachery of his brother-man.

The crew abandoned the ship in a heavy storm. A fire was kindled in the bight of a sand-hill and protected as well as might be with sails and palmetto branches; and to this, Dickenson, with "Great trembling and Pain of Hartt," carried his baby in his own arms and laid it in its mother's breast. Its little body was pitiful to see from leanness, and a great fever was upon it. Robert Barrow, the crippled captain, and a sick passenger shared the child's shelter. "Whereupon two Canibals appeared, naked, but for a breech-cloth of plaited straw, with Countenances bloody and furious, and foaming at the Mouth"; but on being given tobacco, retreated inland to alarm the tribe. The ship's company gathered together and sat down to wait their return, expecting cruelty, says Dickenson, and dreadful death. Christianity was now to be brought face to face with heathenness, which fact our author seems to have recognized under all his terror. "We began by putting our trust in the Lord, hoping for no Mercy from these bloody-minded Creatures; having too few guns to use except to enrage them, a Motion arose among us to deceive them by calling ourselves Spaniards, that Nation having some influence over them"; to which lie all consented, except Robert Barrow. It is curious to observe how these early Christians met the Indians with the same weapons of distrust and fraud which have proved so effective with us in civilizing them since.

In two or three hours the savages appeared in great numbers, bloody and furious, and in their chronic state of foaming at the mouth. "They rushed in upon us, shouting 'Nickalees? Nickalees?' (Un Ingles.) To which we replied 'Espania.' But they cried the more fiercely 'No Espania, Nickalees!' and being greatly enraged thereat, seized upon all Trunks and Chests and our cloathes upon our Backs, leaving us each only a pair of old Breeches, except Robert Barrow, my wife, and child, from whom they took nothing." The king, or Cassekey, as Dickenson calls him, distinguished by a horse-tail fastened to his belt behind, took possession of their money and buried it, at which the good Quaker spares not his prayers for punishment on all pagan robbers, quite blind to the poetic justice of the burial, as the money had been made on land stolen from the savages. The said Cassekey also set up his abode in their tent; kept all his tribe away from the woman and child and aged man; kindled fires; caused, as a delicate attention, the only hog remaining on the wreck to be killed and brought to them for a midnight meal; and, in short, comported himself so hospitably, and with such kindly consideration toward the broad-brimmed Quaker, that we are inclined to account him the better-bred fellow of the two, in spite of his scant costume of horse-tail and belt of straw. As for the robbery of the ship's cargo, no doubt the Cassekey had progressed far enough in civilization to know that to the victors belong the spoils. Florida, for two years, had been stricken down from coast to coast by a deadly famine, and in all probability these cannibals returned thanks to whatever God they had for this windfall of food and clothes devoutly as our forefathers were doing at the other end of the country for the homes which they had taken by force. There is a good deal of kinship among us in circumstances, after all, as well as in blood. The chief undoubtedly recognized a brother in Dickenson, every whit as tricky as himself, and would fain, savage as he was, have proved him to be something better; for, after having protected them for several days, he came into their tent and gravely and with authority set himself to asking the old question, "Nickalees?"

"To which, when we denied, he directed his Speech to the Aged Man, who would not conceal the Truth, but answered in Simplicity, 'Yes.' Then he cried in Wrath 'Totus Nickalees!' and went out from us. But returned in great fury with his men, and stripped all Cloathes from us."

However, the clothes were returned, and the chief persuaded them to hasten on to his own village. Dickenson, suspecting foul play as usual, insisted on going to Santa Lucia. There, the Indian told him, they would meet fierce savages and undoubtedly have their throats cut, which kindly warning was quite enough to drive the Quaker to Santa Lucia headlong. He was sure of the worst designs on the part of the cannibal, from a strange glance which he fixed upon the baby as he drove them before him to his village, saying with a treacherous laugh, that after they had gone there for a purpose he had, they might go to Santa Lucia as they would.

It was a bleak, chilly afternoon as they toiled mile after mile along the beach, the Quaker woman far behind the others with her baby in her arms, carrying it, as she thought, to its death. Overhead, flocks of dark-winged grakles swooped across the lowering sky, uttering from time to time their harsh, foreboding cry; shoreward, as far as the eye could see, the sand stretched in interminable yellow ridges, blackened here and there by tufts of dead palmetto-trees; while on the other side the sea had wrapped itself in a threatening silence and darkness. A line of white foam crept out of it from horizon to horizon, dumb and treacherous, and licked the mother's feet as she dragged herself heavily after the others.

From time to time the Indian stealthily peered over her shoulder, looking at the child's thin face as it slept upon her breast. As evening closed in, they came to a broad arm of the sea thrust inland through the beach, and halted at the edge. Beyond it, in the darkness, they could distinguish the yet darker shapes of the wigwams, and savages gathered about two or three enormous fires that threw long red lines of glare into the sea-fog. "As we stood there for many Hour's Time," says Jonathan Dickenson, "we were assured these Dreadful Fires were prepared for us."

Of all the sad little company that stand out against the far-off dimness of the past, in that long watch upon the beach, the low-voiced, sweet-tempered Quaker lady comes nearest and is the most real to us. The sailors had chosen a life of peril years ago; her husband, with all his suspicious bigotry, had, when pushed to extremes, an admirable tough courage with which to face the dangers of sea and night and death; and the white-headed old man, who stood apart and calm, had received, as much as Elijah of old, a Divine word to speak in the wilderness, and the life in it would sustain him through death. But Mary Dickenson was only a gentle, commonplace woman, whose life had been spent on a quiet farm, whose highest ambition was to take care of her snug little house, and all of whose brighter thoughts or romance or passion began and ended in this staid Quaker and the baby that was a part of them both. It was only six months ago that this first-born child had been laid in her arms; and as she lay on the white bed looking out on the spring dawning day after day, her husband sat beside her telling her again and again of the house he had made ready for her in Penn's new settlement. She never tired of hearing of it. Some picture of this far-off home must have come to the poor girl as she stood now in the night, the sea-water creeping up to her naked feet, looking at the fires built, as she believed, for her child.

Toward midnight a canoe came from the opposite side, into which the chief put Barrow, Dickenson, the child, and its mother. Their worst fears being thus confirmed, they crossed in silence, holding each other by the hand, the poor baby moaning now and then. It had indeed been born tired into the world, and had gone moaning its weak life out ever since.

Landing on the farther beach, the crowd of waiting Indians fled from them as if frightened, and halted in the darkness beyond the fires. But the Cassekey dragged them on toward a wigwam, taking Mary and the child before the others. "Herein," says her husband, "was the Wife of the Canibal and some old Women sitting in a Cabbin made of Sticks about a Foot high, and covered with a Matt. He made signs for us to sitt down on the Ground, which we did. The Cassekey's Wife looking at my Child and having her own Child in her lapp, putt it away to another Woman, and rose upp and would not bee denied, but would have my Child. She took it and suckled it at her Breast, feeling it from Top to Toe, and viewing it with a sad Countenance."

The starving baby, being thus warmed and fed, stretched its little arms and legs out on the savage breast comfortably and fell into a happy sleep, while its mother sat apart and looked on.

"An Indian did kindly bring to her a Fish upon a Palmetto Leaf and set it down before her; but the Pain and Thoughts within her were so great that she could not eat."

The rest of the crew having been brought over, the chief set himself to work and speedily had a wigwam built in which mats were spread, and the shipwrecked people, instead of being killed and eaten, went to sleep just as the moon rose, and the Indians began "a Consert of hideous Noises," whether of welcome or worship they could not tell.

Dickenson and his band remained in this Indian village for several days, endeavoring all the time to escape, in spite of the kind treatment of the chief, who appears to have shared all that he had with them. The Quaker kept a constant, fearful watch, lest there might be death in the pot. When the Cassekey found they were resolved to go, he set out for the wreck, bringing back a boat which was given to them, with butter, sugar, a rundlet of wine, and chocolate; to Mary and the child he also gave everything which he thought would be useful to them. This friend in the wilderness appeared sorry to part with them, but Dickenson was blind both to friendship and sorrow, and obstinately took the direction against which the chief warned him, suspecting treachery, "though we found afterward that his counsell was good."

Robert Barrow, Mary, and the child, with two sick men, went in a canoe along the coast, keeping the crew in sight, who, with the boy, travelled on foot, sometimes singing as they marched. So they began the long and terrible journey, the later horrors of which I dare not give in the words here set down. The first weeks were painful and disheartening, although they still had food. Their chief discomfort arose from the extreme cold at night and the tortures from the sand-flies and mosquitoes on their exposed bodies, which they tried to remedy by covering themselves with sand, but found sleep impossible.

At last, however, they met the fiercer savages of whom the chief had warned them, and practised upon them the same device of calling themselves Spaniards. By this time, one would suppose, even Dickenson's dull eyes would have seen the fatal idiocy of the lie. "Crying out 'Nickalees, No Espanier,' they rushed upon us, rending the few Cloathes from us that we had; they took all from my Wife, even tearing her Hair out, to get at the Lace, wherewith it was knotted." They were then dragged furiously into canoes and rowed to the village, being stoned and shot at as they went. The child was stripped, while one savage filled its mouth with sand.

But at that the chief's wife came quickly to Mary and protected her from the sight of all, and took the sand out of the child's mouth, entreating it very tenderly, whereon the mass of savages fell back, muttering and angry.

The same woman brought the poor naked lady to her wigwam, quieted her, found some raw deerskins, and showed her how to cover herself and the baby with them.

The tribe among which they now were had borne the famine for two years; their emaciated and hunger-bitten faces gave fiercer light to their gloomy, treacherous eyes. Their sole food was fish and palmetto-berries, both of which were scant. Nothing could have been more unwelcome than the advent of this crowd of whites, bringing more hungry mouths to fill; and, indeed, there is little reason to doubt that the first intention was to put them all to death. But, after the second day, Dickenson relates that the chief "looked pleasantly upon my Wife and Child"; instead of the fish entrails and filthy water in which the fish had been cooked which had been given to the prisoners, he brought clams to Mary, and kneeling in the sand showed her how to roast them. The Indian women, too, carried off the baby, knowing that its mother had no milk for it, and handed it about from one to the other, putting away their own children that they might give it their food. At which the child, that, when it had been wrapped in fine flannel and embroidery had been always nigh to death, began to grow fat and rosy, to crow and laugh as it had never done before, and kick its little legs sturdily about under their bit of raw skin covering. Mother Nature had taken the child home, that was all, and was breathing new lusty life into it, out of the bare ground and open sky, the sun and wind, and the breasts of these her children; but its father saw in the change only another inexplicable miracle of God. Nor does he seem to have seen that it was the child and its mother who had been a protection and shield to the whole crew and saved them through this their most perilous strait.

I feel as if I must stop here with the story half told. Dickenson's narrative, when I finished it, left behind it a fresh, sweet cheerfulness, as if one had been actually touching the living baby with its fair little body and milky breath; but if I were to try to reproduce the history of the famished men and women of the crew during the months that followed, I should but convey to you a dull and dreary horror.

You yourselves can imagine what the journey on foot along the bleak coast in winter, through tribe after tribe of hostile savages, must have been to delicately nurtured men and women, naked but for a piece of raw deerskin and utterly without food save for the few nauseous berries or offal rejected by the Indians. In their ignorance of the coast they wandered farther and farther out of their way into those morasses which an old writer calls "the refuge of all unclean birds and the breeding-fields of all reptiles." Once a tidal wave swept down into a vast marsh where they had built their fire, and air and ground slowly darkened with the swarming living creatures, whirring, creeping about them through the night, and uttering gloomy, dissonant cries. Many of these strange companions and some savages found their way to the hill of oyster-shells where the crew fled, and remained there for the two days and nights in which the flood lasted.

Our baby accepted all fellow-travellers cheerfully; made them welcome, indeed. Savage, slave, and beast were his friends alike, his laugh and outstretched hands were ready for them all. The aged man, too, Dickenson tells us, remained hopeful and calm, even when the slow-coming touch of death had begun to chill and stiffen him, and in the presence of the cannibals assuring his companions cheerfully of his faith that they would yet reach home in safety. Even in that strange, forced halt, when Mary Dickenson could do nothing but stand still and watch the sea closing about them, creeping up and up like a visible death, the old man's prayers and the baby's laugh must have kept the thought of her far home very near and warm to her.

They escaped the sea to fall into worse dangers. Disease was added to starvation. One by one strong men dropped exhausted by the way, and were left unburied, while the others crept feebly on; stout Jonathan Dickenson taking as his charge the old man, now almost a helpless burden. Mary, who, underneath her gentle, timid ways, seems to have had a gallant heart in her little body, carried her baby to the last, until the milk in her breast was quite dried and her eyes grew blind, and she too fell one day beside a poor negress who, with her unborn child, lay frozen and dead, saying that she was tired, and that the time had come for her too to go. Dickenson lifted her and struggled on.

The child was taken by the negroes and sailors. It makes a mother's heart ache even now to read how these coarse, famished men, often fighting like wild animals with each other, staggering under weakness and bodily pain, carried the heavy baby, never complaining of its weight, thinking, it may be, of some child of their own whom they would never see or touch again.

I can understand better the mystery of that Divine Childhood that was once in the world, when I hear how these poor slaves, unasked, gave of their dying strength to this child; how, in tribes through which no white man had ever travelled alive, it was passed from one savage mother to the other, tenderly handled, nursed at their breasts; how a gentler, kindlier spirit seemed to come from the presence of the baby and its mother to the crew; so that, while at first they had cursed and fought their way along, they grew at the last helpful and tender with each other, often going back, when to go back was death, for the comrade who dropped by the way, and bringing him on until they too lay down, and were at rest together.

It was through the baby that deliverance came to them at last. The story that a white woman and a beautiful child had been wandering all winter through the deadly swamps was carried from one tribe to another until it reached the Spanish fort at St. Augustine. One day therefore, when near their last extremity, they "saw a Perre-augoe approaching by sea filled with soldiers, bearing a letter signifying the governor of St. Augustine's great Care for our Preservation, of what Nation soever we were." The journey, however, had to be made on foot; and it was more than two weeks before Dickenson, the old man, Mary and the child, and the last of the crew, reached St. Augustine.

"We came thereto," he says, "about two hours before Night, and were directed to the governor's house, where we were led up a pair of stairs, at the Head whereof stood the governor, who ordered my Wife to be conducted to his Wife's Apartment."

There is something in the picture of poor Mary, after her months of starvation and nakedness, coming into a lady's chamber again, "where was a Fire and Bath and Cloathes," which has a curious pathos in it to a woman.

Robert Barrow and Dickenson were given clothes, and a plentiful supper set before them.

St. Augustine was then a collection of a few old houses grouped about the fort; only a garrison, in fact, half supported by the king of Spain and half by the Church of Rome. Its three hundred male inhabitants were either soldiers or priests, dependent for supplies of money, clothing, or bread upon Havana; and as the famine had lasted for two years, and it was then three since a vessel had reached them from any place whatever, their poverty was extreme. They were all, too, the "false Catholicks and hireling Priests" whom, beyond all others, Dickenson distrusted and hated. Yet the grim Quaker's hand seems to tremble as he writes down the record of their exceeding kindness; of how they welcomed them, looking, as they did, like naked furious beasts, and cared for them as if they were their brothers. The governor of the fort clothed the crew warmly, and out of his own great penury fed them abundantly. He was a reserved and silent man, with a grave courtesy and an odd gentle care for the woman and child that make him quite real to us. Dickenson does not even give his name. Yet it is worth much to us to know that a brother of us all lived on that solitary Florida coast two centuries ago, whether he was pagan, Protestant, or priest.

When they had rested for some time, the governor furnished canoes and an escort to take them to Carolina,—a costly outfit in those days,—whereupon Dickenson, stating that he was a man of substance, insisted upon returning some of the charges to which the governor and people had been put as soon as he reached Carolina. But the Spaniard smiled and refused the offer, saying whatever he did was done for God's sake. When the day came that they must go, "he walked down to see us embark, and taking our Farewel, he embraced some of us, and wished us well saying that We should forget him when we got amongst our own nation; and I also added that If we forgot him, God would not forget him, and thus we parted."

The mischievous boy, John Hilliard, was found to have hidden in the woods until the crew were gone, and remained ever after in the garrison with the grave Spaniards, with whom he was a favorite.

The voyage to Carolina occupied the month of December, being made in open canoes, which kept close to the shore, the crew disembarking and encamping each night. Dickenson tells with open-eyed wonder how the Spaniards kept their holiday of Christmas in the open boat and through a driving northeast storm; praying, and then tinkling a piece of iron for music and singing, and also begging gifts from the Indians, who begged from them in their turn; and what one gave to the other that they gave back again. Our baby at least, let us hope, had Christmas feeling enough to understand the laughing and hymn-singing in the face of the storm.

At the lonely little hamlet of Charleston (a few farms cut out of the edge of the wilderness) the adventurers were received with eagerness; even the Spanish escort were exalted into heroes, and entertained and rewarded by the gentlemen of the town. Here too Dickenson and Kirle sent back generous gifts to the soldiers of St. Augustine, and a token of remembrance to their friend, the governor. After two months' halt, "on the eighteenth of the first month, called March," they embarked for Pennsylvania, and on a bright cold morning in April came in sight of their new home of Philadelphia. The river was gay with a dozen sail, and as many brightly painted Indian pirogues darting here and there; a ledge of green banks rose from the water's edge dark with gigantic hemlocks, and pierced with the caves in which many of the settlers yet lived; while between the bank and the forest were one or two streets of mud-huts and of curious low stone houses sparkling with mica, among which broad-brimmed Friends went up and down.

The stern Quaker had come to his own life and to his own people again; the very sun had a familiar home look for the first time in his journey. We can believe that he rejoiced in his own solid, enduring way; gave thanks that he had escaped the judgments of God, and closed his righteous gates thereafter on aught that was alien or savage.

The aged man rejoiced in a different way; for, being carried carefully to the shore by many friends, they knowing that he was soon to leave them, he put out his hand, ready to embrace them in much love, and in a tender frame of spirit, saying gladly that the Lord had answered his desire, and brought him home to lay his bones among them. From the windows of the dusky library I can see the spot now, where, after his long journey, he rested for a happy day or two, looking upon the dear familiar faces and waving trees and the sunny April sky, and then gladly and cheerfully bade them farewell and went onward.

Mary had come at last to the pleasant home that had been waiting so long for her, and there, no doubt, she nursed her baby, and clothed him in soft fooleries again; and, let us hope, out of the fulness of her soul, not only prayed, but, Quaker as she was, sang idle joyous songs, when her husband was out of hearing.

But the baby, who knew nothing of the judgments or mercy of God, and who could neither pray nor sing, only had learned in these desperate straits to grow strong and happy in the touch of sun and wind, and to hold out its arms to friend or foe, slave or savage, sure of a welcome, and so came closer to God than any of them all.

Jonathan Dickenson became a power in the new principality; there are vague traditions of his strict rule as mayor, his stately equipages and vast estates. No doubt, if I chose to search among the old musty records, I could find the history of his son. But I do not choose; I will not believe that he ever grew to be a man, or died.

He will always be to us simply a baby; a live, laughing baby, sent by his Master to the desolate places of the earth with the old message of Divine love and universal brotherhood to his children; and I like to believe, too, that as he lay in the arms of his savage foster-mothers, taking life from their life, Christ so took him into his own arms and blessed him.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * *



A CHILD'S DREAM OF A STAR.

BY CHARLES DICKENS.

There was once a child, and he strolled about a good deal, and thought of a number of things. He had a sister, who was a child too, and his constant companion. These two used to wonder all day long. They wondered at the beauty of the flowers; they wondered at the height and blueness of the sky; they wondered at the depth of the bright water; they wondered at the goodness and the power of God who made the lovely world.

They used to say to one another, sometimes, Supposing all the children upon earth were to die, would the flowers, and the water, and the sky be sorry? They believed they would be sorry. For, said they, the buds are the children of the flowers, and the little playful streams that gambol down the hillsides are the children of the water; and the smallest bright specks playing at hide-and-seek in the sky all night, must surely be the children of the stars; and they would all be grieved to see their playmates, the children of men, no more.

There was one clear shining star that used to come out in the sky before the rest, near the church-spire, above the graves. It was larger and more beautiful, they thought, than all the others, and every night they watched for it, standing hand in hand at the window. Whoever saw it first, cried out, "I see the star!" And often they cried out both together, knowing so well when it would rise, and where. So they grew to be such friends with it, that before lying down in their beds, they always looked out once again, to bid it good night; and when they were turning round to sleep, they used to say, "God bless the star!"

But while she was still very young, O, very, very young, the sister drooped, and came to be so weak that she could no longer stand in the window at night; and then the child looked sadly out by himself, and when he saw the star, turned round and said to the patient pale face on the bed, "I see the star!" and then a smile would come upon the face, and a little weak voice used to say, "God bless my brother and the star!"

And so the time came, all too soon! when the child looked out alone, and when there was no face on the bed; and when there was a little grave among the graves, not there before; and when the star made long rays down towards him, as he saw it through his tears.

Now, these rays were so bright, and they seemed to make such a shining way from earth to heaven, that when the child went to his solitary bed, he dreamed about the star; and dreamed that, lying where he was, he saw a train of people taken up that sparkling road by angels. And the star, opening, showed him a great world of light, where many more such angels waited to receive them.

All these angels who were waiting turned their beaming eyes upon the people who were carried up into the star; and some came out from the long rows in which they stood, and fell upon the people's necks, and kissed them tenderly, and went away with them down avenues of light, and were so happy in their company, that lying in his bed he wept for joy.

But there were many angels who did not go with them, and among them one he knew. The patient face that once had lain upon the bed was glorified and radiant, but his heart found out his sister among all the host.

His sister's angel lingered near the entrance of the star, and said to the leader among those who had brought the people thither,—

"Is my brother come?"

And he said, "No."

She was turning hopefully away, when the child stretched out his arms, and cried, "O sister, I am here! Take me!" And then she turned her beaming eyes upon him and it was night; and the star was shining into the room, making long rays down towards him as he saw it through his tears.

From that hour forth the child looked out upon the star as on the home he was to go to, when his time should come; and he thought that he did not belong to the earth alone, but to the star too, because of his sister's angel gone before.

There was a baby born to be a brother to the child; and while he was so little that he never yet had spoken word, he stretched his tiny form out on his bed and died.

Again the child dreamed of the opened star, and of the company of angels, and the train of people, and the rows of angels with their beaming eyes all turned upon those people's faces.

Said his sister's angel to the leader,—

"Is my brother come?"

And he said, "Not that one, but another."

As the child beheld his brother's angel in her arms, he cried, "O sister, I am here! Take me!" And she turned and smiled upon him, and the star was shining.

He grew to be a young man, and was busy at his books when an old servant came to him and said,—

"Thy mother is no more. I bring her blessing on her darling son!"

Again at night he saw the star, and all that former company. Said his sister's angel to the leader,—

"Is my brother come?"

And he said, "Thy mother!"

A mighty cry of joy went forth through all the star, because the mother was reunited to her two children. And he stretched out his arms and cried, "O mother, sister, and brother, I am here! Take me!" And they answered him, "Not yet." And the star was shining.

He grew to be a man whose hair was turning gray, and he was sitting in his chair by the fireside, heavy with grief, and with his face bedewed with tears, when the star opened once again.

Said his sister's angel to the leader, "Is my brother come?"

And he said, "Nay, but his maiden daughter."

And the man who had been the child saw his daughter, newly lost to him, a celestial creature among those three, and he said, "My daughter's head is on my sister's bosom, and her arm is round my mother's neck, and at her feet there is the baby of old time, and I can bear the parting from her, God be praised!"

And the star was shining.

Thus the child came to be an old man, and his once smooth face was wrinkled, and his steps were slow and feeble, and his back was bent. And one night as he lay upon his bed, his children standing round, he cried, as he had cried so long ago,—

"I see the star!"

They whispered one another, "He is dying."

And he said, "I am. My age is falling from me like a garment, and I move towards the star as a child. And O, my Father, now I thank thee that it has so often opened, to receive those dear ones who await me!"

And the star was shining; and it shines upon his grave.

* * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * * **

THE END