XIII.
_LITTLE ACTS OF KINDNESS; LITTLE DEEDS OF LOVE._
Aunt May’s invitation to come every day and play with Maggie and Bessiewas never once lost sight of by Belle, who was only too glad to acceptit, and be with her beloved little playmates as much as possible.
It was surprising to see how much Belle had improved during thesemonths she had been so much with Maggie and Bessie: no, not surprisingeither to any one who knew how much a good example can do; at leastwhen it shines before eyes which are willing and ready to profit by itslight.
And this was so with dear little Belle. She was not naturally anobstinate or selfish child; and her faults had come chiefly fromthe over-indulgence of her father and Daphne, who seldom or nevercontradicted her, but allowed her to think that she must always haveher own way. She had never been taught the duty and pleasure ofyielding to others, until she was thrown so constantly with our littlegirls; and then the lesson came to her almost without words. She couldnot have better teaching than she found in the grave surprise inBessie’s sweet eyes when she worried her father, and fretted herselffor some forbidden pleasure, or when she was wilful and imperious withher devoted old nurse; or in her gentle, “You wouldn’t tease yourfather when you’re his little comfort: would you, Belle?” She could notbut learn ready obedience, generosity, and thoughtfulness for others,when she saw them put in daily practice even by Maggie, who had so muchnatural heedlessness to struggle with; and, almost without knowingit, she strove to copy her little friends, and to put away the oldself-will and impatience.
“Why! how obedient and good my little daughter is growing,” said herfather, one day, surprised at her ready submission when he was obligedto refuse her some pleasure she had begged for.
“’Cause Bessie says mamma and Jesus will be glad when I’m good,” Belleanswered, laying her cheek against her father’s; “and she said that wasthe best way to make you happy too, papa. She says when we love um wetry to please um. Isn’t that true, papa?”
“Very true, my darling. Bessie is a dear little girl, and I am gladthat you remember when she tells you what is right.”
“She _does_ it more than she _tells_ it, papa: that’s why I ’member somuch. It makes me feel ’shamed when Maggie and Bessie see I am naughty.”
“I won’t go to Aunt May’s this morning, papa,” she said another daywhen her father told her to go and be made ready.
“What! stay away from your dear Maggie and Bessie?” said Mr. Powers.“How is that?”
“Daphne is sick, papa: she has such a hegget”--Belle meantheadache--“she could hardly dress me this morning, and had to lie rightdown. If she has to get up again, I’m afraid she will be more worse, soI will stay home to-day.”
But Belle’s voice shook as she proposed this, for it was a greatsacrifice for her. Six months since she would not have thought ofdenying herself any thing for the sake of her old nurse, and her fatherwas both pleased and touched.
“Then papa’s unaccustomed fingers will see what they can do,” he said,unwilling that his little girl should lose her day’s pleasure; and, ifBelle were not quite as neatly dressed as usual, no fault was found,and “Aunt Margaret” soon remedied all that was wrong.
But another bit of self-denial came in Belle’s way that day, and thatshe carried out.
Coming in with two or three bunches of fine hot-house grapes,--thefirst of the season,--in his hand, Colonel Rush found the children onthe piazza, playing “party” with their dolls’ teacups and saucers.Two other little girls, the children of a neighbor, were playing withthem. He stopped and gave Maggie a bunch to divide amongst them. Theywere greatly pleased with this little treat; but Maggie and Bessiewere rather surprised to see Belle put hers aside on one of the doll’splates, as if she did not intend to eat, or even play with them.
“Are you not going to play with yours?” asked Maggie, ratherreproachfully.
Belle colored a little, and said with some hesitation,--
“I wanted to save them.”
Belle was not like some children who would rather enjoy a nice thing bythemselves, and the others were surprised.
Now Belle would have been ready enough to tell Maggie and Bessie whyshe wanted to keep the grapes, but she did not care to do so before theyoung visitors; lest as she afterwards said, they should think she was“proud of herself for doing it.”
“She thinks we’ll give her some of ours, and then she’ll eat up her ownafterwards,” said Minnie Barlow, one of the little guests.
“I don’t either,” said Belle, flushing angrily: “I wouldn’t eat one ofyour old grapes, not if you begged and begged me to.”
“No,” said Bessie, putting her arm about Belle’s neck: “Belle neverdoes greedy things. I know she has a very excellent reason if she don’teat them. Are you sick, Belle?”
“No,” said Belle; and then she whispered in Bessie’s ear, “but poorDaphne is sick, and I am going to keep my grapes for her. She likesthem very much.”
“And I’ll give you mine for her too,” said Bessie, “yours make only afew for her when she is sick.” Then she said aloud: “I’m going to keepmy grapes too; and Maggie, I think you’d keep yours, if you knew thecircumstance.”
“Then I will,” said Maggie; and turning to the little strangers sheadded, “Bessie knows what’s inside of my mind most as well as I domyself; so if she tells me I would do a thing, I just know I would.”
So Maggie, too, put by her share of the grapes, till the company hadgone, and Belle felt free to tell what she wanted to do with them; whenshe agreed that Bessie was right, and she was quite ready to save hergrapes for such a “circumstance.” It was but a small act of self-denialfor these little girls to make out of their abundance; but who can tellthe pleasure the gift gave to old Daphne. And verily Belle had herreward.
“Now Heaven bress my child,” said the old woman, when Belle offeredthe grapes, and told that she and her young friends had kept them fromtheir play: “if she ain’t growin’ jes like her dear mamma, who wasallus thinkin’ for oders.”
Nothing could have pleased Belle more than to be told she was like herdear mother; but she said,--
“I didn’t used to think for ofers much, Daphne; not till I saw Bessiedo it, and Maggie too. They taught me.”
“Never min’ who taught ye, so long as you’re willin’ to learn,” saidDaphne. “But I say Heaven bress them dear little girls too, as I knowsit will.”
Pleased as Daphne was, she would have been better satisfied if herlittle mistress had taken back her gift for her own use; but Belleinsisted that she should eat the grapes herself, and indeed climbed onher lap and stuffed them one after the other into her mouth, refusingto taste one herself.
“What is that, Uncle Horace?” asked Maggie, one afternoon when she andBessie were out driving on the Avenue with Colonel Rush, Aunt Bessie,and the boys.
The object of her interest was certainly of a nature to excitecuriosity. It was a round building of stone, supported by eightpillars, with open arches between. In the wall, above the pillars, werethree narrow loop-holes or openings. It could scarcely have been told,however, that it was built of stone; for pillars and round walls werealike covered with beautiful green vines, just now in all their summerglory. It stood in the centre of a small park or common, where childrenand nurses were playing and wandering about.
“That,” said Colonel Rush, “is the old stone mill.”
“I don’t think it looks much like a mill,” said Bessie: “it don’t haveany things to go round.”
“Probably it had things to go round, as you call them, once upon atime,” said the Colonel.
“I thought it was a tower built by the early settlers to defendthemselves from the Indians,” said Harry. “Willie Thorn told me so.”
“Many people think so,” said the Colonel, “and some still believe thatit was built by the Danes, hundreds of years ago.”
“Oh!” said Fred, “this is the tower Longfellow wrote about in his‘Skeleton in Armor,?
?? isn’t it, sir?”
“The very same,” said the Colonel; “but, I believe, Fred, that it hasbeen pretty well proved, from old papers, that it had no such romanticbeginning, but was really and truly a windmill.”
“Tell me about the skeleton, Fred,” said Maggie.
So Fred told how a skeleton in armor, having been found in a placecalled Fall River, some miles from Newport, the poet, Longfellow, hadwritten a ballad about it; telling how a viking, or Norwegian sailor ofthe olden time, had fallen in love with the daughter of a prince, whorefused to give his child to the roving sailor; but they had run awaytogether, and crossing the sea had come to this spot, where the vikinghad built this tower for his wife to live in.
“Here for my lady’s bower Built I the lofty tower, Which to this very hour Stands looking seaward,”
chanted Fred, stretching out his hand with a magnificent air towardsthe old tower.
“That’s nice,” said Maggie, with a satisfied nod of her curly head. “Ishall just believe that. It’s a great deal nicer than to think it wasjust a common old windmill for grinding up corn.”
“I shan’t,” said matter-of-fact Bessie, “not when Uncle Horace saysit’s not true.”
“I don’t see that any one can be very _sure_ what it was,” said Maggie,determined to have faith in the most romantic story, “and I shall makeup my mind it was the lady’s bower. But what about the skeleton, Fred?”
“Oh! Mr. Longfellow goes on to say how the lady died, and her husbandcould not bear to live without her; so he went out into the woods andkilled himself, and the skeleton in armor which was really found issupposed to be his.”
“He oughtn’t to kill hisse’f. He ought to wait till Dod killed him,”said Frankie, who had been listening with great interest to the story.“He could play with all these nice chillen, if he’d ’haved hisself.”
“Yes,” said Bessie, who had received the story with as much displeasureas she had done that of the “Chief’s Head,” last summer, at Chalecoo,“if God chooses people to stay here, they ought to do it, even if theyare having very hard times.”
“So they ought, Bess,” said Fred; “but I guess those old vikings didnot care much about playing with children. They were very brave, daringfellows.”
“People can be brave and like children,” said Bessie, slipping herlittle hand into that of her own hero. “Uncle Horace likes children andplays with them, and no one could be braver than he is. And besides,Fred, if people have very good courage, I should think they would bebrave to bear the trouble God sends them, and not go kill themselvesout of it.”
“Well reasoned, little one,” said the Colonel, bending his tall headto kiss her; “that man is certainly a coward who cannot bear what Godsends to him, but takes the life his Maker has given.”
“And I shall think it is a windmill,” said Bessie, quite as resolved tostick to facts as Maggie was to believe the poet’s story.
“And I shall think it the viking’s tower, and write a story-book aboutit when I’m grown up,” said Maggie. “I’ll put it down for a subject.”
If Maggie lives to write a book on each “subject” she has put down forthat purpose, she will be very old indeed.
Bessie said no more; for if she and Maggie differed on something whichwas not important, she never argued about it, and this was probably onereason why they never quarrelled; for each was content to let the otherbe of her own way of thinking, so long as it did no harm. If we couldall learn that lesson it would save many hard words and thoughts, andthe trouble which arises from such.
They all now went back to the carriage, which they had left for acloser view of the old mill, and drove on to what is called the Point,and around the north-western side of the island, from which road theygained a beautiful view of the harbor and bay.
“What is that over there, Uncle Horace?” asked Fred, “it looks like anold fort.”
“Just what it is, my boy,” replied Colonel Rush. “That point iscalled the ‘Dumpling Rocks,’ and that ruin is old Fort Lewis, or FortDumpling.”
“What a funny name,” said Maggie.
They now crossed the long stone causeway which leads to Coaster’sHarbor Island; and, as they went over this, the children were allgreatly delighted with the number of pretty little birds which wentwhirling round them on every side, darting almost under the horses’feet, and in their very faces; passing round and round, above andbeneath the carriage. They were sand-martins, the Colonel said, andbeing disturbed by the rolling of the wheels, were probably trying todraw attention from their nests, which were built in the crevices ofthe stones that formed the causeway.
On this island stood the poor-house which they had come to visit; andhere another carriage, containing several of the elders of the party,had arrived before them. Papa was there and took the little girls outof the carriage when it stopped.
“What a nice place for the poor people to be in, when they don’t haveany house of their own!” said Bessie: “I s’pose they’re very gratefulfor it.”
“Well, I don’t know about that,” said Maggie. “I find poor people inthis world are not always grateful when they ought to be. Don’t youremember Mrs. Bent, Bessie?”
“Yes, I do,” said Bessie, in a tone which told that Mrs. Bent’singratitude, as she and Maggie thought it, was not to be easilyforgotten. Indeed, the way in which Mrs. Bent had received the giftof the hospital-bed for her lame boy, had left a very disagreeableimpression on the minds of our two little girls.
“But I s’pose rich people are not always so grateful as they ought tobe, either,” added Bessie.
“No,” said Maggie, thoughtfully: “maybe some are not, but I think _we_are, generally. I think I feel my blessings, Bessie,--I think I do,’specially being in Newport.”
“There can be no doubt about that,” said Uncle Ruthven, who hadoverheard this short conversation, to his wife: “if ever there was agrateful, contented, little heart it is that of our sunny Maggie.”
Certainly a more comfortable home, or one more beautifully situated,could scarcely have been found for those who could furnish none forthemselves. The grown people, as well as the children, were greatlypleased with the order, neatness, and quiet of the whole place. Thisvisit having been planned, the ladies had come provided with littleparcels of tea, fruit, and other small delicacies, as a treat for someof the sick and old people. There were a few toys and books also forsuch of the children as had behaved well, and these things Maggie andBessie were allowed to present.
“I b’lieve I’ll change my mind about poor people being grateful,” saidMaggie, when she had witnessed the pleasure these trifles gave; “andI’m glad I can, for an ungrateful person is ‘sharper than a serpent’stooth,’ ’specially if it’s an old woman.”
Bessie looked at her sister in great admiration, as she always did whenMaggie made any of these fine speeches; but Harry turned away lest sheshould see him laughing. For as Maggie was so careful of other people’sfeelings, Harry felt bound not to trouble her in that way when he couldavoid it.
“The band plays at Fort Adams to-morrow afternoon,” said the Colonel,as they drove homeward: “who will be for a drive over there?”
There was no want of assenting voices; and, the next afternoon, thewhole family went over to the fort,--some driving, some on horseback,Mr. Powers and Belle being of the party this time.
Maggie and Bessie had never in their lives been inside of a fort,so that this was quite an event to them. Harry and Fred had visitedseveral; but they were all much smaller than Fort Adams, which indeedis the second in size in the country, only Fortress Monroe beinglarger. Passing around the road, which runs between the water and theimmense earthworks which rise above it, they entered the fort beneatha stone arch, and over a stone pavement on which the horses’ feet rangwith a loud clatter. Just without this gateway, was the guard-house,a low stone building, with grated door and loop-holes, where drunkensoldiers, and those who have broken the rules, are confined. Two orthree sullen-l
ooking men were peeping through the iron bars of thedoor, for whom Bessie’s tender little heart was much moved; but Maggiewas afraid of them, and turned her face away, though they could notpossibly have hurt her, and probably had no will to do so.
Within the fort, the children were much astonished at the numberof enormous cannon, and at the great black balls and shells piledtogether in pyramids upon the green in the centre, and beneath thecasemates. The side of the fort next the water was entirely taken upwith these warlike-looking arrangements; while on the inner side werethe officers’ quarters, or little houses where they lived, and thesoldiers’ barracks and mess-rooms. All was neat, clean, and orderly;and, in spite of the purpose for which it was intended, the wholeplace had a bright, cheerful look. The band were playing delightfulmusic on the green, and the drive was filled with gay equipages. Thehandsome carriages, fine horses, and beautifully dressed ladies andchildren, made it a pretty and lively scene, and it was all so new tothe children, that each moment some exclamation of pleasure or wonderescaped them. Some of the officers were sauntering about, talking totheir acquaintances; and the general who commanded the fort, beinga friend of Colonel Rush, came and asked the ladies and children toalight from the carriages, and he would show them over the works. Theywere glad to accept his invitation, and the general took them over thefort, and explained all that was interesting.
But in spite of the many new and curious things she saw, in spite ofthe lovely music, and the merry crowd, Bessie’s mind was full of the“poor, naughty soldiers in the prison;” and when her older friends wereresting in the general’s quarters, while she with the other childrenstayed without and watched the gay scene, she went quietly to Belle andsaid,--
“Belle, dear, don’t you feel rather bad about those soldiers shut up inthat prison place?”
“Not when I don’t see ’em,” answered Belle. “I guess they were prettynaughty to be put in there.”
“May be so,” said Bessie; “but wouldn’t you like to be kind to them?”
“No,” said Belle. “I b’lieve not. One of them looked so cross.”
“Maybe it makes him cross to be shut up there when the music isplaying, and every thing is so nice out here,” said Bessie. “Let’s goand ask them if they will promise to be good if they are let out.”
“We can’t let them out,” said Belle.
“No; but we’ll tell some one they have repented and ask for them tobe let out. You know that soldier with a gun, that was walking up anddown there? well, I guess he’s a kind of soldier-policeman and we’llask him. The prison is just outside of that gate-hole,” said Bessie,pointing to the archway by which the fort was entered; “and we will beback in a moment.”
“Shall we ask Maggie to go?” said Belle.
“No, Maggie was so frightened at them. She is over there with Harry,looking at those ugly black balls; so we won’t ’sturb her, but just goby ourselves.”
So, hand in hand, the two little things ran out under the archway,and over to the guard-house beyond. Not unnoticed, however; forthough they were not seen by their own friends, they were by someacquaintances, who were driving past at the moment, and who, fearingthat they might be run over by the constantly passing carriages, orfall into some other mischief, told Colonel Rush’s servants to seeafter the children. One of the men called his master, and the Colonelspeedily followed the little runaways.
They made for the grated door, with what purpose Bessie hardly knewherself, save that there was kindness in her heart for the poorprisoners; but, as they reached it, the guard or “soldier-policeman,”as Bessie called him, stopped them by crossing his musket in their way.
Belle was frightened,--partly by this, partly by the two or threeastonished faces that peeped at them through the bars,--and would havedrawn back, but Bessie stood her ground, and, looking up at the guardwith her innocent, serious eyes, said,--
“We only want to speak to the poor shut-up soldiers.”
The man shook his head.
“It’s against the rules, miss,” he said.
“But I’m not in rules,” said Bessie. “I don’t live here you know, and Ithink I might do it. If you were in prison you would like some one tocoax you to be good: wouldn’t you?”
The soldier looked at her in astonished silence; but his gun stillbarred the way.
“You’ll let them out, won’t you?” she went on with pleading voice andeyes: “you’ll let them out so they can come in there where there issuch sweet music, and it is all nice and bright? I think they are sorrynow.”
“Yes,” said Belle: “see that poor fellow sitting on the floor with hishead down. I’m sure he is sorry, and will be good, and the ofers willtoo.”
While the little girls were speaking, two more soldiers had come roundfrom the other side of the guard-house. One of them was the corporal;and, hearing what the children said, he answered for the sentry.
“He can’t let them out, little ladies,” he said: “if he did he’d be putthere himself.”
As he finished speaking, Colonel Rush stood behind the children. Thecorporal and the soldiers, even the men behind the grating, saluted thebrave English officer, whom they knew by sight, and whom they greatlyadmired; for the story of his daring and courage were known to thegarrison. But the third man, who was hardly more than a lad, still satwith his arms folded, and his head sunk upon his breast.
“My dear children,” said the Colonel, “this is no place for you. Whatbrought you here?”
“Oh! Uncle Horace,” said Bessie, seizing upon his hand; “won’t you askthese policemen-soldiers to let out those poor prisoners? We feel sobadly about them.”
“My darling,” answered the Colonel, “they cannot let out these men.They are under arrest, and shut up here because they have done wrong,and the guard are here to keep them from getting out.”
“But see that poor soldier sitting down there,” said Bessie: “he looksso sorry. Maybe, he’s thinking of somebody of his, far away, who willhear he has been in prison, and feel badly about it.”
In her earnestness, she was using every argument she could think of;but she had innocently touched almost the only soft spot in the man’sheart. If he was not at the moment thinking of “somebody of his”who was far away, her words brought the thought of that one to hismind,--that “somebody,” his poor young sister, who would be grieved athis disgrace, hurt at his obstinate wrong-doing, if it ever came to herears.
He raised his head, and gave a quick glance at the innocent littlepleader; and a softened look came over the hard, sullen face.
“He’s not sorry, but just sullen, little lady,” said the corporal:“that fellow has been in the guard-house four times in the last week,for insubordination, and they’ll have to try some harder measures totake it out of him, I’m thinking. Your pity is only wasted.”
“Oh, no!” said Bessie; “for you know Jesus said we must be sorry withpeople when they are in trouble, and happy with them when they areglad. I’m _very_ sorry for him and the other men too. Who can let themout, Uncle Horace?”
“Only their officers, Bessie; and I fear they must stay here now tilltheir time is up: but we will hope they will do better in future,and not deserve punishment again. Come away now: your mother will beanxious.”
Bessie obeyed; but both she and Belle cast backward pitying looks atthe poor prisoners. The man they had noticed most, still sat silent;but the other two, as well as the soldiers without, talked withpleasure and amusement of their pretty ways and innocent simplicity.
But the man who had seemed to pay little or no regard to their wordswas the one who remembered them the longest, and to whom they broughtthe most good. He had been hard, obstinate, and disobedient, and, asthe corporal said, had been punished four times during the last week.Punishment and persuasion had alike proved useless in bringing him todo better; but he was softened now. He could not resist that sweetlittle face, the pitying eyes and gentle tones that asked for hisrelease. He thought of them, and of that “somebody of his,” all
thatnight as he lay upon the hard floor of the guard-house; and, when hewas set free in the morning, went to his commanding officer whom hehad disobeyed and insulted; asked forgiveness, and promised that hewould try not to offend again. And he kept his word, striving hardwith himself for he always felt, from this time, as if there were two“somebodies” who would be grieved to hear of his bad behavior anddisgrace.
“Who could let them out, Uncle Horace?” repeated Bessie as the Colonelled her and Belle away.
“Only the officer who ordered them to be shut up, dear,” said theColonel.
“And couldn’t we ask him?” said Bessie.
“Not very well, dear: the rules in the army must be strictly kept;and if these men were let out without good reason, it would be a badexample for the other soldiers, who might think they would not bepunished if they were disobedient.”
“But what had that man on the floor been doing?” asked Belle.
“I do not know, dear. Misbehaving in some way which deservedpunishment.”
“The soldier-policeman said he had been shut up four timesfor--for--in--su--such a long word I can’t remember it, Uncle Horace,and I didn’t know what it meant,” said Bessie.
“Insubordination?” said the Colonel.
“Yes, sir: what does it mean?”
“Disobeying orders, or being impertinent, and so forth,” said theColonel.
“And we’d better not ask the General to let them come out of that darkhouse?” said Belle.
“No, I think not,” said the Colonel. “They would not have been shut upif it had not been necessary, and we had better let the matter rest. Wecan do no good by interfering.”
So thought the Colonel, believing and knowing that discipline mustbe sternly kept up; knowing nothing the while of the good which hadalready been done,--of the tiny seed unconsciously dropped upon thehard and stony ground of an obstinate heart, but which had brought“forth fruit meet for repentance.”
This was by no means Bessie’s last visit to Fort Adams; but she neversaw the prisoner soldiers again, at least she did not recognize them;but they saw and knew her, the innocent little fairy, so she seemed tothese rough men, who had stood outside the prison bars, pleading sopityingly for their release.