Little Ferns For Fannys Little Friends | Page 3

always puts the big dictionary in a chair, to hoist me up high enough to reach my knife and fork; and if there is a dwarf apple or potatoe on the table, it is always laid on my plate. If I go to the play-ground to have a game of ball, the fellows all say--Get out of the way, little chap, or we shall knock you into a cocked hat. I don't think I've grown a bit these two years. I know I haven't, by the mark on the wall--(and I stand up to measure every chance I get.) When visitors come to the house and ask me my age, and I tell them that I am nine years old, they say, Tut, tut! little boys shouldn't tell fibs. My brother Hal has got his first long-tailed coat already; I am really afraid I never shall have anything but a jacket. I go to bed early, and have left off eating candy, and sweet-meats. I haven't put my fingers in the sugar-bowl this many a day. I eat meat like my father, and I stretch up my neck till it aches,--still I'm "little George," and "nothing shorter;" or, rather, I'm shorter than nothing. Oh, my Aunt Libby don't know much. How should she? She never was a boy!

MATTY AND MABEL;
OR,
WHO IS RICH?--WHO IS POOR?
There, Puss! said little Matty, you may have my dinner if you want it. I'm tired of bread and milk. I'm tired of this old brown house. I'm tired of that old barn, with its red eaves. I'm tired of the garden, with its rows of lilacs, its sun-flowers, and its beds of catnip and penny-royal. I'm tired of the old well, with its pole balancing in the air. I'm tired of the meadow, where the cows feed, and the hens are always picking up grass-hoppers. I wish I was a grass-hopper! I ain't happy. I am tired of this brown stuff dress, and these thick leather shoes, and my old sun-bonnet. There comes a nice carriage,--how smooth and shiny the horses are; how bright the silver-mounted harness glitters; how smart the coachman looks, in his white gloves. How nice it must be to be rich, and ride in a carriage; oh! there's a little girl in it, no older than I, and all alone, too!--a RICH little girl, with a pretty rose-colored bonnet, and a silk dress, and cream-colored kid gloves. See--she has beautiful curling hair, and when she puts her pretty face out the carriage window, and tells the coachman to go here, and to go there, he minds her just as if she were a grown lady. Why did God make her rich, and me poor? Why did he let her ride in a carriage, and me go barefoot? Why did he clothe her like a butterfly, and me like a caterpillar?
* * *
Matty, come here. Climb into my lap,--lay your head upon my shoulder,--so. Now listen. You are well and strong, Matty?--yes. You have enough to eat and drink?--yes. You have a kind father and mother?--yes. You have a crowing little dimpled baby brother?--yes. You can jump, and leap, and climb fences, and run up trees like a squirrel?--yes.
Well; the little girl with the rose-colored bonnet, whom you saw riding in the carriage, is a poor little cripple. You saw her fine dress and pretty pale face, but you didn't see her little shrunken foot, dangling helplessly beneath the silken robe. You saw the white gloved coachman, and the silver-mounted harness, and the soft, velvet cushions, but you didn't see the tear in their little owner's soft, dark eyes, as she spied you at the cottage door, rosy and light-footed, free to ramble 'mid the fields and flowers. You didn't know that her little heart was aching for somebody to love her. You didn't know that her mamma loved her diamonds, and silks, and satins better than her own little girl. You didn't know that when her little crippled limb pained her, and her heart ached, that she had "no nice place to cry." You didn't know that through the long, weary day, her mamma never took her gently on her lap,--or kissed her pale face,--or read her pretty stories, to charm her pain away,--or told her of that happy home, where none shall say, I'm sick. You didn't know that she never went to her little bed at night, to smooth her pillow, or put aside the ringlets from the flushed cheek, or kneel by the little bed, and ask the dear All Father to heal and bless her child. You didn't know that she danced till the stars grew pale, while poor little Mabel tossed restlessly from side to side, longing for a cool draught for her parched lip.
"You won't be