The Angel Children | Page 5

heaven sooner, when you die, than if you are naughty, and don't think about these things while you are here. I want to go there very much, and so I try to be good, though I don't always make out well." Tom looked thoughtful at his sister's words, and then said:
"I think that little Genevieve will go very fast, when she dies. But I don't think father will get there very soon, now I tell you!"
"O, but Tom," said Hepsa sadly, "we must not think who will not go, but how we may go."
"I wish I knew how to read," said Tom; "but I never can go to school, father makes me saw so much wood."
Then Hepsa asked him to let her teach him; and, after a good deal of hesitation, he told her he didn't care if she did.
Some time after this, Genevieve's father and mother went away from that place, and she parted from Hepsa with many tears in her eyes, and much grief in her heart. "If I never see you again," she said, "don't forget we are both going into the gardens up there," and Hepsa always remembered.
Genevieve was a very quiet girl, but she was always ready to do something to please her dear mother, and at night brought her father's slippers from the closet, and placed them ready by his chair. She did, too, many little things for the servants, who all loved her very dearly; so when, a few years afterwards, she fell sick, and nothing they could do for her was able to make her any better, but the doctor said she must die, they all wept very much, and no comfort or joy could come into their hearts. But Genevieve gently kissed them, and told them a beautiful peace had come into her heart, for that, in the night, Christ often came to her, and told her how the angel was all ready to take her into his beautiful garden, and teach her out of his great golden books.
At last, one morning she died, and they laid her away in the garden near by the fountain; and they planted the mignonette and myrtle, that, mingling with the moss, it might grow over her grave.
And her mother said in her heart, "Let her lie here, that, as often as I come hither, I may be reminded of the more beautiful gardens of God, to which she has flown. And when, in the cool night, the stars look down, the soft fragrance of the mignonette shall tell them of her loveliness, and the myrtle and the moss of the constant love twining together the souls of the mother and the daughter."
It was as Christ had said; the angel stood ready, and when Genevieve closed her eyes in death, he caught her in his arms, and placed her before the Great Gate, which led into the gardens around the kingdom of heaven. A great many men, women and children stood about it, waiting for it to be opened, when suddenly a very bright angel, brighter than any she had ever seen in her dreams, came among them, seated on glorious clouds.
Then one by one did the crowd go before him, telling him what things they had done on earth, in order to be admitted into the gardens, to be prepared still more for the heavens. One said he had built a large college, given it a large sum of money, and called it by his name, that the world might see his works, and praise the Lord. Another told him how he had toiled in heathen lands, and dwelt among savages, that they might know and love God; another that he had prophesied; another that he had built a hospital for the poor, and had sheltered them from the cold winds; another still that he had delivered slaves from cruel masters, and brought them to the light of freedom. O, there cannot be counted all the men and women who came before the angel, and told of the things they had accomplished! And, as the words came upon Genevieve, her heart trembled for fear, and had it not been for the remembrance of those kind tones of Christ, poor Genevieve would have shrieked aloud.
What should she do? Rapidly she recalled every act of her life; but nowhere in it could she find one act worthy to be brought before the great bright angel. Alas! she had neither founded colleges nor hospitals; she had never toiled in heathen lands, nor prophesied, nor delivered slaves from bondage. Alas! must she lose those gardens when still so near?
The angel's glance fell upon Genevieve, and she drooped down in fear; but what was her surprise when the angel came down from the cloud, and raising her up, said,