The Long Ago | Page 4

a fellow swiftly along when mother-made promises were forgotten and an unbuttoned coat was held outstretched to catch the breeze.
At night the torches and bonfires flickered and glowed where the skaters sent the merry noises of their revelry afloat through the crisp air as they dodged steel-footed in and out among the huts of the winter fishermen.
Perhaps I loved the winter river because I knew that beneath its forbidding surface there was the life of my loved lilies, and because I knew that all in good time the real river - our river - would be restored to us again, alive and joyous and unchanged.
One day, when first the tiny rivulets started to run from the bottom of the snow-drifts, The River suddenly unloosed its artillery and the crisp air reechoed with the booming that proclaimed the breaking-up of the ice. Great crowds of people thronged the banks, wondering if the bridge would go out or would stand the strain of pounding icecakes. The unmistakable note of a robin sounded from somewhere. Great dark spots began to show in the white ice-ribbon that wound through the valley. The air at sundown had lost its sting.
So day by day the breaking-up continued until at last the blessed stream was clear - the bass jumped hungry to the fly - the daffodils and violets sprang from beneath their wet leaf-blankets - and all the world joined the birds in one grand song of emancipation and joy.
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The Big Bend

Above the town, just beyond the red iron bridge, the river made a great bend and widened into a lake where the banks were willow-grown, and reeds and rushes and grasses and lily-pads pushed far out into mid-stream, leaving only a narrow channel of clear water.
To the Big Bend our canoe glided often, paddling lazily along and going far up-stream to drift back with the current.
Arms bared to the shoulder, we reached deep beneath the surface to bring up the long-stemmed water-lilies - the great white blossoms, and the queer little yellow-and-black ones.
Like a blight-eyed sprite the tiny marsh-wren flitted among the rushes, and the musk-rat built strange reed-castles at the water's edge.
The lace-winged dragon-fly following our boat darted from side to side, or poised in air, or alighted on the dripping blade of our paddle when it rested for a moment across our knees.
Among the grasses the wind-harps played weird melodies which only Boyhood could interpret.
In this place The River sang its love-songs, and sent forth an answering note to the vast harmonious blending of blue sky and golden day and incense-heavy air and the glad songs of birds.
And here at this tranquil bend The River seemed to be the self-same river of the old, loved hymn we sang so often in the Little Church With The White Steeple - that river which "flows by the throne of God"; fulfilling the promise of the ancient prophet of prophets and bringing "peace . . . like a river, and glory . . . like a flowing stream."

Christmas

We always used grandmother's stocking - because it was the biggest one in the family, much larger than mother's, and somehow it seemed able to stretch more than hers. There was so much room in the foot, too - a chance for all sorts of packages.
There was a carpet-covered couch against the flowered wall in one corner of the parlor. Between the foot of it and the chimney, was the door into our bedroom. I always hung my stocking at the side of the door nearest the couch, on the theory, well-defined in my mind with each recurring Christmas, that if by any chance Santa Claus brought me more than he could get into the stocking, he could pile the overflow on the couch. And he always did!
It may seem strange that a lad who seldom heard even the third getting-up call in the morning should have awakened without any calling once a year - or that his red-night-gowned figure should have leaped from the depths of his feather bed - or that he should have crept breathless and fearful to the door where the stocking hung. Notwithstanding the ripe experience of years past, when each Christmas found the generous stocking stuffed with good things, there was always the chance that Santa Claus might have forgotten, this year - or that he might have miscalculated his supply and not have enough to go 'round - or that he had not been correctly informed as to just what you wanted - or that some accident, might have befallen his reindeer-and-sleigh to detain him until the grey dawn of Christmas morning stopped his work and sent him scurrying back to his toy kingdom to await another Yule-tide.
And so, in the fearful silence and darkness of that early hour, with stilled breath