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Title: Bruno - or, lessons of fidelity, patience, and self-denial taught by a dog
Author: Abbott, Jacob
Language: English
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HARPER’S
STORY BOOKS
No. 1
BRUNO.
[Illustration]
DECEMBER, 1854.
PRICE 25 Cts
HARPER & BROTHERS
FRANKLIN SQUARE, NEW YORK.
[Illustration: “Bruno forgives him, and why should not I?” said Hiram.]
HARPER’S STORY BOOKS.
A SERIES OF NARRATIVES, DIALOGUES, BIOGRAPHIES, AND TALES,
FOR THE INSTRUCTION AND ENTERTAINMENT
OF THE YOUNG.
BY
JACOB ABBOT.
Embellished with
NUMEROUS AND BEAUTIFUL ENGRAVINGS.
BRUNO;
LESSONS OF FIDELITY, PATIENCE, AND SELF-DENIAL
Taught by a Dog.
NEW YORK:
HARPER & BROTHERS, PUBLISHERS.
Entered, according to an Act of Congress, in the year one
thousand eight hundred and fifty-four, by
HARPER & BROTHERS,
in the Clerk’s Office for the Southern District of New York.
PREFACE.
The present volume is the first of a proposed monthly series of story
books for the young.
The publishers of the series, in view of the great improvements which
have been made within a few years past in the means and appliances of
the typographical art, and of the accumulation of their own facilities
and resources, not only for the manufacture of such books in an
attractive form, and the embellishment of them with every variety
of illustration, but also for the circulation of them in the widest
manner throughout the land, find that they are in a condition to make a
monthly communication of this kind to a very large number of families,
and under auspices far more favorable than would have been possible at
any former period. They have accordingly resolved on undertaking the
work, and they have intrusted to the writer of this notice the charge
of preparing the volumes.
The books, though called story books, are not intended to be works of
amusement merely to those who may receive them, but of substantial
instruction. The successive volumes will comprise a great variety,
both in respect to the subjects which they treat, and to the form and
manner in which the subjects will be presented; but the end and aim
of all will be to impart useful knowledge, to develop the thinking
and reasoning powers, to teach a correct and discriminating use of
language, to present models of good conduct for imitation, and bad
examples to be shunned, to explain and enforce the highest principles
of moral duty, and, above all, to awaken and cherish the spirit of
humble and unobtrusive, but heartfelt piety. The writer is aware of the
great responsibility which devolves upon him, in being thus admitted
into many thousands of families with monthly messages of counsel and
instruction to the children, which he has the opportunity, through the
artistic and mechanical resources placed at his disposal, to clothe in
a form that will be calculated to open to him a very easy access to
their attention, their confidence, and their hearts. He can only say
that he will make every exertion in his power faithfully to fulfill his
trust.
JACOB ABBOTT.
New York, 1854.
CONTENTS.
PAGE
THE COMBAT WITH THE WOLF 13
COMBAT WITH A BOAR 16
JOOLY 19
THE EMIGRANTS 32
THE VOYAGE 34
GOING ALONE 38
SILVER BOWL STOLEN 41
THE SILVER BOWL RECOVERED 52
BRUNO AND THE LOST BOY 62
BOYS ADRIFT 84
BRUNO AND THE ROBIN 97
BURNING OF THE TOOL-HOUSE 120
WILLING TO LEARN 129
PANSITA 135
THE DOG’S PETITION 140
THE STORM ON THE LAKE 143
TAKING AN INTEREST 151
ENGRAVINGS
PAGE
THE TOOL-HOUSE ON FIRE _Frontispiece._
COMBAT WITH THE WOLF 15
THE TWO BOARS 17
COMBAT WITH A BOAR 18
THE CHAMOIS HUNTERS 20
CHILDREN IN THE GROVE 21
BRUNO IN THE SNOW 28
THE COTTAGE 30
BRUNO ON WOLF-SKIN 31
THE EMIGRANTS 33
THE BEGINNING OF THE VOYAGE 35
THE STORM 36
THE END OF THE VOYAGE 37
THE PARTING 39
THE GIPSY CAMP 43
FORTUNE TELLING 51
FRANK AND LORENZO 58
THE PARLOR DOGS 63
VARIETY 64
THE WATCH-DOG 66
THE GATEWAY IN THE WOOD 71
TONY LOST 75
THE PIER 88
THE PORT 94
RALPH AND THE ROBIN 101
HIRAM’S SQUIRREL 104
THE SLY FOX 109
WILLING TO LEARN 132
THE STORM ON THE LAKE 146
BRUNO WATCHING 149
PLAY 150
BRUNO AND THE SHEEP 158
BRUNO.
THE COMBAT WITH THE WOLF.
[Sidenote: The hunter alarmed.]
In the night, a hunter, who lived in a cottage among the Alps, heard a
howling.
“Hark!” said he, “I heard a howling.”
His wife raised her head from the pillow to listen, and one of the two
children, who were lying in a little bed in the corner of the room,
listened too. The other child was asleep.
“It is a wolf,” said the hunter.
“In the morning,” said the hunter, “I will take my spear, and my
sheath-knife, and Bruno, and go and see if I can not kill him.”
Bruno was the hunter’s dog.
The hunter and his wife, and the child that was awake, listened a
little longer to the howling of the wolf, and then, when at length the
sounds died away, they all went to sleep.
[Sidenote: Prepares for a hunt.]
In the morning the hunter took his spear, and his sheath-knife, and his
hunting-horn besides, and then, calling Bruno to follow him, went off
among the rocks and mountains to find the wolf.
[Sidenote: Discovers the animal.]
While he was climbing up the mountains by a steep and narrow path,
he thought he saw something black moving among the rocks at a great
distance across the valley. He stopped to look at it. He looked at it
very intently.
At first he thought it was the wolf. But it was not the wolf.
[Sidenote: The hunter blows his horn.]
Then he thought it was a man. So he blew a loud and long blast with his
horn. He thought that if the moving thing which he saw were another
man, he would answer by blowing _his_ horn, and that then, perhaps, he
would come and help the hunter hunt the wolf. He listened, but he heard
no reply. He heard nothing but echoes.
By-and-by he came to a stream of water. It was a torrent, flowing
wildly among the rocks and bushes.
“Bruno,” said the hunter, “how shall we get across this torrent?”
Bruno stood upon a rock, looking at the torrent very earnestly, but he
did not speak.
“Bruno,” said the hunter again, “how shall we get across this torrent?”
Bruno barked.
[Sidenote: The rude bridge.]
The hunter then walked along for some distance on the margin of the
stream, and presently came to a place where there was a log lying
across it. So he and Bruno went over on the log. Bruno ran over at
once. The hunter was at first a little afraid to go, but at last he
ventured. He got across in safety. Here the hunter stopped a few
minutes to rest.
[Sidenote: The wolf discovered.]
He then went on up the mountain. At last Bruno began to bark and to
run on forward, looking excited and wild. He saw the wolf. The hunter
hastened forward after him, brandishing his spear. The wolf was in a
solitary place, high up among the rocks. He was gnawing some bones. He
was gaunt and hungry. Bruno attacked him, but the wolf was larger and
stronger than he, and threw him back with great violence against the
ground. The dog howled with pain and terror.
[Illustration: Picture of the combat.]
[Sidenote: Bruno’s courage. The wolf is killed.]
The man thrust the spear at the wolf’s mouth, but the ferocious beast
evaded the blow, and seized the shaft of the spear between his teeth.
Then the great combat came on. Very soon the dog sprang up and seized
the wolf by the throat, and held him down, and finally the man killed
him with his spear.
Then he took his horn from his belt, and blew a long and loud blast in
token of victory.
[Sidenote: What became of the skin of the wolf.]
He took the skin of the wolf, and carried it home. The fur was long,
and gray in color. The hunter tanned and dressed the skin, and made it
soft like leather. He spread it down upon the floor before the fire
in his cottage, and his children played upon it. Bruno was accustomed
to lie upon it in the evening. He would lie quietly there for a long
time, looking into the fire, and thinking of the combat he had with
the savage monster that originally wore the skin, at the time when he
fought him on the mountains, and helped the hunter kill him.
* * * * *
The hunter and the hunter’s children liked Bruno very much before, but
they liked him more than ever after his combat with the wolf.
COMBAT WITH A BOAR.
Some wild animals are so ferocious and strong that it requires several
dogs to attack and conquer them. Such animals are found generally in
remote and uninhabited districts, among forests and mountains, or in
countries inhabited by savages.
[Sidenote: Habits of the boar.]
The wild boar is one of the most terrible of these animals. He has long
tusks projecting from his jaws. These serve him as weapons in attacking
his enemies, whether dogs or men. He roams in a solitary manner
among the mountains, and though he is very fierce and savage in his
disposition, he will seldom molest any one who does not molest him. If,
when he is passing along through the forests, he sees a man, he pays
no regard to him, but goes on in his own way. If, however, when he is
attacked by dogs, and is running through the forest to make his escape,
he meets a man in his way, he thinks the man is the hunter that has
set the dogs upon him, or at least that he is his enemy. So he rushes
upon him with terrible fury, and kills him--sometimes with a single
blow--and then, trampling over the dead body, goes on bounding through
the thickets to escape from the dogs.
[Illustration: Picture of a fight.]
[Sidenote: The tusks.]
Wild boars often have dreadful combats with each other. In this
engraving we have a representation of such a fight. The weapons with
which they fight are sharp tusks growing out of the under jaw. With
these tusks they can inflict dreadful wounds.
Savages, when they attack the wild boar, arm themselves with spears,
and station themselves at different places in the forest, where they
think the boar will pass. Sometimes they hide themselves in thickets,
so as to be ready to come out suddenly and attack the boar when the
dogs have seized him.
[Illustration: Picture of the combat.]
[Sidenote: The dogs and the boar. The spears.]
Here is a picture of such a combat. The dogs have pursued the boar
through the woods until he begins to be exhausted with fatigue and
terror. Still, he fights them very desperately. One he has thrown down.
He has wounded him with his tusks. The dog is crying out with pain and
fright. There are three other dogs besides the one who is wounded. They
are endeavoring to seize and hold the boar, while one of the hunters
is thrusting the iron point of his spear into him. Two other hunters
are coming out of a thicket near by to join in the attack. One of them
looks as if he were afraid of the boar. He has good reason to be afraid.
[Sidenote: Savages dress themselves in skins.]
These hunters are savages. They are nearly naked. One of them is
clothed with a skin. I suppose, by the claws, that it is a lion’s skin.
He hunted and killed the lion, perhaps, in the same way that he is now
hunting and killing the boar.
Savages use the skins of beasts for clothing because they do not know
how to spin and weave.
But we must now go back to Bruno, the Alpine hunter’s dog that killed
the wolf, and who used afterward to sleep before the fire in the
hunter’s cottage on the skin.
JOOLY.
[Sidenote: The Alps.]
Bruno’s master lived among the Alps. The Alps are very lofty mountains
in Switzerland and Savoy.
[Sidenote: Chamois hunting.]
The upper portions of these mountains are very rocky and wild. There
are crags, and precipices, and immense chasms among them, where it
is very dangerous for any one to go. The hunters, however, climb up
among these rocks and precipices to hunt the chamois, which is a small
animal, much like a goat in form and character. He has small black
horns, the tips of which turn back.
The chamois climbs up among the highest rocks and precipices to feed
upon the grass which grows there in the little nooks and corners. The
chamois hunters climb up these after him. They take guns with them,
in order to shoot the chamois when they see one. But sometimes it is
difficult for them to get the game when they have killed it, as we see
in this engraving. The hunters were on one side of a chasm and the
chamois on the other, and though he has fallen dead upon the rocks,
they can not easily reach him. One of the hunters is leaning across
the chasm, and is attempting to get hold of the carcass with his right
hand. With his left hand he grasps the rock to keep himself from
falling. If his hand should slip, he would go headlong down into an
awful abyss.
[Illustration: Picture of the chamois hunters on the Alps.]
The other hunter is coming up the rock to help his comrade. He has his
gun across his shoulder. Both the hunters have ornamented their hats
with flowers.
The chamois lies upon the rock where he has fallen. We can see his
black horns, with the tips turned backward.
[Sidenote: The lower slopes of the mountains.]
In the summer season, the valleys among these Alpine mountains are very
delightful. The lower slopes of them are adorned with forests of fir
and pine, which alternate with smooth, green pasturages, where ramble
and feed great numbers of sheep and cows. Below are rich and beautiful
valleys, with fields full of flowers, and cottages, and pretty little
gardens, and every thing else that can make a country pleasant to
see and to play in. There are no noxious or hurtful animals in these
valleys, so that there is no danger in rambling about any where in
them, either in the fields or in the groves. They must take care of the
wet places, and of the thorns that hide among the roses, but beyond
these dangers there is nothing to fear. In these valleys, therefore,
the youngest children can go into the thickets to play or to gather
flowers without any danger or fear; for there are no wild beasts, or
noxious animals, or poisonous plants there, or any thing else that can
injure them.
[Illustration: Children at play.]
[Sidenote: Winter in the Alps.]
Thus the country of the Alps is very pleasant in summer, but in winter
it is cold and stormy, and all the roads and fields, especially in
the higher portions of the country, are buried up in snow. Still, the
people who live there must go out in winter, and sometimes they are
overtaken by storms, and perish in the cold.
[Sidenote: Scene in the hunter’s cottage.]
Once Bruno saved his master’s life when he was thus overtaken in a
storm. The baby was sick, and the hunter thought he would go down in
the valley to get some medicine for him. The baby was in a cradle. His
grandmother took care of him and rocked him. His mother was at work
about the room, feeling very anxious and unhappy. The hunter himself,
who had come in tired from his work a short time before, was sitting
in a comfortable easy-chair which stood in the corner by the fire. The
head of the cradle was near the chair where the hunter was sitting.[1]
[1] For the positions of the chair and cradle in the hunter’s
cottage, see engraving on page 30.
“George,” said the hunter’s wife, “I wish you would look at the baby.”
George leaned forward over the head of the cradle, and looked down upon
the baby.
“Poor little thing!” said he.
“What shall we do?” said his wife. As she said this she came to the
cradle, and, bending down over it, she moved the baby’s head a little,
so as to place it in a more comfortable position. The baby was very
pale, and his eyes were shut. As soon as he felt his mother’s hand upon
his cheek, he opened his eyes, but immediately shut them again. He was
too sick to look very long even at his mother.
[Sidenote: Consultation between the hunter and his wife.]
“Poor little thing!” said George again. “He is very sick. I must go to
the village and get some medicine from the doctor.”
“Oh no!” said his wife. “You can not go to the village to-night. It is
a _dreadful_ storm.”
“Yes,” said the hunter, “I know it is.”
“The snow is very deep, and it is drifting more and more,” said his
wife. “It will be entirely dark before you get home, and you will lose
your way, and perish in the snow.”
The hunter did not say any thing. He knew very well that there would be
great danger in going out on such a night.
“You will get lost in the snow, and die,” continued his wife, “if you
attempt to go.”
[Sidenote: A hard alternative.]
“And baby will die, perhaps, if I stay at home,” said the hunter.
The hunter’s wife was in a state of great perplexity and distress. It
was hard to decide between the life of her husband and that of her
child. While the parents were hesitating and looking into the cradle,
the babe opened its eyes, and, seeing its father and mother there,
tried to put out its little hands to them as if for help, but finding
itself too weak to hold them up, it let them drop again, and began to
cry.
“Poor little thing!” said the hunter. “I’ll go--I’ll go.”
The mother made no more objection. She could not resist the mute appeal
of the poor helpless babe. So she brought her husband his coat and cap,
and forced her reluctant mind to consent to his going.
It was strange, was it not, that she should be willing to risk the life
of her husband, who was all the world to her, whose labor was her life,
whose strength was her protection, whose companionship was her solace
and support, for the sake of that helpless and useless baby?
It was strange, too, was it not, that the hunter himself, who was
already almost exhausted by the cold and exposure that he had suffered
during the day, should be willing to go forth again into the storm, for
a child that had never done any thing for him, and was utterly unable
to do any thing for him now? Besides, by saving the child’s life, he
was only compelling himself to work the harder, to procure food and
clothing for him while he was growing up to be a man.
What was the baby’s name?
His name was Jooly.
At least they called him Jooly. His real name was Julien.
[Sidenote: The hunter bids little Jooly good-by.]
When the hunter was all ready to go, he came to the cradle, and,
putting his great rough and shaggy hand upon the baby’s wrist, he said,
“Poor little Jooly! I will get the doctor himself to come and see you,
if I can.”
So he opened the door and went out, leaving Jooly’s grandmother rocking
the cradle, and his mother at work about the room as before.
When the hunter had gone out and shut the door, he went along the side
of the house till he came to a small door leading to his cow-house,
which was a sort of small barn.
[Sidenote: He calls Bruno.]
He opened the door of the cow-house and called out “BRUNO!”
Bruno, who was asleep at this time in his bed, in a box half filled
with straw, started up on hearing his master’s voice, and, leaping over
the side of the box, came to his master in the storm.
[Sidenote: Bruno’s bed.]
Bruno was glad to be called. And yet it was a dark and stormy night.
The wind was blowing, and the snow was driving terribly. On the other
hand, the bed where he had been lying was warm and comfortable. The
cow was near him for company. He was enjoying, too, a very refreshing
sleep, dreaming of races and frolics with other dogs on a pretty green.
All this repose and comfort were disturbed. Still, Bruno was glad.
He perceived at once that an unexpected emergency had occurred, and
that some important duty was to be performed. Bruno had no desire to
lead a useless life. He was always proud and happy when he had any
duty to perform, and the more important and responsible the duty was,
the more proud and happy it made him. He cared nothing at all for any
discomfort, fatigue, or exposure that it might bring upon him.
[Sidenote: A comparison.]
Some boys are very different from Bruno in this respect. They do not
share his noble nature. They never like duty. All they like is ease,
comfort, and pleasure. When any unexpected emergency occurs, and they
are called to duty, they go to their work with great reluctance, and
with many murmurings and repinings, as if to do duty were an irksome
task. I would give a great deal more for a _dog_ like Bruno than for
such a boy.
[Sidenote: The hunter and Bruno in the snow.]
Bruno and his master took the road which led to the village. The hunter
led the way, and Bruno followed. The road was steep and narrow, and
in many places the ground was so buried in snow that the way was very
difficult to find. Sometimes the snow was very soft and deep, and the
hunter would sink into it so far that he could scarcely advance at
all. At such times Bruno, being lighter and stronger, would wallow on
through the drift, and then look back to his master, and wait for him
to come, and then go back to him again, looking all the time at the
hunter with an expression of animation and hope upon his countenance,
and wagging his tail, as if he were endeavoring to cheer and encourage
him. This action had the effect, at any rate, of encouragement. It
cheered the hunter on; and so, in due time, they both arrived safely at
the village.
The doctor concluded, after hearing all about the case, that it would
not be best for him to go up the mountain; but he gave the hunter some
medicine for the baby.
[Sidenote: The hunter attempts to return to the cottage.]
The medicine was put in a phial, and the hunter put the phial in his
pocket. When all was ready, the hunter set out again on his return home.
[Sidenote: Difficulties in the way.]
It was much harder going up than it had been to come down. The road was
very steep. The snow, too, was getting deeper every hour. Besides, it
was now dark, and it was more difficult than ever to find the way.
At last, when the hunter had got pretty near his own cottage again, his
strength began to fail. He staggered on a little farther, and then he
sank down exhausted into the snow. Bruno leaped about him, and rubbed
his head against his master’s cheek, and barked, and wagged his tail,
and did every thing in his power to encourage his master to rise and
make another effort. At length he succeeded.
“Yes,” said the hunter, “I’ll get up, and try again.”
[Sidenote: Getting lost.]
So he rose and staggered feebly on a little farther. He looked about
him, but he could not tell where he was. He began to feel that he was
lost. Now, whenever a man gets really lost, either in the woods or in
the snow, a feeling of great perplexity and bewilderment generally
comes over his mind, which almost wholly deprives him of the use of
his faculties. The feeling is very much like that which one experiences
when half awake. You do not know where you are, or what you want, or
where you want to go. Sometimes you scarcely seem to know who you are.
The hunter began to be thus bewildered. Then it was bitter cold, and he
began to be benumbed and stupefied.
Intense cold almost always produces a stupefying effect, when one has
been long exposed to it. The hunter knew very well that he must not
yield to such a feeling as this, and so he forced himself to make a new
effort. But the snow seemed to grow deeper and deeper, and it was very
hard for him to make his way through it. It was freshly fallen, and,
consequently, it was very light and soft, and the hunter sank down in
it very far. If he had had snow shoes, he could have walked upon the
top of it; but he had no snow shoes.
At last he became very tired.
“Bruno,” said he, “I must lie down here and rest a little, before I can
go on any further.”
[Sidenote: Bruno tries to encourage and save his master.]
But Bruno, when he saw his master preparing to lie down, jumped about
him, and barked, and seemed very uneasy. Just then the hunter saw
before him a deep black hole. He looked down, and saw that it was
water. Instead of being in the road, he was going over some deep pit
filled with water, covered, except in one place, with ice and snow. He
perceived that he had had a very narrow escape from falling into this
water, and he now felt more bewildered and lost than ever. He contrived
to get by the dangerous hole, feeling his way with a stick, and then he
sank down in the snow among the rocks, and gave up in despair.
[Sidenote: The hunter comes very near perishing in the snow.]
And yet the house was very near. The chimney and the gable end of it
could just be distinguished in the distance through the falling snow.
Bruno knew this, and he was extremely distressed that his master should
give up when so near reaching home. He lay down in the snow by the
side of his master, and putting his paw over his arm, to encourage
him and keep him from absolute despair, he turned his head toward the
house, and barked loud and long, again and again, in hopes of bringing
somebody to the rescue.
[Illustration]
In the picture you can see the hunter lying in the snow, with Bruno
over him. His cap has fallen off, and is half buried. His stick, too,
lies on the snow near his cap. That was a stick that he got to feel
down into the hole in the ice with, in order to ascertain how deep the
water was, and to find his way around it. The rocks around the place
are covered with snow, and the branches of the trees are white with it.
[Sidenote: Danger of going to sleep when out in a storm.]
It is extremely dangerous to lie down to sleep in the snow in a storm
like this. People that do so usually never wake again. They think,
always, that they only wish to rest themselves, and sleep a few
minutes, and that then they will be refreshed, and be ready to proceed
on their journey. But they are deceived. The drowsiness is produced,
not by the fatigue, but by the cold. They are beginning to freeze, and
the freezing benumbs all their sensations. The drowsiness is the effect
of the benumbing of the brain.
Sometimes, when several persons are traveling together in cold and
storms, one of their number, who may perhaps be more delicate than the
rest, and who feels the cold more sensibly, wishes very much to stop a
few minutes to lie down and rest, and he begs his companions to allow
him to do so. But they, if they are wise, will not consent. Then he
sometimes declares that he _will_ stop, at any rate, even if they do
not consent. Then they declare that he shall not, and they take hold
of his shoulders and arms to pull him along. Then he gets angry, and
attempts to resist them. The excitement of this quarrel warms him a
little, and restores in some degree his sensibility, and so he goes
on, and his life is saved. Then he is very grateful to them for having
disregarded his remonstrances and resistance, and for compelling him to
proceed.[2]
[2] Children, in the same way, often complain very strenuously
of what their parents and teachers require of them, and resist
and contend against it as long as they can; and then, if their
parents persevere, they are afterward, when they come to
perceive the benefit of it, very grateful.
But now we must return to the story.
[Sidenote: Alarm in the cottage. They open the door.]
The hunter’s family heard the barking in the house. They all
immediately went to the door. One of the children opened the door. The
gusts of wind blew the snow in her face, and blinded her. She leaned
back against the door, and wiped the snow from her face and eyes with
her apron. Her grandmother came to the door with a light, but the wind
blew it out in an instant. Her mother came too, and for a moment little
Jooly was left alone.
[Illustration]
“It is my husband!” she exclaimed. “He is dying in the snow! Mercy upon
us! What will become of us?
“Give me the cordial,” said she. “Quick!”
So saying, she turned to the shelves which you see in the picture near
where she is standing, and hastily taking down a bottle containing
a cordial, which was always kept there ready to be used on such
occasions, she rushed out of the house. She shut the door after her as
she went, charging the rest, with her last words, to take good care of
little Jooly.
[Sidenote: The puss. Little Jooly sleeps undisturbed.]
Of course, those that were left in the cottage were all in a state of
great distress and anxiety while she was gone--all except two, Jooly
and the puss. Jooly was asleep in the cradle. The puss was not asleep,
but was crouched very quietly before the fire in a warm and bright
place near the grandmother’s chair. She was looking at the fire, and at
the kettle which was boiling upon it, and wondering whether they would
give her a piece of the meat by-and-by that was boiling in the kettle
for the hunter’s supper.
[Sidenote: The hunter and Jooly are both saved.]
When the hunter felt the mouth of the cordial bottle pressed gently to
his lips, and heard his wife’s voice calling to him, he opened his eyes
and revived a little. The taste of the cordial revived him still more.
He was now able to rise, and when he was told how near home he was, he
felt so cheered and encouraged by the intelligence that he became quite
strong. The company in the house were soon overjoyed at hearing voices
at the door, and on opening it, the hunter, his wife, and Bruno all
came safely in.
Jooly took the medicine which his father brought him, and soon got well.
Here is a picture of Bruno lying on the wolf-skin, and resting from his
toils.
[Illustration]
THE EMIGRANTS.
The hunter, Bruno’s master, emigrated to America, and when he went, he
sold Bruno to another man. A great many people from Europe emigrate to
America.
[Sidenote: Emigrants. The way they cross the Atlantic.]
To emigrate means to move from one country to another. The people in
Europe come from all parts of the interior down to the sea-shore,
and there embark in great ships to cross the Atlantic Ocean. A great
many come in the same ship. While they are at sea, if the weather is
pleasant, these passengers come up upon the deck, and have a very
comfortable time. But when it is cold and stormy, they have to stay
below, and they become sick, and are very miserable. They can not stay
on deck at such times on account of the sea, which washes over the
ships, and often keeps the decks wet from stem to stern.
When the emigrants land in America, some of them remain in the cities,
and get work there if they can. Others go to the West to buy land.
[Sidenote: The English family.]
Opposite you see a farmer’s family in England setting out for America.
The young girl who stands with her hands joined together is named
Esther. That is her father who is standing behind her. Her mother and
her grandmother are in the wagon. Esther’s mother has an infant in her
arms, and her grandmother is holding a young child. Both these children
are Esther’s brothers. Their names are George and Benny. The baby’s
name is Benny.
[Illustration: The farmer’s family. The farewell.]
Esther has two aunts--both very kind to her. One of her aunts is going
to America, but the other--her aunt Lucy--is to remain behind. They are
bidding each other good-by. The one who has a bonnet on her head is the
one that is going. We can tell who are going on the journey by their
having hats or bonnets on. Esther’s aunt Lucy, who has no bonnet on, is
to remain. When the wagon goes away, she will go into the house again,
very sorrowful.
[Sidenote: The journey in the covered wagon.]
The farmer has provided a _covered_ wagon for the journey, so as to
protect his wife, and his mother, and his sister, and his children from
the cold wind and from the rain. But they will not go all the way in
this wagon. They will go to the sea-shore in the wagon, and then they
will embark on board a ship, to cross the Atlantic Ocean.
We can see the ship, all ready and waiting, in the background of the
picture, on the right. There will be a great many other families on
board the ship, all going to America. There will be sailors, too, to
navigate the ship and to manage the sails.
THE VOYAGE.
[Sidenote: The voyage in the ship.]
The voyage which the emigrants have to take is very long. It is three
thousand miles from England to America, and it takes oftentimes many
weeks to accomplish the transit. Sometimes during the voyage the breeze
is light, and the water is smooth, and the ship glides very pleasantly
and prosperously on its way. Then the emigrants pass their time very
agreeably. They come up upon the decks, they look out upon the water,
they talk, they sew, they play with the children--they enjoy, in fact,
almost as many comforts and pleasures as if they were at home on land.
Opposite is a picture of the ship sailing along very smoothly, in
pleasant weather, at the commencement of the voyage. The cliff in the
background, on the right, is part of the English shore, which the ship
is just leaving. There is a light-house upon the cliff, and a town on
the shore below.
[Illustration: The emigrant ship setting sail. Smooth sea.]
The wind is fair, and the water is smooth. The emigrants are out upon
the decks. We can see their heads above the bulwarks.
[Sidenote: The buoy.]
The object in the foreground, floating in the water, is a _buoy_. It is
placed there to mark a rock or a shoal. It is secured by an anchor.
Thus, when the weather is fair, the emigrants pass their time very
pleasantly. They amuse themselves on the decks by day, and at night
they go down into the cabins, which are below the deck of the ship, and
there they sleep.
[Illustration: The ship in a storm. Great danger. Heavy seas.]
But sometimes there comes a storm. The wind increases till it becomes a
gale. Clouds are seen scudding swiftly across the sky. Immense billows,
rolling heavily, dash against the ship, or chase each other furiously
across the wide expanse of the water, breaking every where into foam
and spray. The winds howl fearfully in the rigging, and sometimes a
sail is burst from its fastenings by the violence of it, and flaps its
tattered fragments in the air with the sound of thunder.
[Sidenote: Discomfort and distress of the passengers.]
While the storm continues, the poor emigrants are obliged to remain
below, where they spend their time in misery and terror. By-and-by the
storm subsides, the sailors repair the damages, and the ship proceeds
on her voyage.
In the engraving below we see the ship far advanced on her way. She
is drawing near to the American shore. The sea is smooth, the wind is
fair, and she is pressing rapidly onward.
[Illustration]
On the left is seen another vessel, and on the right two more, far in
the offing.
The emigrants on board the ship are rejoiced to believe that their
voyage is drawing toward the end.
[Sidenote: The arrival.]
When the farmer and his family have landed in America, they will take
another wagon, and go back into the country till they come to the place
where they are going to have their farm. There they will cut down the
trees of the forest, and build a house of logs. Then they will plow the
ground, and sow the seeds, and make the farm. By-and-by they will gain
enough by their industry to build a better house, and to fit it with
convenient and comfortable furniture, and thenceforward they will live
in plenty and happiness.
[Sidenote: Benny and George.]
All this time they will take great care of George and Benny, so that
they shall not come to any harm. They will keep them warm in the
wagon, and they will watch over them on board the ship, and carry them
in their arms when they walk up the hills, in journeying in America,
and make a warm bed for them in their house, and take a great deal of
pains to have always plenty of good bread for them to eat, and warm
milk for them to drink. They will suffer, themselves, continual toil,
privation, and fatigue, but they will be very careful not to let the
children suffer any thing if they can possibly help it.
[Sidenote: Ingratitude.]
By-and-by, when Benny and George grow up, they will find that their
father lives upon a fine farm, with a good house and good furniture,
and with every comfort around them. They will hardly know how much care
and pains their father, and mother, and grandmother took to save them
from all suffering, and to provide for them a comfortable and happy
home. How ungrateful it would be in them to be unkind or disobedient to
their father, and mother, and grandmother, when they grow up.
GOING ALONE.
[Sidenote: Emigrant going alone.]
Sometimes, when a man is intending to emigrate to America, he goes
first himself alone, in order to see the country, and choose a place
to live in, and buy a farm, intending afterward to come back for his
family. He does not take them with him at first, for he does not know
what he should do with his wife and all his young children while he is
traveling from place to place to view the land.
[Illustration: He bids his wife and children good-by. Picture of it.]
When the emigrant goes first alone in this way, leaving his family
at home, the parting is very sorrowful. His poor wife is almost
broken-hearted. She gathers her little children around her, and clasps
them in her arms, fearing that some mischief may befall their father
when he is far away, and that they may never see him again. The man
attempts to comfort her by saying that it will not be long before he
comes back, and that then they shall never more be separated. His
oldest boy stands holding his father’s staff, and almost wishing that
he was going to accompany him. He turns away his face to hide his
tears. As for the dog, he sees that his master is going away, and he is
very earnestly desirous to go too. In fact, they know he _would_ go if
he were left at liberty, and so they chain him to a post to keep him at
home.
[Sidenote: A sorrowful parting.]
It is a hard thing for a wife and a mother that her husband should
thus go away and leave her, to make so long a voyage, and to encounter
so many difficulties and dangers, knowing, as she does, that it is
uncertain whether he will ever live to return. She bears the pain of
this parting out of love to her children. She thinks that their father
will find some better and happier home for them in the New World, where
they can live in greater plenty, and where, when they grow up, and
become men and women, they will be better provided for than they were
in their native land.
[Sidenote: The ship. The emigrants.]
In the distance, in the engraving, we see the ship in which this man
is going to sail. We see a company of emigrants, too, down the road,
going to embark. There is one child walking alone behind her father and
mother, who seems too young to set out on such a voyage.
SILVER BOWL STOLEN.
Bruno belonged to several different masters in the course of his life.
He was always sorry to leave his old master when the changes were made,
but then he yielded to the necessity of the case in these emergencies
with a degree of composure and self-control, which, in a man, would
have been considered quite philosophical.
The hunter of the Alps, whose life Bruno had saved, resolved at the
time that he would never part with him.
“I would not sell him,” said he, “for a thousand francs.”
They reckon sums of money by francs in Switzerland. A franc is a silver
coin. About five of them make a dollar.
[Sidenote: Bruno’s master is obliged to sell him. The reason why.]
However, notwithstanding this resolution, the hunter found himself at
last forced to sell his dog. He had concluded to emigrate to America.
He found, on making proper inquiry and calculation, that it would cost
a considerable sum of money to take Bruno with him across the ocean.
In the first place, he would have to pay not a little for his passage.
Then, besides, it would cost a good deal to feed him on the way, both
while on board the ship and during his progress across the country.
The hunter reflected that all the money which he should thus pay for
the dog would be so much taken from the food, and clothing, and other
comforts of his wife and children. Just at this time a traveler came by
who offered to buy the dog, and promised always to take most excellent
care of him. So the hunter sold him, and the traveler took him away.
[Sidenote: Bruno is sold and carried away to England.]
Bruno was very unwilling at first to go away with the stranger. But the
hunter ordered him to get into the gentleman’s carriage, and he obeyed.
He looked out behind the carriage as they drove away, and wondered what
it all could mean. He could not understand it; but as it was always a
rule with him to submit contentedly to what could not be helped, he
soon ceased to trouble himself about the matter, and so, lying down in
the carriage, he went to sleep. He did not wake up for several hours
afterward.
The traveler conveyed the dog home with him to England, and kept him
a long time. He made a kennel for him in the corner of the yard. Here
Bruno lived several years in great peace and plenty.
At length the gentleman was going away from home again on a long tour,
and as there was nobody to be left at home to take an interest in
Bruno, he put him under the charge, during his absence, of a boy named
Lorenzo, who lived in a large house on the banks of a stream near his
estate. Lorenzo liked Bruno very much, and took excellent care of
him.[3]
[3] The house where Lorenzo lived was a large double house, of
a very peculiar form. There is a picture of it on page 58.
There was a grove of tall trees near the house where Lorenzo lived,
which contained the nests of thousands of rooks. Rooks are large black
birds, very much like crows. Bruno used to lie in the yard where
Lorenzo kept him, and watch the rooks for hours together.
[Illustration: The encampment of gipsies.]
[Sidenote: How gipsies live.]
In a solitary place near where Lorenzo lived there was an encampment of
gipsies. Gipsies live much like Indians. They wander about England in
small bands, getting money by begging, and selling baskets, and they
build little temporary huts from time to time in solitary places, where
they live for a while, and then, breaking up their encampment, they
wander on till they find another place, where they encamp again.
[Sidenote: Their ingenuity in stealing.]
Sometimes, when they can not get money enough by begging and selling
baskets, they will steal. They show a great deal of ingenuity in the
plans they devise for stealing. In fact, they are very adroit and
cunning in every thing they undertake.
At one time Lorenzo’s father went away, and one of the gipsies, named
Murphy, resolved to take that opportunity to steal something from the
house.
[Sidenote: Murphy’s plan.]
“We can get in,” said he to his comrade, “very easily, in the night, by
the back door, and get the silver bowl. We can melt the bowl, and sell
it for four or five sovereigns.”
The silver bowl which Murphy referred to was one which had been given
to Lorenzo by his uncle when he was a baby. Lorenzo’s name was engraved
upon the side of it.
Lorenzo used his bowl to eat his bread and milk from every night for
supper. It was kept on a shelf in a closet opening from the kitchen.
Murphy had seen it put there once or twice, when he had been in the
kitchen at night, selling baskets.
“We can get that bowl just as well as not,” said Murphy, “when the man
is away.”
“There’s a big dog there,” said his comrade.
“Yes,” said Murphy, “but I’ll manage the dog.”
“How will you manage him?” asked his comrade.
“I’ll try coaxing and flattery first,” said Murphy. “If that don’t do,
I’ll try threatening; if threatening won’t do, I’ll try bribing; and if
he won’t be bribed, I’ll poison him.”
[Sidenote: Bruno is on the watch.]
That night, about twelve o’clock, Murphy crept stealthily round to a
back gate which led into the yard behind the house where Lorenzo lived.
The instant that Bruno heard the noise, he sprang up, and went bounding
down the path till he came to the gate. As soon as he saw the gipsy, he
began to bark very vociferously.
Lorenzo was asleep at this time; but as his room was on the back side
of the house, and his window was open, he heard the barking. So he got
up and went to the window, and called out,
“Bruno, what’s the matter?”
Bruno was at some distance from the house, and did not hear Lorenzo’s
voice. He was watching Murphy.
Murphy immediately began to coax and cajole the dog, calling him “Nice
fellow,” and “Good dog,” and “Poor Bruno,” speaking all the time in a
very friendly and affectionate tone to him. Bruno, however, had sense
enough to know that there was something wrong in such a man being seen
prowling about the house at that time of night, and he refused to be
quieted. He went on barking louder than ever.
“Bruno!” said Lorenzo, calling louder, “what’s the matter? Come back to
your house, and be quiet.”
Murphy thought he heard a voice, and, peeping through a crack in the
fence, he saw Lorenzo standing at the window. The moon shone upon his
white night-gown, so that he could be seen very distinctly.
[Sidenote: Murphy disappears.]
As soon as Murphy saw him, he crept away into a thicket, and
disappeared. Bruno, after waiting a little time to be sure that the man
had really gone, turned about, and came back to the house. When he saw
Lorenzo, he began to wag his tail. He would have told him about the
gipsy if he had been able to speak.
“Go to bed, Bruno,” said he, “and not be keeping us awake, barking at
the moon this time of night.”
So Bruno went into his house, and Lorenzo to his bed.
[Sidenote: Murphy tries threats.]
The next night, Murphy, finding that Bruno could not be coaxed away
from his duty by flattery, concluded to try what virtue there might
be in threats and scolding. So he came armed with a club and stones.
As soon as he got near the gate, Bruno, as he had expected, took the
alarm, and came bounding down the path again to see who was there.
As soon as he saw Murphy, he set up a loud and violent barking as
before.
“Down, Bruno, down!” exclaimed Murphy, in a stern and angry voice.
“Stop that noise, or I’ll break your head.”
So saying, he brandished his club, and then stooped down to pick up one
of the stones which he had brought, and which he had laid down on the
ground where he was standing, so as to have them all ready.
[Sidenote: He is unsuccessful.]
Bruno, instead of being intimidated and silenced by these
demonstrations, barked louder than ever.
Lorenzo jumped out of bed and came to the window.
“Bruno!” said he, calling out loud, “what’s the matter? There’s nothing
there. Come back to your house, and be still.”
The gipsy, finding that Bruno did not fear his clubs and stones, and
hearing Lorenzo’s voice again moreover, went back into the thicket.
Bruno waited until he was sure that he was really gone, and then
returned slowly up the pathway to the house.
“Go to bed, Bruno,” said Lorenzo, “and not be keeping us awake,
barking at the moon this time of night.”
So Bruno and Lorenzo both went to bed again.
[Sidenote: He tries bribes, which Bruno refuses.]
The next night Murphy came again, with two or three pieces of meat in
his hands.
“I’ll bribe him,” said he. “He likes meat.”
Bruno, on hearing the sound of Murphy’s footsteps, leaped out of his
bed, and ran down the path as before. As soon as he saw the gipsy
again, he began to bark. Murphy threw a piece of meat toward him,
expecting that, as soon as Bruno saw it, he would stop barking at
once, and go to eating it greedily. But Bruno paid no attention to the
offered bribe. He kept his eyes fixed closely on the gipsy, and barked
away as loud as ever.
Lorenzo, hearing the sound, was awakened from his sleep, and getting up
as before, he came to the window.
“Bruno,” said he, “what _is_ the matter now? Come back to your house,
and go to bed, and be quiet.”
Murphy, finding that the house was alarmed again, and that Bruno would
not take the bribe that he offered him, crept away back into the
thicket, and disappeared.
“I’ll poison him to-morrow night,” said he--“the savage cur!”
[Sidenote: The poisoned meat.]
Accordingly, the next evening, a little before sunset, he put some
poison in a piece of meat, and having wrapped it up in paper, he put it
in his pocket. He then went openly to the house where Lorenzo lived,
with some baskets on his arm for sale. When he entered the yard, he
took the meat out of the paper, and secretly threw it into Bruno’s
house. Bruno was not there at the time. He had gone away with Lorenzo.
[Sidenote: Bruno imprisoned.]
Murphy then went into the kitchen, and remained there some time,
talking about his baskets. When he came out, he found Lorenzo shutting
up Bruno in his house, and putting a board up before the door.
“What are you doing, Lorenzo?” said the gipsy.
“I am shutting Bruno up,” said Lorenzo. “He makes such a barking in the
night that we can not sleep.”
“That’s right,” replied the gipsy. So he went away, saying to himself,
as he went down the pathway, “He won’t bark much more, I think, after
he has eaten the supper I have put in there for him.”
Bruno wondered what the reason was that Lorenzo was shutting him up
so closely. He little thought it was on account of his vigilance and
fidelity in watching the house. He had, however, nothing to do but to
submit. So, when Lorenzo had finished fastening the door, and had gone
away, he lay down in a corner of his apartment, extended his paws out
before him, rested his chin upon them, and prepared to shut his eyes
and go to sleep.
[Sidenote: He discovers the meat.]
His eyes, however, before he had shut them, fell upon the piece of meat
which Murphy had thrown in there for him. So he got up again, and went
toward it.
He smelt of it. He at once perceived the smell of the gipsy upon it.
Any thing that a man handles, or even touches, retains for a time a
scent, which, though we can not perceive it is very sensible to a dog.
Thus a dog can follow the track of a man over a road by the scent
which his footsteps leave upon the ground. He can even single out a
particular track from among a multitude of others on the same ground,
each scent being apparently different in character from all the rest.
[Sidenote: He distrusts Murphy’s present, and maintains a faithful
watch.]
In this way Bruno perceived that the meat which he found in his house
had been handled by the same man that he had barked at so many times at
midnight at the foot of the pathway. This made him suspicious of it.
He thought that that man must be a bad man, and he did not consider it
prudent to have any thing to do with bad men or any of their gifts. So
he left the meat where it was, and went back into his corner.
His first thought in reflecting on the situation in which he found
himself placed was, that since Lorenzo had forbidden him so sternly
and positively to bark in the night, and had shut him up so close a
prisoner, he would give up all care or concern about the premises, and
let the robber, if it was a robber, do what he pleased. But then, on
more sober reflection, he perceived that Lorenzo must have acted under
some mistake in doing as he had done, and that it was very foolish in
him to cherish a feeling of resentment on account of it.
“The wrong doings of other people,” thought he to himself, “are no
reason why I should neglect _my_ duty. I will watch, even if I am shut
up.”
So he lay listening very carefully. When all was still, he fell into
a light slumber now and then; but the least sound without caused him
to prick up his ears and open one eye, until he was satisfied that
the noise he heard was nothing but the wind. Thus things went on till
midnight.
[Sidenote: The robber enters the house, and carries away the bowl.]
About midnight he heard a sound. He raised his head and listened. It
seemed like the sound of footsteps going through the yard. He started
up, and put his head close to the door. He heard the footsteps going
up close to the house. He began to bark very loud and violently. The
robbers opened the door with a false key, and went into the house.
Bruno barked louder and louder. He crowded hard against the door,
trying to get it open. He moaned and whined, and then barked again
louder than ever.
Lorenzo came to the window.
“Bruno,” said he, “what a plague you are! Lie down, and go to sleep.”
Bruno, hearing Lorenzo’s voice, barked again with all the energy that
he possessed.
“Bruno,” said Lorenzo, very sternly, “if you don’t lie down and be
still, to-morrow night I’ll tie your mouth up.”
Murphy was now in the house, and all was still. He had got the silver
bowl, and was waiting for Lorenzo to go to bed. Bruno listened
attentively, but not hearing any more sounds, ceased to bark. Presently
Lorenzo went away from the window back to his bed, and lay down. Bruno
watched some time longer, and then he went and lay down too.
In about half an hour, Murphy began slowly and stealthily to creep out
of the house. He walked on tiptoe. For a time he made no noise. He had
the bowl in one hand, and his shoes in the other. He had taken off
his shoes, so as not to make any noise in walking. Bruno heard him,
however, as he was going by, and, starting up, he began to bark again.
But Murphy hastened on, and the yard was accordingly soon entirely
still. Bruno listened a long time, but, hearing no more noise, he
finally lay down again in his corner as before.
[Sidenote: What could be the reason that the poison failed?]
Murphy crept away into the thicket, and so went home to his encampment,
wondering why Bruno had not been killed by the poison.
“I put in poison enough,” said he to himself, “for half a dozen dogs.
What could be the reason it did not take effect?”
When the people of the house came down into the kitchen the next
morning, they found that the door was wide open, and the silver bowl
was gone.
[Illustration]
What became of the silver bowl will be related in another story. I will
only add here that gipsies have various other modes of obtaining money
dishonestly besides stealing. One of these modes is by pretending to
tell fortunes. Here is a picture of a gipsy endeavoring to persuade
an innocent country boy to have his fortune told. She wishes him to
give her some money. The boy wears a frock. He is dressed very neatly.
He looks as if he were half persuaded to give the gipsy his money. He
might, however, just as well throw it away.
THE SILVER BOWL RECOVERED.
On the night when Lorenzo’s silver bowl was stolen by the gipsy, all
the family, except Lorenzo, were asleep, and none of them knew aught
about the theft which had been committed until the following morning.
Lorenzo got up that morning before any body else in the house, as was
his usual custom, and, when he was dressed, he looked out at the window.
“Ah!” said he, “now I recollect; Bruno is fastened up in his house. I
will go the first thing and let him out.”
[Sidenote: Lorenzo discovers the open door.]
So Lorenzo hastened down stairs into the kitchen, in order to go out
into the yard. He was surprised, when he got there, to find the kitchen
door open.
“Ah!” said he to himself, “how came this door open? I did not know that
any body was up. It must be that Almira is up, and has gone out to get
a pail of water.”
[Sidenote: He releases Bruno.]
Lorenzo went out to Bruno’s house, and took down the board by which he
had fastened the door. Then he opened the door. The moment that the
door was opened Bruno sprang out. He was very glad to be released from
his imprisonment. He leaped up about Lorenzo’s knees a little at first,
to express his joy, and then ran off, and began smelling about the yard.
[Sidenote: Bruno’s mysterious behavior.]
He found the traces of Murphy’s steps, and, as soon as he perceived
them, he began to bark. He followed them to the kitchen door, and
thence into the house, barking all the time, and looking very much
excited.
“Bruno,” said Lorenzo, “what is the matter with you?”
Bruno went to the door of the closet where the bowl had been kept. The
door was open a little way. Bruno insinuated his nose into the crevice,
and so pushing the door open, he went in. As soon as he was in he began
to bark again.
“Bruno!” exclaimed Lorenzo, “what is the matter with you?”
Bruno looked up on the shelf where the bowl was usually placed, and
barked louder than ever.
“Where’s my bowl?” exclaimed Lorenzo, looking at the vacant place, and
beginning to feel alarmed. “Where’s my bowl?”
He spoke in a tone of great astonishment and alarm. He looked about on
all the shelves; the bowl was nowhere to be seen.
“Where can my bowl be gone to?” said he, more and more frightened. He
went out of the closet into the kitchen, and looked all about there for
his bowl. Of course, his search was vain. Bruno followed him all the
time, barking incessantly, and looking up very eagerly into Lorenzo’s
face with an appearance of great excitement.
“Bruno,” said Lorenzo, “you know something about it, I am sure, if you
could only tell.”
[Sidenote: The wind-mill.]
Lorenzo, however, did not yet suspect that his bowl had been stolen.
He presumed that his mother had put it away in some other place, and
that, when she came down, it would readily be found again. So he went
out into the yard, and sat on a stone step, and went to work to finish
a wind-mill he had begun the day before.
[Sidenote: Lorenzo’s mother explains the mystery.]
By-and-by his mother came down; and as soon as she had heard Lorenzo’s
story about the bowl, and learned, too, that the outer door had
been found open when Lorenzo first came down stairs, she immediately
expressed the opinion that the bowl had been stolen.
“Some thief has been breaking into the house,” said she, “I’ve no
doubt, and has stolen it.”
“Stolen it!” exclaimed Lorenzo.
“Yes,” replied his mother; “I’ve no doubt of it.”
So saying, she went into the closet again, to see if she could discover
any traces of the thieves there. But she could not. Every thing seemed
to have remained undisturbed, just as she had left it the night before,
except that the bowl was missing.
“Somebody has been in and stolen it,” said she, “most assuredly.”
Bruno, who had followed Lorenzo and his mother into the room, was
standing up at this time upon his hind legs, with his paws upon
the edge of the shelf, and he now began to bark loudly, by way of
expressing his concurrence in this opinion.
[Sidenote: “Seek him, Bruno!”]
“Seize him, Bruno!” said Lorenzo. “Seize him!”
Bruno, on hearing this command, began smelling about the floor, and
barking more eagerly than ever.
“Bruno smells his tracks, I verily believe,” said Lorenzo, speaking to
his mother. Then, addressing Bruno again, he clapped his hands together
and pointed to the ground, saying,
“Go seek him, Bruno! seek him!”
[Sidenote: Bruno departs upon his errand.]
Bruno began immediately to follow the scent of Murphy’s footsteps along
the floor, out from the closet into the kitchen, and from the kitchen
into the yard; he ran along the path a little way, and then made a wide
circuit over the grass, at a place where Murphy had gone round to get
as far as possible away from Bruno’s house. He then came back into the
path again, smelling as he ran, and thence passed out through the gate;
here, keeping his nose still close to the ground, he went on faster and
faster, until he entered the thicket and disappeared.
Lorenzo did not pay particular attention to these motions. He had given
Bruno the order, “Seek him!” rather from habit than any thing else,
and without any idea that Bruno would really follow the tracks of the
thief. Accordingly, when Bruno ran off down the yard, he imagined that
he had gone away somewhere to play a little while, and that he would
soon come back.
“He’ll be sure to come back pretty soon,” said he, “to get his
breakfast.”
But Bruno did not come back to breakfast. Lorenzo waited an hour after
breakfast, and still he did not come.
He waited two hours longer, and still he did not come.
Where was Bruno all this time? He was at the camp of the gipsies,
watching at the place where Murphy had hid the stolen bowl.
[Sidenote: He reaches the gipsy camp. He discovers the place where the
bowl was hidden.]
When he followed the gipsy’s tracks into the thicket, he perceived the
scent more and more distinctly as he went on, and this encouraged him
to proceed. Lorenzo had said “Seek him!” and this Bruno understood as
an order that he should follow the track until he found the man, and
finding him, that he should keep watch at the place till Lorenzo or
some one from the family should come. Accordingly, when he arrived at
the camp, he followed the scent round to the back end of a little low
hut, where Murphy had hidden the bowl. The gipsy had dug a hole in the
ground, and buried the bowl in it, out of sight, intending in a day or
two to dig it up and melt it. Bruno found the place where the bowl was
buried, but he could not dig it up himself, so he determined to wait
there and watch until some one should come. He accordingly squatted
down upon the grass, near the place where the gipsies were seated
around their fire, and commenced his watch.[4]
[4] See engraving, page 43.
There were two gipsy women sitting by the fire. There was also a man
sitting near by. Murphy was standing up near the entrance of the tent
when Bruno came. He was telling the other gipsies about the bowl. He
had a long stick in his hand, and Bruno saw this, and concluded that it
was best for him to keep quiet until some one should come.
“I had the greatest trouble with Bruno,” said Murphy. “He barked at
me whenever he saw me, and nothing would quiet him. But he is getting
acquainted now. See, he has come here of his own accord.”
“You said you were going to poison him,” remarked the other man.
“Yes,” replied Murphy. “I did put some poisoned meat in his house, but
he did not eat it. I expect he smelled the poison.”
[Sidenote: Lorenzo goes in search of Bruno.]
The hours of the day passed on, and Lorenzo wondered more and more what
could have become of his dog. At last he resolved to go and look him up.
“Mother,” said he, “I am going to see if I can find out what’s become
of Bruno.”
“I would rather that you would find out what’s become of your bowl,”
said his mother.
“Why, mother,” said Lorenzo, “Bruno is worth a great deal more than the
bowl.”
“That may be,” replied his mother, “but there is much less danger of
his being lost.”
Lorenzo walked slowly away from the house, pondering with much
perplexity the double loss he had incurred.
“I can not do any thing,” he said, “to get back the bowl, but I can
look about for Bruno, and if I find him, that’s all I can do. I must
leave it for father to decide what is to be done about the bowl, when
he comes home.”
So Lorenzo came out from his father’s house, and after hesitating for
some minutes which way to go, he was at length decided by seeing a
boy coming across the fields at a distance with a fishing-pole on his
shoulder.
“Perhaps that boy has seen him somewhere,” said he. “I’ll go and ask
him. And, at any rate, I should like to know who the boy is, and
whether he has caught any fish.”
[Sidenote: The sheep. The geese.]
So Lorenzo turned in the direction where he saw the boy. He walked
under some tall elm-trees, and then passed a small flock of sheep that
were lying on the grass in the field. He looked carefully among them
to see if Bruno was there, but he was not. After passing the sheep,
he walked along on the margin of a broad and shallow stream of water.
There were two geese floating quietly upon the surface of this water,
near where the sheep were lying upon the shore. These geese floated
quietly upon the water, like vessels riding at anchor. Lorenzo was
convinced that they had not seen any thing of Bruno for some time. If
they had, they would not have been so composed.
[Sidenote: The ducks in the water.]
Lorenzo walked on toward the boy. He met him at a place where the path
approached near the margin of the water. There was some tall grass on
the brink. Three ducks were swimming near. The ducks turned away when
they saw the boys coming, and sailed gracefully out toward the middle
of the stream.
[Illustration: Lorenzo meets Frank going a fishing.]
Lorenzo, when he drew near the boy, perceived that it was an
acquaintance of his, named Frank. Frank had a long fishing-pole in one
hand, with a basket containing his dinner in the other.
“Frank,” said Lorenzo, “where are you going?”
“I am going a fishing,” said Frank. “Go with me.”
“No,” said Lorenzo, “I am looking for Bruno.”
“I know where he is,” said Frank.
“Where?” asked Lorenzo.
“I saw him a little while ago at the gipsies’ camp, down in the glen.
He was lying down there quietly by the gipsies’ fire.”
“What a dog!” said Lorenzo. “Here I have been wondering what had become
of him all the morning. He has run away, I suppose, because I shut him
up last night.”
“What made you shut him up?” asked Frank.
“Oh, because he made such a barking every night,” replied Lorenzo. “We
could not sleep.”
“He is still enough now,” said Frank. “He is lying down very quietly
with the gipsies.”
Lorenzo then asked Frank some questions about his fishing, and
afterward walked on. Before long he came to a stile, where there was a
path leading to a field. He got over the stile, and followed the path
until at last he came to the gipsies’ encampment.
[Sidenote: Bruno in the camp of the gipsies.]
There he found Bruno lying quietly on the ground, at a little distance
from the fire. As soon as he came in sight of him, he called him.
“Bruno! Bruno!” said he.
Bruno looked up, and, seeing Lorenzo, ran to meet him, but immediately
returned to the camp, whining, and barking, and seeming very uneasy.
He, however, soon became quiet again, for he knew very well, or seemed
to know, that it would require more of a man than Lorenzo to take the
bowl away from the gipsies, and, consequently, that he must wait there
quietly till somebody else should come.
[Sidenote: Lorenzo tries to drive Bruno home, but Bruno will not go.]
“Bruno,” said Lorenzo, speaking very sternly, “_come home_!”
Bruno paid no attention to this command, but, after smelling about the
ground a little, and running to and fro uneasily, lay down again where
he was before.
“Bruno!” said Lorenzo, stamping with his foot.
“Won’t your dog obey you?” said Murphy.
“No,” said Lorenzo. “I wish you would take a stick, and drive him
along.”
Now the gipsies did not wish to have the dog go away. They preferred
that he should stay with them, and be their dog. They had no idea that
he was there to watch over the stolen bowl.
“Don’t drive him away,” said one of the gipsy women, speaking in a low
tone, so that Lorenzo could not hear.
“I’ll only make believe,” said Murphy.
So Murphy took up a little stick, and threw it at the dog, saying, “Go
home, Bruno!”
Bruno paid no heed to this demonstration.
Lorenzo then advanced to where Bruno was lying, and attempted to pull
him along, but Bruno would not come. He would not even get up from the
ground.
“I’ll make you come,” said Lorenzo. So he took hold of him by the neck
and the ears, and began to pull him. Bruno uttered a low growl.
“Oh, dear me!” said Lorenzo, “what shall I do?”
In fact, he was beginning to grow desperate. So he looked about among
the bushes for a stick, and when he had found one sufficient for his
purpose, he came to Bruno, and said, in a very stern voice,
“Now, Bruno, go home!”
Bruno did not move.
“Bruno,” repeated Lorenzo, in a thundering voice, and brandishing his
stick over Bruno’s head, “GO HOME!”
Bruno, afraid of being beaten with the stick, jumped up, and ran off
into the bushes. Lorenzo followed him, and attempted to drive him
toward the path that led toward home. But he could accomplish nothing.
The dog darted to and fro in the thickets, keeping well out of the way
of Lorenzo’s stick, but evincing a most obstinate determination not to
go home. On the contrary, in all his dodgings to and fro, he took care
to keep as near as possible to the spot where the bowl was buried.
[Sidenote: Lorenzo goes home.]
At last Lorenzo gave up in despair, and concluded to go back to the
house, and wait till his father got home.
[Sidenote: The search for the bowl.]
His father returned about the middle of the afternoon, and Lorenzo
immediately told him of the double loss which he had met with. He
explained all the circumstances connected with the loss of the bowl,
and described Bruno’s strange behavior. His father listened in silence.
He immediately suspected that the gipsies had taken the bowl, and
that Bruno had traced it to them. So he sent for some officers and a
warrant, and went to the camp.
[Sidenote: The bowl found.]
As soon as Bruno saw the men coming, he seemed to be overjoyed. He
jumped up, and ran to meet them, and then, running back to the camp
again, he barked, and leaped about in great excitement. The men
followed him, and he led them round behind the hut, and there he began
digging into the ground with his paws. The men took a shovel which was
there, one belonging to the gipsies, and began to dig. In a short time
they came to a flat stone, and, on taking up the stone, they found the
bowl under it.
[Sidenote: Pursuing Murphy.]
Bruno seemed overjoyed. He leaped and jumped about for a minute or two
when he saw the bowl come out from its hiding-place, and raced round
and round the man who held the bowl, and then ran away home to find
Lorenzo. The officers, in the mean time, went off hastily in pursuit of
Murphy, who had made his escape while they had been digging up the bowl.
BRUNO AND THE LOST BOY.
Bruno was quite a large dog. There are a great many different kinds
of dogs. Some are large, others are small. Some are irritable and
fierce, others are good-natured and gentle. Some are stout and massive
in form, others are slender and delicate. Some are distinguished for
their strength, others for their fleetness, and others still for their
beauty. Some are very affectionate, others are sagacious, others are
playful and cunning. Thus dogs differ from each other not only in form
and size, but in their disposition and character as well.
[Sidenote: Pointers.]
Some dogs are very intelligent, others are less so, and even among
intelligent dogs there is a great difference in respect to the modes
in which their intelligence manifests itself. Some dogs naturally love
the water, and can be taught very easily to swim and dive, and perform
other aquatic exploits. Others are afraid of the water, and can never
be taught to like it; but they are excellent hunters, and go into the
fields with their masters, and find the game. They run to and fro
about the field that their master goes into, until they see a bird, and
then they stop suddenly, and remain motionless till their master comes
and shoots the bird. As soon as they hear the report of the gun, they
run to get the game. Sometimes quite small dogs are very intelligent
indeed, though of course they have not so much strength as large dogs.
[Illustration: The little parlor dogs.]
In the above engraving we see several small dogs playing in a parlor.
The ladies are amusing themselves with flowers that they are arranging,
and the dogs are playing upon the carpet at their feet.
There are three dogs in all. Two of them are playing together near the
foreground, on the left. The other is alone.
[Sidenote: Bruno was a large dog.]
Bruno was a large dog. He was a very large dog indeed. When other dogs
were playing around him, he would look down upon them with an air of
great condescension and dignity. He was, however, very kind to them.
They would jump upon him, and play around him, but he never did them
any harm.
[Illustration: Bruno among his companions.]
[Sidenote: Faithfulness.]
Bruno was a very faithful dog. In the summer, when the farmer, his
master (at a time when he belonged to a farmer), went into the field to
his work in the morning, he would sometimes take his dinner with him in
a tin pail, and he would put the pail down under a tree by the side of
a little brook, and then, pointing to it, would say to Bruno,
[Sidenote: Watching.]
“Bruno, watch!”
[Sidenote: Bruno and his master eating dinner in the fields.]
So Bruno would take his place by the side of the pail, and remain there
watching faithfully all the morning. Sometimes he would become very
hungry before his master came back, but, though he knew that there was
meat in the pail, and that there was nothing to cover it but a cloth,
he would never touch it. If he was thirsty, he would go down to the
brook and drink, turning his head continually as he went, and while he
was drinking, to see that no one came near the pail. Then at noon, when
his master came for his dinner, Bruno would be rejoiced to see him. He
would run out to meet him with great delight. He would then sit down
before his master, and look up into his face while he was eating his
dinner, and his master would give him pieces of bread and meat from
time to time, to reward him for his fidelity.
Bruno was kind and gentle as well as faithful. If any body came through
the field while he was watching his master’s dinner, or any thing else
that had been intrusted to his charge, he would not, as some fierce and
ill-tempered dogs are apt to do, fly at them and bite them at once, but
he would wait to see if they were going to pass by peaceably. If they
were, he would not molest them. If they came near to whatever he was
set to guard, he would growl a little, to give them a gentle warning.
If they came nearer still, he would growl louder; but he would never
bite them unless they actually attempted to seize and take away his
trust. Thus he was considerate and kind as well as faithful.
[Sidenote: Fierceness.]
Some dogs, though faithful, are very fierce. They are sometimes
_trained_ to be fierce when they are employed to watch against thieves,
in order that they may attack the thieves furiously. To make them more
fierce, their masters never play with them, but keep them chained up
near their kennels, and do not give them too much to eat. Wild animals
are always more ferocious while hungry.
[Illustration: The hungry watch-dog.]
Here is a picture of a fierce watch-dog, set to watch against thieves.
He is kept hungry, in some degree, all the time, to make him more
ferocious. He looks hollow and gaunt. There is a pan upon the ground,
from which his master feeds him, but he has eaten up all that it
contained, and he wants more. This makes him watchful. If he had eaten
too much, he would probably now be lying asleep in his kennel. The
kennel is a small house, with a door in front, where the dog goes in
and out. There is straw upon the floor of the kennel. The dog was lying
down upon the floor of his kennel, when he thought he heard a noise. He
sprang up from his place, came out of the door, and has now stopped to
listen. He is listening and watching very attentively, and is all ready
to spring. The thief is coming; we can see him climbing over the gate.
He is coming softly. He thinks no one hears. A moment more, and the dog
will spring out upon him, and perhaps seize him by the throat, and hold
him till men come and take him prisoner.
This dog is chained during the day, but his chain is unhooked at night,
so as to leave him at liberty. By day he can do no harm, and yet the
children who live in the neighborhood are afraid to go near his kennel,
he barks so ferociously when he hears a noise; besides, they think it
possible that, by some accident, his chain may get unfastened.
[Sidenote: Tiger’s fidelity. His ferocious character.]
This dog’s name is Tiger. Bruno was not such a dog as Tiger. He was
vigilant and faithful, but then he was gentle and kind.
Bruno’s master, the farmer, had a son named Antonio. That is, his name
was properly Antonio, though they commonly called him Tony.
[Sidenote: The difference between Antonio and Bruno.]
Tony was very different from Bruno in his character. He was as
faithless and remiss in all his duties as Bruno was trusty and true.
When his father set him at work in the field, instead of remaining,
like Bruno, at his post, and discharging his duty, he would take the
first opportunity, as soon as his father was out of sight, to go away
and play. Sometimes, when Bruno was upon his watch, Tony would attempt
to entice him away. He would throw sticks and stones across the brook,
and attempt to make Bruno go and fetch them. But Bruno would resist all
these temptations, and remain immovable at his post.
It might be supposed that it would be very tiresome for Bruno to remain
so many hours lying under a tree, watching a pail, with nothing to
do and nothing to amuse him, and that, consequently, he would always
endeavor to escape from the duty. We might suppose that, when he saw
the farmer’s wife taking down the pail from its shelf, and preparing
to put the farmer’s dinner in it, he would immediately run away, and
hide himself under the barn, or among the currant-bushes in the garden,
or resort to some other scheme to make his escape from such a duty.
But, in fact, he used to do exactly the contrary of this. As soon as
he saw that his master was preparing to go into the field, he would
leap about with great delight. He would run into the house, and take
his place by the door of the closet where the tin pail was usually
kept. He would stand there until the farmer’s wife came for the pail,
and then he would follow her and watch her while she was preparing the
dinner and putting it into the pail, and then would run along, with
every appearance of satisfaction and joy, by the side of his master, as
he went into the field, and finally take his place by the side of the
pail, as if he were pleased with the duty, and proud of the trust that
was thus committed to him.
[Sidenote: Antonio’s expedients to avoid work.]
In fact, he _was_ really proud of it. He liked to be employed, and to
prove himself useful. With Tony it was the reverse. He adopted all
sorts of schemes and maneuvers to avoid the performance of any duty.
When he had reason to suppose that any work was to be done in which his
aid was to be required, he would take his fishing-line, immediately
after breakfast, and steal secretly away out of the back door, and go
down to a brook which was near his father’s house, and there--hiding
himself in some secluded place among the bushes, where he thought they
could not find him--he would sit down upon a stone and go to fishing.
If he heard a sound as of his father’s voice calling him, he would
make a rustling of the leaves, or some other similar noise, so as to
prevent his hearing whether his father was calling to him or not. Thus
his father was obliged to do without him. And though his father would
reprove him very seriously, when he came home at noon, for thus going
away, Tony would pretend that he did not know that his father wanted
him, and that he did not hear him when he called.
[Sidenote: The plowing.]
One evening in the spring, Tony heard his father say that he was going
to plow a certain piece of ground the following day, and he supposed
that he should be wanted to ride the horse. His father was accustomed
to plow such land as that field by means of a yoke of oxen, and a
horse in front of them; and by having Tony to ride the horse, he could
generally manage to get along without any driver for the oxen, as the
oxen in that case had nothing to do but to follow on where the horse
led the way. But if Tony was not there to ride the horse, then it was
necessary for the farmer to have his man Thomas with him, to drive
the horse and the oxen. There was no way, therefore, by which Tony
could be so useful to his father as by thus assisting in this work of
plowing; for, by so doing, he saved the time of Thomas, who could then
be employed the whole day in other fields, planting, or hoeing, or
making fence, or doing any other farm-work which at that season of the
year required to be done.
[Sidenote: Antonio escapes.]
Accordingly, when Tony understood that this was the plan of work for
the following day, he stole away from the house immediately after
breakfast, and ran out into the garden. He had previously put his
fishing-line, and other necessary apparatus for fishing, upon a certain
bench there was in an arbor. He now took these things, and then went
down through the garden to a back gate, which led into a wood beyond.
He looked around from time to time as he went on, to see if any one at
the house was observing him. He saw no one; so he escaped safely into
the wood, without being called back, or even seen.
He felt glad when he found that he had thus made his escape--glad, but
not happy. It is quite possible to be glad, and yet to be not at all
happy. Tony felt guilty. He knew that he was doing very wrong; and the
feeling that we are doing wrong always makes us miserable, whatever may
be the pleasure that we seek.
[Sidenote: His walk through the wood.]
There was a wild and solitary road which led through the wood. Tony
went on through this road, with his fishing-pole over his shoulder, and
his box of bait in his hand. He wore a frock, like a plowman’s frock,
over his dress. It was one which his mother had made for him. This
frock was a light and cool garment, and Tony liked to wear it very much.
When Tony had got so far that he thought there was no danger of his
being called back, and the interest which he had felt in making his
escape began to subside, as the work had been accomplished, he paused,
and began to reflect upon what he was doing.
[Sidenote: He almost decides to return and help his father.]
“I have a great mind to go back, after all,” he said, “and help my
father.”
So he turned round, and began to walk slowly back toward the house.
“No, I won’t,” said he again; “I will go a fishing.”
[Illustration]
So he turned again, and began to walk on.
“At any rate,” he added, speaking to himself all the time, “I will go
a fishing for a while, and then, perhaps, I will go back and help my
father.”
So Tony went on in the path until at length he came to a place where
there was a gateway leading into a dark and secluded wood. The wood was
very dark and secluded indeed, and Tony thought that the path through
it must lead to some very retired and solitary place, where nobody
could find him.
“I presume there is a brook, too, somewhere in that wood,” he added,
“where I can fish.”
The gate was fastened, but there was a short length of fence on the
left-hand side of it, formed of only two rails, and these were so far
apart that Tony could easily creep through between them. So he crept
through, and went into the wood.
[Sidenote: He comes to the brook.]
He rambled about in the wood for some time, following various paths
that he found there, until at length he came to a brook. He was quite
rejoiced to find the brook, and he immediately began fishing in it. He
followed the bank of this brook for nearly a mile, going, of course,
farther and farther into the wood all the time. He caught a few small
fishes at some places, while at others he caught none. He was, however,
restless and dissatisfied in mind. Again and again he wished that he
had not come away from home, and he was continually on the point of
resolving to return. He thought, however, that his father would have
brought Thomas into the field, and commenced his plowing long before
then, and that, consequently, it would do no good to return.
[Sidenote: Fishing. The squirrel.]
While he was sitting thus, with a disconsolate air, upon a large stone
by the side of the brook, fishing in a dark and deep place, where he
hoped that there might be some trout, he suddenly saw a large gray
squirrel. He immediately dropped his fishing-pole, and ran to see where
the squirrel would go. In fact, he had some faint and vague idea that
there might, by some possibility, be a way to catch him.
The squirrel ran along a log, then up the stem of a tree to a branch,
along the branch to the end of it, whence he sprang a long distance
through the air to another branch, and then ran along that branch to
the tree which it grew from. From this tree he descended to a rock. He
mounted to the highest point of the rock, and there he turned round and
looked at Tony, sitting upon his hind legs, and holding his fore paws
before him, like a dog begging for supper.
[Sidenote: An unsuccessful hunt.]
“The rogue!” said Tony. “How I wish I could catch him!”
Very soon the squirrel, feeling somewhat alarmed at the apparition of
a boy in the woods, and not knowing what to make of so strange a sight,
ran down the side of the rock, and continued his flight. Tony followed
him for some time, until at last the squirrel contrived to make his
escape altogether, by running up a large tree, keeping cunningly on the
farther side of it all the way, so that Tony could not see him. When
he had reached the branches of the tree, he crept into a small hollow
which he found there, and crouching down, he remained motionless in
this hiding-place until Tony became tired of looking for him, and went
away.
[Sidenote: The lost boy.]
Tony, when at last he gave up the search for the squirrel, attempted
to find his way back to the place where he had left his fishing-pole.
Unfortunately, he had left his cap there too, so that he was doubly
desirous of finding the place. There was, however, no path, for
squirrels in their rambles in the woods are of course always quite
independent of every thing like roadways. Tony went back in the
direction from which he thought he came; but he could find no traces of
his fishing-pole. He could not even find the brook. He began to feel
quite uneasy, and, after going around in very circuitous and devious
wanderings for some time, he became quite bewildered. He at length
determined to give up the attempt to find his fishing-line and cap, and
to get out of the woods, and make his way home in the quickest possible
way.
[Sidenote: Tony’s difficulties.]
The poor boy now began to feel more guilty and more wretched than ever
before. He was not really more guilty, though he _felt_ his guilt far
more acutely than he had done when every thing was going well with him.
This is always so. The feeling of self-condemnation is not generally
the strongest at the time when we are doing the wrong. It becomes far
more acute and far more painful when we begin to experience the bitter
consequences which we bring upon ourselves by the transgression. Tony
hurried along wherever he could find a path which promised to lead him
to the gateway, breathless with fatigue and excitement, and with his
face flushed and full of anxiety. He was in great distress.
He stopped from time to time, to call aloud to his father and to
Thomas. He was now as anxious that they should find him as he had been
before to escape from them. He listened, in the hope that he might hear
the barking of Bruno, or some other sound that might help him to find
his way out of the woods.
[Sidenote: He is misled by various sounds.]
Once he actually heard a sound among the trees, at some distance from
him. He thought that it was some one working in the woods. He went
eagerly in the direction from which the sound proceeded, scrambling,
by the way, over the rocks and brambles, and leaping from hummock to
hummock in crossing bogs and mire. When at length he reached the place,
he found that the noise was nothing but one tree creaking against
another in the wind.
At another time, he followed a sound which appeared different from
this; when he came up to it, he found it to be a woodpecker tapping an
old hollow tree.
[Sidenote: Tony at the brook.]
Tony wandered about thus in the wood nearly all the day, and at length,
about the middle of the afternoon, he became so exhausted with fatigue,
anxiety, and hunger, that he could go no farther. He was very thirsty
too, for he could find no water. He began to fear that he should die
in the woods of starvation and thirst. At length, however, a short
time before the sun went down, he came, to his great joy, to a stream
of water. It was wide and deep, so that he could not cross it. He,
however, went down to the brink of the water, and got a good drink.
This refreshed him very much, and then he went back again up the bank,
and lay down upon the grass there to rest.
[Sidenote: Cows in the water.]
Presently two cows came down to the water, on the side opposite to
where Tony was sitting. They came to drink. Tony wished very much that
they would come over to his side of the water, so that he could get
some milk from them. If he could get a good drink of milk from them, he
thought it would restore his strength, so that he could make one more
effort to return home. He called the cows, and endeavored, by every
means in his power, to make them come through the water to his side.
One of them waded into the water a little way, and stood there staring
stupidly at Tony, but she would not come any farther.
[Illustration]
Then Tony thought of attempting to wade across the water to the cows,
but he was afraid that it might be very deep, and that he should get
drowned. He thought, too, that if he could contrive in any way to get
near the cows, there would still be a difficulty in getting a drink of
their milk, for he had no cup or mug to milk into. He wondered whether
or not it would be possible for him to get down under one of the cows
and milk into his mouth. He soon found, however, that it was of no use
to consider this question, for it was not possible for him to get near
the cows at all.
Then he reflected how many times his mother, in the evenings at home,
when the cows were milked, had brought him drinks of the milk in a cup
or mug, very convenient to drink out of, and how many long and weary
days his father had worked in the fields, mowing grass to feed the
cows, and in the barns in the winter, to take care of them, so as to
provide the means of giving his boy this rich and luxurious food; and
he felt how ungrateful he had been, in not being willing to aid his
father in his work, when opportunities offered to him to be useful.
[Sidenote: Good resolutions.]
“If I ever get home,” said he to himself, “I’ll be a better boy.”
[Sidenote: Here comes Bruno.]
Just then Tony heard a noise in the bushes behind him. At first he was
startled, as most people are, at hearing suddenly a noise in the woods.
Immediately afterward, however, he felt glad, as he hoped that the
noise was made by some one coming. He had scarcely time to look around
before Bruno came rushing through the bushes, and, with a single bound,
came to Tony’s feet. He leaped up upon him, wagging his tail most
energetically, and in other ways manifesting the most extraordinary
joy.
[Sidenote: Bruno leads the way through the woods.]
In a minute or two he began to walk away again into the woods, looking
behind him toward Tony, intimating that Tony was to follow him. Tony
slowly rose from his place, and attempted to go.
“Yes, Bruno,” said he, “I know. You are going to show me the way home.
I’ll come along as fast as I can.”
Tony soon found, however, that he could not come very fast. In fact,
he was almost exhausted by fatigue and hunger, and he had now little
strength remaining. He accordingly staggered rather than walked in
attempting to follow Bruno, and he was obliged frequently to stop and
rest. On such occasions Bruno would come back and fawn around him,
wagging his tail, and expressing his sympathy in such other ways as
a dog has at command, and would finally lie down quietly by Tony’s
side until the poor boy was ready to proceed again. Then he would go
forward, and lead the way as before.
It is very extraordinary that a dog can find his way through the woods
under certain circumstances so much better than a boy, or even than a
man. But so it is; for, though so greatly inferior to a boy in respect
to the faculties of speech and reason, he is greatly superior to him
in certain instincts, granted to him by the Creator to fit him for the
life which he was originally designed to lead as a wild animal. It was
by means of these instincts that Bruno found Tony.
[Sidenote: The various expeditions in search of Tony.]
Bruno had commenced his search about the middle of the afternoon. It
was not until some time after dinner that the family began to be uneasy
about Tony’s absence. During all the forenoon they supposed that he had
gone away somewhere a fishing or to play, and that he would certainly
come home to dinner. When, however, the dinner hour, which was twelve
o’clock, arrived, and Tony did not appear, they began to wonder what
had become of him. So, after dinner, they sent Thomas down behind the
garden, and to the brook, and to all the other places where they knew
that Tony was accustomed to go, to see if he could find him. Thomas
went to all those places, and not only looked to see whether Tony was
there, but he called also very loud, and listened long after every
calling for an answer. But he could neither see nor hear any thing of
the lost boy.
[Sidenote: Bruno’s search.]
Then Tony’s mother began to be very seriously alarmed, and his father,
too, determined to leave his work, and go and see if he could find him.
He accordingly sent Thomas one way, while he himself went another.
Bruno watched all these movements with great interest. He understood
what they meant. He determined to see what he could do. He accordingly
ran out into the garden, where he had seen Tony go after breakfast in
the morning. He smelled about there in all the paths until at length he
found Tony’s track. He followed this track to the seat in the arbor,
where Tony had gone to get his fishing-line. Taking _a new departure_
from this point, he went on, smelling the track along the paths as he
advanced, to the bottom of the garden, thence into a wood behind the
garden, thence along the road till he came to the gate under the trees
where Tony had gone in.
[Sidenote: He finds Tony’s cap and fishing-pole.]
By smelling about this gate, he ascertained that Tony did not open the
gate, but that he crept through between the bars on the left-hand side
of it. Bruno did the same. He then followed the track of Tony in the
solitary woods until he came to the brook where Tony had been fishing.
Here, to his great astonishment, he found Tony’s cap and fishing-pole
lying by the margin of the water.
What this could mean he was utterly unable to imagine. The sight of
these things, however, only increased his interest in the search for
Tony. He soon found the track again, and he followed it along by the
side of the bog, and to the great rock, and by the old trees. What
could have induced Tony to leave his cap and pole by the brook, and
go scrambling through the bushes in this devious way, he could not
imagine, not knowing, of course, any thing about the squirrel.
He, however, proceeded very industriously in the search, following the
scent which Tony’s footsteps had left on the leaves and grass wherever
he had gone, until at length, to his great joy, he came up with the
object of his search by the brink of the water, as has already been
described.
Tony had gone but a short distance from the place where Bruno had
discovered him, before he found his strength failing him so rapidly
that he was obliged to make his rests longer and longer. At one of
these stops, Bruno, instead of waiting by his side, as he had done
before, until Tony had become sufficiently rested to go on, ran off
through the bushes and left him.
“Now, Bruno!” said Tony, in a mournful tone, “if you go away and leave
me, I don’t know what I shall do.”
[Sidenote: The cap restored.]
Bruno was gone about five minutes, at the end of which time he came
back, bringing Tony’s cap in his mouth. He had been to the brook to get
it.
Tony was overjoyed to see Bruno again, and he was, moreover,
particularly pleased to get his cap again.
So he took his cap and put it on, patting Bruno’s head at the same
time, and commending him in a very cordial manner.
“I am very much obliged to you, Bruno,” said he, “for bringing me my
cap--_very_ much obliged indeed. The cap is all I care for; never mind
about the fishing-pole.”
[Sidenote: Bruno returns home.]
Tony spoke these words very feebly, for he was very tired and faint.
Bruno perceived that he was not able to go on; so, after remaining
by his side a few minutes, he ran off again into the bushes and
disappeared.
“Now he has gone to bring the fishing-pole, I suppose,” said Tony. “I
wish he would not go for that; I would rather have him stay here with
me.”
[Sidenote: His strange conduct.]
Tony was mistaken in his supposition that Bruno had gone for the
fishing-pole; for, instead of going to the brook again, where he had
found the cap, he ran as fast as he could toward home. His object was
to see if he could not get some thing for Tony to eat. As soon as he
arrived at the house, he went to the farmer’s wife, who was all this
time walking about the rooms of the house in great distress of mind,
and waiting anxiously to hear some news of those who were in search
of Tony, and began to pull her by her dress toward the place in the
kitchen where the tin pail was kept, in which she was accustomed to put
the farmer’s dinner. At first she could not understand what he wanted.
“My senses!” said she, “what does the dog mean?”
“Bruno!” said she again, after wondering a moment, “what do you want?”
Bruno looked up toward the pail and whined piteously, wagging his tail
all the time, and moving about with eager impatience.
[Sidenote: He succeeds in obtaining a dinner for Tony.]
At length the farmer’s wife took hold of the pail, and, as soon as she
had done so, Bruno ran off toward the closet where the food was kept,
which she was accustomed to put into the pail for her husband’s dinner.
He took his station by the door, and waited there, as he had been
accustomed to do, looking up eagerly all the time to Tony’s mother, who
was slowly following him.
“I verily believe,” said she, joyfully, “that Bruno has found Tony, and
is going to carry him something to eat.”
She immediately went into the closet, and filled the pail up, in a very
hurried manner, with something for Tony to eat, taking care not to put
in so much as to make the pail too heavy. As soon as she had done this,
and put on a cover, and then set the pail down upon the floor, Bruno
immediately took it up by means of the handle, and ran off with it.
Tony’s mother followed him, but she could not keep up with him, and was
soon obliged to relinquish the pursuit.
Bruno had some difficulty in getting over the fences and through the
bars with his burden, as he went on toward the place where he had left
Tony. He, however, persevered in his efforts, and finally succeeded;
and at length had the satisfaction of bringing the pail safely, and
laying it down at Tony’s feet. Tony, who was by this time extremely
hungry, as well as faint and exhausted by fatigue, was overjoyed at
receiving this unexpected supply. He opened the pail, and found there
every thing which he required. There was a supply of bread and butter
in slices, with ham, sandwich fashion, placed between. At the bottom of
the pail, too, was a small bottle filled with milk.
[Sidenote: He conducts Tony home, and goes back for the fishing-pole.]
After eating and drinking what Bruno had thus brought him, Tony felt
greatly relieved and strengthened. He now could walk along, where Bruno
led the way, without stopping to rest at all. So the boy and the dog
went on together, until they safely reached the bottom of the garden.
Here they were met by Tony’s mother, who was almost beside herself with
joy when she saw them coming. She ran to meet Tony, and conducted him
into the house, while Bruno, as soon as he found that his charge was
safe, turned back, and, without waiting to be thanked, ran off into the
woods again.
And where do you think he was going, reader?
He was going to get Tony’s fishing-pole.
Tony’s mother brought her boy into the house, and, after she had bathed
his face, and his hands, and his feet with warm water to refresh and
soothe him, agitated as he was by his anxiety and terror, she gave him
a comfortable seat by the side of the kitchen fire, while she went to
work to get ready the supper. As soon as Tony had arrived, she blew
the horn at the door, which was the signal which had been previously
agreed upon to denote that he was found. Thomas and Tony’s father heard
this sound as they were wandering about in the woods, and both joyfully
hastened home. Tony, in the mean time, dreaded his father’s return.
He expected to be bitterly reproached by him for what he had done. He
was, however, happily disappointed in this expectation. His father did
not reproach him. He thought he had already been punished enough; and
besides, he was so glad to have his son home again, safe and sound,
that he had not the heart to say a word to give him any additional pain.
[Sidenote: Bruno lies down to sleep.]
Bruno himself came home about the same time that Thomas did, bringing
the fishing-pole and line with him. The apparatus was all safe, except
that the hook was gone. It had got torn off by catching against the
bushes on the way. Bruno brought the pole and line to Tony. Tony took
them, and when he had wound up the line, he set the pole up in the
corner, while Bruno stretched himself out before the fire, and there,
with his mind in a state of great satisfaction, in view of what he had
done, he prepared to go to sleep. The bright fire glanced upon the
hearth and about the room, forming a very cheerful and pleasant scene.
[Sidenote: Tony’s reflections.]
How shameful it is, thought Tony, as he looked upon Bruno by the fire,
that while a dog can be so faithful, and seem to take so much pride and
pleasure in doing his duty, and in making himself as useful in every
way as he possibly can, a boy, whose power and opportunities are so
much superior to his, should be faithless and negligent, and try to
contrive ways and means to evade his proper work. You have taught me a
lesson, Bruno. You have set me an example. We will see whether, after
this, I will allow myself to be beaten in fidelity and gratitude by a
dog.
* * * * *
This story reminds me of another one about a boy named Antonio,
who got away from home, and was in trouble to get back, though the
circumstances were very different from those which I have just related.
The name of this new story is “Boys Adrift.”
BOYS ADRIFT.
Boys are generally greatly pleased with seeing ships and the water.
In fact, the view of a harbor, filled with boats and shipping, forms
usually for all persons, old as well as young, a very attractive scene.
There was once a boy named Antonio Van Tromp. They commonly called him
Antony. Sometimes they called him Van Tromp. He lived in a certain
sea-port town, where his father used to come in with a ship from sea.
His father was captain of the ship. Antonio used to be very fond of
going down to the pier while his father’s ship was unloading. One day
he persuaded his cousin, who was several years younger than himself, to
go down with him.
[Sidenote: Antonio and his cousin amuse themselves on the pier.]
The boys played about upon the pier for an hour very happily. The
seamen and laborers were unloading the ship, and there were a great
many boxes, and bales, and hogsheads, and other packages of merchandise
lying upon the pier. There were porters at work carrying the goods
away, and sailors rolling hogsheads and barrels to and fro. There was
an anchor on the pier, and weights, and chains, and trucks, and other
similar objects lying around. The boys amused themselves for some time
in jumping about upon these things. At length, on looking down over
the edge of the pier, they saw that there was a boat there. It was
fastened by means of a rope to one of the links of an enormous chain,
which was lying over the edge of the pier. On seeing this boat, they
conceived the idea of getting into it, and rowing about a little in the
neighborhood of the pier.
[Sidenote: The boat.]
There were no oars in the boat, and so Van Tromp asked a sailor, whom
he saw at work near, to go and get them for him on board the ship.
[Sidenote: Conversation with the sailor.]
“Not I,” said the sailor.
“Why not?” asked Van Tromp.
“It is ebb tide,” said the sailor, “and if you two boys cast off from
the pier in that boat, you will get carried out to sea.”
“Why, I can _scull_,” said Van Tromp.
“Oh no,” said the sailor.
“At least I can pull,” said Van Tromp.
“Oh no,” said the sailor.
The boys stood perplexed, not knowing what to do.
All along the shores of the sea the tide rises for six hours, and while
it is thus rising, the water, of course, wherever there are harbors,
creeks, and bays, flows _in_. Afterward the tide falls for six hours,
and while it is falling, the water of the harbors, creeks, and bays
flows _out_. When the water is going out, they call it ebb tide. That
is what the sailor meant by saying it was ebb tide.
[Sidenote: Sculling and pulling.]
_Sculling_ is a mode of propelling a boat by one oar. The oar in this
case is put out behind the boat, that is, at the stern, and is moved
to and fro in a peculiar manner, somewhat resembling the motion of the
tail of a fish when he is swimming through the water. It is difficult
to learn how to scull. Antony could scull pretty well in smooth water,
but he could not have worked his way in this manner against an ebb
tide.
_Pulling_, as Antony called it, is another name for rowing. In rowing,
it is necessary to have two oars. To row a boat requires more strength,
though less skill, than to scull it.
The boys, after hesitating for some time, finally concluded at least
to get into the boat. They had unfastened the painter, that is, the
rope by which the boat was tied, while they had been talking with the
sailor, in order to be all ready to cast off. When they found that the
sailor would not bring them any oars, they fastened the painter again,
so that the boat should not get away, and then climbed down the side of
the pier, and got into the boat.
[Sidenote: The boat adrift.]
Unfortunately, when, after untying the painter, they attempted to make
it fast again into the link of the chain, they did not do it securely;
and as they moved to and fro about the boat, pushing it one way and
another, the rope finally got loose, and the boat floated slowly away
from the pier. The boys were engaged very intently at the time in
watching some sun-fish which they saw in the water. They were leaning
over the side of the boat to look at them, so that they did not see
the pier when it began to recede, and thus the tide carried them to
a considerable distance from it before they observed that they were
adrift.
At length Larry--for that was the name of Antony’s cousin--looking up
accidentally, observed that the boat was moving away.
“Antony! Antony!” exclaimed, he, “we’re adrift.”
As he said this, Larry looked very much terrified.
Antony rose from his reclining position, and stood upright in the
bottom of the boat. He looked back toward the pier, which he observed
was rapidly receding.
[Sidenote: Adrift.]
“Yes,” said he, “we’re adrift; but who cares?”
When a boy gets into difficulty or danger by doing something wrong, he
is generally very much frightened. When, however, he knows that he has
not been doing any thing wrong, but has got into difficulty purely by
accident, he is much less likely to be afraid.
Antony knew that he had done nothing wrong in getting into the boat.
His father was a sea-captain, and he was allowed to get into boats
whenever he chose to do so. He was accustomed, too, to be in boats on
the water, and now, if he had only had an oar or a paddle, he would not
have felt any concern whatever. As it was, he felt very little concern.
His first thought was to call out to the sailor whom they had left on
the pier. The boys both called to him long and loud, but he was so busy
turning over boxes, and bales, and rolling hogsheads about, that he did
not hear.
“What shall we do?” asked Larry, with a very anxious look.
[Sidenote: The sail-boat.]
“Oh, we shall get ashore again easily enough,” replied Antony. “Here is
a large sail-boat coming up. We will hail them, and they will take us
aboard.”
“Do you think they will take us on board?” asked Larry.
“Yes, I am sure they will,” said Antony.
Just then the boat which the boys were drifting in came along opposite
to a large sail-boat. This boat was sloop-rigged; that is, it had one
mast and a fore-and-aft sail. She was standing up the harbor, and was
headed toward the pier. The sail was spread, and the sail-boat was
gliding along smoothly, but quite swiftly, through the water.
There were two men on board. One was at the helm, steering. The other,
who had on a red flannel shirt, came to the side of the boat, and
looked over toward the boys. We can just see the head of this man above
the gunwale on the starboard side of the boat in the picture.
[Illustration]
[Sidenote: Antony calls for help. He receives none.]
“Hallo! sail-boat!” said Antony.
“Hallo!” said the flannel shirt.
“Take us aboard of your boat,” said Antony; “we have got adrift, and
have not got any oar.”
“We can’t take you on board,” said the man; “we have got beyond you
already.”
“Throw us a rope,” said Antony.
“We have not got any rope long enough,” said the sailor.
As he said these words, the sail-boat passed entirely by.
“What _shall_ we do?” said Larry, much alarmed.
Larry was much smaller than Antony, and much less accustomed to be in
boats on the water, and he was much more easily terrified.
“Don’t be afraid,” said Antony; “we shall get brought up among some of
the shipping below. There are plenty of vessels coming up the harbor.”
[Sidenote: The boys float down the channel.]
So they went on--slowly, but very steadily--wherever they were borne by
the course of the ebbing tide. Instead of being brought up, however, as
Antony had predicted, by some of the ships, they were kept by the tide
in the middle of the channel, while the ships were all, as it happened,
on one side or the other, and they did not go within calling distance
of any one of them. At last even Antony began to think that they were
certainly about to be carried out to sea.
“If the water was not so deep, we could anchor,” said Antony.
“We have not got any anchor,” said Larry.
[Sidenote: The grapnel.]
“Yes,” replied Antony, “there is a grapnel in the bow of the boat.”
Larry looked in a small cuddy under the bow of the boat, and found
there a sort of grapnel that was intended to be used as an anchor.
“Let us heave it over,” said Larry, “and then the boat will stop.”
“No,” replied Antony, “the rope is not long enough to reach the bottom;
the water is too deep here. We are in the middle of the channel; but
perhaps, by-and-by, the tide will carry us over upon the flats, and
then we can anchor.”
“How shall we know when we get to the flats?” asked Larry.
“We can see the bottom then,” said Antony, “by looking over the side of
the boat.”
“I mean to watch,” said Larry; and he began forthwith to look over the
side of the boat.
[Sidenote: They see the bottom.]
It was not long before Antony’s expectations were fulfilled. The tide
carried the boat over a place where the water was shallow, the bottom
being formed there of broad and level tracts of sand and mud, called
flats.
“I see the bottom,” said Larry, joyfully.
Antony looked over the side of the boat, and there, down several feet
beneath the surface of the water, he could clearly distinguish the
bottom. It was a smooth expanse of mud and water, and it seemed to be
slowly gliding away from beneath them. The real motion was in the boat,
but _this_ motion was imperceptible to the boys, except by the apparent
motion of the bottom, which was produced by it. Such a deceiving of the
sight as this is commonly called an optical illusion.
“Yes,” said Antony, “that’s the bottom; now we will anchor.”
[Sidenote: Anchoring.]
So the two boys went forward, and, after taking care to see that the
inner end of the grapnel rope was made fast properly to the bow of the
boat, they lifted the heavy iron over the side of the boat, and let it
plunge into the water. It sank to the bottom in a moment, drawing out
the rope after it. It immediately fastened itself by its prongs in the
mud, and when the rope was all out, the bow of the boat was “brought
up” by it--that is, was stopped at once. The stern of the boat was
swung round by the force of the tide, which still continued to act upon
it, and then the boat came to its rest, with the head pointing up the
harbor.
“There,” said Antony, “now we are safe.”
“But how are we going to get back to the shore?” inquired Larry.
[Sidenote: The boys wait for the tide.]
“Why, by-and-by the tide will turn,” said Antony, “and flow in, and
then we shall get up our anchor, and let it carry us home again.”
“And how long shall we have to wait?” asked Larry.
“Oh, about three or four hours,” said Antony.
“My mother will be very much frightened,” said Larry. “How sorry I am
that we got into the boat!”
“So am I,” said Antony; “or, rather, I should be, if I thought it would
do any good to be sorry.”
[Sidenote: Captain Van Tromp misses them.]
In the mean time, while the boys had thus been making their involuntary
voyage down the harbor, Captain Van Tromp, on board his ship, had been
employed very busily with his accounts in his cabin. It was now nearly
noon, and he concluded, accordingly, that it was time for him to go
home to dinner. So he called one of the sailors to him, and directed
him to look about on the pier and try to find the boys, and tell them
that he was going home to dinner.
In a few minutes the sailor came back, and told the captain that he
could not find the boys; and that Jack, who was at work outside on the
pier, said that they had not been seen about there for more than an
hour, and that the boat was missing too; and he was afraid that they
had got into it, and had gone adrift.
“Send Jack to me,” said the captain.
When Jack came into the cabin, the captain was at work, as usual, on
his accounts. Jack stood by his side a moment, with his cap in his
hand, waiting for the captain to be at leisure to speak to him. At
length the captain looked up.
“Jack,” said he, “do you say that the boys have gone off with the boat?”
“I don’t know, sir,” said Jack. “The boat is gone, and the boys are
gone, but whether the boat has gone off with the boys, or the boys with
the boat, I couldn’t say.”
The captain paused a moment, with a thoughtful expression upon his
countenance, and then said,
“Tell Nelson to take the glass, and go aloft, and look around to see if
he can see any thing of them.”
“Ay, ay, sir,” said Jack.
The captain then resumed his work as if nothing particular had happened.
[Sidenote: Mr. Nelson discovers them by means of his spy-glass.]
Nelson was the mate of the ship. The mate is the second in command
under the captain.
When Nelson received the captain’s order, he took the spy-glass, and
went up the shrouds to the mast-head. In about ten minutes he came down
again, and gave Jack a message for the captain. Jack came down again
into the cabin. He found the captain, as before, busy at his work. The
captain had been exposed to too many great and terrible dangers at sea
to be much alarmed at the idea of two boys being adrift, in a strong
boat and in a crowded harbor.
“Mr. Nelson says, sir,” said Jack, “that he sees our boat, with two
boys in it, about a mile and a half down the harbor. She is lying a
little to the eastward of the red buoy.”
A buoy is a floating beam of wood, or other light substance, anchored
on the point of a shoal, or over a ledge of rocks, to warn the seamen
that they must not sail there. The different buoys are painted of
different colors, so that they may be easily distinguished one from
another.
The captain paused a moment on hearing Jack’s report, and looked
undecided. In fact, his attention was so much occupied by his accounts,
that only half his thoughts seemed to be given to the case of the boys.
At length he asked if there was any wind.
“Not a capful,” said the sailor.
“Tell Nelson, then,” said the captain, “to send down the gig with four
men, and bring the boys back.”
[Sidenote: The gig.]
The gig, as the captain called it, was a light boat belonging to the
ship, being intended for rowing swiftly in smooth water.
[Sidenote: Nelson fits out an expedition to relieve the boys.]
So Nelson called out four men, and directed them to get ready with the
gig. The men accordingly lowered the gig down from the side of the ship
into the water, and then, with the oars in their hands, they climbed
down into it. In a few minutes they were rowing swiftly down the
harbor, in the direction of the red buoy, while Captain Van Tromp went
home to dinner. On his way home he left word, at the house where Larry
lived, that the boys had gone down the harbor, and would not be home
under an hour.
[Sidenote: The boys watch the progress of the tide.]
While these occurrences had been taking place on the pier, the boys
had been sitting very patiently in their boat, waiting for the tide
to turn, or for some one to come to their assistance. They could see
how it was with the tide by the motion of the water, as it glided past
them. The current, in fact, when they first anchored, made quite a
ripple at the bows of the boat. They had a fine view of the harbor,
as they looked back toward the town from their boat, though the view
was so distant that they could not make out which was the pier where
Captain Van Tromp’s vessel was lying.
[Illustration]
Of course, as the tide went out more and more, the surface of the water
was continually falling, and the depth growing less and less all the
time. The boys could easily perceive the increasing shallowness of
the water, as they looked over the side of the boat, and watched the
appearance of the bottom.
[Sidenote: A new danger. A discussion.]
“Now here’s another trouble,” said Antony. “If we don’t look out, we
shall get left aground. I’ve a great mind to pull up the anchor, and
let the boat drift on a little way, till we come to deeper water.”
“Oh no,” said Larry, “don’t let us go out to sea any farther.”
“Why, if we stay here,” said Antony, “until the tide falls so as to
leave us aground, we may have to stay some hours after the tide turns
before we get afloat again.”
“Well,” said Larry, “no matter. Besides, if you go adrift again, the
water may deepen suddenly.”
“Yes,” said Antony, “and then we should lose hold of the bottom
altogether. We had better not move.”
“Unless,” added Antony, after a moment’s thought, “we can contrive to
_warp_ the boat _up_ a little.”
[Sidenote: Warping the boat.]
So saying, Antony went forward to examine into the feasibility of this
plan. He found, on looking over the bow of the boat, that the water was
very shallow, and nearly still; for the tide, being nearly out, flowed
now with a very gentle and almost imperceptible current. Of course, as
the water was shallow, and the rope that was attached to the anchor was
pretty long, the anchor itself was at a considerable distance from the
boat. The boys could see the rope passing obliquely along under the
water, but could not see the anchor.
Antony took hold of the rope, and began to draw it in. The effect of
this operation was to draw the boat up the harbor toward the anchor.
When, at length, the rope was all in, Antony pulled up the grapnel,
which was small and easily raised, and then swinging it to and fro
several times to give it an impetus, he threw it with all his force
forward. It fell into the water nearly ten feet from where it had lain
before, and there sinking immediately, it laid hold of the bottom
again. Antony now, by pulling upon the rope, as he had done at first,
drew the boat up to the anchor at its new holding. He repeated this
operation a number of times, watching the water from time to time over
the bows of the boat, to see whether it was getting deeper or not.
While Antony was thus engaged, the attention of Larry was suddenly
attracted to the sound of oars. He looked in the direction from which
the sound proceeded, and saw, at a considerable distance, a boat coming
toward them.
[Sidenote: “Here comes the gig!”]
“Here comes a boat,” said Larry.
Antony looked where Larry pointed.
“Yes,” said he, “and she is headed directly toward us.”
“So she is,” said Larry.
“I verily believe it is our gig,” said Antony.
“It is,” he added, after looking a moment longer, “and there is Jack on
board of her. They are coming for us.”
In a few minutes more the gig was alongside. Two of the sailors that
had come down in the gig got on board of the boys’ boat with their
oars, and then both boats rowed up the harbor again, and in due time
the boys reached home in safety.
* * * * *
[Sidenote: Moral.]
The moral of this story is, that in all cases of difficulty and danger
it is best to keep quiet and composed in mind, and not to give way to
excitement and terror. Being frightened never does any good, excepting
when there is a chance to run away; in that case, it sometimes helps
one to run a little faster. In all other cases, it is best to be
cool and collected, and encounter whatever comes with calmness and
equanimity.
BRUNO AND THE ROBIN.
“Be not overcome of evil, but overcome evil with good.”
[Sidenote: Hiram and Ralph. The robin.]
At one time Bruno had for his master a boy named Hiram. Hiram had a
friend and companion who lived in the next house to him, whose name was
Ralph. This Ralph had a robin. He kept the robin in a cage.
[Sidenote: The loft.]
There was a small building near the bottom of Ralph’s father’s garden,
which was used as a place of deposit for gardening implements, seeds,
bundles of straw, matting for covering plants, and other similar
articles employed about the garden. This building was called the
“garden-house.” In the upper part of it was a loft, which Ralph had
taken possession of as a storehouse for his wagons, trucks, traps, and
other playthings. He used to go up to this loft by means of a number of
large wooden pins, or pegs, that were driven into one of the posts of
the frame of the garden-house, in a corner. Somebody once recommended
to Ralph to have a staircase made to lead up to his loft, but he
said he liked better to climb up by these pins than to have the best
staircase that ever was made.
Ralph used frequently to carry his robin to this garden-house when he
was playing about there, and on such occasions he would sometimes hang
the cage on a nail out of the window of his loft. He drove the nail
himself into the edge of a sort of a shelf, which was near the window
on the outside. The shelf was put there for doves to light upon, in
going in and out of their house, which was made in the peak of the
roof, over Ralph’s loft.
[Sidenote: Account of Ralph’s robin.]
Ralph caught his robin when he was very young. He caught him in a net.
He saw the nest when the birds were first building it. About a week
after the birds had finished it, he thought it was time for the eggs to
be laid. So he got a ladder, which was usually kept on the back side of
the tool-house, and, having planted it against a tree, he began to go
up. Just then, his little brother Eddy, who was walking along one of
the alleys of the garden near where the bird’s nest was, saw him.
[Sidenote: Eddy’s advice.]
“Ralph,” said Eddy, “what are you going to do?”
“I’m going to get the eggs out of the nest,” said Ralph.
“No,” replied Eddy, “you must not do that.”
Ralph paid no regard to this, but went on slowly mounting the ladder.
The top of the ladder, resting as it did against some of the branches
of the tree, was not very steady, and so Ralph could not go up very
fast. Besides, Ralph was somewhat afraid of the old birds; for they,
seeing that their nest was in danger, were flying about him with
very loud chirpings, being apparently in a state of great terror and
distress.
“Ralph,” said Eddy, “you must not trouble those birds.”
Ralph went steadily on.
“Besides,” said Eddy, when he saw that his brother paid no heed to his
remonstrances, “it would be a great deal better to wait till the eggs
are hatched, and then get one of the birds.”
[Sidenote: The plan changed.]
Ralph paused when he heard this suggestion. He began to think that it
might possibly be a better plan to wait, as Eddy proposed, and to get a
bird instead of an egg. He paused a moment on the ladder, standing on
one foot, and holding himself on by one hand.
“Would you, Eddy?” said he.
“Yes,” said Eddy, “I certainly would.”
Eddy proposed this plan, not so much from any desire he had that Ralph
should get one of the birds when they were hatched, as to save the
eggs from being taken away then. He had an instinctive feeling that it
was wrong to take away the eggs, and he pitied the poor birds in their
distress, and so he said what he thought was most likely to induce
Ralph to desist from his design.
After hesitating a few minutes, Ralph said, “Well, I will.” He then
came down to the ground again, and, taking up the ladder, he carried it
away.
About a week after this, Ralph got the ladder one day when the birds
were not there, and climbed up to the nest. He found three very pretty
blue eggs in it.
[Sidenote: The birds are hatched.]
About a week after this he climbed up again, and he found that the eggs
were hatched. There were three little birds there, not fledged. When
they heard Ralph’s rustling of the branches over their heads, they
opened their mouths very wide, expecting that the old birds had come to
bring them something to eat.
About a week after this Ralph climbed up again, but, just before he
reached the nest, the three birds, having now grown old enough to fly,
all clambered out of the nest, and flew away in all directions.
[Sidenote: “Here’s one!”]
“Stop ’em! stop ’em! Eddy,” said Ralph, “or watch them at least, and
see where they go, till I come down.”
“Here’s one,” said Eddy.
He pointed, as he said this, under some currant-bushes, near an alley
where he was walking. The little bird was crouched down, and was
looking about him full of wonder. In fact, he was quite astonished to
find how far he had flown.
Ralph clambered down the ladder as fast as he could, and then ran off
to the tool-house, saying as he ran,
“Keep him there, Eddy, till I go and get my net.”
“I can’t keep him,” said Eddy, “unless he has a mind to stay. But I
will watch him.”
So Eddy stood still and watched the bird while Ralph went after his
net. The bird hopped along a little way, and then stopped, and remained
perfectly still until Ralph returned.
[Sidenote: A bird pursued.]
The net was a round net, the mouth of it being kept open by means of a
hoop. It was fastened to the end of a long pole. Ralph crept up softly
toward the place where the bird had alighted, and, when he was near
enough, he extended the pole, and clapped the net down over the bird,
and made it prisoner.
[Sidenote: Caught and caged.]
“I’ve caught him! I’ve caught him!” said Ralph, greatly excited. “Run,
Eddy, and get the cage. Run quick. No, stop; you come here, and hold
the net down, and I’ll go and get the cage myself.”
So Eddy held the net down, while Ralph went into the tool-house after
the cage. He succeeded in putting the bird into the cage safely, and
then went home.
[Sidenote: The feeding.]
Ralph attended his bird very carefully for many days, feeding him
with strawberries and crumbs of bread. The natural food of most small
birds consists of seeds, berries, and insects. Ralph knew, therefore,
that strawberries would be good for his bird, and as for bread, he
reflected that it was made from seeds, namely, the seeds of wheat. The
only difference was, that in bread the seeds were ground up, mixed with
water, and baked. So Ralph concluded that bread would be a very proper
food for his robin.
[Illustration: Ralph taming the robin.]
[Sidenote: The stile.]
As soon as the robin grew old enough to hop about a little, Ralph
used often to take him out of his cage and put him on the walk in the
garden, or on the end of a fence, near a stile, where was a broad,
flat place convenient for the little bird to stand on. In such cases,
he would, himself, always stand at a little distance off, so as not to
frighten the bird, and in this manner he gradually taught him to be
very tame and familiar.
[Sidenote: Bruno and Hiram. Description of the premises.]
Although Ralph was thus very kind to his robin, he was generally a very
unreasonable and selfish boy. Bruno, at this time, lived in the house
next to the one where he lived. Bruno belonged, as has already been
said, to a boy named Hiram. The two houses that these two boys lived in
were pretty near together, and the gardens adjoined, being separated
from each other only by a wall. At the foot of each garden was a gate,
and there was a little path which led along from one gate to the other,
through a field where there was a brook, and also a great many trees
overshadowing the banks of it. The boys used often to visit each other
by going from one of these gates to the other along this path. There
was a space under Hiram’s gate where Bruno could get through. He used
often to go through this opening, and pass down into the field, to
drink in the brook, or to play about among the trees. Sometimes both
the gates were left open, and then Bruno would go and look into Ralph’s
garden; and once he went in, and walked along as far as the tool-house,
looking about and examining the premises very curiously. As soon as he
had seen what sort of a place it was, however, he turned round and ran
out again, not knowing what might happen to him if he stayed there.
[Sidenote: Ralph wishes to buy Bruno.]
Ralph saw Bruno often when he went to visit Hiram in his garden, and he
wished that he could have such a dog himself. In fact, he tried to buy
him of Hiram a long time, but Hiram would not sell him. Ralph became
very angry with Hiram at last for so strenuously refusing to sell his
dog.
“You are a great fool,” said he, “for not being willing to sell me the
dog. I would give you any price you would name.”
“That makes no difference,” said Hiram; “I would rather have the dog
than any amount of money, no matter how much.”
[Sidenote: Ralph becomes Bruno’s enemy.]
So Ralph turned, and went away in a rage; and the next time he saw
Bruno out in the field behind the garden, he ran down to his gate and
pelted him with stones.
Bruno could not understand what reason Ralph could have for wishing to
hurt him, or being his enemy in any way. He perceived, however, that
Ralph was his enemy, and so he became very much afraid of him. When he
wished to go down to the brook, he always looked out through the hole
under the gate very carefully to see if Ralph was near, and if he was,
he did not go. If he could not see Ralph any where, he would creep out
stealthily, and walk along in a very cautious manner, turning his head
continually toward Ralph’s gate, to watch for the slightest indications
of danger; and if he caught a glimpse of Ralph in the garden, he would
turn back and run into Hiram’s garden again.
[Sidenote: The boys play together.]
Bruno was a very courageous dog, and he would not have run away from
Ralph, but would have attacked him in the most determined manner, and
driven him away from the garden gate, and thus taught him better than
to throw stones at an innocent and unoffending dog, had he not been
prevented from doing this by one consideration. He perceived that Ralph
was one of Hiram’s friends. Hiram went often to visit Ralph, and Ralph,
in return, came often to visit Hiram. They used to employ themselves
together in various schemes of amusement, and Bruno, who often stood
by at such times, although he could not understand the conversation
that passed between them, perceived, nevertheless, that they were
good friends. He would not, therefore, do any harm to Ralph, even in
self-defense, for fear of displeasing Hiram. Accordingly, when Ralph
assaulted him with sticks and stones, the only alternative left him was
to run away.
[Sidenote: Hiram catches a squirrel. Ralph wishes to buy the squirrel.]
It is singular enough that Ralph, though often very unreasonable and
selfish in his dealings with other boys, and though in this instance
very cruel to Bruno, was still generally kind to animals. He was very
fond of animals, and used to get as many as he could; and whenever
Hiram had any, he used to go to see them, and he took a great interest
in them. Once Hiram caught a beautiful gray squirrel in a box-trap. He
put the trap down upon a chopping-block in a little room that was used
as a shop in his father’s barn. Ralph came in to see the squirrel. He
kneeled down before the block, and, lifting up the trap a little way,
he peeped in. The squirrel was in the back corner of the trap, crouched
down, and feeling, apparently, very much afraid. He had a long, bushy
tail, which was curled over his back in a very graceful manner. Ralph
resolved to buy this squirrel too, but Hiram was unwilling to sell
him. However, he said that _perhaps_ he would sell him, if Ralph would
wait till the next day. Ralph accordingly waited; but that night the
squirrel gnawed out of his trap, and as the shop window was left open,
he made his escape, and got off into the woods again, where he leaped
back and forth among the branches of the trees, and turned head over
heels again and again in the exuberance of his joy.
[Illustration: The shop.]
[Sidenote: Hiram and Joe go into the woods.]
One day Hiram went out into the woods with a man whom they called Uncle
Joe, to get some stones to mend a wall. They went in a cart. They
placed a board across the cart for a seat. Uncle Joe and Hiram sat
upon this seat together, side by side, Hiram on the right, as he was
going to drive. The tools for digging out the stones, consisting of a
spade, a shovel, a hoe, and a crowbar, were laid in the bottom of the
cart. Thus they rode to the woods. Bruno followed them, trotting along
by the road-side, and now and then running off under the fences and
walls, to see if he could smell the tracks of any wild animals among
the ferns and bushes.
[Sidenote: Bruno barks at something.]
He was not successful in this hunting on his way to the woods, but,
after he arrived there, he accomplished quite a brilliant achievement.
Hiram and Uncle Joe were very busy digging out stones, when their
attention was arrested by a very loud and violent barking. Hiram knew
at once that it was Bruno that was barking, though he could not see
him. The reason why they could not see the dog was, that he was down
in the bottom of a shady glen, that lay near where Hiram and Uncle Joe
were digging the stones.
“What’s that?” said Hiram. “What is Bruno barking at?”
“I don’t know,” said Uncle Joe; “go and see.”
[Sidenote: Bruno finds a fox’s hole.]
So Hiram threw down his hoe, and, seizing a stick, he ran down into the
glen. He found Bruno stationed before a hole, which opened in under
a bank, near a small spring. He seemed very much excited, sometimes
running back and forth before the hole, sometimes digging into it with
his fore paws, and barking all the time in a very loud and earnest
manner. He seemed greatly pleased when he saw Hiram coming.
As soon as Hiram saw that Bruno was barking at a hole, which seemed to
be the hole of some wild animal, he went back and called Uncle Joe to
come and see. Uncle Joe said he thought it was the hole of a fox, and
from the excitement that Bruno manifested, he judged that the fox must
be in it.
“I’ll go and get the tools,” said he, “and we will dig him out.”
[Sidenote: Hiram gets a little fox.]
So Uncle Joe went for the tools, and he and Hiram began to dig. They
dug for more than half an hour. Finally they came to the end of the
hole, and then they found a young fox crouching close into a corner. He
was about as large as a small kitten.
[Sidenote: His plans for him. Hiram gives his fox a hole to live in.]
Hiram said he meant to carry the fox home, and bring him up, and tame
him. He accordingly took him in his arms, and carried him back to the
place where they had been digging stones. Uncle Joe carried back the
tools. Bruno jumped about and barked a great deal by the side of Hiram,
but Hiram ordered him to be quiet, and finally he learned that the
little fox was not to be killed. When they reached the stone quarry,
Hiram made a small pen for the fox. He made it of four square stones,
which he placed together so as to inclose a small space, and then he
covered this space by means of a flat stone which he placed over it.
Thus the little prisoner was secured.
When the pen was completed, and the fox put in, Hiram resumed his work
of digging stones with Uncle Joe. He was very eager now to get the load
completed as soon as possible, so as to go home with his fox. While he
was at work thus, Bruno crouched down before the place where Hiram had
shut up his fox, and watched very earnestly. He understood that Hiram
wished to keep the fox, and therefore he had no intention of hurting
him. He only meant to be all ready to give the alarm, in case the
little prisoner should attempt to get away.
Hiram had very good success in training and taming his fox. Ralph and
Eddy came often to see him, and they sometimes helped Hiram to feed
him, and to take care of him. There was a place by an old wall behind
the house where Hiram lived where there was a hole, which seemed to
lead under ground, from a sort of angle between two large stones.
“I’ll let him have that hole for his house,” said Hiram. “I don’t know
how deep it is; but if it is not deep enough for him, he must dig it
deeper.”
[Sidenote: The chain.]
Ralph had a small collar which was made for a dog’s collar; and one
day, when he felt more good-natured than usual, and had in some measure
forgotten Hiram’s refusal to sell Bruno to him, he offered to lend
Hiram this collar to put around Foxy’s neck.
“Then,” said Ralph, “you can get a long chain, and chain Foxy to a
stake close to the mouth of his hole. And so the chain will allow him
to go in and out of his hole, and to play about around it, and yet it
will prevent his running away.”
Hiram liked this plan very much. So Ralph brought the collar, and the
boys put it upon Foxy’s neck. Hiram also found a kind of chain at a
hardware store in the village, which he thought would be suitable to
his purpose, and he bought two yards of it. This length of chain,
when Foxy was fastened with it, gave him a very considerable degree
of liberty, and, at the same time, prevented him from running away.
He could go into his hole, where he was entirely out of sight, or he
could come out and play in the grass, and under the lilac bushes that
were about his hole, and eat the food which Hiram brought out for him
there. Sometimes, too, he would climb up to the top of the wall, and
lie there an hour at a time, asleep. If, however, on such occasions,
he heard any one coming, he would run down the rocks that formed the
wall, and disappear in his hole in an instant, and he would not come
out again until he was quite confident that the danger had gone by.
[Sidenote: The cunning of the fox.]
It is not very difficult to tame a fox. And yet, in his natural state,
he is very wild and very cunning. He resorts to all sorts of maneuvers
and contrivances to entrap such animals as he likes for food. On the
adjoining page is the picture of a fox lying in wait to catch some
rabbits which he sees playing in a neighboring field. He watches for
them very slyly; and when they come near enough, he will spring upon
them, and seize them entirely unawares.
[Illustration: Picture of a fox lying in wait for some rabbits.]
He is very cunning, and yet, if he is caught young, it is not difficult
to tame him.
[Sidenote: Ralph offers half a dollar for Hiram’s fox.]
One day, after some time, Ralph took it into his head to buy Foxy, as
he had tried to buy Bruno; but he found Hiram as little disposed to
sell the one as the other.
“I will give you half a dollar for him,” said Ralph, “and that is twice
as much as he is worth: a full grown fox is not worth more than that.”
Ralph had some money in small silver pieces and cents, amounting to
about half a dollar. This treasure he kept in a tin moneybox, shaped
like a house, with a place to drop money in down the chimney.
“No,” said Ralph, “I would rather not sell him.”
Ralph tried a long time to persuade Hiram to sell the fox, but Hiram
persisted firmly in his refusal. At length Ralph became very
angry with him, because he would not consent. This was extremely
unreasonable. Has not a boy a right to do as he pleases about selling
or keeping his own property?
Most certainly he has; and yet nothing is more common than for both men
and boys to be angry with their friends and neighbors for not being
willing to sell them property which they wish to buy.
[Sidenote: “Ralph, are you stoning Bruno?”]
When Ralph found that Hiram could not be induced to sell Foxy, he went
off in great anger, muttering and threatening as he went. He passed out
through the gate at the bottom of the garden, and then walked along
the path toward the gate which led to his own garden. As he was going
in, he saw Bruno lying down upon a grassy bank near the stream. He
immediately began to take up stones to stone him. The first stone which
he threw struck Bruno on the back, as he lay upon the grass, and hurt
him very much. Bruno sprang up and ran away, barking and making other
outcries indicative of pain and terror. Hiram came running down to the
garden to see what was the matter. When he reached the place, he saw
Ralph just aiming another stone.
“Ralph!” exclaimed Hiram, greatly astonished, “are you stoning Bruno?”
“Yes,” said Ralph; “I’ve stoned him a great many times before, and I’ll
stone him again the next time I catch him down here.”
[Sidenote: Bruno’s escape.]
By this time Bruno had come to the gate. He scrambled in through his
hole, and then, thinking that he was now safe, he walked along up one
of the alleys of the garden.
Hiram, knowing well that it would do no good to remonstrate with Ralph
while he was in such a state of mind, shut the gate of the garden, and
went to the house.
[Sidenote: Ralph resolves to reclaim his collar.]
That evening, while Hiram was in the house eating his supper, Ralph
came down out of his own garden, and went into Hiram’s. He was talking
to himself as he walked along.
“I am going to get my collar,” said he. “I won’t lend it to such a
fellow any longer. I shall take it off the fox’s neck, and carry it
home. I don’t care if the fox does get away.”
[Sidenote: He does so.]
When he approached the old wall, the fox was on the top of it; but, on
hearing Ralph coming, he ran down, and went into his hole. As soon as
Ralph reached the place, he pulled the fox out roughly by the chain,
saying,
“Come out here, you red-headed son of a thief, and give me my collar.”
So saying, he pulled the fox out, and unhooked the chain from the
collar. He unfastened the collar, and took it off from the fox’s neck.
He then threw the fox himself carelessly into the grass, and walked
away down the garden.
Just at this time Hiram came out from his supper, and, seeing Ralph
walking away, he apprehended something wrong, and he accordingly
hastened on to see if his fox was safe. To his great surprise and
grief, he saw the chain lying on the ground, detached and useless. The
fox was gone.
He immediately called out to Ralph to ask an explanation.
“Ralph,” said he, “where is my fox?”
“_I_ haven’t got your fox,” said Ralph.
“Where is he, then?” asked Hiram.
“Gone off into the woods, I suppose,” said Ralph.
Hiram stood still a moment, utterly confounded, and wondering what all
this could mean.
“I came to get my collar,” said Ralph, holding up the collar in his
hand, “and if the fox has gone off, it is not my fault. You ought to
have had a collar of your own.”
[Sidenote: Hiram laments the loss of his fox.]
Hiram was extremely grieved at the thought of having so wanton an
injury inflicted upon him by his neighbor and playmate, and he turned
toward the place where his fox had been kept with tears in his eyes.
He looked all about, but the fox was nowhere to be seen. He then went
slowly back to the house in great sorrow.
As for Ralph, he went back into his own garden in a very unamiable
state of mind. He went up into the loft over the tool-house to put the
collar away. He climbed up upon a bench in order to reach a high shelf
above, and in so doing he knocked down a box of lucifer matches, which
had been left exposed upon a corner of the shelf. He uttered a peevish
exclamation at the occurrence of this accident, and then got down upon
the floor to pick up the matches. He gathered all that he could readily
find upon the floor, and put them in the box, and then put the box back
again upon the shelf. Then he went away into the house.
[Sidenote: Hope.]
About two hours after this, just before dark, Hiram was sitting on the
steps of the door at his father’s house, thinking mournfully of his
loss, when he suddenly heard a very loud barking at the foot of the
garden.
“There!” said he, starting up, greatly excited, “that’s Bruno, and he
has found Foxy, I’ll engage.”
[Sidenote: An alarm. The garden-house on fire.]
So saying, Hiram ran down the garden, and on his way he was surprised
to see a smoke rising from the direction of Ralph’s garden-house.
He did not, however, pay any very particular attention to this
circumstance, as it was very common for Ralph to have fires in the
garden, to burn the dried weeds and the old straw which often collect
in such places. He hastened on in the direction of Bruno’s barking,
quite confident that the dog had found his lost fox, and was barking
for him to come and get him.
Just at this moment he saw Bruno come running to the gate at the
bottom of the garden. He was barking violently, and he seemed very
much excited. As soon as he saw Hiram coming, he ran back again and
disappeared. Hiram hastened on, and, as soon as he got through the
gate into the field, he saw that Bruno was standing at the gate which
led into Ralph’s garden, and running in and out alternately, and
looking eagerly at Hiram, as if he wished him to come. Hiram ran to
the place, and, on looking in, he saw, to his utter consternation,
that the garden-house was on fire. Dense volumes of smoke were pouring
out of the doors and windows, with now and then great flashes of flame
breaking out among them. Bruno, having brought Hiram to the spot,
seemed now desirous of giving the alarm to Ralph; so he ran up toward
the house in which Ralph lived, barking violently all the way.
His effort was successful. In a minute or two he returned, barking as
before, and followed by Ralph. Ralph was greatly terrified when he saw
that the garden-house was on fire. He ran back to the house to call his
mother. She came down to the place in great haste, though she seemed
quite calm and composed. She was a woman of a very quiet disposition,
and was almost always composed and self-possessed. She saw at a glance
that the fire could not be put out. There was no sufficient supply of
water at hand, and besides, if there had been water, she and the two
boys could not have put it on fast enough to extinguish the flames.
[Sidenote: “What shall we do?”]
“Oh dear me! oh dear me!” exclaimed Ralph, in great distress, “what
shall we do? Mother! mother! what shall we do?”
“Nothing at all,” said his mother, quietly. “There is nothing for us to
do but to stand still and see it burn.”
“And there’s my poor robin all burning up!” said Ralph, as he ran to
and fro in great distress. “Oh, I wish there was somebody here to save
my robin!”
[Sidenote: The robin in danger.]
The cage containing the robin was hanging in its place, under the shelf
by the side of the window. The smoke and flame, which came out from the
window and from a door below, passed just over it, and so near as to
envelop and conceal the top of the cage, and it was plain that the poor
bird would soon be suffocated and burned to death, unless some plan
for rescuing it could be devised. When Hiram knew the danger that the
bird was in, his first thought was that he was glad of it. He pitied
the bird very much, but he said to himself that it was good enough for
Ralph to lose it. “He deserves to lose his bird,” thought he, “for
having let my Foxy go.”
This spirit, however, of resentment and retaliation remained but a
moment in Hiram’s mind. When he saw how much interest Bruno seemed
to feel in giving the alarm, and in desiring to have the fire
extinguished, he said to himself, “Bruno forgives him, and why should
not I? I will save the bird for him, if it is possible, even if I get
scorched in doing it.”
[Sidenote: Hiram rescues the robin by means of the ladder.]
He accordingly ran round to the back side of the garden-house to get
the ladder. Bruno followed him, watching him very eagerly to see what
he was going to do. Hiram brought the ladder forward, and planted it
against the garden-house, a little beyond the place where the cage, was
hanging. In the mean time, Ralph had run off to the house to get a pail
of water, vainly imagining that he could do at least something with it
toward extinguishing the flames and rescuing the bird. By the time he
got back, Hiram had placed the ladder, and was just going up, amid the
smoke and sparks, to get the cage.[5] Bruno stood by at the foot of the
ladder, looking up eagerly to Hiram, and watching as if he were going
to take the cage as soon as it came down.
[5] See Frontispiece.
Hiram had to stop once or twice in going up the ladder to get breath,
for the wind blew the smoke and sparks over him so much at intervals as
almost to suffocate him. He, however, persevered, and finally succeeded
in reaching the cage. He took it off from its fastening, and brought
it down the ladder. When he reached the ground, Bruno took it from his
hand by means of the ring at the top, and ran off with it away from the
fire. He then placed it carefully upon the ground, and began leaping
around it, wagging his tail, and manifesting every other indication of
excitement and delight.
Ralph was very much pleased, too, to find that his robin was safe. He
took the cage, and, carrying it away, set it down at a still greater
distance from the fire. The garden-house was burned to the ground.
Hiram and Bruno waited there until the fire was almost out, and then
they went home. Hiram experienced a feeling of great satisfaction and
pleasure at the thought that he had been able to save Ralph’s bird. “I
should have been sorry,” said he to himself, “if he had lost his bird,
and I think, too, that he will be sorry now that he let my little Foxy
go.”
The next morning, after breakfast, Hiram concluded that he would go
round into Ralph’s garden, and look at the ruins of the fire. He passed
out through the gate at the bottom of his father’s garden, and then
turned into the path leading to the other gate, and there, to his
surprise, he saw Ralph sitting on a stone, feeding Bruno with a piece
of meat. It was a piece which he had saved from his own breakfast for
the purpose. Bruno was eating the meat with an appearance of great
satisfaction, while Ralph sat by, patting him on the head.
[Sidenote: “Hiram, I am giving Bruno some breakfast.”]
“Hiram,” said Ralph, as soon as he saw Hiram coming, “I am giving Bruno
some breakfast.”
Bruno looked up toward Hiram and wagged his tail.
“That’s right,” said Hiram. “He seems to like it very much.”
“Hiram,” said Ralph, again.
“What?” said Hiram.
Ralph hesitated. He seemed to have something on his mind, and not to
know exactly how to express it.
“How is the robin this morning? Did he get stifled any by the smoke?”
[Sidenote: Restitution. Ralph proposes to get another fox for Hiram.]
“No,” said Ralph; “he is as bright as a lark.” Then, after a moment’s
pause, he added, “I am sorry I let your Foxy get away. I suppose I
ought to pay you for him; and, if I could get another fox for you, I
would. I have not got any thing but just my bird. I’ll give you him.”
To find Ralph taking this view of the subject was something so new and
strange to Hiram, that at first he did not know what to say.
“No,” he replied, at length, “I would rather not take your bird, though
I am very sorry that Foxy has got away. If you had only told me that
you wanted your collar, I would have taken it off, and fastened Foxy
with something else.”
Ralph hung his head and had nothing to say.
The boys went soon after this to look at the bed of ashes and embers
that marked the spot where the garden-house had stood, and then they
sauntered together slowly back into Hiram’s garden. Bruno followed
them. He seemed to understand that a great change had somehow or other
taken place in Ralph’s disposition of mind toward him, and he was no
longer afraid. The boys went together to the place where Foxy had been
confined.
“John Thomas hunts foxes sometimes with his father,” said Ralph. “There
are a great many in the woods back of their farm. I am going to see if
I can’t get him to catch you another young one. I shall tell him I will
give him half a dollar if he will get one, and that is all the money I
have got.”
Hiram did not reply to this suggestion. He did not know exactly what to
say. His thought was, that no other fox that could possibly be found
would supply the place, in his view, of the one that he had lost. He
had taken so much pains to teach that one, and to tame him, that he had
become quite attached to him individually, and he was very sure that he
should never like any other one so well. He did not, however, like to
say this to Ralph, for he perceived that Ralph was very much troubled
about what he had done, and was quite anxious to make some reparation,
and he thought that it would trouble him still more to learn that all
reparation was wholly out of his power.
“And if he catches one for you,” continued Ralph, “then I’ll give you
the collar for your own. I would give it to you now, if it would do you
any good.”
“I’ll take the chain off, at any rate,” said Hiram, “and carry it in,
and keep it, in case I ever should have another fox.”
[Sidenote: Foxy found.]
So he stooped down, and began to unhook the chain from the stake to
which it was fastened. As he did this, his face was brought down pretty
near to the hole under the wall, and, looking in there, his attention
was attracted to two bright, shining spots there, that looked like the
eyes of an animal.
[Sidenote: “Run and get the collar.”]
“Hi--yi,” said he, suddenly, “I verily believe he is here now. Run and
get the collar.”
Ralph took a peep, first, into the hole, and then ran for the collar.
When he came back, he found Hiram sitting down on the grass, with the
fox in his arms. The truth was, that the fox had been treated so kindly
since he had been in Hiram’s keeping, and he had become so accustomed
to his hole under the wall, that he did not wish to go away. When he
found himself at liberty by the removal of the collar, he had gone off
a little in the grass and among the bushes, but, when night came on,
he had returned as usual to his hole; and when he heard the voices of
the boys at the wall in the morning, he supposed that Hiram had come to
give him his breakfast, and he came accordingly out to the mouth of his
hole to see if his supposition were correct. He submitted to have his
collar put on very readily.
Thus there was a general reconciliation all round, and Bruno, Foxy,
Hiram, and Ralph became, all four of them, very excellent friends.
Be not overcome of evil, but overcome evil with good.
This story reminds me of another one relating to the burning of a small
building in the bottom of a garden, called a tool-house. I will here
relate that story, and then tell more about Bruno. It will be seen that
this tool-house took fire in a very singular way. Precisely how Ralph’s
garden-house took fire never was known. It was probably in some way
connected with the matches which Ralph left upon the floor. Whether
he stepped upon one of them, and thus ignited it, and left it slowly
burning--or whether some mouse came by, and set one of them on fire by
gnawing upon it--or whether one of the matches got into a crack of the
floor, and was then inflamed by getting pinched there by some springing
or working of the boards, produced by the gardener’s walking over the
floor or wheeling the wheelbarrow in--whether, in fine, the mischief
originated in either of these ways, or in some other wholly unknown,
could never be ascertained.
At all events, however--and this is the conclusion of the story--the
garden-house was soon rebuilt, and Ralph was effectually cured of his
resentment and enmity by the noble and magnanimous spirit which Hiram
and Bruno exhibited in saving his bird.
_Be not overcome of evil, but overcome evil with good._
Three times I have put this precept in the story, in order that you may
be sure to remember it.
THE BURNING OF THE TOOL-HOUSE.
When one has committed a fault, to acknowledge it frankly, and to bear
the consequences of it one’s self submissively, is magnanimous and
noble. On the contrary, to resort to cunning tricks to conceal it, and
especially to attempt to throw the blame of it upon others who are
innocent, is mean and contemptible.
[Sidenote: Description of the tool-house. Thomas, the gardener.]
Once there were two boys, named William and John, who had a building
for a tool-house and work-shop at the bottom of their father’s garden.
It was very similar in its situation to the one described in the last
story. The building was at a place where the land descended, so that
while it was only one story high on the front side toward the garden,
it was two stories high on the other side toward a brook, which ran
along near the lower garden fence. The upper part of the building was
the tool-room. This room opened out upon one of the alleys of the
garden. The lower part was the shop. The door leading into the shop
was behind. There was a fire-place in the shop, and the chimney passed
up, of course, through the tool-room; but there was no fire-place in
the tool-room, for there never was any occasion to make a fire there.
The only use of that room was, that Thomas, the old gardener, used to
keep his spades, and rakes, and hoes, and other garden tools in it;
and sometimes of a summer evening, when his work was done, he used
to sit at the door of it and smoke his pipe. The building was very
convenient, though it was small, and old, and so not of much value.
In the winter, the boys were accustomed occasionally to have a fire in
the work-shop below, when they were at work there. There was not much
danger in this, for the floor of the room was of stone.
[Sidenote: Sealing the packages.]
In the summer, of course, they never required a fire, except when they
wished to use the glue. Then they were accustomed to make a small
fire to dissolve the glue. One summer morning, however, they wanted a
candle. They had been collecting garden seeds, and they wished to seal
them up in small packages with sealing-wax. It would have been better,
perhaps, to have tied the parcels up with twine; but the boys took a
fancy to using sealing-wax, for the sake of the interest and pleasure
which they expected to find in the work of sealing. So, just before
noon, when they had got their seeds all ready, William went up to the
house, and his mother gave him a long candle.
When William came into the shop, John accosted him, saying,
[Sidenote: The boys have no candlestick.]
“Why, William, you have not brought any candlestick. What shall we do
for a candlestick?”
“I forgot that,” said William.
“Never mind,” said John; “we can make one with a block and three nails.”
There is a way of making a candlestick in a shop, which consists of
driving three nails into a small block of wood, at such a distance
apart as to leave just space for the end of the candle between them.
If the nails are driven into the block in a proper manner, and if the
heads of the nails are not too large, this contrivance makes quite a
good candlestick.
Another way is to take a similar block of wood, and bore a hole in the
top of it just large enough to receive the end of the candle, and just
deep enough to hold it firmly.
William proposed that they should make the candlestick by boring a
hole, but John thought it was best to do it by means of nails.
[Sidenote: The two candlesticks.]
So they concluded to make two. John was to make one with nails, and
William one with the borer. So they both began to look about among
the shavings under the bench for blocks, and when they found two that
seemed to answer their purpose, William went to a drawer, and selected
a borer of the proper size, while John began to choose nails with small
heads out of a nail-box which was upon the bench for his operation.
In due time the candlesticks were both finished. The one which William
had made was really the best; but John insisted that the one which he
had made was the best, and so William, who was a very good-natured boy,
gave up the point. The candle was put into John’s candlestick, and
William put his away upon a shelf, to be used, perhaps, on some future
occasion. The boys then lighted the candle by means of a match, and put
it on the end of the work-bench where they were going to do the work of
putting up their seeds.
[Sidenote: The boys leave the candle burning.]
It was now, however, about noon, which was the hour for the boys to
go home to dinner. They arranged their seeds a little upon the bench,
but did not have time to begin to seal them up before they heard the
dinner-bell ring. They then left their work, and went up to the house.
Unfortunately, they left the candle burning. As it was bright daylight,
and especially as the sun shone in near where the candle stood, the
flame was very faint to the view; in fact, it was almost entirely
invisible, and the boys, when they looked around the shop just before
they left it, did not observe it at all.
After dinner, the boys concluded that they would go a fishing that
afternoon, and not finish putting up their seeds until the following
day.
[Sidenote: The matting. The pipe.]
While they were gone, the candle was burning all the time, the flame
gradually descending as the combustion went on, until, about tea-time,
it reached the block of wood. It did not set the wood on fire, but
the wick fell over, when the flame reached the wood, and communicated
the fire to a roll of matting which lay upon the bench behind it. The
matting had been used to wrap up plants in, and was damp; so it burned
very slowly. About this time, Thomas, the old gardener, came and sat
down in the doorway of the tool-house above, smoking his pipe. He did
not know, however, what mischief was brewing in the room below; and so,
when it began to grow dark, he knocked the ashes out of his pipe upon
the ground of the garden, shut the tool-room door, and went home.
[Sidenote: Fire! fire!]
That night, about midnight, the boys were suddenly awakened and
dreadfully terrified by a cry of fire, and, on opening their eyes, they
perceived a strong light gleaming into the windows of their bed-room.
They sprang up, and saw that the tool-house was all on fire. The people
of the house dressed themselves as quick as possible, and hastened to
the spot, and some of the neighbors came too. It was, however, too
late to extinguish the fire. The building and all the tools which it
contained, both in the tool-room and in the shop, and all the seeds
that the boys had collected were entirely consumed.
Nobody could imagine how the building took fire. Some said it must
have been set on fire by malicious persons. Others thought that old
Thomas must have been unconsciously the author of the mischief, with
his pipe. Nothing certain, however, could be ascertained at that time,
and so the company separated, determining to have the matter more fully
investigated the following morning.
William and John, who had dressed themselves when the alarm was first
given, and had gone to the fire, now went back to their room, and went
to bed again.
[Sidenote: What was the origin of the fire? A conversation.]
After they had been in bed some time, and each thought that the other
must be asleep, William said to John,
“John!”
“What?” said John.
“Are you asleep?” asked William.
“No,” said John.
“I will tell you how I think the tool-house got on fire,” said William.
“How?” asked John.
“Why, I believe we left our candle burning there,” replied William.
“Yes,” said John, “I thought of that myself.”
Here there was a little pause.
Presently John said,
“I don’t suppose that they will know that our candle set it on fire.”
“No,” said William, “unless we tell them.”
[Sidenote: The conversation continued.]
“They will suppose, I expect,” added John, “that Thomas set it on fire
with his pipe.”
“Yes,” said William, “perhaps they will.”
Here there was another pause.
[Sidenote: The boys hesitate.]
“Unless,” continued John, after reflecting on the subject a little
while in silence, “unless mother should remember that she gave us the
candle, and ask us about it.”
“We could say,” he added again, “that we did not go into the shop any
time in the afternoon or evening. That would be true.”
“Yes,” said William. “We did not go into it at all after we went home
to dinner.”
The boys remained silent a few minutes after this, when John, who felt
still quite uneasy in mind on the subject, said again,
“I expect that father would be very much displeased with us if he knew
that we set the tool-house on fire, for it has burned up all his tools.”
“Yes,” said William.
“And I suppose he would punish us in some way or other,” added John.
“Yes,” said William, “I think it very likely that he would.”
“But then, John,” continued William, “I don’t think it would be right
to let Thomas bear the blame of setting the tool-house on fire, when we
are the ones that did it.”
John was silent.
“I think we had better go and tell father all about it the first thing
to-morrow morning.”
“We shall get punished if we do,” said John.
“Well,” said William, “I don’t care. I had rather be punished than try
to keep it secret. If we try to keep it secret, and let Thomas bear the
blame, we shall be miserable about it for a long time, and feel guilty
or ashamed whenever we meet father or Thomas. I had rather be punished
at once and have it done with.”
[Sidenote: “Let us tell father.”]
“Well,” said John, “let us tell father. We will tell him the first
thing to-morrow morning.”
The affair being thus arranged, the boys ceased talking about it,
and shut up their eyes to go to sleep. After a few minutes, however,
William spoke to his brother again.
“John,” said he, “I think I could go to sleep better if I should go and
tell father now all about it. I don’t suppose that he is asleep yet.”
“Well,” said John, “go and tell him.”
So William got up out of his bed, and went to the door of his father’s
room. He knocked at the door, and his father said “Come in.” William
opened the door. His father was in bed, and there was no light in the
room, except a dim night-lamp that was burning on a table.
[Sidenote: The explanation.]
“Father,” said William, “I came to tell you that I suppose I know how
our tool-house caught on fire.”
“How was it?” asked his father.
“Why, John and I had a candle there before dinner, and I believe we
left it burning; and so I suppose that, when it burned down, it set the
bench on fire.”
“That could not have been the way,” said his father, “for, when it got
down to the candlestick, it would go out.”
“But there was not any candlestick,” said William, “only a wooden one,
which we made out of a block and three nails.”
“Oh! that was the way, was it?” said his father. “Indeed!”
Here there was a short pause. William waited to hear what his father
would say next.
“Well, William,” said his father, at length, “you are a very good boy
to come and tell me. Now go back to your bed, and go to sleep. We will
see all about it in the morning.”
So William went out; but, just as he was shutting the door, his father
called to him again.
“William!” said he.
“What, sir?” said William.
“Get up as early as you can to-morrow morning, and go to Thomas’s, and
tell him how it was. He thinks that he must have set the tool-house on
fire, and he is quite troubled about it.”
“Yes, sir, I will,” said William.
Then he went back to his room, and reported to John what he had done,
and what his father had said. The boys were both very much relieved in
mind from having made their confession.
“I am very glad I told him,” said William; “and now I only wish I could
tell Thomas about it without waiting till morning.”
“So do I,” said John.
“But we can’t,” said William, “so now we will go to sleep. But we will
get up, and go to his house the first thing in the morning.”
[Sidenote: The boys get up early to explain the accident to Thomas.]
This the boys did. Thomas’s mind was very much relieved when he heard
their story. He went directly into the house to tell his wife, who, as
well as himself, had been very anxious about the origin of the fire.
When he came out, he told the boys that he was very much obliged to
them for coming to tell him about it so early. “In fact,” said he, “I
think it is very generous and noble in you to take the blame of the
fire upon yourselves, instead of letting it rest upon innocent people.
There are very few boys that would have done so.”
[Sidenote: The final result.]
William and John were fortunately disappointed in their expectations
that they would have to suffer some punishment for their fault. In
fact, they were not even reproved. They told their father all about it
at breakfast, and he said that, though it certainly was not a prudent
thing for boys to trust themselves with a wooden candlestick in a shop
full of wood and shavings, still he did not think that they deserved
any particular censure for having made one. “The whole thing was one of
those accidents which will sometimes occur,” said he, “and you need not
think any thing more about it. I will have a new tool-house and shop
built pretty soon, and will make it better than the old one was. And
now, after breakfast, you may go down and rake over the ashes, and see
if you can rake out any of the remains of the garden tools.”
* * * * *
[Sidenote: An important principle.]
It would have been better for the story if it had happened that the
boys, in setting fire to the tool-house, had really been guilty of some
serious fault, for which they were afterward to be punished; for the
nobleness and magnanimity which are displayed in confessing a fault,
are so much the greater when the person confessing occasions himself
suffering by it.
WILLING TO LEARN.
[Sidenote: Bruno was willing to learn.]
Bruno had one excellent quality, which made him a special favorite with
the several boys that owned him at different times. He was _willing to
learn_.
[Sidenote: Boys and girls.]
When you are attempting to teach a dog any new art or accomplishment,
it is a great thing to have him willing to learn. It is the same, in
fact, if it is a girl or a boy that is the pupil. Sometimes, however,
when you are attempting to teach a dog, he shows very plainly all the
time that he does not wish to learn. If you have got him harnessed into
a little carriage, and wish to teach him to draw, he will stop and
seem very unwilling to proceed, and, perhaps, sit right down upon the
ground; or, if he has any chance to do so, he will run off and hide in
the bushes, or, if it is in the house that you are teaching him, in a
corner of the room or under the table. I was taking a walk once on the
margin of a stream, and I met some boys who were attempting to teach
their dog to dive into the water after sticks and such things, and the
dog was so unwilling to make the attempt, that they were obliged every
time to take him up and throw him in.
[Sidenote: A difficult lesson for a dog.]
I have known children to behave just in this way in learning to read or
to write. They come to the work reluctantly, and get away from it as
often and as quick as they can. But it was not so with Bruno. He was
glad to learn any thing that the boys were willing to teach him. A boy
at one time took it into his head to teach him to walk up a flight of
steps backward, and although Bruno could not conceive what possible
advantage it could ever be to him to learn such an accomplishment as
that, still he went to work resolutely to learn it, and though at first
he found it very difficult to do, he soon succeeded in going up very
well.
If any boy who reads this book should make the attempt to teach _his_
dog to go up steps backward, and should find the dog unwilling to
learn, he will know at once how hard it is for his teacher to teach
him to write or to calculate, when he takes no interest in the work
himself. If he then imagines that his dog were as desirous of learning
to go up the steps backward as he is to teach him, and were willing
to try, and thinks how easy it would be in that case to accomplish
the object, he will see how much his own progress in study would be
promoted by his being cordially interested himself in what he is doing.
[Sidenote: The dog that went to market.]
I am always surprised when I find a dog that is willing to learn, and
am still more surprised when I find a child that is not willing. A
dog learns for the benefit of his master, a child learns for his own
benefit. I knew a dog who was taught to go to market. His master would
put the money and a memorandum of the things that were to be bought in
the basket, and the dog would then carry the basket to market by the
handle, which he held in his mouth. Then the market-man would take out
the money and the memorandum, and would put in the things that were
wanted, and the dog would carry them home. Now this was of no advantage
to the dog, except from the honorable satisfaction which he derived
from it in the thought that he was usefully employed, and that he was
considered worthy to sustain important trusts and responsibilities.
So far as his own ease and comfort was concerned, it would have been
better for him never to have learned such an art, and then, instead
of carrying a heavy basket to and fro along the street, he could have
spent his time in basking in the sun, or playing about with other
dogs. There is no necessity for a dog to learn any thing for his own
advantage. Nature teaches him every thing that he requires for himself.
He has to study and learn only for the benefit of his master.
It is very different from this with a child. When a child is in
his earliest infancy, he is the most ignorant and helpless being
imaginable. He can not speak; he can not walk; he can not stand; he
can not even creep along the floor. Then, besides, he _knows_ nothing.
He does not know any of the persons around him; he does not know the
light; he is bewildered, and filled with a stupid kind of wonder when
he looks at it; he does not know how to open and shut his hand, or to
take hold of any thing; and long after this, when he begins to learn
how to take hold of things, he is so ignorant and foolish, that he is
as ready to take hold of a burning candle as any thing else.
[Sidenote: Children learn for their own benefit.]
Of course, to fit such a child to perform the duties of a man in such a
busy world as this, he has a great many things to learn. And what is to
be particularly noticed is, that he must learn every thing himself. His
parents can not learn for him. His parents can _teach_ him--that is,
they can show him how to learn--but they can not learn for him. When
they show him how to learn, if he will not learn, and if they can not
contrive any means to make him, there is an end of it. They can do no
more. He must remain ignorant.
[Illustration: The little child willing to learn to walk.]
Here is a picture of a child that is willing to learn. His name is
Josey. His parents are teaching him to walk. He is just old enough to
learn to walk, and you see by his countenance, although it is turned
somewhat away from us, that he is pleased with the opportunity. He is
glad that he is going to learn to walk, and that his parents are going
to teach him. I do not suppose that he feels _grateful_ to his father
and mother for being willing to take so much pains to teach him, for he
is not old enough for that. But he is _glad_, at any rate, and he is
willing to try.
His mother is helping him to begin, and his father is encouraging him
to step along--holding out his hand, so that Josey may take hold of it
as soon as he gets near enough, and thus save himself from falling.
Since Josey is willing to learn, it gives his father and mother great
pleasure to teach him. Thus all three are happy together.
[Sidenote: Some children unwilling to learn.]
Sometimes a child, when his father and mother wish to teach him to
walk, is _not_ willing to learn. He will not try. He sits down at once
upon the ground, and will not make any effort, like the dog who does
not wish to learn to draw. So far as learning to walk is concerned,
this is of no great consequence, for, as his strength increases, he
will at last learn to walk himself, without any particular teaching.
There are a great many things, however, which it is very important for
children to know, that they never would learn of themselves. These they
must be taught, and taught very patiently and carefully. Reading is one
of those things, and writing is another. Then there is arithmetic, and
all the other studies taught in schools. Some children are sensible
enough to see how important it is that they should learn all these
things, and are not only willing, but are glad to be taught them. Like
Josey, they are pleased, and they try to learn. Others are unwilling to
learn. They are sullen and ill-humored about it. They will not make any
cordial and earnest efforts. The consequence is, that they learn very
little. But then, when they grow up, and find out how much more other
people know and can do than they, they bitterly regret their folly.
[Sidenote: Some are willing.]
Some children, instead of being unwilling to learn what their parents
desire to teach them, are so eager to learn, that they ingeniously
contrive ways and means to teach themselves. I once knew a boy, whose
parents were poor, so that they could not afford to send him to school,
and he went as an apprentice to learn the trade of shoemaking. He knew
how important it was to study arithmetic, but he had no one to teach
him, and, besides that, he had no book, and no slate and pencil. He,
however, contrived to borrow an arithmetic book, and then he procured
a large _shingle_[6] and a piece of chalk, to serve for slate and
pencil. Thus provided, he went to work by himself in the evenings,
ciphering in the chimney-corner by the light of the kitchen fire.
Of course he met with great difficulties, but he persevered, and by
industry and patience, and by such occasional help as he could obtain
from the persons around him, he succeeded, and went regularly through
the book. That boy afterward, when he grew up, became a senator.
[6] A shingle is a broad and thin piece of wood, formed like a
slate, and used for covering roofs. The word is explained here,
because, in some places where this book will go, shingles are
not used.
[Sidenote: Things difficult to learn.]
Some things are very difficult to learn, and children are very often
displeased because their parents and teachers insist on teaching them
such difficult things. But the reason is, that the things that are most
difficult to learn are usually those that are most valuable to know.
[Sidenote: The lawyer and the wood-sawyer.]
Once I was in the country, and I had occasion to go into a lawyer’s
office to get the lawyer to make a writing for me about the sale of
a piece of land. It took the lawyer about half an hour to make the
writing. When it was finished, and I asked him how much I was to pay,
he said one dollar. I expected that it would have been much more than
that. It was worth a great deal more than that to me. So I paid him the
dollar, and went out.
At the door was a laborer sawing wood. He had been sawing there all the
time that I had been in the lawyer’s office. I asked him how long he
had to saw wood to earn a dollar.
“All day,” said he. “I get just a dollar a day.”
[Sidenote: Difference of pay, and reason for it.]
Now some persons might think it strange, that while the lawyer,
sitting quietly in his office by a pleasant fire, and doing such easy
work as writing, could earn a dollar in half an hour, that the laborer
should have to work all day to earn the same sum. But the explanation
of it is, that while the lawyer’s work is very easy to do after you
have learned how to do it, it is very _difficult_ to _learn_. It takes
a great many years of long and patient study to become a good lawyer,
so as to make writings correctly. On the other hand, it is very easy to
learn to saw wood. Any body that has strength enough to saw wood can
learn to do it very well in two or three days. Thus the things that are
the most difficult to learn are, of course, best paid for when they are
learned; and parents wish to provide for their children the means of
living easily and comfortably in future life, by teaching them, while
they are young, a great many difficult things. The foolish children,
however, are often ill-humored and sullen, and will not learn them.
They would rather go and play.
It is very excusable in a dog to evince this reluctance to be taught,
but it is wholly inexcusable in a child.
PANSITA.
This is a true story of a dog named Pansita. They commonly called her
Pannie.
Pansita was a prairie-dog. These prairie-dogs are wild. They live in
Mexico. They burrow in the ground, and it is extremely difficult to
catch them. They are small, but very beautiful.
Pansita belonged to an Indian girl on the western coast of Mexico.
An American, who came into that country from Lima, which is a city in
Peru, saw Pansita.
“What a pretty dog!” said he. “How I should like her for a present to
the American minister’s wife in Lima.”
So he went to the Indian girl, and tried to buy the dog, but the girl
would not sell her. She liked her dog better than any money that he
could give her.
[Sidenote: Pansita bought with gold.]
Then the gentleman took some gold pieces out of his pocket, and showed
them to the mother of the girl.
“See,” said he; “I will give you all these gold pieces if you will sell
me Pansita.”
The Indian woman counted over the gold as the gentleman held it in his
hand, and found that it made eighteen dollars. She said that the girl
should sell Pansita for that money. So she took the dog out of the
girl’s arms, and gave it to the gentleman. The poor girl burst into a
loud cry of grief and alarm at the thought of losing her dog. She threw
the pieces of gold which her mother had put into her hand down upon the
ground, and screamed to the stranger to bring back her dog.
But he would not hear. He put the dog in his pocket, and ran away as
fast as he could run, till he got to his boat, and the sailors rowed
him away.
[Sidenote: She is taken off in a ship. Lima.]
He took the dog in a ship, and carried her to Peru. When he landed,
he wished to send her up to Lima. So he put her in a box. He had made
openings in the box, so that little Pannie might breathe on the way. He
gave the box to a friend of his who was going to Lima, and asked him to
deliver it to the American minister.
[Sidenote: A pretended chronometer.]
He was afraid that the gentleman would not take good care of the box if
he knew that there was only a dog inside, so he pretended that it was a
chronometer, and he marked it, “_This side up, with care_.”
A chronometer is a sort of large watch used at sea. It is a very exact
and a very costly instrument.
He gave the box to his friend, and said, “Will you be kind enough, sir,
to take this chronometer in your lap, and carry it to Lima, and give it
to the American minister there?”
The gentleman said that he would, and he took the box in his lap, and
carried it with great care.
Before long, however, Pansita, not having quite air enough to breathe
inside the box, put her nose out through one of the openings.
“Ah!” said the gentleman, “this is something strange. I never knew a
ship’s chronometer to have a nose before.”
Thus he discovered that it was a dog, and not a chronometer that he was
carrying.
He, however, continued to carry the box very carefully, and when
he arrived at Lima he delivered it safely to the minister, and the
minister gave it to his wife.
[Sidenote: The beauty of the dog. The lady is much pleased.]
The lady was very much pleased to see such a beautiful dog. Its form
was graceful, its eyes full of meaning, and its fur was like brown
silk, very soft, and smooth, and glossy.
[Sidenote: The American flag hoisted.]
By-and-by a revolution broke out in Lima, and there was great confusion
and violence in the streets. The Americans that were there flocked
to the house of the minister for protection. The house was a sort of
castle. It had a court, in the centre, and great iron gates across the
passage-way that formed the entrance. The minister brought soldiers
from the ships to guard his castle, and shut the gates to keep the
people that were fighting in the streets from getting in. He hoisted
the American flag, too, on the corner of the battlements. The Americans
that had fled there for safety were all within the walls, greatly
alarmed.[7]
[7] Such a minister as this is a high public officer of
government, who resides at a foreign capital for the purpose
of attending to the business of his own country there, and of
protecting the citizens in case of danger.
[Sidenote: Danger.]
Pansita, wondering what all the noise and confusion in the streets
could mean, concluded that she would go out and see. So, watching her
opportunity, she slipped through among the soldiers to the passage-way,
and thence out between the bars of the great iron gates. The lady, when
she found that Pansita had gone out, was greatly alarmed.
“She will be killed!” said she. “She will be killed! What can I do to
save her? She will certainly be killed!”
But nothing could be done to save Pansita; for if they had opened the
gates to go out and find her, the people that were fighting in the
streets would have perhaps rushed in, and then they would all have been
killed.
[Sidenote: Pansita is recovered.]
So they had to wait till the fighting was over, and then they went out
to look for Pansita. To their great joy, they found her safe in a house
round the corner.
After a time, the minister and his wife returned to America, and
they brought Pansita with them. They had a house on the North River,
and Pansita lived with them there many years in great splendor and
happiness.
[Sidenote: Pannie’s bed.]
The lady made a bed for Pannie in a basket, with nice and well-made
bed-clothes to cover her when she was asleep. Pannie would get into
this bed at night, but she would always scratch upon it with her claws
before she lay down. This was her instinct.
She was accustomed in her youth, when she was burrowing in the ground
in the prairies in Mexico, to make the place soft where she was going
to lie down by scratching up the earth with her paws, and she continued
the practice now, though, of course, this was not a proper way to beat
up a bed of feathers.
Pannie was a great favorite with all who knew her. She was affectionate
in her disposition, and mild and gentle in her demeanor; and, as is
usually the case with those who possess such a character, she made a
great many friends and no enemies.
[Sidenote: Mistakes.]
By-and-by Pannie grew old and infirm. She became deaf and blind, and
sometimes, when the time came for her to go to bed at night, she would
make a mistake, and get into the wrong basket--a basket that belonged
to another dog. This would make Looly, the dog that the basket belonged
to, very angry. Looly would run about the basket, and whine and moan
until Pansita was taken out and put into her own place.
[Sidenote: Pannie’s death and burial.]
At last Pansita died. They put her body in a little leaden coffin, and
buried it in a very pleasant place between two trees.
This is a true story.
THE DOG’S PETITION.
[Sidenote: Letter-day.]
One day, about the middle of the quarter, in a certain school, what the
boys called Letter-day came. Letter-day was a day in which all the boys
in the school were employed in writing letters.
Each boy, on these occasions, selected some absent friend or
acquaintance, and wrote a letter to him. The letters were written
first on a slate, and then, after being carefully corrected, were
copied neatly on sheets of paper and sent. The writing of these letters
was thus made a regular exercise of the school. It was, in fact, an
exercise in composition.
[Sidenote: Erskine’s conversation with his teacher.]
A boy named Erskine, after taking out his slate, and writing the date
upon the top of it, asked the teacher whom he thought it would be best
for him to write to.
“How would you like to write to your aunt?” asked the teacher.
“Why, _pretty_ well,” said Erskine, rather doubtfully.
“I think it would be doing good to write to her,” said the teacher. “It
will please her very much to have a letter from you.”
“Then I will,” said Erskine. “On the whole, I should like to write to
her very much.”
So Erskine wrote the letter, and, when it had been corrected and
copied, it was sent.
This is the letter. It gives an account of a petition offered by a
dog to his master, begging to be allowed to accompany the boys of the
school on an excursion:
[Sidenote: Erskine’s letter.]
August 2, 1853.
DEAR AUNT,--I hope you have been well since I have heard from
you.
We took an excursion up to Orange Pond, and stayed all day. In
the morning it was very misty, but in about an hour it cleared
up, and the sun came out. Charles and Stephen went over to Mr.
Wingate’s to get a stage, and a lumber-wagon, and a carriage.
There were two horses in the stage, and an old gray one in the
lumber-wagon. Wright and I went down to get William Harmer, a
new scholar, to come up here before we started. At last we all
were ready, Crusoe and all. The teacher bought a little dog in
the vacation, and named him Crusoe. One of the boys wrote a
letter, and tied it about Crusoe’s neck, and this was it:
[Sidenote: The dog’s petition.]
MY VERY DEAR MASTER,--Can I go with the boys to-day on
the excursion? I will be very good, and not bark or
bite. I wish to go very much indeed, and I hope you
will let me.
From your affectionate dog,
Bow-wow-wow.
[Sidenote: Account of an excursion. Diving off the row-boats.
The hot rock. Coming home.]
Soon we started. It was very cool when we left home, but when
we got out on the hills it was very hot. The teacher let us
get out once and get some berries. After a ride of about nine
miles, we got out, and found it a very cool place. The public
house was very near to the pond, and we ran down there as
soon as we got our fishing-poles. Some of the boys got into
an old boat, and got a fish as soon as they cast their poles
out. The man said some of us should go out on an old rock
that was there, and the rest of us in a boat. We had a fine
time fishing, and caught about thirty small fish. Mr. Wingate
went out in another boat, and caught a very large perch and
pickerel, and a few other fish. After we had caught a few
more fish, we became tired, and wanted to go to the shore; so
the teacher took two or three of us at a time, and we went to
the shore. After we had played around a little, we had a nice
dinner, and then we went in swimming. The man said we might
dive off the small row-boats. We had fine fun pulling the boats
along while we were wading in the water, for it was nice and
sandy on the bottom. We found we could wade out to the rock
before named. We all waded out on it; but no sooner had we got
on the top, than we jumped off in all directions, for it was so
hot that one could roast an egg on it. We all ran back to the
shore as fast as we could go, laughing heartily. As soon as we
got up and were dressed, we went up to the house. Mr. Wingate
harnessed up the horses, and we were soon trotting home. We
went around by a different way from the one we came by, through
some woods, and had a fine ride home. That is the end of our
excursion to Orange Pond.
From your affectionate friend,
ERSKINE.
Erskine’s aunt was very much gratified at receiving this letter. She
read it with great interest, and answered it very soon.
THE STORM ON THE LAKE.
[Sidenote: The philosophy of mountains, springs, brooks, and lakes.]
Mountains make storms, storms make rain fall, and the rain that falls
makes springs, brooks, and lakes; thus mountains, storms, brooks, and
lakes go together.
Mountains make storms, and cause the rain to fall by chilling the air
around their summits, and condensing the vapor into rain and into snow.
Around the lower parts of the mountains, where it is pretty warm, the
vapor falls in rain. Around the higher parts, where it is cold, it
falls in snow.
[Sidenote: Formation of rivers.]
Part of the water from the rain soaks into the ground, on the
declivities of the mountains, and comes out again, lower down, in
springs. Another portion flows down the ravines in brooks and torrents,
and these, uniting together, form larger and larger streams, until, at
length, they become great rivers, that flow across wide continents. If
you were to follow up almost any river in the world, you would come to
mountains at last.
It does not always rain among the mountains, but the springs and
streams always flow. The reason of this is, that before the water which
falls in one storm or shower has had time to drain out from the ground
and flow away, another storm comes and renews the supply. If it were to
cease to rain altogether among the mountains, the water that is now in
them would soon be all drained off, and the springs and streams would
all be dry.
But how is it in regard to lakes? How are the lakes formed?
[Sidenote: How lakes are formed.]
This is the way.
When the water, in flowing down in the brooks and streams, comes to a
valley from which it can not run out, it continues to run in and fill
up the valley, until it reaches the level of some place where it _can_
run out. As soon as it reaches that level, the surplus water runs out
at the opening as fast as it comes in from the springs and streams, and
then the lake never rises any higher.
A lake, then, is nothing but a valley full of water.
Of course, there are more valleys among mountains than any where else,
and there, too, there are more streams and springs to fill them. Thus,
among mountains, we generally find a great many lakes.
[Sidenote: Outlets; feeders.]
Since lakes are formed in this way, you would expect, in going around
one, that you would find some streams flowing into it, and _one_ stream
flowing out. This is the case with almost all lakes. The place where
the water flows out of the lake is called the outlet. The streams which
flow into the lake are sometimes called the _feeders_. They feed the
lake, as it were, with water.
[Sidenote: Ponds without outlets.]
Sometimes a lake or pond has no outlet. This is the case when there are
so few streams running into it that all the water that comes can dry up
from the surface of the lake, or soak away into the ground.
Sometimes you will find, among hilly pastures, a small pond, lying in a
hollow, which has not any outlet, or any feeders either. Such a pond as
this is fed either by secret springs beneath the ground, or else by the
water which falls on the slopes around it when it is actually raining.
If you were to take an umbrella, and go to visit such a pond in the
midst of a shower, and were to look down among the grass, you would see
a great many little streams of water flowing down into the pond.
[Sidenote: The way to note the rise and fall of water in a lake.]
Then if, after the shower was over, you were to put up a measure in
the water, and leave it there a few days, or a week, and then visit
it again, you would find that the surface of the water would have
subsided--that is, gone down. As soon as the rain ceases, so that all
fresh supplies of water are cut off, the water already in the pond
begins at once to soak away slowly into the ground, and to evaporate
into the air. Once I knew a boy who was of an inquiring turn of mind,
and who concluded to ascertain precisely what the changes were which
took place in the level of a small pond, which lay in a hollow behind
his father’s garden. So he measured off the inches on a smooth stick,
and marked them, and then he set up the stick in the water of the pond.
Thus he could note exactly how the water should rise or fall. There
came a great shower very soon after he set up his measure, and it
caused the water in the pond to rise three inches. After that it was
dry weather for a long time, and the level of the pond fell four inches
lower than it was when he first put up the measure.
Lakes among the mountains are often very large, and the waves which
rise upon them in sudden tempests of wind and rain sometimes run very
high.
[Sidenote: The storm on the Lake of Gennesaret. Jesus in the ship.]
The Lake of Gennesaret, so often mentioned in the New Testament, was
such a lake, and violent storms of wind and rain rose sometimes very
suddenly upon it. One evening, Jesus and his disciples undertook to
cross this lake in a small vessel. It was very pleasant when they
commenced the voyage, but in the night a sudden storm came on, and the
waves rose so high that they beat into the ship. This was the time that
the disciples came and awoke Jesus, who was asleep in the stern of the
ship when the storm came on, and called upon him to save them. He arose
immediately, and came forward, and rebuked the winds and the sea, and
immediately they became calm.
[Illustration]
The adjoining engraving represents the scene. Jesus has come forward
to the prow, and stands there looking out upon the waves, which seem
ready to overwhelm the vessel. The disciples are greatly terrified. One
of them is kneeling near the place where Jesus stands, and is praying
to God for mercy. The others are behind. They are equally afraid. The
sails have been torn by the wind, and are flying away. Jesus extends
his hand, and says to the winds and waves, “Peace! be still!”
The anchor of the ship is seen in the engraving hanging over the bow.
But the anchor, in such a case as this, is useless. The water is
too deep in the middle of the lake for it to reach the bottom; and,
besides, if it were possible to anchor the vessel in such a place, it
would do more harm than good, for any confining of the ship, in such a
sea, would only help the waves to fill it the sooner.
[Sidenote: Navigation of mountain lakes.]
The people who live on the borders of the lakes that lie among the
mountains often go out upon them in boats. Sometimes they go to fish,
sometimes to make passages to and fro along the lake, when there is no
convenient road by land, and sometimes they go to bring loads of hay or
sheaves of grain home from some field which lies at a distance from the
house, and is near the margin of the water.
[Sidenote: Tempests and storms.]
When a storm arises on the lake after the boat has gone out, the people
who remain at home are often very anxious, fearing that the boats may
have been overwhelmed by the waves. Over the leaf there is a picture
of people watching for the return of a man and boy who have gone out
on the lake. They went out in the middle of the day, and, though it is
now night, they have not returned. The family are anxious about their
safety, for in the middle of the afternoon there was a violent storm of
thunder and lightning, with dreadful gusts of wind and pouring rain.
The storm has now entirely passed away, and the moon, which has just
risen, shines serenely in the sky. Still the boat does not return. The
family fear that it may have foundered in the storm.
[Sidenote: Conversation in Marie’s cottage.]
The family live in a cottage on the margin of the lake. Marie, the wife
of the man and the mother of the boy that went away in the boat, is
very anxious and unhappy.
“Do you think that they are lost?” she said to Orlando.
Orlando was her oldest son.
“Oh no,” replied Orlando. “When the black clouds began to come up in
the sky, and they heard the thunder, they would go to the shore, and
draw up their boat there till the storm was over. And now that the
water is smooth again, and the air calm, I presume they are somewhere
coming home.”
“But how can they find their way home in the darkness of the night?”
said Marie.
“There is a moon to-night,” said Marie’s father. He was an old man, and
he was sitting at this time in the chimney-corner.
“Yes, there is a moon,” replied Marie, “but it is half hidden by the
broken clouds that are still floating in the sky.”
“I will light the lantern,” said Orlando, “and go out, and hold it up
on a high part of the shore. They will then see the light of it, and it
will guide them in.”
[Sidenote: Orlando and Bruno.]
Bruno was lying before the fire while this conversation was going
on. He was listening to it very attentively, though he could not
understand it all. He knew some words, and he learned from the words
which he heard that they were talking about the boat and the water, and
Pierre, the man who was gone. So, when Orlando rose, and went to get
the lantern, Bruno started up too, and followed him. He did not know
whether there would be any thing that he could do, but he wished to be
ready at a moment’s notice, in case there should be any thing.
[Sidenote: Anna and the baby.]
He stood by Orlando’s side, and looked up very eagerly into his face
while he was taking down the lantern, and then went with him out to the
door. The old man went out too. He went down as near as he could get
to the shore of the pond, in order to look off over the water. Orlando
remained nearer the door of the cottage, where the land was higher, and
where he thought the lantern could be better seen. Marie, with her baby
in her arms, and her little daughter, Anna, by her side, came out to
the steps of the door. Bruno took his place by Orlando’s side, ready
to be called upon at any time, if there should be any thing that he
could do, and looking eagerly over the water to see whether he could
not himself make some discoveries.
[Illustration: Watching for the boat.]
He would have liked to have held the lantern, but it would not have
been possible for him to have held it sufficiently high.
Just at this time the moon began to come out from behind the clouds,
and its light was reflected beautifully on the waters of the lake, and
the old man obtained, as he thought, a glimpse of a dark object gliding
slowly along over the surface of the distant water.
[Sidenote: The boat is coming.]
“They are coming!” he exclaimed. “They are coming! I see them coming!”
Bruno saw the boat too, and he soon began to leap about and bark to
express his joy.
* * * * *
[Sidenote: Excellence of Bruno’s behavior.]
Thus Bruno always felt an interest in all that interested his master,
and he stood by ready to help, even when there was nothing for him to
do. It is always a source of great pleasure to a father to observe that
his boy takes an interest in what he is doing, and stands ready to help
him, provided always that he does not interrupt the work by asking
questions. This Bruno never did. He never interrupted work in any way,
and least of all by asking questions.
[Illustration: Play.]
It is far more manly and noble for boys to take an interest, sometimes,
in useful work, than to be wholly absorbed, as some boys are, all the
time in idle play.
TAKING AN INTEREST.
[Sidenote: Important difference between the dog and the horse.]
There is a great difference between the dog and the horse, in respect
to the interest which they take in any work which they have to do. A
horse does not like to work. He never runs to his master to be saddled
when his master wishes to go and take a ride. If he runs either way,
he runs off. If you wish any time to take a ride in a wagon, and you
go into the pasture to find your horse, it is often very hard work to
catch him. He knows that you are going to harness him up, and give
him something to do, and he does not like to do it; so away he goes,
bounding over the pasture, and looking back, first over one shoulder,
and then over the other, to see whether you are pursuing him.
It is very different with the dog. As soon as he sees his master
take down his hat and cane, he jumps up and runs to accompany him.
He desires, above all things, to accompany his master wherever he
goes, that he may protect him, and render him any other service which
occasion may require.
It is true that a dog does not generally like to be harnessed into a
wagon, and draw, but the reason of this probably is, that drawing a
load is not a work that he is by nature fitted for. He is not properly
built for such work. His shoulders are not fitted to receive a collar,
and his feet are not of the right form to take good hold of the ground.
The nature and qualities of the dog fit him for other duties, and these
duties he is always greatly interested in performing. If his master is
a traveler, he is always ready to set out on the journey with him. If
his master stays at home, he is always on the watch about the house,
guarding the premises, and ready to do any thing that he may be called
upon to do. In a word, such duties as he is at all qualified for by his
nature and habits, he is always ready to perform with alacrity and with
hearty good-will.
[Sidenote: Supposed black pony. How valuable such a pony would be.]
What a fine thing it would be for a boy to have a horse of such a
disposition--a little black pony, I will suppose--just large enough
for the boy to harness and drive! Suppose you had such a pony. You
take the bridle, and go out into the pasture for him some day when
you feel inclined to take a ride. As soon as you enter the pasture,
you call him. Immediately on hearing your voice, he runs out of the
thicket where he was lying in the shade, and ascends an eminence near,
so that he can see. He looks all around to find where the voice comes
from, and when he sees you with the bridle in your hand, he immediately
feels proud and happy at the thought of being employed, and he comes
galloping toward you, prancing and capering in a very joyous manner.
As soon as he gets near you, he ceases his prancing, and, walking up to
you, he holds his head down that you may put the bridle on. As soon as
the bridle is buckled, you put the bridle-rein over his neck, and say,
“There! run along, pony!”
So your pony runs along before you, looking back from time to time,
first over one shoulder, and then over the other, not to see whether
you are pursuing him, in order that he may escape, but to be sure that
you are following him, and that he is going the right way. When he gets
to the gate, he waits till you come to open it for him; or, if he has
ingenuity enough to lift up the latch himself, he opens the gate and
goes through, and then waits outside till you come. As soon as you have
gone through the gate, he trots off to the barn. He does not know yet
whether you are going to put the saddle on, or to harness him into your
little wagon. But he is equally ready for either. He looks forward with
great pleasure to the thought of carrying you along over a pleasant
road, cantering merrily up and down the hills; and he resolves that he
will take special care not to stumble or fall with you. Or, if he finds
that you prefer riding in the wagon that day, he thinks how pleasant
it will be to trot along over the road with you, and give you a good
drive. If you stop any where by the way, he waits patiently where you
leave him until you come back again. If he is in the wagon, he stands
very still, lest he should do some damage to the vehicle by moving
about. If he has a saddle on, he walks out to the road-side, perhaps,
to crop the grass a little while he is waiting, but he lifts up his
head now and then to see if you are coming, in order that he may be all
ready to go on again when you wish to go.
It would certainly be a fine thing to have such a pony as that.
[Sidenote: How useful and valuable such a boy would be.]
But for a man, it is a finer thing to have such a _boy_ as that. I
never knew such ponies, but I have often known such boys. They take
a special interest and pleasure in being useful, and especially in
assisting their father and mother in any thing, no matter what it is,
that their father and mother wish to do. They feel proud and happy to
be employed, and come always with a ready alacrity whenever they are
called upon, and to do what they can do with a hearty good-will.
[Sidenote: Georgie at the raising. The way he acted.]
Boys sometimes take an interest of the wrong kind in what their fathers
are doing--that is, an interest which seeks for their own pleasure
and amusement, and not for the furtherance of the work. There was a
farmer, for instance, once, who had two sons, Lawrence and Georgie.
The farmer was building a shed, and when the shed was framed, the
carpenters came one afternoon to raise it. Lawrence was away from home
when the carpenters came, having gone to mill, but Georgie was very
much interested in the raising, and he brought several of the boys
of the neighborhood to see it. With these boys he played about among
the timbers of the frame, running along upon them from end to end, or
jumping over them. He made a great deal of noise in singing to express
his joy, and in calling to his companions.
“Georgie,” said his father, at last, “be still, or I shall send you
away.”
His father should have sent him away at once, instead of threatening to
do so if he was not still.
[Sidenote: Boring.]
Georgie was still after this, for he knew that his father would do as
he said; but he soon found out other means of making trouble besides
noise. He and the other boys went to one of the carpenters, who was
boring a hole, and he began to beg the carpenter to let him take the
auger and bore it.
“I can bore,” said he.
“I see you can,” said the carpenter, “but I wish you would not come
here and bore me.”
The other carpenters who were near laughed at hearing this, and
Georgie, not liking to be laughed at, walked away to another part of
the work. Here he began to ask questions, such as what this beam was
for, and what tenon was going into that mortice, and whether such and
such a hole was not bored wrong. All these questions interrupted the
workmen, confused them in their calculations, and hindered the work. At
last, Georgie’s father told him not to ask any more questions, but to
keep perfectly still.
[Sidenote: He and the other boys make a balancer.]
His father would, in fact, have sent him away entirely, were it not
that he was wanted from time to time to do an errand, or fetch a tool.
These errands, however, he did very slowly and reluctantly, so that
he was of little service. Finally, he proposed to the boys that they
should make a balancer, and they did so. They put up one short beam of
wood upon another, and then, placing a plank across, two of the boys
got on, one at each end, and began see-sawing up and down. This was
their balancer.
“Isn’t it good fun,” said Georgie, as he went up into the air, “to have
a raising?”
“Yes,” said the other boy, who was then down by the ground.
“I hope they won’t get through to-night,” said Georgie, coming down,
“and then we can have some more fun to-morrow.”
[Sidenote: A fall.]
Just then the upper beam, which supported the balancer, fell off, and
the plank, with the boys on it, came to the ground. There was now a
great outcry. Georgie’s father and some of the carpenters came to see
if the boys were hurt. They were not seriously hurt, but the accident
occasioned quite an interruption to the raising.
So Georgie’s father, finding that the trouble which Georgie made him
was greater far than any service that he rendered, sent him away.
Now this is not the right way to take an interest in what your father
or mother is doing.
[Sidenote: Lawrence comes home.]
Lawrence got back from the mill just as Georgie went away. He
immediately came and took Georgie’s place. He stationed himself near
his father, so as to be ready to do any thing which might be required
whenever he should be called upon. He observed carefully every thing
that was done, but he asked no questions. If he saw that a tool was
wanted, or going to be wanted, he brought it, so as to have it all
ready the moment it should be required. Thus, although he could not do
much substantial work himself, he assisted the men who could do it very
much, and rendered very effectual service, so that the raising went on
very prosperously, and was finished that night, greatly to his father’s
satisfaction.
[Sidenote: Conversation at the supper-table.]
At supper that night the farmer took his seat at the table. His wife
sat opposite to him. Lawrence was on one side, and Georgie on the other.
“Have you finished the raising?” said his wife.
“Yes,” said the farmer, “we have finished it. I did not expect to get
through. But we _have_ got through, and it is all owing to Lawrence.”
“Did he help you?” asked his wife.
“Yes,” said the farmer; “he forwarded the work, I think, a full half
hour, and that just saved us.”
Now that is the right kind of interest to take in what your father and
mother are doing.
[Sidenote: Another incident.]
At another time, one night after Georgie and Lawrence had gone to bed,
they heard a sort of thumping sound out in the barn.
“Hark!” said Lawrence; “what is that noise?”
Georgie said he thought it could not be any thing of consequence, and
so he shut up his eyes, and prepared to go to sleep. But Lawrence,
though he was equally sleepy, felt afraid that something might be the
matter with one of the horses; so he got up and went to his father’s
room, and told his father about the noise. His father immediately rose
and dressed himself, and went down to the barn.
“Georgie,” said Lawrence, “let us get up too. Perhaps we can help.”
“Oh no,” said Georgie, sleepily, “there is nothing that _we_ could do.”
“I can hold the lantern, at any rate,” said Lawrence, “and do some
good, perhaps, in that way.” So Lawrence dressed himself and went down
stairs, while Georgie went to sleep again.
[Sidenote: Lawrence takes an interest in his father’s concerns.]
Lawrence got out into the barn just in time to find that the horse had
fallen down, and had got entangled in his halter, so that he was in
danger of choking to death.
“Ah, Lawrence!” said his father, “you are just in time. I want you to
hold the lantern for me.”
So Lawrence took the lantern, and held it while his father disentangled
the halter, and got the horse up. Lawrence, who was much interested all
the time, held the lantern in the best possible way for his father to
see.
“That’s right,” said his father; “hold the lantern so that you can see
yourself, and then you may be sure that I can see.”
That is the right kind of interest for boys to take in what their
father or mother are doing.
That was, in fact, the kind of interest that Bruno took. He was always
on the watch for opportunities to do good, and when he saw that he
could not do any more good, he was extremely careful not to make any
trouble.
[Illustration: Driving the sheep to pasture in the morning.]
[Sidenote: Bruno sits waiting for orders.]
He would stand or sit silently by, looking on and watching what was
going forward with great interest, ready to act the moment that he was
called upon, as you see in the opposite engraving. They are driving
some sheep to pasture very early in the morning. It was dark when they
first came out with the flock, and so they brought a lantern; but the
sun has risen now, and it is light. Although it was very early when the
men set out with the flock, Bruno was eager to come with them. He has
helped to drive the sheep all the way. They have reached the pasture
at last, and there is now nothing more for him to do. So he is sitting
down to rest, and contemplating with great satisfaction, while he
rests, the accomplishment of the work which was to be done, and ready
to do any thing more that may be required without a moment’s delay.
In the distance, in the engraving, a river is seen, meandering through
a rich and beautiful country, with the beams of the morning sun
reflected from the surface of the water.
* * * * *
[Sidenote: A good conscience.]
The satisfaction which results from the faithful performance of duty
is a very solid and substantial pleasure. It endures long, and has no
alloy. There is something manly and noble in the very nature of it, and
he who makes it the end and aim of all his efforts in his search for
happiness is sure of a rich reward.
[Sidenote: They who are not faithful in duty can never be happy.]
Learn from the example of Bruno, then, to find your happiness in the
diligent and faithful performance of duty. “Duty first, and pleasure
afterward,” is the true rule for all. They who seek pleasure first,
or, rather, who look for their happiness in personal and selfish
gratifications, lead a very low and groveling life, and never exemplify
the true nobleness and dignity to which the human soul should aspire.
Nor do they ever attain to any real or permanent happiness. They
experience a continual feeling of self-reproach and self-condemnation
which mars all their enjoyments, and adds a fresh ingredient
of bitterness to all their sorrows. In a word, they are always
dissatisfied with themselves, and he who is dissatisfied with himself
can never be happy.
THE END.
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