Fanny Fern

“ I am sure black John don’t; he is just as civil as if we were as presentable as a Broadway belle; certainly he is used to it; he is used to seeing ladies emerge from begrimed caterpillar riding-habits into all sorts of gay butterfly paraphernalia; John is charitable; he always suspends his judgment of passengers till the next morning at breakfast; then he knows who is who. If a lady takes diamonds with her coffee, he knows she talks bad grammar, and is not what she would have people think her; he is not surprised to have her find fault with every thing from the omelette to the Indian cake. ”

“ That was why her mamma was troubled at what the nurse had said to her little grieved sorrowful daughter; and that was why, though she felt very sick, she sent for her to try and make her feel happy. Oh, you never will know, any of you, until you have little children of your own, how strong a mother’s love is.
Well, little Katy crept into her mother’s room, and sidled up to the bed, with an eye on the strange woman, Mrs. Smith, as if she feared every moment that she would snatch her up, before she could get to her mother’s bedside. ”

“ But we will not stop to look at them now, we have come to see Lucy, poor little crippled Lucy. There she lies in that cot yonder, next the window, with her little snow-flake of a hand lying outside the white coverlid; she raises her pale face from the pillow, and her eyes grow bright, for she knows that I love and pity her; she can’t move much, for (it will make you feel so bad that I can hardly bear to tell you) she has had her leg cut off, where the cars crushed it. ”

“ Well, you can imagine what sort of a man such a boy would make, when he grew up. When he was twenty, he got married, and brought his wife home to his mother’s to live; his father had been dead many years. Ah, then the poor old lady, his mother, reaped the bitter fruit of the seed she had sown. Tom ordered her round like a servant; sitting with his feet up in a chair, while she limped up-stairs and down to wait upon him. Poor old lady; she saw too late the sad mistake she had made; and how cruel had been her kindness to Tommy. ”

“ I should be sorry to believe that you know how much pain you sometimes give a little girl in this way: perhaps her mother is a widow and has to earn her own living, and can not spare time every morning to go with her daughter to school, or to call for her when school is done; and it pains her very much to have to send the weeping child who is so afraid of you, out alone; and she sighs when she thinks of the time when that child’s father was alive, and they had plenty of money to hire a nurse-maid to see that she did not get run over or troubled on her way. ”

“ One day Lucy went to her mother, and said: “May I have my curls cut off?”
“No,” said her mother, “I should not like to have them cut; I think it would be a great pity, they are so soft, so long, and so even; your head is always full of notions, run away and play.”
Lucy went away, but she kept thinking about her hair, and wishing her mother would let her have it all cut off, and when Lucy once got her heart set on any thing, she never would be satisfied till she got it. ”

“ I will take black Nanny too; but then I am not sure Pat Smith allows colored people in his circus. “Well, if he is such a senseless Pat as that, he may go without three twenty-five cent pieces, that’s all, for Nanny likes a little fun as well as if her skin were whiter; and if Nanny can’t come in, Nelly and I won’t. But Nanny can; Pat is not such a fool. So, come along, Nanny; come along, Nelly; it don’t matter what you wear. Walk a little faster, both of you; we must get a good seat, or we shall lose half the fun. Short people are apt to fare badly in a crowd. Here we are! This a circus! ”

“ Beside, suppose this lady who knows so much about books, should get into difficulty with her servants, and they should all go off and leave her; must her husband go without his dinner because she can not, at a moment’s notice, get more servants to cook for her? how helpless such a woman is—how ashamed she must feel, as her husband puts on his hat and goes to an eating-house to get his dinner. Bessie did not think of all this, but her mother did. ”

“ No little eyes brightened, or rosy lips said, “How nice—how glad I am!” and yet the little group, gathered there around the warm fire, were well fed and well clothed; there would be the usual turkey, and mince-pie, and plum-pudding at the Thanksgiving dinner; but grandpapa would not be there. Grandpapa was “gone!” What was Thanksgiving, without grandpapa’s silver head at the table? Little curly heads would miss the trembling hands of blessing; little ears would listen vainly for the faltering kindly voice; little eyes would watch when the hall door opened, but hear no tottering footstep ”

“ I would that I had never heard of Niagara; I would that I had 53come upon it unawares some glorious morning before Indian girls had peddled moccasins there, or boys, had profaned it by selling pictures and crosses; I would have knelt on that lovely island, and seen God’s majesty in the ceaseless, roaring torrent; God’s smile in the bright rainbow, hung upon the fleecy mist; God’s love in making earth so beautiful, for those who forget to thank Him for it. ”

“ The little Indian papoose did not laugh when Maud said “boo” to it, and touched its dusky chin with her little white forefinger. It looked as solemn as a judge, as it lay there twinkling its beadlike black eyes. Little sociable Maud did not like that; when she played with her spotted kitty, the good-natured kitty always said “purr—purr—purr;” when she went out to see the little frisky, pink, and white pigs, they ran up to the side of the pig-stye and said, “ugh! ugh! ugh!” when she met the old rooster, he halloed out as loud as he could, “cock-a-doodle-do!” the horse said “neigh!” ”

“ But no mother’s clasp could hold little Luly; no mother’s tears could bribe the Death Angel. Rose-red grew the cheek, then white as snow, the little hands grew hot, then icy cold, the soft eye bright, then dim, and she who never grieved us living, grieved us dying. ”

“ All is hurry, skurry; carriages, cab-men, passengers, and baggage. Nelly’s eyes look wonderingly about her, and she keeps close to her mother, for the loud shouts of the men frighten her; now she is safe in the cars—how pale, sleepy, and cross every body looks! ”

“ Now, perhaps you do not know that the servants in the New York hotels set up nearly all night, to wait upon people who stay out late at theaters, and like a nice dainty supper when they get home; and to take care of strangers, too, who arrive late at night; so you can imagine how tired they are, and how soundly they sleep, poor fellows, in the morning. Many of them are most excellent people, who bear without complaint all the hard words they get from those, whose chairs they stand behind, and who consider themselves privileged for that reason to insult and abuse them. ”

“ Greenwood is the great cemetery, or burial-place, of the New Yorkers, on Long Island, and a very lovely place it is, too. I like to see burial-places filled with flowers, and waving trees, and sparkling fountains; I do not like that death should be made a gloomy thing. I do not like that children should lie awake nights in shuddering fear of it. ”

“ You must have come from the country, or you would not stop to look at a crowd in New York. Nothing short of an earthquake ever astonishes a New Yorker. Ah, but this is a very serious matter; a little girl has been run over by the street-cars, and lies there on the pavement, maimed, bleeding, and senseless. Well, she should have been more careful; well, she should not have been playing in the street; well, she should have been at home with her mother. Suppose she had no home which deserved the name? Suppose she had no mother? What is a mother? ”

“ And though He keeps the sun, moon, and stars in their right places, and holds the roaring winds and the great mighty sea in His fists, and makes all the trees and flowers, and birds and beasts, and human beings all over the earth, He is never “so busy” that He can not bend down His ear whenever a little child sobs, or, looking up to Heaven, calls Him “Father.” ”

“ I should like to have counted the great three-cornered nuts he used to empty on the kitchen-table, from his pockets, for Jenny, every time he brought in a pound of tea or sugar. Oh, I can tell you that a good-humored, smiling face, and a voice made musical by a kind heart, are worth all the beautiful Camelia faces that ever peeped from under a green vail. ”

“ Was it wrong for Bessie’s mother to insist upon her going into the kitchen sometimes, and learning how to clean silver, and how to cook and make pies and cakes? was it wrong for her to oblige her to keep her thimble and scissors in her work-basket, instead of on the piazza-floor, and her shawl in the drawer instead of under the bed? ”

“ I like the cricket which chirps the tired farmer to sleep; I like the distant bleat of the lamb, the faint lowing of the cow; I lay my head on Nature’s breast, in her gentler moods, and tell her all my hopes and fears, and am not ashamed of my tears. ”

“ Yes, my children, just so surely as the bright sun shines over your dear little heads, our loving God, who writes down in His book every act of injustice and wrong-doing, even to little children, will, if you only work on with a brave, patient heart, turn all your trials into blessings. ”

“ I could drink milk, you know, mother.”
“But if it didn’t rain the grass would all dry up, and then the cows would give no milk.”
“Well, I don’t know any thing about that. I know I don’t like rain, any how; do you like a rainy day, mother?”
“Yes, very much: it gives me such a nice chance to work; I have nobody to interrupt me. I can do a great deal on a rainy day.”
8“But I have no work, mother.”
“Ah, that is just the trouble: time lies heavy on idle hands; suppose you wind these skeins of silk into nice little balls for my work-basket?” ”

“ A stupid boy who never wants “fun” will never be good for any thing. But it is not “fun” to give pain to the weak, timid, and helpless; it is not fun to play the tyrant. Oh, no, no. It is fun to play ball, and hop-scotch; and it is fun to skate, and slide, and “coast,” as the Boston boys call it (i.e., go down a steep, icy hill on a sled) ; but this steep, icy hill should not be in the street, where horses and carriages are, crossed by other streets, through which people are passing. ”

“ I am too big to drive hoop, and not old enough to wear one; too tall to let my hair loose on my shoulders, and not old enough to fix it up with a comb; I am too large to wear an apron, and I can’t keep my dress clean without one; I have out-grown tucks, and am not allowed to wear flounces; I have to pay full price in the omnibuses, and yet gentlemen, because of my baby-face never pull the strap for me; I have lost my relish for “Mother Goose,” and am not allowed to read love-stories; old men have done giving me sugarplums, and young men have not begun to give me “kisses;” ”

“ It would have been much less trouble to Bessie’s mother had she allowed her to take her own way about these things, instead of trotting up-stairs and down to see what she was about, and how things looked in her room; but Bessie’s mother knew that a woman is always disgusting, no matter how much she knows, or has read, unless she is neat and tidy in her habits, and that she is not worthy the name of a woman, if she can not take proper care of her house, or is too indolent, or slovenly to do it ”

“ Oh, is it not well that God does not feel so toward us, sinners? that He pities us because we are so bad and wicked? and that when every body forsook poor bad Tom, He drew near to him, in the voices of the dear little children, softening his icy heart, as the sun melts the snow? ”

“ I could not tell you all their tormenting tricks, which never kept Horace from working steadily on; or how they got the black, inky, printer’s balls, and rubbed them all over his yellow hair, and played other roguish tricks to torment him; and how he kept steadily on with his work, never getting angry, never noticing their nonsense, till they were forced to let him alone, for it is no fun to keep on trying to plague any body who don’t mind it a bit. ”

“ I believe that the merry laugh of a little child is just as sweet in His ear, as the little prayer it lisps. He loves you all; oh, how much! He likes you to be happy; He made you to be happy as well as good. ”

“ I am no judge of cows, but I think that is a pretty cow. Any lady might be proud of her great, soft brown eyes. I am glad she does not know that one of these days, the butcher will thump her on the head and sell her for beef; I am glad she does not know that the pretty little calf, which frolics by her side, will be eaten for veal, next week. Munch away, old cow, and enjoy the fresh clover while you can; I don’t believe you have any idea what a pretty picture you and your baby calf make, as you stand with your hoofs in that brook and bend your heads to drink. ”

“ What are you afraid of? That solemn flock of geese? those hens and roosters? or that great Newfoundland dog, who looks big enough to swallow you at a mouthful? or that steady old brown cow? A pretty fellow you are to be afraid! you who fell upon poor puss, shook her, and chased her up-stairs and down, and in my lady’s chamber, till her back had a hump as big as any camel’s, and her eyes looked like two great emeralds ”