Grace Livingston Hill

“ Little Rose blushed all over her pretty face, and after thinking a moment, replied,—
“A dictionary is a book that tells what all words mean.”
“Oh!” sighed the wind, “we must have a dictionary.”
Mr. Fish having made a dash up stream after a fly, now resumed his sedate manner and spoke:
“My friends, a programme says what we will have every day, and a committee are the ones who make it.”
“Then let’s all be committee,” said the buttercup.
[35]
“That’s a very good plan,” said Bachelor. “Now, what shall we have? They always have a prayer meeting first at Chautauqua.” ”

“ We will preach sermons full of God and his works, for we have seen a great many ages, and their story is locked up in us.”
“And the brook shall tell us of books,” said the old wind. “There is good in everything, and we shall try not to feel discouraged the next time we are in a difficulty.” ”

“ Rapidly he dashed on the color, delicate greens and blues blending with the sea-shell pink, and glowing with deep crimson and gold, till the assembled committee fairly held their breaths with delight. The crimson [61] and gold and purple in the west were beginning to fade and mix with soft greys and tender yellows, before the committee thought of returning to their work.
“What a lot of time we have wasted,” said the oldest squirrel; “to-morrow is Sunday, and of course we can’t work then, and now it is time to go home.” ”

“ Why, we know philosophy.”
“I think the forest trees could lecture on philosophy,” said the wind.
“Yes, yes, yes,” they all cried. “The forest trees, for they are very old and have had longer to search for wisdom than we.”
“Very well; three lectures a week on philosophy, by the old forest trees; write it down, please,” cried Bachelor.
The secretary, a scarlet-headed woodpecker, carefully carved it on the trunk of an old tree, and I think you [48] can still find the minutes of that day written in lines of beauty all over the tree. ”

“ Not one word,” chattered a saucy squirrel. “That’s a fish story. As if you could get on dry land and go to lectures.”
“I DON’T BELIEVE IT,” CHATTERED A SAUCY SQUIRREL.
“Oh! very well, you needn’t believe it if you don’t want to,” answered the fish in a hurt tone, “but I heard a man on board the steamer read the [41] programme, and those are the very words he read.”
“If we only had a dictionary,” again sighed the rose.
“Dictionary, dictionary, dic, dic, dictionary,” murmured the brook, thoughtfully.
“A dictionary is absolutely necessary before we can proceed any further,” said the south wind. ”

“ There is fun enough in sense. The world is full of interesting things; and, if they come to a growing child not in discouraging tangles but an easy one at a time, there is fun enough in getting hold [ii] of them. That is the way to grow. Our Little Men and Women helps such growth as that. Beginnings of things made easy by words and pictures; not too easy. The reading habit has got to another stage. ”

“ There is nothing more dreary than chemistry taught as it used to be taught to beginners. There is nothing brighter and fuller of keen delight than chemistry taught as it can be taught to little children even. ”

“ Now will any one venture to say that any particular mother, you for instance, has got to put cooking and sewing before the training of children?
Any mother who really makes up her mind to put her children first can find out how to grow tolerable children at least. ”

“ What, when baby begins to read for herself? Our Little Men and Women is made to go on with. Babyland forms the reading habit. Think of a baby with the reading habit! After a little she picks up the letters and wants to know what they mean. ”

“ Next spring when the snow is gone and the trees are putting forth their leaves, and all looks tender and beautiful, you will see the birds flying back and forth, very busy, carrying travellers and messages; the squirrels will [102] go chattering to their store-houses to see that all is right, and to air the rooms a little; the birds will build many nests, more than they need, and you will wonder why, and will never know that they are summer nests for rent, else you might like to rent one yourself. ”

“ We could make as beautiful music as ever any organ or piano made.”
“But what is it all for?” asked a bright-eyed daisy.
“To teach the people all about the things that the great God has made, [17] and show them how to live to please Him, and how to please Him in the best way,” promptly answered Bachelor.
“There is a great good man at the head of it, and I heard a lady say that God Himself sent him there to take care of Chautauqua for Him, for it is all made to praise God. ”

“ Now that is exactly what nine hundred and ninety-nine in a thousand of us want, if it isn’t dry. And it isn’t dry. Few of those who have the wonderful knowledge of what is going on in the learned world have the gift of popular explanation—the gift of telling of it. ”

“ And they have instruments [14] to play on,—organs and pianos, and violins and harps.”
“How beautiful,” murmured the flowers.
“Tell us more,” said the brook; “tell us more, more, more,—tell, tell, tell!”
“More, more,” said the wind.
“It lasts all summer, so the people who can’t come at one time will come at another, though my cousin said she thought that one day all the people in the world came at once. There must have been something very grand to bring so many that day. There were not enough rooms for visitors to sleep in, and Chautauqua is a large place, the largest I was ever [15] in. ”

“ That is what they call it at Chautauqua when a great many speak about one thing. I heard a man telling his little girl about it on the boat,” said the fish.
And the woodpecker wrote it down.
“What was that other you said?” asked a sharp little chipmunk.
“Missionary Day,” said the fish.
“And what is that?”
“Why, there are home missions and foreign missions,” said the fish. “And they talk about them both. I think they have a day for each, or maybe two or three. Missions are doing good to some one, but I don’t [80] exactly see the difference between home and foreign missions.” ”

“ We must invite all the flowers and birds and brooks and trees all over the world, and they will have to get ready. It will take the flowers the rest of this summer and all of next winter to get their dresses made and packed in their brown travelling seed trunks. ”

“ The proper training of children, for instance, can’t be done without some comprehension of children themselves, of what they ought to grow to, their stages, the means of their guidance, the laws of their health, and manners. ”

“ Once a young man came and bought a very large bunch of them and took them to a young lady in a white dress, and she wore them everywhere for three or four days—you know our family is a very long-lived one, and we are something like the camel, in that we can go a long time without a drink of water—well, she kept them carefully and took them everywhere she went, and they saw and heard a great many new things. One evening this young lady sat in a big place full of people, and an old lady sitting behind her said to another lady, ‘Just see those pink bachelor buttons! ”

“ Cooking and sewing!
Woman’s worst failure then is due to the stupid blunder of putting comparatively trivial things before the most important of all. The result is bad children and waste of a generation or two—all for putting cooking and sewing before the training of children. ”

“ He is the head manager, and will give you all the lectures you want. Good-by! the sun is getting low, and I must be off.” And he sped away, leaving the woodpecker writing down “telegraph” and “lightning” on one corner of his memoranda.
And now the committee returned, having decided, by unanimous vote, [95] that the mocking-bird should be the leader of the choir, as he could sing any part, and so help along the weak ones whenever he could see the need of it.
There was a pause after the committee had been told all that had happened during their absence, broken at last by Bachelor. ”

“ You ought not to risk your health; it is not good to get so out of breath,” said a motherly old robin.
“CLOSE TO A WINDOW WHERE SAT AN OLD LADY.”
“Oh! I have such good news to [65]
[66]
[67] tell you,” cried the little bird as soon as he could speak. “I sat on a bough this morning, close to a window where sat an old lady, who was reading aloud to a sick man, so I stopped to listen. These are the words she read,—‘Sermons in stones, books in running brooks.’ I didn’t hear any more, but came right away to study that. I was so glad I had found something to help us. Two things in one.” ”

“ They always have great sermons at Chautauqua, and I have often heard the passengers on the steamer scolding because the boats did not run on Sunday, for they said the great men always kept their best thoughts for sermons.” This from the fish.
They all paused. “We can’t any of us preach sermons, what shall we do?” questioned a fern.
“I’m sure I don’t know; we might [63] each of us go to church and listen to a sermon and preach it over again,” said a thoughtful bird. ”

“ D. Lothrop Company, Boston.
“I’ll be their teacher—give them private scientific lectures! Trust me to manage the school part!” The book is alive with the secrets of things.
It takes a learned man to write an easy book on almost any subject.
Arthur Gilman, of the College for Women, at Cambridge, known as the “Harvard Annex,” has made a little book to help young people along in the use of the dictionary. One can devour it in an hour or two; but the reading multiplies knowledge and means of knowledge.
Short Stories from the Dictionary. ”

“ We should have to secure reduced rates. They always do on Chautauqua Lake.”
“Oh! as to that,” said the wind, “I and the birds would do the transportation free of charge, and the brook would do all it could, I’m sure.”
“Of course, of course,” babbled the brook.
“That is very kind of you indeed,” said Bachelor. “But I should think that the earliest possible beginning that we could hope to have would be next spring.”
After much impatient arguing on the part of the buttercups and daisies, it was finally agreed that the [30] first meeting of their Chautauqua should be held the following spring. ”

“ I took them out of the window and hid them in a safe place and went back for more, but just as I was turning the leaves over to find evolution, some [46] one came up and shut the window, and I had to crawl out through the cracks. Well, I have all the ‘P’s’ and some of the ‘T’s’; we can find theology and poetry. ”

“ He sends you greetings and many good wishes for the success of your plan, and regrets deeply that he cannot be with you next summer; but he is old, very old, and he has so much to do that he cannot leave even for a day or two. ”

“ D. Lothrop Company, Boston.
An unconscious beginning of what may grow to be philology, if one’s faculty lies that way. Such bits of education are of vastly more importance than most of us know. They are the seeds of learning. ”

“ There are thousands and thousands of children and children of larger growth all over the country who know about Pansy the writer, and The Pansy the magazine. There are thousands and thousands more who will be glad to know. ”