Golden Moments Read online

sunshine shone through the window of the second house also, andsoftly kissed the rosy cheek of little Winnie, as she lay sleeping inher cot.

  "Get up," said a small voice in her ear: "it is your turn to arrange theschoolroom to-day."

  Winnie jumped out of bed, and was dressed in less than no time; for thegood fairy had set her train to wait on her. Her shoes were placed readyto her feet, her strings did not get into knots, and even her hair wasnot tangled.

  Running down into the schoolroom, and tying on a large apron, she set towork to polish the mahogany cupboard with so good a will that Jack Tar,who stood above it, fairly clapped his hands with glee. Two neat littlemaids swept the floor, and two little men with their tiny brushes tookup the dust. The highest shelf in the book-case was soon mounted by oneof the pygmies, whilst two on the next shelf dusted and handed him thebooks. The carpet-cleaner stretched and nailed down a corner of thedrugget which had been kicked up. The coachman, footman, butler, andbuttons stood in readiness to carry out the orders of Policeman X. Itwas a good thing Policeman X was there; for quite a crowd had collectedto see the work so briskly going on. The three little pygmies climbed upthe rail of a chair to beeswax and polish it. A bookbinder satcross-legged on one corner, arranging the loose leaves of a book; and afat cobbler sat balanced on the rail below, singing, "A stitch in timesaves nine."

  The work was soon done; and when Aunt Susan came into the room shepraised little Winnie, and said the white hen had laid her an egg forbreakfast.

  Now, perhaps, you would like to know the names of the two fairies whoattended the little girls. The good fairy was called Work-with-a-will;the bad fairy, No-will-to-work.

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  HELPING MOTHER.

  It was a lovely summer's day; there was a hot sun with a nice breeze,and Mrs. Jones, who had a heavy wash on her hands, was delighted.

  "I shall get all dried off before night," she exclaimed, as she hung outthe snowy sheets, and the children's shirts and pinafores, which latterlooked rather like doll's clothes as they hung on the line besidefather's great stockings.

  Tommy and Jeannie, of course, were there too, and very busy, as they hadtaken it into their heads to plant all the clothes-pegs they could layhands upon, under the idea that they would soon grow into cabbages!

  "Dear! dear!" exclaimed poor Mrs. Jones, when she turned round, havingfilled the line, and found out what her children had been after. "Didany one ever see such children? I must get them away from the washsomehow. See now, duckies, I'll get you some cherries off the tree, andyou'll play pretty on the bench, and let mother get on with her work,won't you?"

  "Yes, mother, we'll be ever so good," declared Tommy; and Jeannie, whocould not speak plainly, echoed solemnly, "Never good!"

  So Mrs. Jones fetched a ladder and gathered some juicy cherries, and fora long time the children played with them happily enough. First of allTommy kept a jeweller's shop on the old bench, and sold cherry earringsto Jeannie, who tried to fasten the double cherries on to her fat littleears. Then she kept shop, and sold cherry boots to Tommy, and then theygot the doll's perambulator and wheeled the cherries to market, and thenTommy said it was time to eat the cherries, and he divided them fairly,and soon ate his share up. But what a mess he did make of his hands andface! they were stained black with cherry juice. "Never mind!" saidTommy calmly, "I'll soon wipe it all off;" and catching hold of a sheetwhich hung on the line near, he first rubbed himself quite clean, andthen gave Jeannie's hands a rub, too, on this most convenient towel. Nottill he had finished, and the sheet was again flapping in the wind, didthoughtless Tommy reflect on the mischief he had done. But when he sawthe purple stains on the clean sheet he began to cry bitterly, andrunning to his mother, he pulled her round and showed her thecherry-stained sheet.

  "Look, mother! look! But I didn't mean to," he sobbed.

  "Mothers," says an old writer, "should be all patience," and certainlyMrs. Jones needed patience that morning. She did look vexed at first, asshe saw her work undone, but the next minute she was able to say gently,"What a pity, Tommy! You should think a bit, and then you would be ableto help me when I'm busy," and that was all. She took the sheet down andput it once more in the wash-tub.

  Meanwhile Tommy sat quietly sucking his thumb. He always sucked histhumb when he thought, and just now he had a great deal to think of.Mother had said he might help her! That was quite a new idea to Tommy,and he sucked his thumb harder than ever.

  That summer's day marked a turning point in Tommy's life. He thendetermined--little fellow as he was--to help mother, and it waswonderful how soon the thoughtless little pickle grew into a helpfulboy.

  "It seems as if he couldn't do enough for me," Mrs. Jones would declare,with honest pride in her tone; "and Jeannie, she copies Tommy, andbetween them both they'll fetch and carry and run for me till I seem asif I had nothing left for me to do. I'm a lucky woman, that I am!"

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  LITTLE SISTER.

  Sleep, little sister, a sweet, sweet sleep, Dear little sister with eyes so blue, Daylight is dying And shadows are lying,Lying where lately the sunbeams grew!

  The pretty birds, little one, cease to sing, Cosy are they in the mossy nest, Birdies like we, dear, Weary must be, dear,Glad in the gloaming to get to rest!

  The flowers are closing their petals fair, Closing them up till the dawn of day, Then in their beauty, Doing their duty,All will uncurtain their colours gay!

  Sleep, little sister, a sweet, sweet sleep, Dear little sister with eyes so blue, Sleep without fear, love, Sissie is near, love,She will keep watch, and be guard over you!

  E. Oxenford.

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  "LITTLE ME."

  I cannot tell how she came to be called "Little Me." She was a shylittle girl, and almost afraid of her own voice; though to hear herplaying with her brothers you would not have fancied that she was shy.And now they were on their way to the country. There was Emma the nurse,and Miss Brown the governess, Little Me, Tommy, aged seven, and Jack,aged ten. There was first a long journey in a cab, with many boxes; thena long journey in a train very full of people.

  It seemed to Little Me as if that train had been going on all the day,and the sandwiches and milk which nurse had in a little hamper tastedquite warm; and Little Me's legs ached from dangling from a seat toohigh for her feet to reach the ground, and at last she fell asleep.

  She awoke suddenly with a start to find every one turning out of thetrain, and she felt cross and inclined to cry, but there was no time.

  "LITTLE ME."]

  At last all three children, Miss Brown, and nurse were safely packedinto a carriage which was waiting for them. The luggage came behind in acart.

  Little Me was really tired, so nurse put her to sit on a soft rug at thebottom of the carriage. Here she could just see green trees overhead,and the tops of green hedges, and soft white clouds turning to gold andred, as the sun set behind some hills in the far-off distance.

  They reached at last a pretty cottage, with a thatched roof and a whitewall quite covered with red roses. There was a little path of roundstones leading up to the front door, and all the windows had smalldiamond panes.

  A stout old lady, in a spotless white cap with pink ribbons, met them atthe door, and took Little Me in her strong arms and carried her up somenarrow stairs into a bedroom with white curtains to the bed and windows,and white walls.

  After a good wash Little Me felt quite wide-awake, and very hungry, andwas glad to be taken down to tea.

  It _was_ a delightful tea! There were tiny little loaves for each of thechildren, home-made cakes with plenty of plums, and strawberries andcream, and ducks' eggs. These the farmer's wife showed Little Me hadpretty pale green shells, instead of white or brown like the hens' eggs,and Mrs. White promised to show
the children some baby chickens andducklings the next day.

  How Little Me _did_ sleep that night, to be sure! She never heard herfather and mother and Bob, her elder brother, arrive at all; and it waseight o'clock before she woke the next morning, and found they had allgone out and left Me in kind Mrs. White's care. Mrs. White took her tofeed the chickens--such dear little fluffy balls of yellow and white andblack down, and Mrs. White let Little Me feed them out of a saucer, andsome of them jumped over Me's hand, and were most friendly; and thenMrs. White took her to a pretty pond, and showed her a beautiful duckand nine baby ducks, not so fluffy and small as the chickens, but yetvery soft and clean-looking.

  Bob was rather too grown up to play much with Little Me, and Tommyalways played with Jack, so that Little Me spent much of her timewandering about by