They were all very sad, and the girl in the pink frock was crying bitterly, for they had been to the woods, and on the way home the wooden horse had fallen over on one side and broken off his head.
"Don't cry so, pray don't cry so," the little one said, as she knelt down in front of her sister, and tried to kiss her.
"And oh, sister," said the brother, "it would have been far worse if he had lost his tail too. Besides, perhaps he does not mind much; it is not as if he were alive."
"Ah, yes," sobbed the tall girl. "But when you are as old as I am you will know that it is a terrible thing to lose your head, even if it is only wooden."
The children stood under an archway. Behind them was the blue sky; in front of them the clear, still lake that wandered and wound about the garden; above their heads the leaves of a tree whispered and told strange stories to the breeze.
"Poor tree! it is sighing for the blossoms the wind has carried away," they said to each other, and they looked back at the garden. "And, poor flowers, too," they said, "all your bright colours are gone, and your petals lie scattered on the ground; to-morrow they will be dead." "Ah, no," the flowers sighed, "the rainbow-maker will gather them up, and once more they will see the sun." Before the children could answer, a tall fair maiden came down the pathway. They could see her plainly in the twilight. Her eyes were dim with gathering tears, but on her lips there was a smile that came and went and flickered round her mouth. All down her back hung her pale golden hair; round her neck was a kerchief of many colours; her dress was soft and white, and her snowy apron was gathered up in one hand. She looked neither to the right nor to the left. She did not utter a single word; and the children could hear no sound of her footstep, no rustling from her dress. She stooped, and picking up the fading petals, looked at them tenderly for a moment, while the tears fell slowly down her cheeks; but the smile hovered round her mouth; for she knew that they would shine again in the sight of their beloved sun. When her apron was quite full, she turned round and left the garden. Hand-in-hand the children followed. She went slowly on by the side of the lake, far, far away across the meadows and up the farthest hill, until at last she found her home behind a cloud just opposite the sun. There she sat all through the summer days making rainbows. When the children had watched her for a long long time, they went softly back to their own home. The rainbow-maker had not even seen them.
"Mother," they said one day, "we know now where the colours go from the flowers. See, they are there," and as they spoke they thought of the maiden sitting silently at work in her cloud-home. They knew that she was weeping at sending forth her most beautiful one, and yet smiling as she watched the soft archway she had made. "See, they are all there, dear mother," the children repeated, looking at the falling rain and the shining sun, and pointing to the rainbow that spanned the river.
They sat down to eat their porridge. The naughty little girl turned her back upon her sister, and put a large spoonful into her mouth.
"Oh—oh—oh!" she cried, "I have burnt my tongue."
"Eat it slowly," said the good little sister. She took up her porridge carefully, and after blowing it very gently, and waiting for a minute or two while it cooled, ate it, and found it very nice.
"I shall not eat mine until it is quite cold," said Totsey, getting cross.
"Then it will be nasty," said the good little sister, still going on with her own porridge.
"Oh, dear," said Totsey, "if I eat it too hot it burns me, and if I eat it too cold it's nasty. What shall I do?"
"Take it as I do mine," said the good little sister. "It is the right way."
"There are two wrong ways and only one right way; it isn't fair," sighed the naughty little girl. "And, oh! my porridge is so nasty." Then she asked, "Did you ever eat your porridge too hot and burn your tongue?"
"No," answered the good little sister; "I never ate my porridge too hot and burnt my tongue."
"Did you ever eat your porridge when it was quite cold and very nasty?"
"No," answered the good little sister again; "I never ate my porridge when it was quite cold and very nasty."
"Well, I have," said Totsey; "and so I know about two things that you do not know about." And the naughty little sister got up and walked away, and the good little sister sat still and thought about many things.
There was once a very proud boy. He always walked through the village with his eyes turned down and his hands in his pockets. The boys used to stare at him, and say nothing; and when he was out of sight, they breathed freely. So the proud boy was lonely, and would have had no friends out of doors if it had not been for two stray dogs, the green trees, and a flock of geese upon the common.
One day, just by the weaver's cottage, he met the tailor's son. Now the tailor's son made more noise than any other boy in the village, and when he had done anything wrong he stuck to it, and said he didn't care; so the neighbours thought that he was very brave, and would do wonders when he came to be a man, and some of them hoped he would be a great traveller, and stay long in distant lands. When the tailor's son saw the proud boy he danced in front of him, and made faces, and provoked him sorely, until, at last, the proud boy turned round and suddenly boxed the ears of the tailor's son, and threw his hat into the road. The tailor's son was surprised, and, without waiting to pick up his hat, ran away, and sitting down in the carpenter's yard, cried bitterly. After a few minutes, the proud boy came to him and returned him his hat, saying politely—
"There is no dust on it; you deserved to have your ears boxed, but I am sorry I was so rude as to throw your hat on to the road."
"I thought you were proud," said the tailor's son, astonished; "I didn't think you'd say that—I wouldn't."
"Perhaps you are not proud?"
"No, I am not."
"Ah, that makes a difference," said the proud boy, still more politely. "When you are proud, and have done a foolish thing, you make a point of owning it."
"But it takes a lot of courage," said the tailor's son.
"Oh, dear, no," answered the proud boy; "it only takes a lot of cowardice not to;" and then turning his eyes down again, he softly walked away.
All the wood had been blue with violets, but now they were nearly gone. The birds sang louder and louder to keep them and to call them back, but soon there was not a violet left in all the wood from end to end. The snowdrops died, and the primrose faded, the cowslips and blue-bells vanished, the thorn grew white with blossom, the wild honeysuckle filled the wood with its fragrance, and soon the fruit began to ripen.
The blackbirds and the swallows and the chaffinches, and all the birds they knew, gathered round the garden trees and bushes, and forgot the woods, until suddenly one day they espied a little child. She was sitting on a chair under a tree; she had a little table before her and a pink ribbon round her hat; she was eating fruit with a large silver spoon. The birds were afraid, and held aloof until a sparrow chirped and the child looked up, and when they saw how blue her eyes were, they sang out bravely and fluttered round her, thinking that she had brought them news from the violets. But she never looked up again, though the birds crowded on to the branch above her, and perched upon the table, and rubbed their little beaks against her plate. She just held on her hat with one hand, and with the other went on taking up fruit with a silver spoon.
"Ah, dear child," a swallow twittered, "perhaps you do not know what is written in your eyes; so many of us carry secrets that we ourselves know last of all."
The children were very much puzzled what to do, for it was Midsummer-night, and they knew that there was a dream belonging to it; but how to come across it they could not tell. They knew that the dream had something to do with fairies, a queen, and all manner of lovely things; but that was all. At first they thought they would sit up with the doors and windows open, and the dog on the steps ready to bark if he saw anything unusual. Then they felt sure that they could not dream while they were wide-awake, so three of them went to bed, and one dozed in a corner of the porch, with her clothes on. Presently the dog barked, and two children in their night-gowns ran out to see, and one took off her night-cap and looked out of window; but it was only old Nurse coming back from a long gossip with the village blacksmith's wife and mother-in-law. So the dog looked foolish, and Nurse was angry, and put them all to bed without any more ado.
"Oh," they cried, "but the fairies, and the queen, and the flowers! What shall we do to see them?"
"Go to sleep," said Nurse, "and the dream may come to you;—you can't go to a dream," she added, for you see she was just a peasant woman, and had never travelled far, or into any land but her own.
So the children shut their eyes tightly and went to sleep, and I think that they saw something, for their eyes were very bright next morning, and one of them whispered to me, softly, "The queen wore a wreath of flowers last night, dear mother, and, oh, she was very beautiful."
"I don't like you," said he, in a rage.
"You are a naughty boy," said she, crossly.
"I shall never speak to you again."
"I shall never play with you any more."
"I don't care."
"And I don't care."
"I shall tell of you."
"All right. I shall tell of you."
"Nasty mean thing to threaten."
"You threatened first."
"Nasty, disagreeable thing."
"Ugly, unkind boy." Then they turned back to back, and stood sulking. He put his hands into his pockets, and she sucked her finger.
"That's the worst of a girl," thought he; "I shan't give in."
"I can't bear boys," thought she; "and I won't make it up to-day."
"We might have had good fun all this afternoon if she hadn't been so silly," he thought presently.
"It would have been so nice if he hadn't been disagreeable," she thought after a bit. Then he began to fidget and to kick the floor a little with one foot, and she began to cry and to wipe her tears away very softly and quickly, so that he might not see them.
He looked over his shoulder quickly. She saw him, and turned still more quickly away. "I shall go and take a long walk in the woods," he said.
"You don't know where the rabbit-holes are," she answered.
"Yes, I do; I found them out the other day."
"I shall go out with Mary."
"All right."
"And I shall never go into the woods with you any more."
"Very well. I don't care," he said. Then she broke down and sobbed.
"You are a very unkind boy."
"It's all your fault."
"No, it's all yours. You began."
"No, you began."
"You don't like me now," she sobbed.
"Yes, I do."
"You said I was a nasty, disagreeable thing."
"Well, I didn't mean it if I did. You said I was an ugly, unkind boy."
"Oh, but I didn't mean it," she said.
"You know I'm very fond of you."
"All right, then, let's make it up." So he turned round quickly and she turned round slowly, and he put his arms round her waist, and she put her hands up on to his shoulders, and they kissed each other, and hugged each other, and rubbed noses, and laughed.
"Shall we go to the woods?" she asked, doubtfully.
"Yes, come along."
"You said you'd go without me," she pouted.
"Oh, but I shouldn't have liked it a bit."
"And I should have been so unhappy," she said.
"And now we just will have a game," he answered, as hand-in-hand they went off as fast as they could scamper.
It was the most tiresome kite in the world, always wagging its tail, shaking its ears, breaking its string, sitting down on the tops of houses, getting stuck in trees, entangled in hedges, flopping down on ponds, or lying flat on the grass, and refusing to rise higher than a yard from the ground.
I have often sat and thought about that kite, and wondered who its father and mother were. Perhaps they were very poor people, just made of newspaper and little bits of common string knotted together, obliged to fly day and night for a living, and never able to give any time to their children or to bring them up properly. It was pretty, for it had a snow-white face, and pink and white ears; and, with these, no one, let alone a kite, could help being pretty. But though the kite was pretty, it was not good, and it did not prosper; it came to a bad end, oh! a terrible end indeed. It stuck itself on a roof one day, a common red roof with a broken chimney and three tiles missing. It stuck itself there, and it would not move; the children tugged and pulled and coaxed and cried, but still it would not move. At last they fetched a ladder, and had nearly reached it when suddenly the kite started and flew away—right away over the field and over the heath, and over the far far woods, and it never came back again—never—never.
Dear, that is all. But I think sometimes that perhaps beyond the dark pines and the roaring sea the kite is flying still, on and on, farther and farther away, for ever and for ever.
"To-morrow is May-day," the children said; "the birds must call us very early, and we will go to the woods and make a garland." And in the morning, long before the sun had looked over the tops of the houses into the village street, they were far away in the woods.
"I will give them some roses as they come back," the gardener said. "They shall put them among the spring flowers, as a swallow among the thrushes, to show that summer is on its way."
When the children had made their garland and a posy for each one of them, they went singing all down the village street, over the grey stone bridge, beyond the hayricks, and past the houses on the hill-side.
In one of the houses there was a pale little child with a sad, thin face. "Mother," he said, "here are some children with a garland. Will it be summer when they have gone by?" He called after them as they went on, "Come back, oh, come back again!"
"Yes, we will come back," they answered, but they went on their way singing. All through the day he waited for them, but they did not come; and at last, when it was evening, the mother took him up into her arms to carry him to his bed. Suddenly he heard the children singing in the distance. "Oh, mother," he exclaimed, "they are coming;" and he watched till they came up the hill again and stood before him. "But where is your garland?" he asked.
"We gave it to lame Mary, the postman's wife, for she is always longing to see the fields," they answered; "but these roses are for you, dear little boy; they are all for you," and putting them into his hands they went back to the village.
"You are very tired," the child said to the roses; "all your leaves are drooping. Poor roses, perhaps you are lonely away from the garden; but you shall sleep near me, and there is a star rising up in the sky; it will watch us all through the night." Then the child nestled down in his white bed—he and his little warm heart, in which there was love for all things. While he slept the roses looked at his pale little face and sighed, and presently they stole softly on to his cheeks and rested there. The children saw them still there when the summer was over; when the garland was quite dead, and lame Mary longed for the fields no more.
Tommy was sitting on the bench near the end of the lane. By his side was a basin tied up in a cotton handkerchief; in the buttonhole of his coat there was a sprig of sweet-william. The girls from the big house came and stood still in front of him, staring at him rudely, but he did not speak.
"Tommy, are you tired?" they asked.
"Yes," Tommy answered, crossly, "I'm very tired, and father's working in the fields, and I have got to take him his dinner before I go to the fair."
"Why don't the servants take it?"
"Servants!" said Tommy scornfully; "we've no servants. We are not rich people!"
"Wouldn't you like to be rich?" the eldest sister asked, while the two little ones walked slowly round Tommy, looking at the feather in his hat; he had put it there so that he might look smart when he went on to the village.
"No, it's too expensive," said Tommy, shaking his head; "rich people have to buy such a lot of things, and to wear fine clothes, and they can't have dinner in the fields."
"My father has his dinner in a room," said the girl.
"That's because he's rich," answered Tommy, "and people would talk if he didn't; rich people can't do as they like, as poor can."
"And my father lives in a big house," the girl went on, for she was vulgar, and liked to boast.
"Yes, and it takes up a lot of room; my father's got the whole world to live in if he likes; that's better than a house."
"But my father doesn't work," said the girl, scornfully.
"Mine does," said Tommy, proudly. "Rich people can't work," he went on, "so they are obliged to get the poor folk to do it. Why, we have made everything in the world. Oh! it's a fine thing to be poor."
"But suppose all the rich folk died, what would the poor folk do?"
"But suppose all the poor folk died," cried Tommy, "what would the rich folk do? They can sit in carriages, but can't build them, and eat dinners, but can't cook them." And he got up and went his way. "Poor folk ought to be very kind to rich folk, for it's hard to be the like of them," he said to himself as he went along.
There were some children in the north looking at the swallows flying south. "Why are they going away?" the little one asked.
"The summer is over," the elder sister answered, "and if they stayed here they would be starved and die of cold, and so, when the summer goes, they journey south."
"Our mother and sisters are in the south," the little one said, as they looked after the birds. "Dear little swallows, tell mother that we are watching for her!" But they were already flying over the sea. The chilly winds tried to follow, but the swallows flew so swiftly they were not overtaken; they went on, with the summer always before them. They were tired many a time; once they stayed to rest upon the French coast, and once, in the Bay of Biscay, they clung to the rigging of a ship all through the night, but in the morning they went on again.
Far away in the south, two English children were looking from the turret window of an old castle.
"Here are the swallows," they said; "perhaps they have come from England. Dear swallows, have you brought us a message?" they asked.
"It was very cold, we had no time for messages; and we must not lose the track of summer," the swallows twittered, and they flew on till they reached the African shore.
"Poor little swallows," said the English children, as they watched the ship come into port that was to take them back to their own land; "they have to chase the summer and the sun, but we do not mind whether it is summer or winter, for if we only keep our hearts warm, the rest does not matter."
"It is very good of the swallows to come to us," the elder sister said, in the next spring, when she heard their first soft twitter beneath the eaves, "for the summer is in many places, and we are so far from the south."
"Yes, it is very good of them to come," the children answered; "dear little swallows, perhaps they love us!"
Now, this story is quite true. Once upon a time there was a cat called Mr. Puff; he lived in a grand house, quite close to the Turkish Embassy. A lord and a lady and several servants lived with Mr. Puff; he was very kind to them, letting them do in all things as they liked, and never sending them away or keeping the house to himself. One day Mr. Puff, being out in the rain, found a poor little kitten, covered with mud, and crying bitterly: so Mr. Puff took the kitten between his teeth, carried it home, and set it down on the drawing-room hearth-rug. The lord and the lady had the kitten washed, and gave it food, and called it Smut. Then Smut went and sat him down on the lord's writing-table.
When Smut grew to be a cat, but before he was yet a large one, the lord and the lady thought awhile, and spoke, "We have a dear friend," they said, "and he is catless; therefore, if Mr. Puff will agree, we will take Smut to him as a present." And Mr. Puff agreed. So Smut was put into a birdcage, for there was nothing else to serve him for a travelling carriage, and taken to the dear friend's house. The dear friend had a little girl with golden hair, and when she saw Smut, she cried out for joy, and said, "Never before did I see a dicky-bird with a furry coat, a long tail, and little white teeth." But Smut shook his head, as if to say, "I am not a dicky-bird, sweet maid, but only a four-legged cat;" then they opened the birdcage door, and he walked out, waving his tail.
Now, when Smut grew up, his gravity and dignity made all who knew his history wonder, and few could believe that he had once been a dirty kitten, covered with mud, glad to accept the charity of Mr. Puff. When a year had gone, or perhaps even a longer time, there was a great war in Turkey, and terrible battles were fought. Then Smut looked very anxious, and went quite bald, and his coat fell off in little patches; but none could tell why. At last he died, and the little girl wept sorely, and all who had known him grieved and lamented.
And when Smut had been sleeping only a little while beneath the lilac tree, accident revealed that, instead of a lowly foundling, he had been of high degree, for the little vagrant Mr. Puff had found was no less a person than the Turkish Ambassador's coachman's wife's cat's kitten.
She was always called the bad girl, for she had once, when she was very little, put out her tongue at the postman. She lived alone with her grandmother and her three brothers in the cottage beyond the field, and the girls in the village took no notice of her. The bad girl did not mind this, for she was always thinking of the cuckoo clock. The clock stood in one corner of the cottage, and every hour a door opened at the top of its face, and a little cuckoo came out and called its name just the same number of times that the clock ought to have struck, and called it so loudly and in so much haste that the clock was afraid to strike at all. The bad girl was always wondering whether it was worse for the clock to have a cupboard in its forehead, and a bird that was always hopping in and out, or for the poor cuckoo to spend so much time in a dark little prison. "If it could only get away to the woods," she said to herself, "who knows but its voice might grow sweet, and even life itself might come to it!" She thought of the clock so much that her grandmother used to say—
"Ah, lassie, if you would only think of me sometimes!" But the bad girl would answer—
"You are not in prison, granny dear, and you have not even a bee in your bonnet, let alone a bird in your head. Why should I think of you?"
One day, close by the farm, she saw the big girls from the school gathering flowers.
"Give me one," she said; "perhaps the cuckoo would like it." But they all cried, "No, no!" and tried to frighten her away. "They are for the little one's birthday. To-morrow she will be seven years old," they said, "and she is to have a crown of flowers and a cake, and all the afternoon we shall play merry games with her."
"Is she unhappy, that you are taking so much trouble for her?" asked the bad girl.
"Oh, no; she is very happy: but it will be her birthday, and we want to make her happier."
"Why?"
"Because we love her," said one;
"Because she is so little," said another;
"Because she is alive," said a third.
"Are all things that live to be loved and cared for?" the bad girl asked, but they were too busy to listen, so she went on her way thinking; and it seemed as if all things round—the birds, and bees, and the rustling leaves, and the little tender wild flowers, half hidden in the grass—answered, as she went along—
"Yes, they are all to be cared for and made happier, if it be possible."
"The cuckoo clock is not alive," she thought. "Oh, no; it is not alive," the trees answered; "but many things that do not live have voices, and many others are just sign-posts, pointing the way."
"The way! The way to what, and where?"
"We find out for ourselves;—we must all find out for ourselves," the trees sighed and whispered to each other.
As the bad girl entered the cottage, the cuckoo called out its name eleven times, but she did not even look up. She walked straight across to the chair by the fireside, and kneeling down, kissed her granny's hands.