Books: The Junior Classics Volume 8

S >> Selected and arranged by William Patten >> The Junior Classics Volume 8

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28 | 29 | 30

No red man would ever deign to use such an insignificant looking
axe, and so we must suppose it to have been a toy hatchet for some
little fellow that chopped away at saplings, or, perhaps knocked
over some poor squirrel or rabbit; for our good old Moravian
friend, the missionary, also tells us that "the boys learn to climb
trees when very young, both to catch birds and to exercise their
sight, which by this method is rendered so quick that in hunting
they see objects at an amazing distance." Their play, then, became
an excellent schooling for them; and if they did nothing but play
it was not a loss of time.

Several little arrow-points I also found in the valley. The axe was
not far away, and both it and they may have belonged to the same
bold and active young hunter. All of these arrow-points are very
neatly made.

The same missionary tells us that these young red men of the forest
"exercise themselves very early with bows and arrows, and in
shooting at a mark. As they grow up they acquire a remarkable
dexterity in shooting birds, squirrels, and small game."

Every boy remembers his first pen-knife, and, whether it had one or
three blades, was proud enough of it; but how different the fortune
of the stone-age children, in this matter of a pocket-knife, which
was doubtless a piece of flint chipped into a shape that might be
used as a knife.

I have found scores of such knives in the fields that extend along
the little valley, and a few came to light in my search that
afternoon in the brook-side sands and gravel. So, if this chipped
flint is a knife, then, as in modern times, the children were
whittlers.

Of course, our boys nowadays would be puzzled to cut a willow
whistle or mend the baby's go-cart with such a knife as this; but
still, it will not do to despise stone cutlery. There is a big
canoe in one of the Government buildings that is sixty feet long.
That boat was made in quite recent times, and only stone knives and
hatchets were used in the process.

I found, too, in that afternoon walk, some curiously shaped
splinters of jasper, which at first did not seem very well adapted
to any purpose; and yet, although mere fragments, they had every
appearance of having been purposely shaped, and not of accidental
resemblances to a hook or sickle blade. When I got home I read that
perfect specimens, mine being certain pieces of the same form, had
been found off in Norway; and Professor Nilsson, who has carefully
studied the whole subject, says they are fish-hooks made of flint,
the largest being bone. Hooks of exactly the same pattern as these
really have been found within half a mile of the little valley I
worked in that afternoon.

The fish-hooks found in Norway have been thought to be best adapted
for, and really used in, capturing cod-fish in salt water and perch
and pike in inland lakes. The broken hooks I found were fully as
large; and so the little brook that now ripples down the valley,
when a large stream, must have had a good many big fishes in it, or
the stone-age fishermen would not have brought their fishing-hooks,
and have lost them, along this remnant of a larger stream.

But it must not be supposed that only children in this by-gone era
did the fishing for their tribe. Just as the men captured the
larger game, so they took the bigger fishes; but it is scarcely
probable that the boys who waded the little brooks with bows and
arrows would remain content with that, and, long before they were
men, doubtless they were adepts in catching the more valuable
fishes that abounded, in Indian times, in all our rivers.

So, fishing, I think, was another way in which the stone-age
children played.

THE MIST

By Carl Ewald

The sun had just gone down.

The frog was croaking his "good-night," which lasted so long that
there seemed no end to it. The bee was creeping into its hive, and
little children were crying because they had to go to bed. The
flower was closing up its petals and bowing its head; the bird was
tucking its bill under its wing; and the stag was laying himself
down to rest in the tall, soft grass in the glade of the wood.

From the village church the bells were ringing for sunset, and when
that was over the old clerk went home. On his way he had a little
chat or two with the people who were out for an evening stroll, or
were standing before their gate and smoking a pipe till they bade
him good-night and shut the door.

Then it grew quite quiet, and the darkness fell. There was a light
in the parson's house, and there was one also in the doctor's. But
the farmers' houses were dark, because in summer-time the farmers
get up so early that they must go early to bed.

And then the stars began to twinkle, and the moon crept higher and
higher up the sky. Down in the village a dog was barking. But it
must have been barking in a dream, for there was nothing to bark
at.

"Is there anybody there?" asked the Mist.

But nobody answered, for nobody was there. So the Mist issued forth
in her bright, airy robes. She went dancing over the meadows, up
and down, to and fro. Then she lay quite still for a moment, and
then she took to dancing again. Out over the lake she skipped and
deep into the wood, where she threw her long, damp arms round the
trunks of the trees.

"Who are you, my friend?" asked the Night-Violet [Footnote: An
inconspicuous flower which in Denmark is very fragrant in the
evening, the "night-smelling rocket" (_Hesperis triatto_).],
who stood there giving forth fragrance just to please herself.

The Mist did not answer, but went on dancing.

"I asked you who you were," said the Night-Violet. "And as you
don't answer me, I conclude that you are a rude person."

"I will now conclude _you_" said the Mist. And then she spread
herself round the Night-Violet, so that her petals were dashed with
wet.

"Oh, oh!" cried the Night-Violet. "Keep your fingers to yourself,
my friend. I have a feeling as if I had been dipped in the pond.
You have no reason for getting so angry just because I asked you
who you are."

The Mist let go of her again. "Who am I?" she said. "You could not
understand even if I told you."

"Try," said the Night-Violet.

"I am the dewdrop on the flower, the cloud in the sky, and the mist
on the meadow," said the Mist.

"I beg your pardon," said the Night-Violet. "Would you mind saying
that again? The dewdrop I know. It settles every morning on my
leaves, and I don't think it is at all like you."

"No; but it is I all the same," said the Mist mournfully. "But no
one knows me. I must live my life under many shapes. One time I am
dew, and another time I am rain; and yet another time I babble as a
clear, cool streamlet through the wood. But when I dance on the
meadows in the evening, men say that it is the marsh-lady brewing."

"It is a strange story," said the Night-Violet. "Do you mind
telling it to me? The night is long, and I sometimes get a little
bored by it."

"It is a sad story," answered the Mist. "But you may have it and
welcome." But when she was about to lie down the Night-Violet shook
with terror in all her petals.

"Be so kind as to keep at a little distance," she said, "at least
till you have properly introduced yourself. I have never cared to
be on familiar terms with people I don't know."

So the Mist lay down a little way off and began her story:--"I
was born deep down in the earth--far deeper than your roots go.
There I and my sisters--for we are a large family, you must
understand--came into the world as waves of a hidden spring, pure
and clear as crystal; and for a long time we had to stay in our
hiding-place. But one day we suddenly leapt from a hillside into
the full light of the sun. You can well imagine how delightful it
was to come tumbling down through the wood. We hopped over stones
and rippled against the bank. Pretty little fishes gambolled
amongst us, and the trees bent over so that their beautiful green
was reflected in our waters. If a leaf fell, we cradled it and
fondled it and carried it out with us into the wide world. Ah, that
was delightful! It was indeed the happiest time of my life."

"But when are you going to tell me how you came to turn into mist?"
asked the Night-Violet impatiently. "I know all about the
underground spring. When the air is quite still, I can hear it
murmur from where I stand."

The Mist lifted herself a little and took a turn round the meadow.
Then she came back, and went on with her story:--"It is the worst
of this world that one is never contented with what one has. So it
was with us. We kept running on and on, till at last we ran into a
great lake, where water-lilies rocked on the water and dragon-flies
hummed on their great stiff wings. Up on the surface the lake was
clear as a mirror. But whether we wished it or not, we had to run
right down by the bottom, where it was dark and gruesome. And this
I could not endure. I longed for the sunbeams. I knew them so well
from the time I used to run in the brook. There they used to peep
down through the leaves and pass over me in fleeting gleams. I
longed so much to see them again that I stole up to the surface,
and lay down in the sunshine all amongst the white water-lilies and
their great green leaves. But, ugh! how the sun burnt me there on
the lake I It was scarcely bearable. Bitterly did I regret that I
had not stopped down below."

"I can't say this part of your story is very amusing," said the
Night-Violet. "Isn't the Mist soon coming?"

"Here it is!" said the Mist, and dropped down once more on the
flower, so that it nearly had the breath squeezed out of it.

"Ough! ough!" shrieked the Night-Violet. "Upon my word, you are
the most ill-natured person I have ever known. Move off, and go on
with your story, since it must be so."

"In the evening, when the sun had set, I suddenly became
wonderfully light," said the Mist. "I don't know how it came about,
but I thought I could rise up from the lake and fly; and before I
knew anything about it, I was drifting over the water, far away
from the dragon-flies and the water-lilies. The evening breeze bore
me away. I flew high up into the air, and there I met many of my
sisters, who had been just as eager for novelty as myself, and had
had the same fate. We drifted across the sky, for, you see, we had
become clouds."

"I am not sure I do see," said the Night-Violet. "The thing sounds
incredible."

"But it is true all the same," answered the Mist "And let me tell
you what happened then. The wind carried us for a long way through
the air. But all at once it would not do so any more, and let us
drop. Down we fell on to the earth as a splashing shower of rain.
The flowers all shut up in a hurry, and the birds crept under
cover--except, of course, the ducks and the geese, for, you know,
the wetter it is the more they like it. Yes--and the farmer too! He
wanted rain so much for his crops, he stood there hugely delighted,
and did not in the least mind getting wet. But otherwise we really
did make quite a sensation."

"Oh! so you are the rain as well?" said the Night-Violet. "I must
say you have plenty to do."

"Yes, I'm never idle," said the Mist.

"All the same, I have not yet heard how you became mist," said the
Night-Violet. "Only, _please_ don't get into a passion again.
You know you promised to tell me without my asking you, and I would
sooner hear the whole story over again than shiver once more in
your horrid, clammy arms."

The Mist lay silent and sobbed for a few moments. Then she went on
with her story:--"After I had fallen on the earth as rain, I sank
down into the black soil, and was already congratulating myself on
soon getting back to my birthplace, the deep underground spring.
There, at any rate, one enjoyed peace and had no cares. But, as I
was sinking into the ground, the tree roots sucked me up, and I had
to wander about for a whole day in the boughs and leaves. They
treated me as a beast of burden, I assure you. All the food that
the leaves and flowers needed I had to carry up to them from the
roots. It was not till the evening that I managed to get away. When
the sun had gone down the flowers and trees all heaved a deep sigh,
and I and my sisters flew off in that sigh in the form of bright
airy Mists. To-night we dance on the meadow. But when the sun rises
in the morning we shall turn into those pretty transparent dewdrops
which hang from your petals. When you shake us off we shall sink
deeper and deeper till we reach the spring we came from--that is,
if some root or other does not snap us up on the way. And so the
journey goes on. Down the brook, out into the lake, up into the
air, down again to the earth--"

"Stop!" said the Night-Violet. "If I listen to you any more, I
shall become quite sea-sick."

Now the frog began to stir. He stretched his legs, and went down to
the ditch to take his morning bath. The birds began to twitter in
the wood, and the bellow of the stag echoed amongst the trees. It
was on the point of dawn, and here came the Sun peeping up over the
hill.

"Hullo, what is that?" he said. "What a strange sight! One can't
see one's hand before one's face. Wind of the morning! up with you,
you sluggard, and drive the foul Mists away."

The Morning Wind came over the meadow, and away went the Mists. And
at the very same moment the first rays of the Sun fell right on the
Night-Violet.

"Heyday!" said the flower. "We have got the Sun already, so I had
better make haste and shut up. Where in the world has the Mist gone
to?"

"I am still here," said the Dewdrop that hung on its stalk.

But the Night-Violet shook herself peevishly. "You may stuff
children with that nonsense," she said. "As for me, I don't believe
a word of your whole story. It is as weak as water."

Then the Sun laughed and said, "You are quite right _there_!"

THE ANEMONES

By Carl Ewald

"Peeweet! peeweet!" cried the Plover, as he flew over the bog in
the wood. "My Lady Spring is coming! I can tell it from the feeling
in my legs and wings."

When the new Grass that lay below in the earth heard that, it
pushed up at once and peeped out merrily from among the old yellow
Grass of last year. For the Grass is always in a great hurry.

The Anemones in among the trees also heard the Plover's cry; but
they, on the contrary, would not come up yet on any account. "You
must not believe the Plover," they whispered to one another. "He is
a gay young spark who is not to be depended upon. He always comes
too early, and begins crying out at once. No, we will wait quietly
till the Starlings and Swallows come. They are sensible,
steady-going people who know what's what, and don't go sailing with
half a wind."

And then the Starlings came. They perched on the stumps in front of
their summer villa, and looked about them. "Too early as usual,"
said Daddy Starling. "Not a green leaf and not a fly to be seen,
except an old tough one from last year, which isn't worth opening
one's bill for." Mother Starling said nothing, but she did not seem
any more enchanted with the prospect.

"If we had only stayed in our cosy winter home down there beyond
the mountains," said Daddy Starling. He was angry at his wife's not
answering him, because he was so cold that he thought it might do
him good to have a little fun. "But it is _your_ fault, as it
was last year. You are always in such a dreadful hurry to come out
to the country."

"If I am in a hurry, I know the reason for it," said Mother
Starling. "And you ought to be ashamed of yourself if you didn't
know it also, since they are your eggs just as much as mine."

"What do you mean?" said Daddy Starling, much insulted. "When have
I neglected my family? Perhaps you even want me to sit in the cold
and sing to you?"

"Yes, I do," said Mother Starling in the tone he couldn't resist.

He began to pipe at once as well as he knew how. But Mother
Starling had no sooner heard the first notes than she gave him a
flap with her wings and snapped at him with her beak. "Oh, please
stop it!" she cried bitterly. "It sounds so sad that it makes one
quite heartsick. Instead of piping like that, get the Anemones to
come up. I think it must be time for them. And besides, one always
feels warmer when there are others freezing besides oneself."

Now as soon as the Anemones had heard the first piling of the
Starling, they cautiously stuck out their heads from the earth. But
they were so tightly wrapped up in green kerchiefs that one could
not get a glimpse of them. They looked like green shoots which
might turn into anything. "It is too early," they whispered. "It is
a shame of the Starling to entice us out. One can't rely on
anything in the world nowadays."

Then the Swallow came. "Chee! chee!" he twittered, and shot through
the air on his long, tapering wings. "Out with you, you stupid
flowers! Don't you see that my Lady Spring has come?"

But the Anemones had grown cautious. They only drew their green
kerchiefs a little apart and peeped out. "One Swallow does not make
a summer," they said. "Where is your wife? You have only come here
to see if it is possible to stay here, and you want to take us in.
But we are not so stupid. We know very well that if we once catch a
bad cold we are done for, for this year at any rate."

"You are cowards," said the Swallow, perching himself on the
forest-ranger's weathercock, and peering out over the landscape.

But the Anemones waited still and shivered. A few of them who could
not control their impatience threw off their kerchiefs in the sun.
The cold at night nipped and killed them; and the story of their
pitiful death was passed on from flower to flower, and caused a
great consternation.

And then--one delightfully mild, still night--my Lady Spring came.

No one knows how she looks, because no one has ever seen her. But
all long for her, and thank her and bless her. She goes through the
wood and touches the flowers and trees, and at once they burst out.
She goes through the cattle-stalls and unties the beasts, and lets
them out on to the field. She goes straight into the hearts of men
and fills them with gladness. She makes it hard for the best boy to
sit still on his form at school, and she is the cause of a terrible
number of mistakes in the copy-books. But she does not do all this
at once. Night after night she plies her task, and she comes first
to him who longs for her most.

So it happened that on the very night of her coming she went
straight to the Anemones, who stood in their green kerchiefs and
didn't know how to hold out any longer. And one, two, three! there
they stood in their newly-ironed white collars, and looked so fresh
and so pretty that the Starlings sang their prettiest songs out of
sheer joy in them.

"Ah, how sweet it is here!" said the Anemones. "How warm the sun
is, and how the birds sing! It is a thousand times better than last
year." But they said the same thing every year, so one needn't take
any account of it.

There were many others who were quite beside themselves when they
saw the Anemones had come out. One was a schoolboy who wanted to
have his summer holidays at once; and another was the Beech Tree,
who felt exceedingly put out. "Aren't you coming soon to me, my
Lady Spring?" he said. "I am a much more important person than
those silly Anemones, and I can't really hold in my buds much
longer."

"I am coming, I am coming," answered my Lady Spring. "But you must
give me a little time."

She went on her way through the wood, and at every step many and
many an Anemone burst into flower. They stood in crowds round the
roots of the Birch Tree, and bashfully bowed their round heads to
the earth.

"Look up," said my Lady Spring, "and rejoice in God's bright
sunshine. Your life is short, so you must enjoy it while you have
it."

The Anemones did as she told them. They stretched and strained, and
spread their white petals to all sides, to drink as much sunshine
as they could. They pushed their heads against one another, and
twined their stalks together, and laughed, and were immensely
happy.

"Now I can wait no longer," said the Beech, and he burst into leaf.

Leaf after leaf crept forth from its green sheath and waved in the
wind. The great Tree made a green arch, like a mighty roof over the
earth.

"Dear me, is it already evening?" asked the Anemones, who noticed
that it had grown quite dark.

"No; it is Death," said my Lady Spring. "Now _your_ time is
over. It happens to you just as it happens to all that is best on
earth. Everything in turn must spring to life, and bloom, and die."

"Die?" cried some little Anemones. "Must we die already?"

And some of the big ones grew quite red in the face in their terror
and vexation.

"We know what it is," they said. "It is the Beech that is the death
of us. He steals the sunshine for his own leaves, and does not
allow us a single ray. He is a mean, wicked thing."

They stood for some days, grumbling and crying. Then my Lady Spring
came for the last time through the wood. She had still the Oak
Trees and some other crusty old fellows to attend to. "Lie down
nicely in the earth and go to sleep," she said to the Anemones, "It
is of no use to kick against the pricks. Next year I will come back
and waken you once more to life."

And some of the Anemones did as she told them. But others still
stretched their heads into the air, and grew so ugly and stalky
that it was horrid to see them.

"Fie for shame!" they cried to the Beech Leaves. "It is you who are
killing us,"

But the Beech shook his long boughs and let his brown husks drop
down to the ground, "Wait till the autumn, you little simpletons,"
he said, laughing. "Then you shall see."

The Anemones could not understand what he meant. But when they had
stretched themselves till they were as tall as they could be, they
broke off and withered.

The summer was over, and the farmer had carried his corn home from
the field. The wood was still green, but it was a darker green than
before; and in many places red and yellow leaves glowed among the
green ones. The sun was tired after his hot work in the summer, and
went early to bed.

At night Winter was stealing about among the trees to see if his
time was not soon coming. When he found a flower, he gallantly
kissed it, saying,--"What! are you here still? I am charmed to meet
you. Please stay where you are. I am a good old man, and would not
harm a cat."

But the flower shuddered at his kiss, and the transparent dewdrop
that hung from its petal froze to ice at the instant.

Again and again Winter ran through the wood. When he breathed on
them, the leaves turned yellow and the earth grew hard. Even the
Anemones, who lay below in the earth waiting till my Lady Spring
should come back as she had promised, they too felt his breath and
shuddered down in their roots.

"Ugh! how cold it is!" they said to one another. "How shall we
stand the winter? We shall die for a certainty before it is over."

"Now it's _my_ time," said Winter. "Now I need no longer steal
about like a thief in the night. After to-day I shall look
everybody in the face, and bite their noses, and make their eyes
run with water."

At night he let loose the Storm. "Let me see you make a clean
sweep," he said. And the Storm obeyed his command. He went howling
through the wood, and shook the branches till they creaked and
cracked. Any that were rotten broke off, and those that held on had
to turn and bow this way and that. "Away with that finery!" howled
the Storm as he tore off the leaves. "This is not the time to dress
yourself up. The snow will soon be coming on to your branches; that
will be quite another story."

All the leaves fell in terror to the earth, but the Storm would not
let them rest. He seized them round the waist and waltzed with them
out over the field, high up into the air, and into the wood again,
swept them into great heaps, and then scattered them in all
directions--just as it pleased him.

Not till morning came did the Storm grow weary and lie down to
rest. "Now you shall have peace for a time," he said. "I will take
a rest till we have the spring cleaning. Then we can have another
turn together--that is, if there are any of you left by then." And
the leaves lay down to rest, and spread themselves like a thick
carpet over the whole land.

The Anemones felt that it had become pleasantly warm. "Can it be my
Lady Spring already?" they asked each other.

"I haven't got my buds ready," shouted one of them.

"Nor I! Nor I!" cried the others in one voice. But one of them took
courage and peeped out over the earth.

"Good-morning!" cried the withered Beech Leaves. "It is a little
too early, little lady. I hope you will be none the worse for it."

"Isn't it my Lady Spring?" inquired the Anemone.

"Not yet," answered the Beech Leaves. "It is only the green Beech
Leaves that you were so angry with last summer. The green has gone
from us, so we have no great finery to boast of now. We have
enjoyed our youth and had our fling, I can tell you. And now we lie
here and protect all the little flowers in the earth against the
winter."

Pages:
1 | 2 | 3 | 4 | 5 | 6 | 7 | 8 | 9 | 10 | 11 | 12 | 13 | 14 | 15 | 16 | 17 | 18 | 19 | 20 | 21 | 22 | 23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 27 | 28 | 29 | 30