Chapter XIII: Conclusion

TWO or three days after the class-meeting, Mrs. Murray called on Mrs. Riker. She was influenced by two reasons: she was really anxious to repair the injustice of which she had been guilty, and she wanted to get her baby-clothes done up for less money than Sarah Southmayd asked her. Mrs. Riker thanked her, but said quietly that she thought Mrs. Murray had better keep on with Sarah, who was an excellent laundress and very careful.

"But she is such a fuss!" said Mrs. Murray, who was used to having her own way, and who expected that Mrs. Riker would be glad enough to get the work back again. "She asks more than you do, and she won't have them at all unless I make out two lists every time; and that is such a bother. Come, Mrs. Riker, you shouldn't bear malice."

"I have nothing to bear malice about," replied Mrs. Riker with a gentle dignity which "quenched" Mrs. Murray's intention of patronage at once. "I am not going to take in any more washing at present. I cannot well do it without Eunice's help, and she will be otherwise engaged; and besides, I have unexpectedly received a legacy which will make it perfectly easy for me to live without hard work."

"Dear me!" said Mrs. Murray, very much disappointed. "How much is this great fortune, if I may ask?"

"Oh, it is no great fortune—only an annuity of two hundred a year for my life," replied Mrs. Riker, smiling; "but that, with my pension and what fine sewing I can do, will make me quite independent."

"And pray what is Eunice going to do?—Teach school, I suppose?" said Mrs. Murray pettishly. "That may be more genteel than washing fine things, but I don't think she will find it easier or more profitable."

"Eunice is not going to teach, but to study," replied Mrs. Riker. "She has a fine voice and a decided talent for music, and Mrs. Ferarra has most kindly undertaken to give her a musical education."

"But, dear me! She won't do anything at it," said Mrs. Murray. "Her hands will never manage the piano, beginning so late in life and after she has spoiled them with hard work. Besides, where will she get a piano?"

"Professor C— thinks she will do very well, and he says it is all the better for her that she has never had any singing-lessons heretofore. He spent some time trying her voice, and says it is an uncommonly fine one. As to the piano, Mrs. Hazleton is kind enough to lend her one for the present."

"Dear me!" said Mrs. Murray. "I thought the Hazletons professed to be very exclusive people, but I suppose they patronize Eunice on account of that fuss about the bear. Well, Mrs. Riker, I am sure I hope this money and patronage will be an advantage to you. I suppose Eunice will end by going on the stage."

Mrs. Riker did not reply, and Mrs. Murray departed very much vexed, to tell the news that the Ferarras and Hazletons had taken up that Riker girl, and were going to make her a public singer.

"Did you hear what Mrs. Murray was saying, Fanny?" asked Mrs. Gunderson. "She tells me the Ferarras are so taken with Eunice Riker's voice that they are going to educate her for the stage. Pretty good promotion that, for one of Miss Ackerman's pet saints!"

"Nonsense!" returned Fanny, not very dutifully. "Mrs. Murray is a goose. It is true that Mrs. Ferarra is going to give Eunice a musical education—Eunice told me that herself—but I don't suppose there has ever been anything said or thought about the stage. I should think we had had about enough of talking about Eunice Riker, ma—and about other people too, for that matter."

Fanny improved very much after the class-meeting at Miss Ackerman's. Her stepmother married again, and Fanny, by her own desire, went to live with her grandmother and aunts. The elder Mrs. Gunderson and her daughters were women of refinement and cultivation, whose minds were occupied with something besides the concerns of their neighbors. From them Fanny learned to take an interest in books and in all sorts of good works. She is now an assistant district visitor under her aunt, and is also very much occupied with the study of ferns and mosses, of which she has made a fine collection, and she bids fair to be a useful and respectable woman.

It was, as Fanny said, quite true that Mrs. Ferarra had taken Eunice's music in hand. We have heard her allude to "Carmen's dowry." When Anita's twin sister died at the age of five years, Mrs. Ferarra began the practice of laying aside every year as much money as Carmen would have cost her had she lived. This sum was of course increased year by year. It was called "Carmen's dowry," and was expended for the benefit of some deserving person—if possible, a young girl. *

* I know a lady—now, alas! a childless mother—who has pursued this
course for years.

Mrs. Ferarra had first been led to notice Eunice by her remarkable voice. Her esteem for the modest, industrious girl increased with acquaintance, and was confirmed by the way Eunice had passed through her late severe trial. She consulted with her husband, and the result was that the money which would have paid for Carmen's music, had she lived, went to provide for Eunice the best instruction the city could afford. Mrs. Hazleton no sooner heard of the plan than she begged permission to assist in it, and did so in the best way by lending Eunice a fine cottage piano.

"Present it to the young person, Mrs. Hazleton my dear," said her husband. "It is the least acknowledgment we can make for the inestimable services rendered under circumstances of such extreme peril to our poor, unfortunate child."

"Perhaps it would be better to make the instrument a loan at first," Mrs. Hazleton said to her husband. "Then, if Eunice shows that she has taste and perseverance, we can make it a gift or perhaps exchange it for a better one. If she has not, we can cast about for some other way of rewarding her. But we must proceed with care not to hurt Mrs. Riker's and Eunice's self-respect, of which they have a great deal."

"And rightly, too—quite rightly. They are most worthy people, and have as much right to self-respect as persons whom fortune has more highly favored. You are quite right, Mrs. Hazleton my dear, and very judicious. Manage it your own way," said Mr. Hazleton, who was a worthy, right-thinking gentleman, though he had a great opinion of his own consequence, and talked like Mr. Micawber and Dr. Johnson rolled into one.

Julia continued very ill for a long time. After the height of her fever was passed, she fell into a state of extreme weakness, both of body and mind. She could neither sit up, nor bear any conversation, nor read, nor even be read to, and it seemed for a time as if her mind was likely to give way entirely. As soon as she was able to travel on a sleeping-car, her mother took her to the Springs and placed her under the care of Dr. Henry. Here she improved slowly, with many ups and downs, but at last she recovered her health in some measure, so as to be no longer a burden to herself and her friends, though she was never well. That loose staple which was to be mended to-morrow spoiled a life.

The box was packed and despatched, and in due time came a letter from Mrs. Swift, which was read to the whole class assembled at Mrs. Ackerman's. I transcribe a part of it for the reader's benefit:

"DEAR MADAM:

"Three days since we received a notice that a box was awaiting us at Siskowitz Station, six miles off, and yesterday a kind neighbor brought it over to us. My husband assembled the whole family round the box, and we had a prayer and sung a hymn of thanksgiving before we opened it. * I wish you could have peeped in and seen the faces of the children, and especially that of my poor little lame seven-year-old girl, when the box marked with her name was put into her hands and she discovered the beautiful doll, with the note 'introducing Flora Arabella.'"

* A simple fact.

Mary Edgar jumped up and clapped her hands, while her eyes danced with delight:

"So that is what papa did with the doll? He never would tell me. How glad I am!—Please excuse me for interrupting, Miss Ackerman."

"Oh, we can excuse you without any difficulty," said Miss Ackerman, smiling.

"Anna never has had any but a home-made doll before," read on Percy, "and her joy was almost too great for utterance. She says, 'Tell Mary Edgar that I will think of her every night and morning when I say my prayers.'"

"It was not I that sent it; it was papa. I sold it to him," said honest little Mary, very much delighted. "I will tell him what she says."

"Ethelind desires especially to thank the young ladies who have provided her with such a beautiful wardrobe. The things fit perfectly, and I only fear they are too fine for a poor missionary's daughter. As I wrote before, she had a presentation to an excellent school, but we feared she would be unable to avail herself of it, because we literally could not procure decent clothes for her. She sends her thanks and good wishes, and says she will try to do credit to her kind friends in Rockdale; and I think she will do so, for, though 'I say it that shouldn't,' she is a good Christian girl and a great comfort to father and mother. I do not know how to particularize when everything is so nice. Baby looks very pretty and feels very comfortable in his new frock, sacque, and red shoes."

"Dear little man!" said Eunice.—"Don't you wish we could see him, Phebe?"

"Mr. Swift wishes particularly to thank the young lady who sent the stationery; and I would say the same for the box of working things. We can hardly procure a decent sheet of paper or a good needle here for any money. The books are a great pleasure to the whole family. I trust the young lady who sent them is better by this time. She shall not want our prayers for her health, both of soul and body."

"Poor Julia!" said three or four voices together.

Percy read on:

"In conclusion, let me thank you, every one, for the pleasure and comfort you have given us—pleasure and comfort such as you can never understand unless you should be situated as we are. Lest I should seem to repine, however, I will say that neither Mr. Swift nor myself have ever regretted for one moment the decision we made when we gave ourselves to the work of the Lord in the missionary field. I speak for him as well as myself when I say that after sixteen years' experience, with all their hardships and privations, if the thing were to do again, we would decide as we did before. Wishing our dear friends in Rockdale all the blessings here and hereafter which our common Master has to bestow, we remain—

"Your sincere and obliged friends,

"RICHARD AND STELLA SWIFT."

"What a nice letter!" said Ida.

"Yes indeed—just the kind I like," added Matilda. "It tells what one wants to know."

"I don't think it is quite as nice as the one the Wood street people got when they sent their box," observed Phebe Goodman. "That had so many nice reflections and was written in such beautiful language!"

"I hate beautiful language; and as to reflections, I like to make my own," said Matilda.—"Don't you, Miss Ackerman?"

"Why, yes, Matilda, I must confess I do," said Miss Ackerman, smiling; "but different people have different tastes, you know.—I think, girls, we ought to be pleased with the result of our work. We have 'both done good and got good,' as an old author says whom I was reading this morning. Is not that true?"

"I'm sure it is true for me," said Matilda.

"And for me," said Ida. "I think if I ever have the use of my hand again, I shall want to sew and practise all day long."

"Can't you use it yet?" asked some one.

"Only a very little. The end of the bone is so tender it won't bear any pressure, but I am thankful to be able to dress myself. I never knew what a thumb was worth before."

"We don't know what a good many of our blessings are worth till we lose them," remarked Anita. "After all, a good deal of trouble grew out of the box, too."

"Yes, but how well it has all turned out!" said Eunice. "Even Fanny Gunderson says that it will be a lesson to her as long as she lives; and I believe it will."

"It may be a lesson to all of us," remarked Miss Ackerman, "if we only use it rightly—if we only remember that charity does not consist in giving nor making great and painful sacrifices.

"'Though I bestow all my goods to feed the poor, and though I give my body to be burned, and have not charity, it profiteth me nothing.' 1 Cor. xiii. 3.

"It is love which must be the fountain and spring of all our efforts; not a mere sentiment which is at the mercy of every passing gust and every frost of feeling, but love as a principle—such love as the Saviour meant when he said,—

"'He that hath my commandments and keepeth them, he it is that loveth
me'—

"Such love as he showed when he died to atone for our sins and bring us to God—such love as the apostle describes when he says,—

"'Love worketh no ill to his neighbor: therefore love is the fulfilling
of the law.'"