In a very lovely little cottage, around which grew sweet-briers and rose-trees, and up whose windows climbed honeysuckles and jessamines, lived a mother with her baby.
The mother was a young woman, with golden hair, kind blue eyes, and fair white skin. There was always a look of love in her eye, and in the gentle tones of her voice the most soothing tenderness. People said the baby looked like her; but he cried so much that his face was continually distorted, and so the resemblance was not of any use to him.
Now there was a great deal of discussion about the baby's looks, as to which he most resembled, his father or mother; some decided in favor of his father, who was a tall man, with black hair, and black eyes, and large, sharp features. It was a difficult question to answer, inasmuch as the baby had yet but a very few hairs on his head, and his features were not easily distinguishable; and as each person's decision affected only his own opinion, there was a great deal of discussion and comparing of the poor baby's little face with those of his parents, and, through dint of being often shown them, the father and mother began to find the most remarkable resemblance to each other in their little child.
Well, one day he had been crying very hard, and his poor mother was nearly worn sick with trying to quiet him. She had walked all over the house, shown him everything on the tables, taken up books and shaken them before his eyes, carried him to the windows and cried "See there! see there!" with fresh tones of love and pity, without his seeming to be in the least edified by it all. She tossed him before the looking-glass; but he did not seem to be comforted by the glimpse of himself, done up in a blanket, which he caught; until, at last, after putting everything into every place in which it didn't belong, and trying to make him look at things he didn't care to see, she resolutely put him in the cradle, rocked him with his head moving now on this and now on that side of the pillow, until he fell fast asleep.
He had no sooner closed his eyes to sleep than he left his baby's body in the cradle, and ran straight off to the gardens of God in heaven, towards that place where dwell the angel-children who are yet to go down and live upon the earth. As he came near the tall flowers, whose golden petals were spread, and in whose cups lay sweet dew, he clapped his hands with joy, and a bright smile lay on his lips, which before had been distorted with grief.
Not far from him there rose a bright fountain, which, falling, dashed its water gently down into a broad, silvery basin beneath. In the midst of the falling spray a large bird, with long, blue plumage, played, now diving beneath the water, and now catching the drops as they fell from the fountain. Then came other birds, some in gay scarlet plumage, with white feathers about their necks and at the tips of their wings and tails; they, too, played in the fountain, and chased each other over the sparkling waters.
Then there were tall trees, of such a bright green as is seldom seen on the earth, and on them were fruits which looked a little like those we see here, but a thousand times more beautiful, for they shone like precious stones. About everything was a glory which it is impossible to describe.
At a little distance was a troop of fair children at play, and when they had seen the little child from the earth they ran towards him, and would have kissed him joyously, but that they saw the tears he had so recently shed still standing upon his cheeks; at this, sorrow shone over their faces, and tears like pearls entered their own eyes, as, in the tenderest manner, they asked him the cause of his grief.
"Do not ask me, dear brothers and sisters," he entreated; "I wish only to think how I am with you now for a little while, and I long to forget the earth-scenes." Speaking thus he kissed them all, and led them away off among the bright fields.
Very gayly they played a long time; they plucked the golden apples from the trees, and threw them far up in the sky, and the apples bounded so lightly that they still went on, till at last they dropped down to the earth into some dark rooms where poor people lived, who, when they found them, rejoiced exceedingly.
Then they went riding on the clouds, and the light of their faces gave a brightness to the edge of the clouds, so that the people on the earth loved to stand watching them, never fancying what a troop of angel-children were frolicking on them.
At last they became weary of this sport, and bent their way quite towards the earth. At this our earth-child saddened, and did not wing his flight as quickly as the others did. Upon this they looked around upon him and said:
"Why tarry you? Do you not know we go to the earth, to do there what our dear Teacher bids us? You have played with us, and will you not now do the work which you have so often done with us before?" So he sped on with them, but his voice was silent and his heart wept.
They soon came to the earth, and then, unseen by any one, they made their way towards a little, dingy house, in one room of which sat a little boy upon a bench, driving pegs into the sole of a boot. On one side lay all the boots in which he had driven pegs, and on the other a great many more in which he must still drive them. He looked sad and pale, and the sweat lay in large drops upon his forehead. By his side sat a large, stout man, with his shirt-sleeves rolled up, displaying strong, brawny arms, while his face was red and stern. He was also at work, but watched the boy well, and if he saw his arm rested for a moment he would give him a little push, bidding him mind his work; and so the poor boy had to drive the pegs into the soles of the boots, even though he was weary and his face pale and sad.
Then the angel-children, seized with one feeling of love and pity (for they could remember how the poor boy used to be one of them and play in the garden of God), soared above him. One came down and wiped off the drops of sweat from his brow; another passed his soft hands over the boy's face, and rested him; and another put comforting thoughts into his soul.
Then the master looked up, and when he saw how the boy seemed suddenly refreshed, he told him it was good to work and silly to be tired; and when the boy heard these hard words, tears came into his eyes, and he thought of his mother who used so tenderly to care for him, but had now been gone long to the home of the angels.
Then some of the angel-children wiped away the tears which had come into the boy's eyes, and another shook his beautiful wings over his head, so that at once a cool breeze fell over him and hopeful words entered his soul. Some of the children moved his arm up and down as he drove the pegs into the boot, and he wondered how easily he was able to work.
All this time our earth-child stood apart, nodding his head sadly, and when the others asked him the cause, he answered, "O, you do not know how hard it is to live on the earth! See this poor boy; how far different was it with him when he played with us in the gardens up there!"
The children were silent; they knew not how to comfort him. They thought, too, of the time when they should live on the earth.
Then they flew along and came to a large city, in which lived many homeless children, who were led about by unkind and evil spirits; and passed constantly by men and women, who did not so much as give them one kind word.
As the angel-children wandered among them they shuddered: such strange words filled the air, and so dark and dingy looked the houses where they went in and out. Could it be that these children, who talked together in angry moods, who rather sought the opportunity to trouble each other, had ever played in that fountain, and laughed together in the heavenly fields? "O," they sighed, "could we but once drive the evil spirits from one of them, and whisper in his ear of the kind love of God!"
Then their wings fluttered and folded themselves over the head of a large boy, whose clothes were dirty and tattered, his hair matted and disordered, his body thin and wan, while the expression of his face was very old and vacant. A slight girl, holding a little pail in her hand, came along near him, and made as if she would go by him; but the boy would not suffer her to pass on, and, stopping her, said to her,
"Well, and what have you got?"
The child looked at him fearfully, and remained silent; but the boy did not heed her half-imploring look, but proceeded to lay hold of her pail, in which she had had hot corn to sell, and, opening it, discovered there six pennies instead.
"Ah," he cried exultingly, "that is what I wanted! You have done well with your corn; you may go on now;" and, despite the poor child's cries, he took away the pennies, and, in resisting the little struggle the child was able to make, he threw her down upon the pavement.
This was in a dark street, filled with people wicked like this boy, and where was no one who cared to take the child's part.
But those angel-children were silent witnesses of this scene, and they put out their hands, so the little girl was not much hurt in her fall. Then they looked at each other in dismay; the pearly tears again came into their bright eyes, and they asked each other what they might do for this wretched boy. They remembered when the boy and girl played together in the fair garden of God; and it was not possible for them to remember that, and look unmoved upon this fearful change which had come over him. "O, this is a sad earth-life!" murmured the baby's spirit; and he nodded his head again in sorrow. "Why may not I, too, become like this boy?"
"But must the earth-life bring this change?" asked another of the angel-children, who saw the anguish of his friend, but knew not how to comfort him. "Do we not remember the poor boy who worked so hard, and had no rest, yet he was patient and good, and kept bright, and hung the cord which tied his soul to heaven with the tear-drops which fell for his dear, dead mother? When tried, he gave back no hard words. He was better than we, who are happy always and have no trials."
Not long after, they found the wicked boy asleep; he had thrown himself down, in the corner of a dirty alley, on a little straw. The children hovered over him, trying how they might approach him. They drove hence the dark spirits, one by one, who hindered their approach, and then they carried him off by the sea-shore in a dream; they made him sit upon the sand and listen to the roar ing of the waters; the large rocks stood scattered on the beach, and the sea-mosses and shells were thrown up by the waves. Afar off, upon the water, he saw a long line of bright clouds, which seemed to climb up to heaven to meet the bright, twinkling stars. The moonlight shone softly down upon him.
Then they laid him down upon the sand, and made him look up into the sky to feel the rest and peace of it; still more came the moonlight upon him, and the stars seemed to open and close their eyes for pity. The wind came towards him and passed along his brow and over his heart. Then came into his soul an indescribable longing, such as he had never felt before—a longing which the noise of the sea, the beauty of the clouds, the peace of the sky, and the tenderness of the wind, had aroused in him.
He felt that something inexpressibly dear had been lost to him, and he feared never again to regain it; the quiet moon and the pitying stars made him fear. A deep grief entered his heart, and he wept as from an everlasting sorrow. As he wept the angels rejoiced, and hovered over his head in a halo of light; for they knew that these tears would bring him into the path that led to heaven!
Not far off lived a man who cared for destitute and ignorant children; the angel-band flew to bring him, and when the boy opened his eyes, in which the tears of repentance still lay, the ocean and bright clouds had disappeared; but there was bent upon him a pitying, benignant look, which went to the boy's heart, and a kind voice lingered in his ear, subduing him by its very strangeness. So he at once received the proffered hand, and arose and went with him to his home.
After that, the angel-children went into a splendid mansion, where, in a large, handsome chamber, lay a little girl suffering under severe pain. Her little couch was hung in blue silk, and rich laces adorned her pillows. On a little table by the side of her bed stood golden goblets, to refresh her parched mouth with pleasant drinks. Yet, still the little girl moaned in pain. Her eyelids were closed, and her weary hand lay still upon the bed. At her side sat her nurse, watching her wants and longing to relieve them. Costly toys lay uncared for on the rich, heavy carpet. The flowers had lost their charm, the delicious fruit lay, full and ripe, neglected on their dish.
Sleep would not come to the child; weary and in pain, she had laid there a long, long time, her poor little body wasting slowly away towards the grave.
"Let us give her rest and comfort," said the angel-children; and, waving their wings over her, she fell to sleeping.
The nurse said, then, there might be hope. Listen and hear, what bright hope there was, indeed!
They whispered to her, that soon her pain should cease, and that, for her trust and patience, she should go to God's beautiful garden. They showed her the fountains and the birds; they told her how she should again ride upon the clouds, and study from the great books of God. Then in her sleep she smiled, and the nurse, who was watching her face, wept for joy, and exclaimed,
"There is hope! there is hope!"
Yes, there was hope!
When the little girl awoke, there was a more heavenly patience still, in her soul, and a longing to meet the loving glances of the angel-children again.
As the children wended their flight back to the gardens, and sat down beneath the green trees, and ate of their delicious fruit, they strove in vain to bring back the brightness to the face of the earth-baby.
"Ah, it would be so beautiful to stay with you!" he said. "I would like always to comfort these afflicted ones; but, alas! I shall need comfort myself, and you will come to me, as we have been to others. When I am on the earth there seems something gone and lost, and what is before me is confused and dim. I find myself so weak and helpless, when here I am so sprightly and strong! I cannot move myself at all, and when I remember these gardens I have left, and you with whom I have played, I can but cry all the time! It looks cold and bleak there, as it never does here. Then, should I grow up to be wicked, like those children we have seen, and so go far away from heaven, how wretched should I become, how much better that I never had left these gardens!"
Thus he complained, and the other children were silent, for they knew how they, too, at some time, must go down and try their fortunes upon the earth; and, too, they sorrowed to lose their companion, for they knew that soon he could not come to them any more; and while they told him, very eagerly, how they would come to watch over him, a soft tread fell on their ears, and their dear teacher approached them.
Her hair floated in long curls upon the cool air, and her eyes were bent down in sorrow upon the earth-child.
"Have you so soon forgotten the lessons you have learned from the book of God?" she asked; and the tones of her voice were like the soft harmonies of heaven. She held in her hand a book, along whose pages the letters sparkled in the brightness of gold and silver. At the sight of her, the earth-child threw himself at her feet, and besought her thus:
"Keep me with you, dear teacher, and teach me from your book! Why should I go to the earth-home again?"
Tenderly did the angel-teacher embrace and uplift the imploring child. She pointed to a distant part of the garden, towards a grate of lattice-work, in gold, silver and pearls, whence issued a glorious light. Beyond this they saw angels walking, in their hands bearing still more glorious books than the one she held.
"When I taught you, long ago, how beautiful was the life there, how pure the love, did you not long to go thither? And when I told you that the way thither was only through the earth, that it was long and difficult and narrow, that many troubles must make you strong to walk in it, did you not long to go, promising not to complain? Do you so soon falter? Have I not told you that the book you carry in your hands there must first be formed on the earth? that there you shall pick up one by one the shining letters which compose it? Why do you complain? have you forgotten that your home is better than those miserable ones which have been given to those who were your beloved playmates here? This is your last visit to the garden of God. The angel-children shall come and whisper to you in your dreams; and, when they in their turns go down to live upon the earth, hold your arms out to them, and, when their steps are weak, help them along. And when you see children with tattered clothes, in poor cottages, look not proudly on your own, but remember that here, in the garden of God, you played together in the same fountain, drank the same dew; and think no more of yourself or your beautiful earth-home, for God gave it to you for the same purpose he gave the wretched cottage to the other. Remember, too, the good mother, who has patiently hushed your cries, and will yet bear you through many dark places. She has never yet tired in caring for you, and you have given her little else but trouble. Go; be henceforth patient and loving."
Sorrow came into the heart of the child for his selfishness; and, as he thought of his beautiful mother, how she always smiled upon him, and would help him to heaven, his heart filled up with love to her.
At that moment he opened his eyes, and there by his side sat the mother, watching for his awaking; a heavenly smile stole over his features, and he held up his arms to her. The mother caught him from the cradle, and wept over him in the ecstasy of a new-found joy and love; for it was the First Smile her baby had given her.
