Phemie Frost's Experiences. Ann S. Stephens

is a sin, and that the fun which comes out of pain to any of God's creatures is a crime, there would not be much for Mr. Bergh and his noble society to do. The cruel instincts of a child become ferocious in the man. With such, men can best deal. I thank God that one brave spirit is found ready and able to protect the dumb creatures that are given us for blessings, not for victims.

      While I am writing this, picture after picture comes up from my own past girlhood, and my heart stands still as I remember how ferocious a thirst for fun and ignorance can be in a child. How many sleepy-looking toads I have seen, with their backs all jewels, and their throats yellow gold, that asked nothing but a burdock leaf for shelter, and a few flies for food, crushed to death by boys who thought no harm, and only liked the sport of killing something.

      Since then, I have learned that these little creatures are a great help to gardeners, and that wise men foster them with kindness and care.

      Once, down by the trout-brook we know of, I saw a lot of children, busy as bees, doing something on the bank, where two or three boys were kneeling, and the rest looking on. Of course I went down to the brook, and, being a little mite of a creature, looked on, half frightened, half wondering.

      The boys had caught a great frog, green as grass. He was, I have no doubt, one of those hoarse old croakers, that make one timid about going by ponds and marshy ground in the night, up in our State. Well, they had him down in the grass, and one held him while the other ran a pin through both jaws and twisted it there. There was no fun in this. A lot of doctors cutting off an arm couldn't have been more gravely in earnest. Some of the boys were eight and ten years old; but not one of them seemed to feel that they were doing a hideous thing. I remember feeling very sorry for the poor frog, but it was not till years and years after that I understood the horrible, lingering death these ignorant boys had tortured him with. Since then I have never thought of that sparkling trout stream, without a pain at my heart.

      "Childish ignorance," I hear you say—for some of these boys were your own brothers, and meant no harm. But what right had they to be ignorant? They knew well enough that it was against the law to kill one another. Why were they not taught that the life that God gives to His meanest creature is as sacred as a good man's prayers; unless necessity calls for it, and then it must be taken with as little suffering as death can give?

      Sisters, I am in earnest; the missionary spirit is strong upon me. I wish our Society to take up this subject with interest. What Mr. Bergh has been doing among men, we must do among the children of this generation. When ignorance is an excuse for cruelty, you and I and every woman of the land are wretches if we allow a child to sin because it knows no better. There is no great study necessary to work out a reform here. The mother who knows what is right knows how to impress it on her children; and if they play at death and destruction, she is the person most to blame.

      Don't say that I am writing out one of my popular addresses before the Society—I never thought of such a thing; but when I saw the great Natural History Philanthropist, my heart and mind went right back to you and my duties as a missionary of universal progress, and I sat there in silence thinking over these things till I forgot that he was there.

      At last he spoke, and said, kindly enough, "Is there anything I can help you in?"

      I started and reached out my hand.

      "Mr. Bergh," says I, enthusiastically, "I can help you! All the world over we women work best in the primary department. You have begun a grand and a noble work among men. We will begin at the other end, and in that way cut your work down to nothing. I see a clear path before us. Henceforth I will belong to your Society, and you shall belong to mine. Is it agreed?"

      He sat down by me; his eyes grew bright; his earnestness of purpose inspired me to press forward to the mark of the prize—I beg pardon, the old prayer-meeting spirit will manifest itself in spite of me when my soul is full of a great purpose.

      After we had talked on the great subject satisfactorily, he said, all at once, "But you came for some purpose in which I may have the pleasure of serving you."

      Then I remembered my bird and its imperial object. Revealing my gold-paper box, I opened it carefully, fearing a sudden flight. Nothing moved. Trembling with dread, I put in my hand; it touched a soft fluff of feathers that did not stir.

      My heart sank like a lead weight in my bosom. I looked in; the poor little thing lay in the bottom of the box, with its wings spread out, and its head lying sideways. I touched it with my hand; it was limp and dead. While I had been talking with so much feeling about cruelty to animals, my own little songster—no, being a female she was not that—but my poor pet had been smothered to death in that gorgeous little receptacle.

      With my heart swelling like a puff-ball, I turned my shoulder on that good man, and closed my satchel solemnly, as if it had been a tomb.

      "Sir," says I, in a voice full of touching penitence, "I feel myself just at this minute wholly unworthy of the mark of the high calling to which I have offered myself. A young lady who puts herself forward to teach thoughtful kindness to the young, should be above reproach in that respect herself."

      The good gentleman looked awfully puzzled, for how would he guess at the crime I had locked up in that box?

      "Good-morning," says I, walking away; "the time may come when I shall feel a new exaltation, but just now—well, good-morning."

      I went away meek and humble as a pussy cat. When I looked down at the box in my hand it seemed as if I was carrying a coffin.

      Well, I buried my poor little pet in that identical box, with the blue ribbon about its neck; but the poem I forwarded to him in Boston. I may be meek and humbly conscious of my own shortcomings, but the Grand Duke of all the Russias shall never go home with the idea that Vermont hasn't got poets as well as Boston, and that young ladies cannot put as much vim and likewise maple-sugar into their poetry as that smart fellow, Dr. Holmes, simmered down in his.

      Just read mine and his, that's all!

      I do think that nothing can equal the forwardness of some New York girls. Would you believe it, one stuck-up thing has just stolen my beautiful idea, and sent her card to the great Grand Duke tied round a bird's neck; but it was like stealing a fiddle and forgetting the fiddlestick. A card isn't poetry. There is no accounting for the vanity of some people; but the best proof of genius is imitation.

XV.

       CHRISTMAS IN NEW YORK.

       Table of Contents

      DEAR SISTERS:—Thanksgiving is the great Yankee jubilee of New England. Then every living thing makes itself happy, except the turkeys, and geese, and chickens. They, poor martyrs, have been scared into the middle of next week by the yells, and shrieks, and awful cackling of the whole army of winged creatures that sit in ten thousand ovens, with their legs tied, their wings twisted, and the gravy a-dripping down their sides and bosoms, like rain from the eaves of a house. Of course, for that day, every barn-yard in New England goes into mourning. The poor hen is afraid to cackle when she lays an egg, for fear of having a gun cracked at her. Even the fat hogs look melancholy in their pens, for a smell of roasting spare-ribs comes over them, and they seem to ruminate mournfully on some means of saving their own bacon.

      Of course, there must be some unhappiness even on a New England Thanksgiving, or earth would forget itself and turn into heaven all at once. Besides, who thinks of the scared gobblers, when he has a plump turkey roasted brown as a berry, scenting the whole house with richness? I for one could not bring myself to the foul contemplation—excuse the wit—spontaneity is perhaps my fault.

      Well, what Thanksgiving is to New England, Christmas-day is to New York. Everybody goes to meeting in the morning, and everybody takes dinner with everybody else after that. For days before it comes the streets are full of covered wagons, and men and boys, loaded down with