THE REAPERS.
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Thevillage seems deserted. No children on the green running races with each other, or playing hunt-the-slipper on the smooth turf. No old men resting beneath the manorial tree, sunning themselves, and talking with feeble voices, like the aged men of Troy, compared by Homer to grasshoppers; neither is there the sound of the spinning-wheel by the open cottage door, with its rustic porch and clustering hops. All are away to the harvest-field. Let us go there too. We are all bidden guests at FarmerDrayton’s, and our holiday will pass merrily among the reapers.
AUTUMNTHE REAPERS.
AUTUMNTHE REAPERS.
AUTUMN
THE REAPERS.
“Good morning, Goody! Where are you going with your troop of rosy children, all glee and gossip?” “To the harvest-field, young masters. ’Tis a pleasant time, that comes but once a year, and we make the most of it. My master was out before the sun, reaping in the field beside the river; but I had to dress the children and get his dinner, and that makes me late.” “Good day, then; we will not hinder you.” Away she goes, half running, the children out of breath with delight. They have turned into Johnson’s field. Let us follow them. There they are with twenty or thirty others, gathering the scattered ears, asRuth gathered them on the plains of Bethlehem. Look at Goody! How diligently she is picking up the ears! The children, too, are all helping. Before the season is over, they will collect at least three clear bushels of wheat; and if the weather prove showery, and the wagon is hurried to the barn, they will obtain a larger quantity.
Farmer Johnson is at the farthest end, watching his reapers. He looks pleased, and with reason, for the rustling corn stands thick, and the men work cheerfully. The Lord of the Field, (for such the chief reaper is called,) heads the long line of farming servants. When he clasps the opposite ears in his strong arms, they clasp theirs also; when hethrusts his sickle, they do the same; and there is presently laid low a wide extent of grain, with its garniture of flowers,—the corn-cockle, and scarlet-poppy, sweet basil, and marjoram, herbs Robert and Christopher, Cicily and William—names by which old simplers commemorated worth or friendship, or the villagers of other days associated with the memory of benefactors, whose skill and kindness might be shadowed forth in the qualities of their favorite plants. It seems as if those who bind up the sheaves have some pleasant or grateful thoughts connected with the prostrate flower, for a few are carefully taken from among the rest and put aside.
Before the young wheat springs up,we shall hear, I fancy, the church-bells ringing merrily, for there are John Gray and Susan Bell hard at work. He has just pulled the prickly stems of the woolly thistle from the corn she is about to bind. Farmer Johnson often tells the men and women to mind their work; but he takes no notice of John and Susan, though many a kindly word passes between them, for he knows that more industrious and well-conducted young persons are no where to be found.
Two boys