CHAPTER IV.
Nellyturned out more and more of an acquisition every day. Pretty as this new place was, Little Sunshine was not quite so happy as the week before. She had not so many things to amuse her out-of-doors, and indoors she was kept more to her nursery than she approved of or was accustomed to, being in her own home mamma’s little friend and companion all day long. Now mamma was often too busy to attend to her, and had to slip away and hide out of sight; for whenever Sunny caught sight of her, the wail of “Mamma, mamma, I want you!” was really sad to hear.
Besides, she had another tribulation. In the nearest house, a short distance down the lane, lived six children whom she knew and was fond of, and had come to Scotland on purpose to play with. But alas! one of them caught the measles, and, Little Sunshine never having had measles, or anything,—in fact never having had a day’s illness or taken a dose of physic in her life,—the eldersdecided that it was best to keep the little folks apart. Mamma tried hard not to let Sunny find out that her dear playfellows of old lived so near; but one day these sharp little ears caught their names, and from that time she was always wanting to go and play with them, and especially with their “little baby.”
“I want to see that little baby, mamma; may Sunny go and cuddle the dear little baby?”
But it was the baby which had the measles, and some of the rest were not safe. So there was nothing for it but to give orders to each household that when they saw one another they were to run away at once; which they most honourably did. Still, it was hard for Sunny to see her little friends—whom she recognised at once, though they had not met for eight months—galloping about, as merry as possible, playing at “ponies,” and all sorts of things, while she was kept close to her Lizzie’s side and not allowed to go near them.
Thus, but for kind little Nelly, the child would have been dull,—at least, as dull as such a sunshiny child could well be,—which was not saying much. If she grows up with her present capacity for enjoying herself, little Sunny will be a blessing wherever she goes, since happy-minded people always make others happy. Still, Nelly was welcome company, especially of afternoons.
The days passed on very much alike. Before breakfast, Sunny always went a walk with her mamma, holding hands, and talking like two grown-up persons,—about the baa-lambs, and calves, and cows, which they met on their way along the hillside. It was a beautiful hillside, and everything looked so peaceful in the early morning. They seldom met anybody, except once, when they were spoken to by a funny-looking man, who greatly offended Sunny by asking if she were a boy or girl, but added, “It’s a fine bairn, anyhow!” Then he went on to say how he had just come “frae putting John M’Ewen in his coffin, ye ken; I’m gaun to Glasgow, but I’ll be back here o’ Saturday. Ay, ay, I’ll be back o’ Saturday,” as if the assurance must be the greatest satisfaction to Sunny and her mamma. Mamma thought he must have been drunk, but no, he was only foolish,—a poor half-witted fellow, whom all the neighbourhood knew, and were good to. He had some queer points. Among the rest, a most astonishing memory. He would go to church, and then repeat the sermon, or long bits of it, off by heart, to the first person he met. Though silly, he was quite capable of taking care of himself, and never harmed anybody. Everybody, Nelly said, was kind to “daft John.” Still, Sunny did not fancy him, and when she came home shetold her papa a long story about “that ugly man!”
She had great games with her papa now and then, and was very happy whenever she could get hold of him. But her great companion was Nelly. From the minute Nelly came out of school till seven o’clock,—Sunny’s bedtime,—they were inseparable; and the way the big girl devoted herself to the little one, the patience with which she submitted to all her vagaries, and allowed herself to be tyrannised over,—never once failing in good temper and pleasantness,—was quite pretty to see. They played in the garden together, they went walks, they gathered blackberries, made them into jam, in a little saucer by the fire, and then ate them up. With a wooden spade, and a “luggie” to fill with earth, they used to go up the hillside, or down to the glen, sometimes disappearing for so long that mamma was rather unhappy in her mind, only Nelly was such a cautious little person, that whenever she went she was sure to bring her two charges home in safety.
One day, Nelly not being attainable, mamma went with the “big child” and the little one to the Dominie’s Hole.
It was a real long walk, especially for such tiny feet, that eighteen months ago could barely toddle alone; all across the field of the baa-lambs, whichalways interested Sunny so much that it was difficult to get her past them; she wanted to play with them and “cuddle” them, and was much surprised when they invariably ran away. However, she was to-day a little consoled by mamma’s holding her upon the top of the stone dike at the end of the field, to watch “the water running” between the trees of the glen.
In Scotland water runs as I think it never does in England,—so loudly and merrily, so fast and bright. Even when it is brown water,—as when coming over peat it often is,—there is a beauty about it beyond all quiet Southern streams. Here, however, it was not coloured, but clear as crystal in every channel of the little river, and it was divided into tiny channels by big stones, and shallow, pebbly watercourses, and overhanging rocks covered with ferns, and heather, and mosses. Beneath these were generally round pools, where the river settled dark and still, though so clear that you could easily see to the bottom, which looked only two or three feet deep, when perhaps it was twelve or fifteen.
The Dominie’s Hole was one of these. You descended to it by a winding path through the glen, and then came suddenly out upon a sheltered nook surrounded by rocks, over which the honeysuckles crept, and the birk or mountain ash grewout of every possible cranny. Down one of these rocks the pent-up stream poured in a noisy little waterfall, forming below a deep bathing-pool, cut in the granite—I think it was granite—like a basin, with smooth sides and edges. Into this pool, many years ago, the poor young “Dominie,” or schoolmaster, had dived, and striking his head against the bottom, had been stunned and drowned. He was found floating, dead, in the lonely little pool, which ever after bore his name.
A rather melancholy place, and the damp, sunless chill of it made it still more gloomy, pretty as it was. Little Sunshine, who cannot bear living in shadow, shivered involuntarily, and whispered, “Mamma, take her!” as she always does in any doubtful or dangerous circumstances. So mamma was obliged to carry her across several yards of slippery stones, green with moss, that she might look up to the waterfall, and down to the Dominie’s Hole. She did not quite like it, evidently, but was not actually frightened,—she is such a very courageous person whenever she is in her mamma’s arms.
When set down on her own two feet, the case was different. She held by her mamma’s gown, looked at the noisy tumbling water with anxious eyes, and seemed relieved to turn her back upon it, and watch the half-dozen merry rivulets intowhich it soon divided, as they spread themselves in and out over the shallow channel of the stream. What charming little baby rivers they were! Sunny and her mamma could have played among them for hours, damming them up with pebbles, jumping over them, floating leaves down them, and listening to their ceaseless singing, and their dancing too, with bubbles and foam gliding on their surface like little fairy boats, till—pop!—all suddenly vanished, and were seen no more.
It was such a thirsty place, too,—until mamma made her hand into a cup for the little girl, and then the little girl insisted on doing the same for mamma, which did not answer quite the same purpose, being so small. At last mamma took out of her pocket a letter (it was a sad letter, with a black edge, but the child did not know that), and made its envelope into a cup, from which Sunny drank in the greatest delight. Afterward she administered it to her mamma and her Lizzie, till the saturated paper began to yield,—its innocent little duty was done. However, Sunny insisted on filling it again herself, and was greatly startled when the bright, fierce-running water took it right out of her hand, whirled it along for a yard or two, and then sunk it, soaked through, in the first eddy which the stream reached.
Poor child! she looked after her frail treasurewith eyes in which big tears—and Sunny’s tears, when they do come, are so very big!—were just beginning to rise; and her rosy mouth fell at the corners, with that pitiful look mamma knows well, though it is not often seen.
“Never mind, my darling; mamma will make her another cup out of the next letter she has. Or, better still, she will find her own horn cup, that has been to Scotland so often, and gone about for weeks in mamma’s pocket, years ago. Now Sunny shall have it to drink out of.”
“And to swim? May Sunny have it to swim?”
“No, dear, because, though it would not go down to the bottom like the other cup, it might swim right away and be lost, and then mamma would be so sorry. No, Sunny can’t have it to swim, but she may drink out of it as often as she likes. Shall we go home and look for it?”
“Yes.”
The exact truth, told in an intelligible and reasonable way, always satisfies this reasonable child, who has been accustomed to have every prohibition explained to her, so far as was possible. Consequently, the sense of injustice, which even very young children have, when it is roused, never troubles her. She knows mamma will give her everything she can, and when she does not, it is simply because she can’t; and she tellsSunnywhyshe can’t, whenever Sunny can understand it.
So they climbed contentedly up the steep brae, and went home.
Nothing else happened here—at least to the child. If she had a rather dull life, it was a peaceful one. She was out-of-doors a great deal, with Lizzie and Nelly of afternoons, with her mamma of early mornings. Generally, each day, the latter contrived to get a quiet hour or two; while her child played about the garden steps, and she sat reading the newspaper,—the terrible newspaper! When Sunny has grown up a woman, she will know what a year this year 1870 has been, and understand how, many a time, when her mamma was walking along with her, holding her little hand and talking about all the pretty things they saw, she was thinking of other mothers and other children, who, instead of running merrily over sunshiny hillsides, were weeping over dead fathers, or dying miserably in burnt villages, or starving, day by day, in besieged cities. This horrible war, brought about, as war almost always is, by a few wicked, ambitious men, made her feel half frantic.
One day especially,—the day the Prussians came and sat down before Paris, and began the siege,—Little Sunshine was playing about, with her little wooden spade, and a “luggie,” that herpapa had lately bought for her; filling it with pebbles, and then digging in the garden-beds, with all her small might. Her mamma sat on the garden steps, reading the newspaper. Sunny did not approve of this at all.
“Come and build me a house. Put that down,” pulling at the newspaper, “and build Sunny a house. Please, mamma,” in a very gentle tone,—she knows in a minute, by mamma’s look, when she has spoken too roughly,—“Please, mamma, come and build Sunny a house.”
And getting no answer, she looked fixedly at her mamma,—then hugged her tight around the neck and began to sob for sympathy. Poor lamb! She had evidently thought only little girls cried,—not mammas at all.
The days ran on fast, fast; and it was time for another move and another change in Little Sunshine’s holiday. Of course she did not understand these changes; but she took them cheerfully,—she was the very best of little travellers. The repeated packing had ceased to be an interest to her; she never wanted now to jump upon mamma’s gowns, and sit down on her bonnets, by way of being useful; but still the prospect of going in a puff-puff was always felicitous. She told Nelly all about it; and how she was afterward to sail in a boat, with Maurice and Maurice’s papa (Mauricewas a little playfellow, of whom more presently), how they were to go fishing and catch big salmon.
“Wouldn’t you like to catch a big salmon?” she asked Nelly, not recognising in the least that she was parting with her, probably never to meet again in all their lives. But the elder child looked sad and grave during the whole of that day. And when for the last time Nelly put her arms around Sunny and kissed her over and over again, Sunny being of course just as merry as ever, and quite unconscious that they were bidding one another good-bye, it was rather hard for poor little Nelly.
However, the child did not forget her kind companion. For weeks and even months afterwards, upon hearing the least allusion to this place, Sunshine would wake up into sudden remembrance. “Where’s Nelly? I want to see Nelly,—I want Nelly to come and play with me;” and look quite disappointed when told that Nelly was far away, and couldn’t come. Which was, perhaps, as much as could be expected of three years old.
Her little bare feet pattering along the floor
Always happy in the present, and frightened at nothing so long as she was “close by mamma,” Little Sunshine took her next journey. On the way she stayed a night at the seaside place where she had been taken before, and this time theweather was kind. She wandered with her Lizzie on the beach, and watched the waves for a long time; then she went indoors to play with some other little children, and to pay a visit to the dear old lady who had been ill, when she was here last. Here, I am afraid, she did not behave quite as well as she ought to have done,—being tired and sleepy; nor did she half enough value the kind little presents she got; but she will some day, and understand the difference between eighty years of age and three, and how precious to a little child is the blessing of an old woman.
Sunny went to bed rather weary and forlorn, but she woke up, next morning, and ran in to papa and mamma, still in her nightgown, with her little bare feet pattering along the floor, looking asbright as the sunshine itself. Which was very bright that day,—a great comfort, as there was a ten hours’ sea-voyage before the little woman, who had never been on board a steamboat, and never travelled so long at a time in all her life. She made a good breakfast to start with, sitting at table with a lot of grown-up people whose faces were as blithe as her own, and behaving very well, considering. Then came another good-bye, of course unheeded by Little Sunshine, and she was away on her travels once more.
But what happened to her next must be put into a new chapter.