THE MORNING-GLORY.
“How did Luly look?” Her eyes were brown, her hair was brown, too; she was very pale, and slender, and had a soft, sweet voice, just such a voice as you would expect from such a fragile little girl. Luly did not like to be noticed: she was fond of being by herself, and would often sit for an hour at a time, quite still, with her slender hands crossed in her lap, thinking; her cheek would flush, and her eye moisten, but no one knew what Luly was thinking about. Luly did not love to play; she did not care for dolls, or baby-houses; she never jumped rope, or drove hoop, or played hunt the slipper; this troubled her mother, who knew that all healthy young creatures love to play and frolic; and so she brought Luly all sorts of pretty toys, and Luly would say very sweetly, “Thank you, dear mamma,” and put them on the shelf, but she never played with them, and seemed quite to forget that they were there. Luly’s grandmother shook her head, andsaid, “Luly will die; Luly will never live to grow up.”
If Luly heard any one speak in a harsh, cross voice, she would shiver all over, as if some cold wind were blowing upon her; and if she saw two persons quarreling, she never would be satisfied till she had made peace between them. One day, before she could speak plain, her mother sent her down to the kitchen on an errand; when she got to the door, she stood still, for the cook and the chambermaid were very angry with each other; one was saying “You did,” and the other “I didn’t,” in very loud tones, and their faces were very red with passion. Luly stood in the door-way, looking, listening, and trembling, as she always did at any such sight. Tears gathered slowly in her eyes, and unable to bear it any longer, she stepped between them, and clasping her little hands, said in her broken way, with her sweet, musical voice, “Oh, don’tcondict, please don’tcondict.” So the girls stopped contradicting, ashamed before a little child, “for of such is the kingdom of heaven.”
Luly never disobeyed her mother—never—never. If her mother told her not to go out in the garden without her leave, and then went away for an hour, she was just as sure that Luly had obeyed her, as if she had been there to see; and yet, every night when this littlegirl went to bed, she would say, as she laid her head upon the pillow, “Mother, do you think God will forgive all my sins to-day? I hope he will,I hope I haven’t made God sorry, mother;” and when her mother said, “Yes, I know he will forgive you, Luly,” she would smile so peacefully, and say: “Now you can go down stairs, mother.” Luly never was afraid of God; she never thought or spoke of His “punishing” her; but she loved Him so much that it was a great grief to her to think that she might have “made Him sorry,” as she called it. One morning when she woke, one beautiful summer morning, when the scent of the roses came in at the open window, when the dew-drops were glistening, and the green trees waving, and the birds singing, she crept out of her little crib, and stood at her window looking out on the fair earth, with her little hands clasped, her eyes beaming, and her cheek glowing.
“What is it, Luly?” said her mother, as tears rolled slowly down Luly’s cheeks.
“I want to see Him,” whispered Luly.
“Who, my child?”
“God.”
Then Luly’s mother thought of what her grandmother had said: “Luly will not live; Luly will die,”and she clasped her little girl tightly to her breast, as if she feared even then she would go from her.
But no mother’s clasp could hold little Luly; no mother’s tears could bribe the Death Angel. Rose-red grew the cheek, then white as snow, the little hands grew hot, then icy cold, the soft eye bright, then dim, and she who never grieved us living, grieved us dying.