talsTORICAl- Do Not CIRCULATE wº t ---------—-, -- N JUVENILE C0LLECTION Tº. T H E S T O R Y O F A P O L A R B E A R A N D O T H E R B E D T I M E S T O RI E S BY J. G. & C. KERNAHAN A N D OTHERS I L L U S T R A T E D 32em 330th T H E PLATT & P E CIK CO. Juven: r: , Collectio BEDTIMESTORY-LAND BOOKS Uniform with this Volume A N D FOR SAL E A T T H E SAM E PRI C E PIFF COTTONTAIL’S TRAVELS BY BURTON STONER - PIFF AND HIP WOODCHUCK'S ADVENTURES BY BURTON STONER - BUNTY BROWN BUNNIKIN’S TRAVELS AND OTHER BEDTIME STORIES DANNY FOX’S ADVENTURES - AND OTHER BEDTIME STORIES FLUFFYTAIL’S ADVENTURES AND OTHER BEDTIME STORIES LITTLE ELLIE AND TALKING BEAR BY J. G. AND C. KERNAHAN. LITTLE WILEO AND TALKING WOLF BY J. G. AND C. KERNAHAN JESSIE AND THE TALKING PANSIES BY MRS, FRANK SITTIG TEDDY, THE TALKING CAT . BY MRS. FRANK SITTIG TOM, DOT AND TALKING MOUSE l;Y J (, . AND C RERN A HAN . PIGGY-WIGGY AND PIGGY-WIGGINS BY RUTH CROSSLEY THE LITTLE SMALL RED HEN AND OTHER BEDTIME STORIES CoPYRIGHT, 1916, BY THE PLATT & PECK CO. ELLIE AND TALKING BEAR ONE autumn afternoon not long ago, a lit. tle maiden of eight summers lay stretched on a great rug before the fire in her mother's drawing-room. The little girl was all alone, for her mother had gone to make some calls, and nurse was busy getting baby to sleep in the nursery. Often when baby was being got to sleep, Ellie would come to her favourite place in the drawing-room, for fear she should forget, and wake her little brother; and also, it must be confessed, because this little girl liked to be alone sometimes, she had so many things to think about. Ellie was perhaps just a little too thought- ful; for, till baby came, she had been the only child, and so had no companions ex- ELLIE AND TALKING BEAR cept grown-up people. But now she had be- gun to attend a morning school, and to mix with children of her own age. The children at the school called Ellie “old-fashioned,” an expression which suggested to poor Ellie's ~ mind visions of long-waisted gowns and poke- bonnets, such as she had seen once in her mother's wardrobe, where some relics of past generations hung, smelling of lavender and old Eastern perfumes. When Ellie had asked her mother why these clothes looked so funny, she had been told that it was because they were old-fashioned. From this Ellie argued that she herself must look funny, since her schoolfellows called her old-fash- ioned: for her pretty Smocked frocks were just what other children wore, and, besides, there was a picture just like them in mother's very last fashion book. ELLIE AND TALKING BEAR But if Ellie had only known it, it was neither her frock nor her looks that gained for her the name she resented, but a certain odd way she had of talking. --- On this autumn afternoon Ellie lay on the rug, and thought about this and many other things. She wondered how Miss Graham, her teacher at school, managed to coil her hair in a pattern like the figure 8. She won- dered why a line of her addition sum would come to a different number every time she added it up. She wondered why her boot buttons came off so frequently, and what made her hair get in tangles, and a great many other things, till at last her eyes fell upon a big portfolio upon an easel near the win- dow. This portfolio contained sketches by her Uncle Tom, made while exploring in the Arctic regions. Uncle Tom had written a * ELLIE AND TALKING BEAR book, and on the cover, after his name, ap- peared the letters F.R.S., which Ellie knew signified something very grand indeed. Yet this F.R.S. did not impress Ellie nearly so much as his stories about bears, and seals, and wonderful Arctic birds, and icebergs, and snow-fields. The very rug on which Ellie lay was the skin of a huge Polar bear shot by Uncle Tom. After Ellie's eyes fell on this portfolio her thoughts wandered into Greenland. Ellie closed her eyes, and saw great snow-fields spreading before her, all illuminated by the wonderful Northern Lights. Ice-mountains plunged and sailed in a vast Arctic sea. Soft brown-eyed seals glanced from the water, while strange wide-winged birds uttered their weird cries. “You are none of you real, you know,” ELLIE AND TALKING BEAR said Ellie, keeping her eyes fast shut that she might not lose the picture that her imagi- nation had called up. “You are all dreams, and I could send you every one away if I liked to open my eyes.” “You could not,” said a voice, which seemed to come directly under her. And then, without any more warning, poor Ellie felt herself lifted by the rug till she had to hold fast to the fur not to fall off. “Now, where are you?” said the same voice which had spoken before. “I don't know,” cried Ellie, holding faster than ever to the fur. “I suppose I'm on the rug, and something has lifted it up.” “You are not on a rug, and nothing has lifted it up. You are on a Polar Bear's back, and he lifted himself up.” “Well,” said Ellie, much mystified, and a ELLIE AND TALKING BEAR little frightened, “you never did it before, you know.” -: “Because I was hibernating,” replied the voice; and it undoubtedly came from the bear-rug, which by this time was standing on all its four feet just like a live bear. . “But,” objected Ellie, “Uncle Tom said Polar bears didn't hibernate.” “They can if they like,” was the surly re- joinder. “And your Uncle Tom made sad havoc among the Polar bears, I can tell you. Havoc is the Anglo-Saxon for hawk—” “Oh,” interrupted Ellie, “I didn't think rugs could know so much.” “I beg, little girl, that you will not call me a rug,” said the Polar Bear, with much * dignity. “What am I to call you?” inquired Ellie concernedly. “I don't want to offend you.” ELLIE AND TALKING BEAR “Then why do you do it?” responded the Polar Bear. “You wouldn't like to be called a rug, would you?” - “Certainly not,” Ellie admitted. “But, you see, I couldn't be mistaken for one, for I don’t hibernate in front of any one's drawing-room fire and, besides, you looked so very flat stretched out on the floor.” “That's because you are not a bear, and because you are not a traveller, but only an ignorant little girl,” replied the Polar Bear. And, having said these words, the huge ani- mal began to walk. - Poor Ellie held as fast as she could to the Bear's neck, and ventured to remark: “I think, Polar Bear—if that is what you like me to call you—that you had better not walk about in my mamma's drawing-room. You might break something, you know, and ELLIE AND TALKING BEAR then mamma would perhaps cry, as she did when the parlor-maid broke the lovely vase she brought from Venice. Mamma's eyes are papa said so.” too pretty to cry “Your mamma's feet are pretty,” replied the Bear, “and she wears satin shoes on them, all embroidered with beads, but she steps on me with them, so I don't mind about her Venetian vases. If she had been to my Arctic home, she might have learnt more considera- tion. But you shall have a chance to learn.” And with this the Bear advanced to the French window, and, rising on his hind legs, undid the fastening. “You are not going to take me out,” cried Ellie, in a frightened voice. “Let me get off, please.” *== “You lay on me for your pleasure, now you shall ride on me for mine,” replied the ELLIE AND TALKING BEAR Polar Bear. And without any further remark he walked out upon the green terrace outside, and then made for the carriage drive, tread- ing ruthlessly on the flower-beds with his huge paws. “There's one thing,” Ellie observed, with some satisfaction in her tone, “we shall meet mamma's carriage for certain; and then you will be scolded for taking me out in the damp with no hat on. I daresay she won't let you be her rug any longer, after you have behaved so badly.” At these words the Bear stood still, and turned his head to look at Ellie. But her face was hidden by a branch of chrysanthe- mum flowers, at which she was very glad. “Little girl,” began the Bear after an awful pause, “do not venture to call me a rug again, or you may regret it.” > ELLIE AND TALKING BEAR “You are breaking down mamma's chrysan- themum bushes,” Ellie remarked, wishing to change the subject. “Never mind,” answered the Bear pleas- antly, and striding on. “She won't find it out to-night, and to-morrow we shall be too far away for it to matter.” Ellie was by no means a cry-baby, but she did begin to cry at these words, more es- pecially as the Bear had begun to walk So fast that already the garden was left be- hind. -- “Leave off crying,” said the Bear angrily; “you are wetting my neck.” “I’m sure you can’t feel it through all that fur,” Ellie replied indignantly. “But I know about it,” retorted the Bear, “which is much the same thing.” “Oh!” said Ellie, “I didn't know that know- \!\， ‘ \\$ | % ºsN º º & § 22-2: º: \ | º k; ; ºr º, º , ºr: §§ º ſº }|{} ELLIE AND TALKING BEAR a bit of fire,” said a voice which sounded so like her mother's that Ellie fairly started. “How careless those servants are! Poor little thing! here she is asleep on the rug, and quite blue with cold—and I declare she has got in her arms the stuffed eider duck Tom brought me!” *- Ellie sat up on the bear-rug and blinked in the semi-darkness at her mother. “I was just going by iceberg to the Arctic Fox's reception,” she said. Then a servant lit the gas, and Ellie looked around, rubbing her eyes again and again. Yes, she was in her mother's pretty drawing-room! There was the easel with the portfolio upon it! There was the rug lying flat beneath her! There was the bird in her arms! It was all very bewildering. *s- ELLIE AND TALKING BEAR Then the nursery tea-bell sounded, and Ellie got up, and, sighing as she glanced at the fire-place where the fire had burnt ſº away to white ashes, said: “I wish I could have gone by iceberg to the Arctic Fox's reception before I awoke!” THE PARADISE BIRD SPRING had come and decked the larches with tiny tassels. Primroses starred the grass, while the hawthorn pelted the tinkling stream, which laughed and gurgled over the peb- bles, with fairy snow-showers. Still pools reflected green boughs, and the sun shed its glamor over all. Birds filled the air with wild joyous song. But among all this glad- ness a poor little brown bird sat by a torn nest with drooping wing. Near the nest lay her mate, dead. * As the little brown bird sat and mourned, a thrush came up and began to pluck the feathers from the dead bird to line her nest with. “No, do not take them,” said the little brown bird sorrowfully; “death is so cold— do not take his feathers from him—take those } THE PARADISE : BIRD that line my nest. I shall not need them.” So the thrush came and went, bearing away a feather every time. Then came a black- bird, and he, too, began to pluck the feathers from the dead bird. “No, do not take them,” said the little brown bird, “death is so cold—leave him his feathers,” and then she plucked a feather from her breast and gave it to the black- bird, and a drop of red blood fell upon the ground. Then came other birds, and to each she gave a feather, and every time she said the same words, and every time a drop of red blood fell upon the ground. And when night came the little brown bird dropped her head upon her bleeding breast and mourned. Then a bright angel came and gathered up the drops of blood, and they became flaming THE PARADISE BIRD rubies in her hand. Then she spoke softly. to the little brown bird. “These gems of sorrow and of love shall beautify the King's crown, and thou shalt no longer be a little brown bird, but the most beautiful bird in the King's garden.” With the dawn the birds came once more for feathers to line their nests. The brown bird was too weak to resist, and they plucked feather after feather from her bleeding breast. a Suddenly, with a wild joyous cry, a beauti- ful Bird of Paradise rose from among them, and mounted above the tree tops higher and higher, till at last it could be seen no longer. But the mangled body of the little brown bird was no longer there. And this is how there came to be a Bird of Paradise. THE MONSTER OF THE FIERY EYES HIGH on the mountain which over- shadowed the village stood a grand castle, which had been there so long that the vil- lagers said it was made when the mountain was. And the charity of the lords who had in turn lived there seemed as old as the castle. The poor villagers had only to climb the mountain side and ring at the great door to have their wants relieved. But there came a day when a woman came running into the village in terror, and as she ran she cried, “Do not go near the castle, for a terrible monster is there with fiery eyes —he stands by the door.” Then all the villagers began to lament; it was to them as if the end of the world MONSTER OF THE FIERY EYES had come. The lord of the castle must have grown weary of their much asking, and had set a monster to guard his door. --- From that time no one ventured on the mountain side. Illness and death stalked through the village. Men, women, and chil- dren went hungry, and shivered in their rags. Caronette knelt by her boy's cot. He was dying, and he was her only child. Her tears fell fast on the small waxen face. “Oh, if only he had good food, he might live,” she cried; and her thoughts flew to the castle where it had been necessary only to ask to receive. She seized a shawl, and, wrapping it around her, left the cottage, with her lips tightly pressed together, and began to climb the mountain side. Above she could see the two fearful eyes of the monster shining MONSTER OF THE FIERY EYES * luridly. But she pressed on. “If it kill me, I can but die,” she panted. sº Nearer and nearer Caronette got to the castle, and the eyes of the beast seemed further apart. * *~~ Her breath came in gasps as she plodded On, and she closed her eyes at last that she might not see the monster. --er When she opened them she was at the door, and on each side stood a great lamp. The door was opened by the lord him- self. “Come in,” he said kindly; “what is it you have need of?—you are the first to come since I put the lamps to aid you to find my door on dark nights.” THE ROYAL ROPE “WHAT is the King doing, mother?” asked little Karl. 2 “The King is doing nothing, as befits his Majesty,” said the mother. “Look how splen- did his robe is! Is it not good of him to let us feast upon his magnificence!” , Karl's mother spoke aloud that all might hear her, and that it might by chance reach the ear of King Carodos that she and her house were loyal, and that her little son was brought up to honor the King. The poor mother had no wish to see her husband cast into prison; and the cruelties of the King were only spoken of in whispers, and behind closed doors. The people cowered and cringed and starved and hated—but above all they were __” THE ROYAL ROPE afraid. So when the King and his retainers stood upon the terrace, the miserable folk left their work to kneel before their royal Ina Ster. “But what is the King doing with his hands?” repeated little Karl. Just then the King caught sight of the boy, who was very fair to look upon, and bade one of his retainers bring the lad to him. “He is small,” said the King, “but he would make a pretty page.” * When the retainers told the mother, two great tears rolled down her cheeks, which she quickly brushed away. But the boy was delighted to be sent for by the King, for he had been kept in ignorance of his Majesty's cruelties. As soon as Karl reached the King he knelt THE ROYAL ROPE —l prettily on one knee, and looked up fearlessly into the hard eyes of the monarch, his cheeks flushed and his mouth smiling. The King had not often been looked at in that way, and it confused him so that he did not speak at once. So Karl said, “Now, your Majesty, I see what you are doing with your hands—you are making a strong rope—Oh, dreadfully strong.” The King looked down at his hands, and all the courtiers looked in the same direc- tion. They only saw the King fidgeting with his fingers. “What can the boy mean?” said the King. “It is a rope like they hang people with,” said Karl. At this both the King and the courtiers --~ * THE ROYAL ROPE looked very grave, for they knew that inno- cent children often saw what older people were blind to. “That reminds me,” said the King; “take out my butler and hang him. He spilt my wine.” Then a stern figure which stood beside the King, and whom no man had seen until that moment, put something into a measure he was carrying, and cried with a loud voice, “You have now filled up the measure of your iniquities, O King!” Terror seized every one, for the figure with the measure they now saw for the first time, and his face shone like the Sun, and was terrible to look upon. “You by your evil deeds have been weav- ing that rope, O wicked King, and with it THE ROYAL ROPE you shall be hanged to yonder tree,” said the figure. Yes, there was the rope of which the child had spoken visible to all now. The figure took it from the convulsed fingers of the King and tied it round his neck while he yelled for mercy. “You who have shown no mercy shall re- ceive none,” said the figure, and he drew the struggling monarch to the tree and hanged him. Then in a flash of flame the figure disappeared. THE ROYAL BURDEN THERE was once a King who had so fine a kingdom that he was envied by every other King. His palaces were of marble, and even the locks on his doors were of fine gold. Foun- tains played in his beautiful gardens, and flowers bloomed all the year round. He had horses and carriages, and many servants, and possessed so much money that he had never been able to count it, and he had so many jewels that he could deck himself in different ones every day in the year. Yet this King was not happy, for a mournful sound filled the air, and he could never get away from it night or day. He engaged musicians to play to drown the sound. But above the harps and the violins, and even the brass instru- THE ROYAL BURDEN ments, this mournful sound made itself heard. Sometimes the King would change his palace and live in another, but wherever he went the mournful sound followed him. At last he offered a great reward to any one who would show him a way to get rid of this annoyance. The first to come to him was a little old woman whose brown withered skin showed through her rags. The courtiers would have sent her away, but the King said, “Let her come and have speech with me. One never knows; sometimes fools speak wisdom.” The little old woman bowed to the ground before the King. “Speak,” said the monarch. “Do you think you know of some means of ridding me of this evil which renders my days and nights so wretched?” THE ROYAL BURDEN —º “Yes, your Majesty,” said the old woman. “I have with me a small packet, which if your Majesty will wear next your heart, and never part with, will take away the mourn- ful sound from you for ever.” The King eagerly stretched out his hand for the packet. “If I find your words true,” he said, “you shall receive the reward.” When the King was alone in his bed- chamber, he placed the packet near his heart, and found that with no effort could he re- move it. It was heavy as lead. A bit of paper fluttered to the ground on which there was writing. It had been attached to the packet. The King took it up and read: “These are the sorrows of thy people.” So THE ROYAL BURDEN he must wear the sorrows of his people upon his heart! “Ah,” he cried, “are the sorrows of my people then so heavy | I cannot support this burden.” e. He clutched at his heart, where an intoler- able pain lay. Then he summoned his courtiers. “Bring me the wretch who gave me that packet,” he cried; and the courtiers ran quickly enough to do his bidding, for indeed they were afraid, and with reason, of his wrath. Soon they returned dragging with them the trembling old woman who fell on her knees at his feet. “Wretched woman!” cried the King, “tell me how to rid myself of this burden which is greater than I can bear,” he commanded. “Oh, your Majesty,” answered the old THE ROYAL BURDEN woman, “there is but one way. Go your- self into the miserable hovels where some of your subjects spend their wretched lives. Look with your own eyes upon the sickness, the poverty, the despair. Look on the old people who shiver in their rags, and on the little children who cry for bread!” Then was the King exceedingly angry. “Do you think,” he exclaimed, “that I, a King, will visit those kennels?” Then he bade his courtiers to remove the old woman. But all that night the King was unable to sleep because of the agony of that burden upon his heart, which grew heavier and heavier as the hours went by. But the mourn- ful sound in the air he no longer heard, by reason of his own moaning. THE ROYAL BURDEN When the morning came he again sum- moned his courtiers. “Order my chariot,” he said, “for I am going to visit the hovels where my poorest subjects live.” And the courtiers hastened to do the King's bidding, saying among themselves, “The King is sick unto death!” And indeed his Majesty's face was pale and drawn with pain, and his hand was ever upon his heart. Through the fine wide streets of the city the chariot passed. But at last it came to a standstill, and a courtier told the King that the streets he would visit were too narrow for it to pass. “Then I must go on foot,” said the King, leaving his seat, and stepping out on to the pavement. --- THE ROYAL BURDEN The street he entered was so narrow that no sunlight could enter. The tenements were indescribably wretched. Scarcely any glass remained in the windows, and the doors were falling from their hinges. Sad-eyed men and women crouched in the doorways, and little children with pinched faces stood in groups near shop windows where uninviting food **s-, was visible behind dirty glass. But no sooner did these wretched crea- tures realise that the King was there, than they ran like rats to their holes. The royal presence meant to them disaster. It was the King—the King who taxed them till they had not enough left to buy bread; the King who punished them; the King who lived in fine palaces while they rotted in vile dens. But the King entered at one of the doors, and ascended the broken stairs, and walked THE ROYAL BURDEN into a wretched room, where a woman lay dying upon a sack, with a baby at her breast, while upon the floor other children crouched dumb with misery. The King covered his face to shut out the sight, and turned and fled. When he reached his palace he called with a loud voice, “Let criers be sent in every part of the city, and let them say, ‘The King has issued a proclamation that all who are in want must come to the royal palace, and they shall receive according to their needs. Let the people be told that builders shall begin 3 2 9 at once to make them good dwellings. Then the King's hand left his heart, for the pain had departed, nor did he ever again hear that mournful sound in the air, for he had lifted sorrow from the hearts of his people. THE GARDEN OF GOD IT was broad noonday in the garden, and so hot that one could see the air palpitating and quivering above the gravel paths in un- dulant haze of heat. Even the butterfly gasped for breath, and grumbled because the swaying of the grasses set stirring a warm puff, which was like the opening of an oven. The sun seemed so near, and was trying so hard to be hot, that the daisies said they could see him spinning and panting as he stood above them: but that, I think, was only their fancy, although it is true that he was shining so exactly overhead, that there was not a streak of shadow where one could creep for shelter from the sweltering heat. All the flowers were parched and drooping, and except for THE GARDEN OF GOD the passing buzz where a bee went drowsily by, or buried himself with a contented burr in the heart of a pansy, not a sound stirred the sultry silence. ------ All at once there was a sudden scurry * among the birds. A cat which had been basking and purring in the sunshine, open- ing and shutting an eye every now and then to make believe that she was not sleepy, had dropped off into a doze, and now yawned and awakened; and this was the signal-for a general stir. “Phew! but it is hot, to be sure!” exclaimed the butterfly, as he darted up for a stretch from the poppy-head on which he had been sitting, and went waltzing, anglewise, down the gravelled path of the garden, lacing the long, green lines of the boxwood bordering with loops of crimson and gold. THE GARDEN OF GOD “I hope my weight won't inconvenience you,” he said with airy politeness-to the lily, dropping himself lazily, and without waiting for an answer, upon her delicate head, which drooped so feebly beneath this new burden that several scented petals fluttered fainting to the ground. “I am grieved to see you looking so sadly,” he continued, after he had settled himself to his liking; “but what on earth, my good soul, makes you lean forward in that uncomfort- able attitude? There is a charmingly shady spot under the shelter of the wall behind yOu. Why don't you lean in that direction? As it is, you are going out of your way to make yourself uncomfortable, besides which I should very much prefer to be out of the heat.” “I should be glad to move into the shade,” THE GARDEN OF GOD said the lily gently, “but my sweetheart, the rose, has fallen asleep by the border, and I am leaning over her to keep the sun from her buds.” “How very charming you are!” lisped the butterfly languidly, and in a tone of polite contempt which seemed to imply, “and what a fool!” “But your ideas are a little crude, don't you know, though of course interesting. It is easy to see you are not a person of the world. When you have travelled about, and learnt as much as I have, you will come to look at such things in a different way.” “Yes, you have travelled, and lived in the world, and seen a great deal,” said the lily; “but I have loved; and it is by loving, as well as by living, that one learns.” “Don’t presume to lecture me!” was the impatient answer. “Fancy a flower finding º t * # Şs '/ !\， , * ： \ſ| ºg sae \\ §§ ſae \，R） §§№ § （3）? ſae © ！ ∞'， ººğ) ∞-º & ſaeſº （） №ſae “You’ll have to begin by undearn- ing,” fut in a big doześće daščia. ** THE GARDEN OF GOD fault with a butterfly! Don't you know that I am your superior in the scale of being!. But, tell me, does this love of which you speak bring happiness?” “The greatest of all happiness,” whispered the lily almost to herself, and with infinite tenderness—her white bells seeming to light up and overflow, like human eyes, as she spoke. “To love truly, and to be loved, is indeed to be favoured of heaven. All the good things which this world contains are not worthy to be offered in exchange for the - love of one faithful heart.” “Then I must learn to love,” said the but- terfly decisively, “for happiness has always been my aim. Tell me how to begin.” “You’ll have to begin by unlearning,” put in a big double-dahlia, which was standing by like a sentinel, and looking as stiff and THE GARDEN OF GOD stuck-up as if he had just been appointed flower-policeman to the garden. *~ “Don’t you be afraid that any one's going to fall in love with you,” was the spiteful re- joinder of the butterfly, edging himself round and round on a lily-bell as he spoke. “Your place is in the vegetable garden, along with the cauliflowers and the artichokes. There is something distinguished about a white chrysanthemum, and the single-dahlias are shapely, although they do stare so; but the double-dahlias!”—and the butterfly affected a pretty shudder of horror which made the double-dahlia stiffen on his stem with rage. - “How dare you speak slightingly of my family!" he said indignantly. “And as for those big chrysanthemums! why they’re just like tumbled heaps of worsted, or that shaggy- eyed skye-terrier dog that we see sometimes THE GARDEN OF GOD in the garden—untidy, shapeless, lumpy things I call them!” The butterfly, who had been alternately opening and shutting his wings, as if he thought the sight of such splendor was too dazzling to be borne continuously, but really because he knew that the sombre tinting which they displayed when closed, height- ened, by contrast, their gorgeous coloring when open, was nothing if not well-bred, so he simply pretended to stifle a yawn in the dahlia's face, and to make believe that he had not heard what was said. “After all,” he said, turning his back pointedly upon the dahlia, and shutting up his wings with a final Snap—just as a fine lady closes a fan—“after all, my dear lily, I don't know whether it's worth my while to learn to love: for, by this time next year, you THE GARDEN OF GOD and I will be dead, and it will be all the same then to us as if we had never loved, or even lived at all.” “I know nothing about death,” replied the lily, “but no one who loves can doubt im- mortality, and if the rose and I are not already immortal, I believe that our love will make us so.” “What is this immortality?” said the but- terfly. “I have heard the word used a great deal in my wanderings, but I never quite knew the meaning of it.” “It is the finding again after death of those we have loved and lost; and the loving and living with them for ever, I think,” an- swered his companion. “I don't believe you know anything about it,” said the butterfly decisively. “All the men and women I’ve met—and they ought THE GARDEN OF GOD to know—used ever so much longer words.” “Perhaps you are right,” replied the lily quietly, bending forward to shield a stray rosebud from the burning sun, “but to be for ever with those I love would be immortal- ity enough for me. And I heard the maiden who walks in the garden speaking yester- day, and I remember that she said it was more godlike to love one little child purely and unselfishly than to have a heart filled with a thousand vast vague aspirations after things . ** * we can neither know nor understand.”