New Aims in Life 3
Back to The True Path, and How to Walk Therein
"Educate that child?"
"Yes, don't you approve the plan? She is a bright, affectionate little thing, and her mother is poor, to destitution."
Louisa threw her arm around Catharine's neck, and gave her a heart-warm kiss. "Don't give up, my dear girl!" she said earnestly.
"O, no! I am happier now than I have been in a long time. Everything is sunny to me now. Rainbow tints touch all. A thousand blessings are showered upon me; how could I speak so bitterly, when I have kind, affectionate friends? How much more I shall try to do for their happiness than I have done! If we would only do all the good which Providence throws in our way, how many beautiful spots we could look back to in after years!
"But I am an enthusiast, Louisa; all comes to me so glowingly. My aims in life are fixed now, I hope. I have triumphed, but I have had many prayers and tears and struggles since I last saw you. It has been a hard thing for me to resolve to yield up my daydreams, my idle feelings, my talents, my all — to better purposes than my own amusement. But now — now it seems a sweeter thing to pour out my sympathies, to make others joyful; it is a blessed power. We do not realize what we are, the pure happiness we are capable of, until we feel thus. It seems so delightful to me to be full of plans, eager and interested, like other people. I am as full of romance as ever, but I shall look on life, and weave around real incidents the charmed spell. I shall no longer fly from the common-place, but I will breathe over it the poetry of kindly affections. I shall not selfishly avoid the society of all but a chosen few. I shall observe and study; I shall do anything — everything to wake up my mind from its lethargic dreams. I will keep a journal to watch over my wayward heart, and note down my resolutions and short-comings. It shall benefit me by being my confessional, and it shall uplift me with its own unequaled pure romance. Now haven't I as great a tact for creating sources of happiness as I had, a few weeks ago — the talent for discovering miseries! I shall yet be a happy creature, and a useful one, too, I hope."
Louisa listened to this gush of happy feeling, with a smile beaming from her blue eyes, and softening every feature. Never had the dear voice of Catharine sounded so sweetly musical. Her own experience, though brief, told her that clouds followed the joyful sunshine; but it also told her that those clouds would break again, and from the bosom of the heavens, a flood of yet purer light would descend; she sought not to dampen the ardor of her friend by reminding her of the changeful states of mind to which we are subject, the hours of stern conflict with feelings and motives which we thought we had abandoned entirely. She had seldom seen Catharine's strength of character thoroughly roused, but it had sometimes flashed forth with a light that assured her it could burn brightly and steadily, if principle, undying principle, were but there to feed the flame.
Casting aside these reflections for the present, she yielded with her friend to that delicious freshness and childhood of the heart which all must have felt for a time at least. She rummaged among the books on education lying on Catharine's table, sometimes laughing and jesting about her new dignities, and again entering into a serious discussion. At last, to little Susy's great delight, she took her dress from her, and, occupying her vacated seat, began to sew with a charming energy. When the protégé had Catharine's permission to disappear, Louisa said, gayly, "Why, Kate, we are as happy as queens here, in our capacity of seamstresses. So you are really going to give that little bright-eyed damsel a first-rate education; going to take the whole charge of her! Is she very smart?"
"Yes, and generous and sweet-tempered. I shall not waste any accomplishments on her; but I shall cultivate and strengthen her mind, and see that the best affections of her nature are called forth, as a matter of the first importance."
"O! you will make a charming teacher; you talk like a book. Who would have thought a wild, careless girl like you, could speak so judiciously on such a subject?"
"Ah! indeed," said Catharine, with her hearty, mischievous laugh, "these wild girls don't get the credit of even being in their sober senses. I suppose my acquaintances will think I am loony, as the Scotch say. Well, be it so! I can be laughed at — but I can't be moved."
"We would be in a pretty bad plight, if we depended on the opinions of our friends entirely, instead of our own convictions of duty," remarked Louisa.
As weeks rolled on, Catharine was fretted, worried, and tormented with little Susy. Hasty words sometimes sprang to her lip, but the strong, upright will came off conqueror in the end. She went into society with a different spirit.
"Such a delightful time we will have tonight!" were the eager words that escaped her lips, as she and Louisa were tripping along Broadway one afternoon; "we must not stay long at Mrs. Belcher's; I hope she is not very sick."
"O! I hope not," answered Louisa; then taking up the subject that most occupied her thoughts, she exclaimed, in a lively tone, "I shall have just the kind of company you like, the talent and genius, and you shall be the star. I won't have to coax you to be bright tonight, will I?"
"Oh, be quiet" said Catharine, with a laugh and a blush; "I don't like flattery. But here we are; now we must not stay long."
"No, indeed! a quarter of an hour, at most. I have lots of business at home; but, as Mrs. Belcher expressed a wish that we should call on her, I think we ought."
"Certainly, I think so too." In a few moments, the young girls stood by the sick-bed of the fashionable lady. Her face was pale and thin, and wore the sad, thoughtful look sickness and sorrow can give to the merriest or most inexpressive countenance.
"Ah! I am glad you have come," she said, extending her little white hands to the girls as they approached her; she smiled kindly as each, in turn, bent over her and kissed her. "Bring your chairs here close by me. I am so lonely. All my friends just send to the door to inquire after me. I knew you would not be careful to avoid a sick-bed, so I sent for you. The greater part of the time I only see my nurse."
"We had not heard of your sickness before," said Louisa.
"I thought not."
"Is your husband out of the city?" Catharine inquired thoughtlessly; she had heard some vague rumors about Mr. Belcher, but had forgotten them.
"No, O, no!" was the brief reply; but in that tone, and in the expression that crossed Mrs. Belcher's face, the young girls read volumes. Her husband was a gambler, and his wife had learned it but three weeks before, when he started suddenly for the South. Her kindhearted visitors stayed longer than they had intended; they felt that they had lightened the tedious hours of the invalid.
"We will come and see you often," said Catharine, tenderly.
"As often as you want us," Louisa added, with a sweet, sad smile.
"I can't bear to have you leave me, dear girls," Mrs. Belcher said, in a half-pleading voice. "I don't expect to sleep all this weary night. If one of you could only stay with me? But I would not ask it."
"I wish we could," answered Louisa. Catharine was silent; her heart throbbed with sudden disappointment. She thought of the pleasure she had been anticipating. It came before her with glowing vividness, arrayed in the sunny warmth with which imagination prepares us for expected enjoyment. And then she thought of the kindness by which she might soothe the neglected wife. There was a powerful struggle in her bosom — the good triumphed. Speaking to Mrs. Belcher in rather a low tone, she said, "Louisa expects a number of friends at her house tonight. She of course cannot be excused, but I will stay with you, and read to you, or amuse you the best I can."
"Thank you!" exclaimed Mrs. Belcher, gratefully; "but perhaps you intended to spend the evening at Louisa's?"
"I am going to spend it here now, at all events," Catharine replied, with her own peculiarly decided willful smile.
"I wish it was convenient for me to stay, too," said Louisa, as she pressed Mrs. Belcher's hand at parting. Then turning to her friend, who had approached the window, she said, in an undertone, "Ah! Catharine, my pleasure is gone, too. I shall think of you all the time; so lonely, and I will be where all is gaiety." The pitying drops actually started in Louisa's eyes.
"March home as fast as you can go," said Catharine, in the same low voice, leading her companion to the door, and dashing away a tear that came in spite of a smile.
"You unman me, you charming little baby. Just look here!" and she pointed to a crystal drop that was rolling with "solemn gait and slow" down her cheek. Louisa disappeared, with a mischievous light chasing away her pathetic tears. Catharine moved around the invalid's bed; and deep, gentle affections came clustering about her heart. She felt happy in theconsciousness of having done right; her half-pensive smile, and tender voice, was a balm to the wounded spirit of the sufferer. She led the conversation along gently to subjects most adapted to give consolation to the sick and sorrowful.
Gradually and slowly, she opened in Mrs. Belcher's heart the good and tender feelings, so long hidden under the smile of prosperity, on the callousness of worldly cares and pleasures. With the coloring of her own sun-bright imagination, she spoke of life and its true aims. She cheered her desolate bosom with uplifting hopes and thoughts. And the weary sick one listened earnestly, as Catharine touched a chord in her bosom no kind being had ever sought to touch before; she felt that she had friends here, and a friend in our Father in Heaven. As more hallowed sympathies were gently offered — a more soothing sadness breathed over her spirit. Tears coursed slowly and silently down her pale face. With a gush of feeling, Catharine leaned forward, and folded her arms around her slender form, as if that might protect her from sorrow. She pressed her lips upon her forehead, and her own warm, kind tears fell, and mingled with those of the invalid.
The hope she had expressed to Louisa, had come to pass. In that lonely bosom, she had awakened to a sad yet sweet music the string that could vibrate to hopes higher than those of earth. When morning bathed all in its welcome light, did that young girl regret her act of self-denial? Let those who have had a similar experience answer. To change the whole current of our thoughts and feelings is not the work of a moment, yet there must be a time when that work must commence. With Mrs. Belcher it had just begun; and through the influence of Catharine and Louisa, she became, in time, not brilliant nor gifted, but what all may become — gentle, upright, and useful.
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