WHAT MAKES MEN?
What care I for cold or snow?
School bell rings, and off I go!
I am ready for the storm,
And my heart is light and gay;
Mother's hand has wrapped me warm,
As I trudge along the way.
Mother says, “Learn all you can,
Then you'll be a better man.”
So I pack my books and go.
Through the rain or wind or snow;
For I hope some day to be
Just the man she'd like to see.
Well I know that boys must learn
To be ready for each turn,
Never idle nor afraid.
By rough struggles men are made.
So each morning, off I start.
With a merry, willing heart.
—Selected.
LUCILE'S SURPRISE
It was a bitter cold day in January, so cold that the children ran all the way to school. It was snowing, too, and blowing as hard as it could. A very small crowd was in the classroom that morning, and everyone began to wonder why.
“Not on account of the cold, surely,” declared Edith Watts. “Why, it's just fine to be out to-day. And I know Lucile would never stay away because it was cold. She has too much spunk for that.”
But still Lucile didn't come, and everyone wondered: for she never was sick, and had said nothing the day before about staying away.
At the last moment Polly Dalton came hurrying in, saying, “Girls' there's a scarlet fever sign on Dayres' door, so Lucile must be sick. The nun was putting the sign up as I came by.”
Later in the day it was found that several other children had fever, or were afraid to come out lest they should get it, so the Hill School was closed for a week. Edith Watts was very lonely without her little friend, and spent much of her time writing letters to her, or in thinking of nice things to do for her.
“I wish I could think of something very, very sweet to do for her, something that would make her happy all the time,” she said. “It must be so lonely and stupid for her to stay in the same room all the time, never seeing any other children.”
“Keep thinking about it and the right thought will come to you,” mamma told her, and mamma's advice turned out to be right, as usual.
Two days later, Edith came downstairs, her face shining.
“I know, mamma. I know what will make Lucile happy every day in the whole six weeks she must stay in the house. The kittens! I will give her my kittens. It has been nearly two weeks since she has seen them, and they have grown so much and their fur has fluffed out so beautifully she will hardly know them.”
And the kittens were lovely. Who wouldn't want a present like that? Edith loved them with all her heart, but she didn't for one minute want to keep them for herself when she knew they would make Lucile happy. She put them carefully in a basket, covering them well to keep out the cold. A nice Indian hanging-basket that she had used for a swing for the pets was packed, too, and then papa took the “happy thought,” as mamma called it, to Lucile's home.
“Remember, it must be a surprise for her,” his small daughter reminded him as he left the house. “I want her to awaken from a nap and find the kittens swinging in the basket just where she can see them.”
And that is the way Lucile saw them. If they ever had looked sweet to Edith's eyes, they looked a thousand times more so to Lucile's poor, tired ones.
“Oh-h-h!” she exclaimed, with a long-drawn, happy sigh. “You darling darlings! Have you come to stay, or are you only visitors?”
The basket with its dainty load hung from a picture-hook near by, and the new-comers looked quite contented to stay. They jumped into the bed and did all they knew to cure the little girl. And they really helped.—Written for Dew Drops by Elizabeth Roberts Burton.