Violet: A Fairy Story
away at all we give to him just as much as if we laid it in his hand.

Don't you know that Christ called the poor and ignorant God's little children, and declared he loved them all better than your mother and father love you?

And not only this, God cares when even a bird falls to the ground with his wing broken, and is watching to see how much you are willing to do for his creature.

CHAPTER XIII.

VIOLET BERRYING.

I called Violet a little berry girl, and I'll tell you why.

On the great hill above their hut, all over one side of it, were blackberry vines; and in autumn, when the berries were ripe, Violet and her mother would spend hours and hours picking them.

The sun would be scorching hot sometimes, and the thorny vines would tangle into Violet's dress and tear her arms, and mosquitos would buzz around her, until she was ready to cry or to declare she could not pick any more.

Poor Violet! You think, perhaps, that it is hard to walk to school under your parasol these sunny days; and she had, day after day, to stand out there among the vines, picking, and picking, and picking, till the two great water pails were full of berries.

But when she grew tired, Love would point to her poor old mother working so patiently, and looking so tired and warm; and when the fairy whispered, "Will you leave her here to finish the work alone?" Violet would forget in a minute her own weariness, and sing and laugh so merrily, and tell so often how fast her pail was filling up, that the mother would forget her weariness too, and only think how fortunate and how rich she was to have such a good, bright child.

When she found a place where the berries grew thick and large, Violet would call her mother to pick there; and old Mary, Reuben's wife, said that "somehow she never could find such splendid places as Violet did."

So, leaving her there, the little girl would move on; and no matter how low she found the bushes, or how thinly covered with fruit, fairy Contentment, hovering over her head, would sing, "Who cares? The fewer, the sweeter."

What with Contentment's singing, and that of Violet, and the crickets and locusts, and the bees and bobolinks, there was music enough in the blackberry pasture; and it 
 Prev. P 18/47 next 
Back Top
Privacy Statement Terms of Service Contact