Mildred at Home: With Something About Her Relatives and Friends.. Finley Martha
Dinsmore rang for a servant, and sent a message to Zeke. He was directed to make himself clean and decent, and come to the veranda for further orders.
He obeyed. Elsie found him waiting there, and taking him to her garden explained minutely what she wished him to do, calling his attention particularly to the difference between the leaves of the weeds that were to be uprooted and those of some annuals not yet in bloom.
He promised faithfully to attend to her directions and to be industrious.
"Don't you think it's nicer, easier work than what you would have had to do in the field?" she asked.
"Ya-as, Miss Elsie," he drawled, "but it's stoopin' all de same, and I'se got de misery in de back."
She gave him a searching look, then said reproachfully, "O Zeke, you don't look the least bit sick, and I can't help being afraid you are really lazy. Remember God knows all about it, and is very much displeased with you, if you are not speaking the truth."
"Sho I'se gwine to wuk anyhow, honey," he answered, with a sound between a sigh and a groan, as he bent down and pulled up a weed.
"That's right," she said pleasantly, as she turned and left him.
An hour later, coming out to see what progress he was making, she found nearly all her beloved annuals plucked up by the roots, and lying withering among the weeds in the scorching sun.
"Oh, how could you, Zeke!" she cried, her eyes filling with tears.
"Why, what's de mattah, Miss Elsie?" he asked, gaping at her in open-mouthed wonder, not unmixed with apprehension and dismay.
"Matter? You have been pulling up flowers as well as weeds. That is one you have in your fingers now."
Zeke dropped it as if it had been a hot coal, and stood staring at it where it lay wilting on the hot ground. "Sho, Miss Elsie, I didn't go fo' to do no sech t'ing," he said plaintively; "t'ought I was doin' 'bout right. Shall I plant 'em agin?"
"No; they wouldn't grow," she said.
"Dis niggah's mighty sorry, Miss Elsie. You ain't gwine to hab him sent back to de wuk in de field, is you?" he asked, with humble entreaty.
"I'm afraid that is all you are fit for, Zeke; but the decision rests with papa. I will go and speak to him about it. Don't try to do any more work here, lest you do more mischief," she said, turning toward the house.
He hurried after her. "Please now, Miss Elsie, don' go for to 'suade massa agin dis po' niggah."
"No, I shall not," she answered kindly; "perhaps there is something else you can be set at about the house or grounds. But, Zeke," turning to him and speaking very earnestly, "you will never succeed at anything unless you strive against your natural laziness, and try to do your best. That is what God bids us all do. He says, 'Whatsoever thy hand findeth to do, do it with thy might.' 'Whatsoever ye do, do it heartily, as to the Lord and not unto men.'"
"S'pect dat's so, Miss Elsie," he drawled; "but de Lawd He ain't gwine to take no notice what a po' niggah's 'bout in de field or de garden."
"That's a great mistake, Zeke," she said. "His eye is always on you – on everybody; and He is pleased with us if He sees us trying to do faithfully the work He has given us, no matter how low the task may seem to us or other human creatures, and displeased if we are not trying to do it 'as to the Lord and not unto men.'"
"You ain't 'fended 'bout dose po' flowahs what dis po' niggah bin pull up in a mistake, is you now, Miss Elsie?" he asked.
Evidently her religious teachings had made no more impression than the idle whistling of the wind.
"No, Zeke, I only can't trust you again," she said, turning away with a slight sigh over her failure to win him from his inborn indolence.
She hastened to her father with the story of what had occurred.
"Ah! it is about what I had expected," he said. "I am sorry for your loss, but it can soon be repaired. Have you left Zeke there to finish the work of destruction?"
"No, sir; I told him to stop till he heard from you."
"He shall go back to the field at once; there is no propriety in giving him an opportunity to do further mischief," Mr. Dinsmore said, with a decision that left no room for remonstrance; and summoning a servant sent the order.
Elsie heard it with a sigh. "What now? You are not wasting pity on that incorrigibly lazy wretch?" her father asked, drawing her caressingly to his knee.
"I did hope to do him some good, papa," she sighed, "and I'm disappointed that I can't."
"There may be other opportunities in the future," he said. "And do not fret about the flowers. You are welcome to claim all in my gardens and conservatories."
"How good and generous you always are to me, you dear father!" she said, thanking him with a hug and kiss, while her face grew bright with love and happiness. "No, I won't fret; how wicked it would be for one who has so many blessings! But, papa, I can't help feeling sorry for the little tender plants, plucked up so rudely by the roots and left to perish in the broiling sun. They were live things, and it seems as if they must have felt it all, and suffered almost as an insect or an animal would."
Her father smiled, and smoothed her hair with softly caressing hand. "My little girl has a very tender heart, and is full of loving sympathy for all living things," he said. "Ah, Travilla. Glad to see you!" as at that instant that gentleman galloped up and dismounted.
"So am I, sir," Elsie said, leaving her father's knee to run with outstretched hand to meet and welcome their guest.
He clasped the little hand in his, and held it for a moment, while he bent down and kissed the sweet lips of its owner. "What news?" Mr. Dinsmore asked, when he had given his friend a seat and resumed his own.
"None that I know of, except that I have come to your view (which is my mother's also) of the subject we were discussing yesterday, and have decided to act accordingly," Mr. Travilla answered, with a rarely sweet smile directed to little Elsie.
"Oh!" she cried, her face growing radiant, "I am so glad, so very glad!"
"And I, too," said her father. "I am sure you will never regret having come out boldly on the Lord's side."
"No; my only regret will be that I delayed so long enrolling myself among His professed followers. I now feel an ardent desire to be known and recognized as His servant, and am ready to go forward, trusting implicitly His many great and precious promises to help me all my journey through."
"'Being confident of this very thing, that He which hath begun a good work in you will perform it until the day of Jesus Christ'?" quoted Mr. Dinsmore inquiringly.
"Yes," said Mr. Travilla, "for He is able to keep that which I have committed unto Him; able to keep even me from falling."
Chapter Third.
AUNT WEALTHY
Dr. Landreth and his party reached Philadelphia in due season, arriving in health and safety, having met with no accident or loss by the way.
Mrs. Dinsmore found her father and the family carriage waiting for her and her baby boy at the depot.
The others took a hack and drove to the Girard House, where Miss Stanhope, who had been visiting friends in the neighborhood of the city, had appointed to meet them, that they and she might journey westward in company. She was there waiting for them in a private parlor.
The meeting was a joyful one to the two ladies, who, though always warmly attached, had now been separated for a number of years. They clasped each other in a long, tender embrace; then Mildred introduced her husband, and exhibited her baby with much pride and delight; Annis, too, for she had quite grown out of Aunt Wealthy's recollection, and had scarce any remembrance of the old lady, except from hearing her spoken of by the other members of the family.
The travellers were weary with their journey, and there was much to hear and tell; so the remainder of that day was given up to rest and talk, a part of the latter being on the arrangement of their plans. Mildred proposed that they should take a week or more for rest and shopping, then turn