University of Virginia Library

4. CHAPTER IV.
A POOR MAN'S JOURNEY.

It was a lovely morning in June when Uncle
Phil set forth for New-York with his invalid
daughter. Ineffable happiness shone through his
honest face, and there was a slight flush of hope
and expectation on Charlotte's usually pale and
tranquil countenance as she half rebuked Susan's
last sanguine expression—

“You will come home as well as I am, I know
you will, Lottie!”

“Not well—oh, no, Susy, but better, I expect
—I mean, I hope.”

“Better, then, if you are, that is to say, a great
deal better—I shall be satisfied, sha'n't you, Harry?”

“I shall be satisfied that it was best for her to
go, if she is any better.”

“I trust we shall all be satisfied with God's
will, whatever it may be,” said Charlotte, turning
her eye full of gratitude upon Harry. Harry
arranged her cushions as nobody else could

to support her weak back; Susan disposed her
cloak so that Charlotte could draw it around her if
the air proved too fresh; and then, taking her willow
basket in her hand, the last words were spoken,
and they set forth. Uncle Phil was in the
happiest of his happy humours. He commended
the wagon—“it was just like sitting at home in a
rocking-chair—it is kind o' lucky that you are
lame, Lottie, or maybe Mrs. Sibley would not have
offered to loan us her wagon. I was dreadful
fraid we should have to go down the North River.
I tell you, Lottie, when I crossed over it once, I
was a most scared to death—the water went swash,
swash—there was nothing but a plank between
me and etarnity; and I thought in my heart I should
have gone down, and nobody would ever have
heard of me again. I wonder folks can be so
foolish as to go on water when they can travel on
solid land—but I suppose some do!”

“It is pleasanter,” said Charlotte, “to travel at
this season where you can see the beautiful fruits
of the earth, as we do now, on all sides of us.”
Uncle Phil replied and talked on without disturbing
his daughter's quiet and meditation. They travelled
slowly, but he was never impatient, and she
never wearied, for she was an observer and lover
of nature. The earth was clothed with its richest
green—was all green, but of infinitely varied teints.
The young corn was shooting forth—the winter
wheat already waved over many a fertile hillside
—the gardens were newly made, and clean, and
full of promise—flowers, in this month of their
abundance, perfumed the woods, and decked the
gardens and courtyards, and where nothing else

grew, there were lilachs and pionies in plenty.
The young lambs were frolicking in the fields—
the chickens peeping about the barnyards; and
birds, thousands of them, singing at their work.

Our travellers were descending a mountain
where their view extended over an immense tract
of country, for the most part richly cultivated.

“I declare,” exclaimed Uncle Phil, “how much
land there is in the world, and I don't own a foot
on't, only our little half-acre lot—it don't seem
hardly right.” Uncle Phil was no agrarian, and
he immediately added, “But, after all, I guess I
am better off without it—it would be a dreadful
care.”

“Contentment with godliness is great gain,”
said Charlotte.

“You've hit the nail on the head, Lottie; I don't
know who should be contented if I ain't—I always
have enough, and everybody is friendly to
me—and you and Susan are worth a mint of money
to me. For all what I said about the land, I really
think I have got my full share.”

“We can all have our share in the beauties of
God's earth without owning, as you say, a foot of
it,” rejoined Charlotte. “We must feel it is our
father's. I am sure the richest man in the world
cannot take more pleasure in looking at a beautiful
prospect than I do—or in breathing this sweet,
sweet air. It seems to me, father, as if every thing
I look upon was ready to burst forth in a hymn of
praise—and there is enough in my heart to make
verses of if I only knew how.”

“That's the mystery, Lottie, how they do it—

I can make one line, but I can never get a fellow
to it.”

“Well, father, as Susy would say, it's a comfort
to have the feeling, though you can't express it.”

Charlotte was right. It is a great comfort and
happiness to have the feeling, and happy would it
be if those who live in the country were more sensible
to the beauties of nature; if they could see
something in the glorious forest besides “good
wood and timber lots”—something in the green valley
besides a “warm soil”—something in a water-fall
besides a “mill-privilege.” There is a susceptibility
in every human heart to the ever-present and
abounding beauties of nature; and whose fault is
it that this taste is not awakened and directed? If
the poet and the painter cannot bring down their
arts to the level of the poor, are there none to be
God's interpreters to them—to teach them to read
the great book of nature?

The labouring classes ought not to lose the
pleasures that, in the country, are before them
from dawn to twilight—pleasures that might counterbalance,
and often do, the profits of the merchant,
pent in his city counting-house; and all the
honours the lawyer earns between the court-rooms
and his office. We only wish that more was made
of the privilege of country life; that the farmer's
wife would steal some moments from her cares
to point out to her children the beauties of nature,
whether amid the hills and valleys of our inland
country, or on the sublime shores of the ocean.
Over the city, too, hangs the vault of heaven—
“thick inlaid” with the witnesses of God's power
and goodness—his altars are everywhere.

The rich man who “lives at home at ease,” and
goes irritated and fretting through the country because
he misses at the taverns the luxuries of his
own house—who finds the tea bad and coffee worse
—the food ill cooked and table ill served—no mattresses,
no silver forks—who is obliged to endure
the vulgarity of a common parlour—and, in spite of
the inward chafing, give a civil answer to whatever
questions may be put to him, cannot conceive of
the luxuries our travellers enjoyed at the simplest
inn.

Uncle Phil found out the little histories of all the
wayfarers he met, and frankly told his own. Charlotte's
pale sweet face attracted general sympathy.
Country people have time for little by-the-way
kindnesses; and the landlady, and her daughters,
and her domestics inquired into Charlotte's malady,
suggested remedies, and described similar cases.

The open-hearted communicativeness of our
people is often laughed at; but is it not a sign of a
blameless life and social spirit?