University of Virginia Library

2. CHAPTER II.

As the old man, Robert Alison, for this
was the name of the father of the beautiful
sewing girl, rested his chin upon his staff,
and gazed thoughtfully upon his child as she
plied her bright needle, he looked sad, and a
heavy sigh escaped him. Jennette looked
up from the linen bosom which she was stitching,
and smilingly said, for she knew he
sighed for her toil:

`I shall soon be done it, dear father; I
have only one more plait to stitch down.'

`But what avails it if you have most done
this? At daylight, with the birds, you will
be up and commencing another. Alas, Jennette,
I cannot but sigh when I see one so
young thus early doomed to toil, and—'

`Not another word, dear father,' cried the
young girl, playfully sealing his lips with her
fore-finger. `You know it is no toil to me,
I do it cheerfully.'

`But I can't help feeling it. How many
young ladies of your age enjoy life, and
know no labor or privations, while you—'

`Hark! did you not hear a footfall?' she
said, raising her head and listening. `I certainly
hear a step outside the door.'

`It is doubtless some fisherman come
down to look after the safety of his boats;
though it is a rough time for any one to be
abroad. The water roars as dismally under
the wharf as if it would gladly swallow up
the whole pier. There was a crash! It was
a boat dashed against one of the piles. I
hope no poor man will lose his means of support
to-night. Few of our poor neighbors
can afford to lose a skiff. I am better off
who have nothing to lose. But I am complaining,
and this is wrong. I wont complain
of my own destitution, but I have a right to
feel for you, when I see you rising up early
and sitting up late to put bread into my
mouth.'

`No, father, into my own! Can I live on
air? It does not take a dozen more stitches
a day for you than it would for me alone, and
then it renders me so happy to have the privilege
of doing something for you.'

`But you are growing paler every day.'

And it could be seen that the paleness
which we at first remarked, and set down to
fear wholly, was the settled paleness of confinement
and close application over the needle;
for there was observable no change of
color in her cheek, no returning of the rich,
blood to beautify them. This paleness gave
a peculiar interest to her face, and lent to it,

as it were, more thought and feeling. `You
are growing paler every day, my Jennette!'
and the tears came into his eyes, and rolled
down his cheeks. As he felt them drop warm
on his hand, he brushed them quickly away
lest she should see them.

`I never liked much color, father,' answered
Jennette, in the same cheerful and
cheering tone which marked all her replies.

`I think your chest is getting weaker, and
your voice—'

`There! enough, my dear good father,'
she said, affecting an air of alarm, `you will
frighten me, and make me believe I am sick,
when I was never so well. The thought of
how happy I make you makes me well.'

`You are a noble and good girl! God
knows but for you, Jennette, I should now
be in the alms-house! `And,' he added
with a tremulous voice, `when I sit here
and watch you sewing so diligently, and
without any respite, spoiling your eyes and
ruining your constitution, I think I had
best—'

`Best what, father?' she asked, looking up
with surprise and doubt.

`Best go to the alms-house!'

`Never, never! while my hand can use a
needle, never! father!' she cried with generous
warmth, while her fingers shook with
fearful agitation. `Oh, why can't you forget
me, and be happy and contented to let
me labor for you? You know, you see how
gladly, how thankfully I do it.'

`Yes, and it is this makes me feel worse
about it.'

`I know what it is, dear father,' she said
archly, as her fine eyes rested on his face.
`You have too much pride to be dependent
on your child, and so would deprive me of
the pleasure of doing what I can for you. It
is only pride, father.'

`No, not a bit of pride in it, Jennette, except
to be proud of you! But how can I
help feeling sorrowful when I see how hard
you have to work that I may enjoy even the
necessaries of life, though your poor little
needle has brought me many comforts, too.
You are up with the dawn, and when I wake
I find you bent over your sewing, and your
hands going like a shuttle. All day you sew,
save the intervals when you cook our humble
meals or wait on me, and every night when I
go to bed I leave you at your needle. It is
too much for you, Jennette, and I am no
man, no father, to suffer you to kill yourself
for such an old wreck as I am! I had better
die and save your life.'

`My dear father, your words grieve me to
the heart. If you knew how wretched they
make me you would never utter another like
them. What should I do but toil night and
day for you, sir?' Were you dead should I
have to cease toiling for myself? You are
no additional burden, dear father. You are
a blessing to me, and may God in his mercy
long keep you with me. It is true I am sometimes
weary, but the thought that I am laboring
for you renews my strength. If I had
only myself to sew for, I should feel weary
often, for I should not have that sweet incentive
that now upholds me.'

`Well, well, you are an angel, if ever there
was one on this earth,' said her father, with
emotion, `I will not pain your kind heart
any more, as I know it does not mend the
matter. Still I cannot but wish that you
were better off in this world's goods. You
have no idea, Jennette, how a fond father's
heart bleeds at beholding his child, that
child a lovely daughter of eighteen, with a
face, a figure, a mind to adorn society, slaving
herself to the needle from sheer poverty.
If it were not that I feared God, and feel
that he does right, I should feel like swearing.
I sometimes think that a good round
half dozen of oaths would do us both good.'

`Praying is better than swearing, dear father,'
answered Jennette, gently.

`I know it, I know it, child. I pray for
you every night and morning, and for that
matter I have a prayer running through my

thoughts all day. My love for you has become
a prayer.'

`Be assured that God will answer it, dearest
father,' she replied, bending towards him
affectionately, and resting her hand in his.
`I have no fear, no anxiety for the futnre.'

`I will try not to, love. There again is
that step. A man is walking up and down
beneath the eaves-dropper. He can't mean
no harm, or he would be more cautious.
Poor stealing a thief would find her about.
It is some one, no doubt, watching for the
safety of his boats.'

The maiden paused an instant to listen
and then resumed her stitching as the
sound ceased. In a few moments more she
completed her day's task, and without glancing
at the neatly sewn shirt she folded it up,
with a look of pleasure and a sigh of relief.
It caught the ear of her father, who said,
with emotion:

`Would to heaven, Jennette, that were the
last shirt you were ever to put a needle into.'

`I should hope not, father. If I could get
no more work to do, we should perish! I
am thankful that I find as much as I want
to do.'

`No danger but you'll find enough, child,
for the skillfulness of your needle is well
known. Let me look at that. It is a great
work for one day for your poor fingers. Do
you know how many stitches there are in it?'

`No, sir.'

`I do! I counted them in the last you
done. There are seventeen thousand and
odd! You get for making this shirt sixteen
cents! That is not quite a penny for every
thousand stitches! It is in this way you are
coining your young heart and your life, drop
by drop oozing out at your fingers ends. I
know not which to wonder at most, your industrious
patience, Jennette, or the unblushing
hardihood of the avaricious man who
dares to ask you to take so mean a pittance
for so much labor.

`He would refuse to give me work, father,
if I asked more; and there are others whom
he could employ. It is a very small sum—
eight cents a day—for you and I to live upon.
But so long as we are permitted to live together
I am thankful to have the work to do,
even at this price. I am paid two cents more
than others.'

`Because your reputation as a neat shirt-maker
has gone before you. When I was in
command of the Greyhound, little did I suspect
I should ever be keeled up not worth a
Portuguese stiver, and my dear little Jennette
supporting me at sixpence a day! Even
black Cæsar, good soul, shed tears to see you
work the other day.'

`Dear father,' said Jennette, as if wishing
to divert his mind from making painful contrasts
between the present and the past, `as I
have done my work, will you let me read a
chapter to you before you go to bed?'

`I don't care about it,' he answered, gloomily,
`I begin to think that—'

`Now don't say anything you'll be sorry
you've uttered, dear father,' she said with
playful warning.

`I don't know that I shall be sorry I uttered
it. The Bible says those who trust in
God shall find prosperity; and what is it I
have done ever since I broke my leg and
lost my health but trust in him? and instead
of prosperity, I am doomed to see my only
child sacrifice herself by inches to maintain
me and herself. If you find comfort in the
Bible read in it. I don't find any there.'

`My dear father, who do you love best on
earth?'

`You, my child.'

`What would be the greatest affliction God
could put upon you?'

`To take you from me.'

`And suppose he should bring me by sickness
to the brink of the grave, and you
should ask God then to fulfil the promise in
his word to give prosperity, in what shape
would you desire that prosperity to come?'

`In restoring you to health and to my arms,
my wise and good child. I see the drift of
your questioning. God forgive my murmuring.

Having you, I am prospered beyond all
I can desire or think. Take the Bible and
read where you will. I will still trust to it.'

With a smiling countenance, Jennette resumed
her chair, drawing it a little nearer
her father; and taking the Bible in her hand
she opened it, and began to read in a clear
but low voice.

The blast whistled about the corner of the
house, and the waves dashed up beneath the
floor, and the rafters creaked and shook, but
she heeded nothing but the words of life
and hope and peace that shone from the blessed
page. These were some of the words
she read:

“`Oh, that one might plead for a man
with God, as a man pleadeth for his neighbor.

“`I was at ease, but he hath broken me
asunder: he hath also taken me by my neck,
and shaken me to pieces, and set me up for
his mark.

“`He is chastened with pain upon his
bed, and the multitude of his bones with
strong pain.

“`He shall pray unto God, and he will be
favorable unto him. He will deliver his soul
from going into the pit, and his life shall see
the light.

“`Behold, happy is the man whom God
correcteth; for he maketh sore and buildeth
up; he shall deliver thee in six troubles, yea
in seven there shall no evil touch thee.”'

When Jennette had done reading she
closed the book, and looked in her father's
face. Its discontent had vanished, and
peace and hope illumined it.

`There is comfort in that book, Jennette,
always something to comfort one. I hope I
shall never give up my confidence in it. But
it is very hard to believe that we shall see
good days. I have not a friend on earth, as
you know, to whom I can or will apply for
aid. I have so long been an invalid that
those who once knew me believe me dead;
for the bed-ridden is as soon forgotten
as the dead. No, no, after my rebuff last
year in trying to get aid, I have no one to go
to. I cannot work, except I sew, and make
sails, and this would, you say, irritate my
blood, and give me fever. I can't walk out
to seek assistance and make friends; and so
how we can be better off than we now are
is more than I can see. Your shilling a day,
hard as it is earned, is not going to do more
than buy us a little coffee and bread, and a
herring or two. But I will hope! One of
your hymns you sing so sweetly says it is “an
anchor,” and I am too old a sailor not to
know the advantage of an anchor when one
is on a lee shore. So I'll hope for the best,
and try and be cheerful; for I know that
gloomy looks are but a poor and thoughtless
return for your industrious toil, dear girl.
Now give me thine own blessing, and I'll to
bed.'

Jennette assisted him to his feet, or rather
foot, for one of his legs was drawn up and
bandaged, and its place supplied by a crutch.
By the aid of this and her arm, this wreck
of a once strong man drew himself with difficulty
to the truckle bed, upon the edge of
which he sat down. She then tenderly kissed
him `good night,' and leaving the light by his
side, disappeared through a door on the left,
with a small bit of candle in her hand. It
was a small bed-room into which she entered,
and, poor as she was, she had managed to
give it an air of neatness and comfort, though
poverty could not be wholly driven forth. A
small plain board table, covered with a napkin,
was placed beneath a shilling looking-glass.
A few little pictures hung around,
and a narrow cot bed, covered with a patch-work
quilt, stood against the wall. There
was no carpet upon the floor, and no pillow
to the cot. Yet this little humble room had
witnessed more hours of pure and peaceful
happiness than the tapestried chamber of a
crowned queen. In a few moments after entering
her room, Jennette was sleeping as
sweetly as if she were an heiress, nay, perhaps
far more sweetly than if she
were!