FREE BOOKS

Author's List




PREV.   NEXT  
|<   43   44   45   46   47   48   49   50   51   52   53   54   55   56   57   58   59   60   61   62   63   64   65   66   67  
68   69   70   71   72   73   74   75   76   77   78   79   80   81   82   83   84   85   86   87   88   89   90   91   92   >>   >|  
and cattle, the milk and the butter, were kept guarded from them. Many and many an evening I've listened to my mother that's dead and gone--God rest her soul!--telling of an old woman that, at the time of the blooming of the hawthorn, always put a spent coal under the churn, and another beneath the grandchild's cradle, because that was said to drive the fairies away; and how primroses used to be scattered at the door of the house to prevent the fairies from stealing in, because they could not pass that flower. But you don't hear much of that any more; for the priest said 'twas superstition, and down from the heathenish times. So the old people came to see 'twas wrong to use such charms, and the young people laughed at the old women's tales. Now on May Day the shrines in the churches are bright with flowers, of course. And as for the innocent merrymakings, instead of a dance round the May or hawthorn bush, as in the olden times, in some places there's just perhaps a frolic on the village green, when the boys and girls come home from the hills and dales with their garlands of spring blossoms--not paper flowers like those," added Delia, with a contemptuous glance at Abby's wreath, forgetting how much she had admired it only a few moments before. Somehow it did not now seem so beautiful to Abby either. She took it off, and gazed at it with a sigh. "Here in New England the boys and girls go a-Maying," she said. "Last year, when we were in the country, Larry and I went with our cousins. We had such fun hanging May-baskets! I got nine. But," she went on, regretfully, "I don't expect any this year; for city children do not have those plays." She went upstairs to the sitting-room, where Larry was rigging his boat anew. He had been to the pond, but the wind wrought such havoc with the little craft that he had to put into port for repairs. Half an hour passed. Abby was dressing her beloved doll for an airing on the sidewalk,--a promenade in a carriage, as the French say. While thus occupied she half hummed, half sang, in a low voice, to herself, a popular May hymn. When she reached the refrain, Larry joined, and Delia appeared at the door just in time to swell the chorus with honest fervor: "See, sweet Mary, on thy altars Bloom the fairest flowers of May. Oh, may we, earth's sons and daughters, Grow by grace as fair as they!" "If you please," said Delia at its close, "there's a man below stai
PREV.   NEXT  
|<   43   44   45   46   47   48   49   50   51   52   53   54   55   56   57   58   59   60   61   62   63   64   65   66   67  
68   69   70   71   72   73   74   75   76   77   78   79   80   81   82   83   84   85   86   87   88   89   90   91   92   >>   >|  



Top keywords:

flowers

 

people

 

fairies

 
hawthorn
 

daughters

 
baskets
 

regretfully

 

children

 
expect
 
rigging

sitting

 

upstairs

 
England
 
Maying
 
cousins
 

country

 

hanging

 

fervor

 

honest

 
chorus

carriage

 
French
 

occupied

 

popular

 

reached

 

appeared

 
joined
 
refrain
 

hummed

 

promenade


sidewalk

 

wrought

 

fairest

 

beloved

 

dressing

 

airing

 

passed

 
altars
 

repairs

 

garlands


scattered
 

prevent

 
stealing
 
primroses
 
grandchild
 

beneath

 

cradle

 
heathenish
 
superstition
 

flower