Blade-O'-Grass. Golden Grain. and Bread and Cheese and Kisses.Farjeon, B. L. (Benjamin Leopold)
General
Blade-O'-Grass. Golden Grain. and Bread and Cheese and Kisses.
Farjeon, B. L. (Benjamin Leopold)
Christmas stories; Fiction
The funeral took place on the Thursday. Rachel, Mrs. Silver, and Mr.
Merrywhistle accompanied Blade-o'-Grass to the last resting-place of
her child. The women brought some winter flowers with them. If
anything could have soothed the heart of Blade-o'-Grass on that
occasion, it was the sight of these flowers, as well as the tender
consideration which lay in the act. Before the lid of the coffin was
nailed down, Blade-o'-Grass, with trembling hands and white lips,
placed some of these flowers in her dead child's hands; her tears
rained upon them as she stooped and kissed the lifeless clay. She did
not raise her head for many moments, and I heard her whisper to her
dear to be sure and wait for her in the better land. I led her from
the coffin, and bade her take heart.
'I do, sir, I do!' she sobbed. 'I remember every word you said.
Stoney-alley and the narrow streets through which we wended our way to
the wider thoroughfares were thronged with poor people, and many a
'Lord love you!' came from their lips, and women pressed forward and
asked Rachel, whose arm was round the weeping mother's waist, to shake
hands with them. When we arrived at the churchyard, we found Jimmy
Virtue waiting by the side of the grave. The simple service was soon
ended, and the clay of the poor child was left to peace and God.
XI.
ONCE UPON A TIME THERE LIVED ON AN ISLAND----
There was a considerable stir in the immediate neighbourhood of the
Temple of Liberty on the night of the great meeting. Paul's-buildings,
now newly christened, was situated in a dimly-lighted narrow street,
and had in its time played many parts. It had been a lecture-hall, a
warehouse for old clothes, a dancing academy, a refuge for 'fat women'
and 'living skeletons,' a home for the tamest of wild beasts; and it
had brought misfortune upon all who had flown to it. It was a moot
point whether the social regenerators who had christened it the Temple
of Liberty would fare better than their predecessors.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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