Jemmy Stubbins, or the Nailer Boy: Illustrations of the Law of Kindness
General
Jemmy Stubbins, or the Nailer Boy: Illustrations of the Law of Kindness
Charity -- Juvenile literature; England -- Social life and customs -- Juvenile literature; Humanitarianism -- Juvenile literature
And now, before I dismiss the School, I want to ask each boy and girl on
these benches, who gave a half dime for Josiah's education, if the
brightest silver dollar ever coined would buy of either of them that
half dime? Would you sell for a dollar your share in his education and
happiness, in the joy, hope and expectations which your gifts have
brought to life in that poor nailer's cottage? There are some beautiful
verses in the Bible which I hope you will write in your copy-books, and
remember all your days. "He that giveth to the poor lendeth to the Lord,
and he will repay." And have you not been paid fifty times over for what
you gave Josiah? "It is more blessed to give than to receive," said One
who gave the greatest gift that God could give to mail. Have you not
found it so in regard to your gifts to Josiah? You see how happy you
have made him; how blessed it has been to him to receive your presents.
But how blessed and happy you must be to make him all this joy and
gladness! Ask little Phebe Alcott there, if she has not got her pay ten
times over for going without milk so many days that he might have some
warm clothes for winter. Ask little Sarah Brown if she has not been
repaid well for carrying around her subscription paper for him so many
frosty mornings in Worcester. And now, good-night. It has been a long,
long time since I met you in the School-room. Many new faces have been
added to our circle. Some that I used to see here are gone. But still,
the benches are full, and I hope no boy or girl will vacate their seat
for the next year.
LITTLE JOHNNY.
BY J.B. SYME.
* * * * *
It was our fortune to be born in the country--far away, at the foot of
one of the blue hills of Scotland--in a quaint old fashioned little
house--in a quiet little village that seemed shrunken and grey, and
grim, and decrepid with age. The drooping ashes, the solemn oaks, and
the shady plane-trees, spread their long arms tenderly over the
straw-thatched roofs of this lowly hamlet, as if to defend it from the
burning sun and reckless storms; and the Ayrshire rose and ivy crept up
and clung to its damp and crumbling walls. In the broken parts of the
gables, and in the crevices of the ruined chimneys, the dew-fed
wall-flower grew in poverty and beauty, and shook the incense from its
waving flowers into the bosom of summer. The bearded moss clustered like
a thousand little brown pin-cushions upon the old thatch, and older
stones; and sometimes the polyanthus and primrose, planted beside it by
some child who loved to look at flowers, would close their eyes and lay
their dewy checks upon the moss's breast at evening.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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