Last Words: A Final Collection of StoriesEwing, Juliana Horatia
General
Last Words: A Final Collection of Stories
Ewing, Juliana Horatia
Children's stories; Conduct of life -- Juvenile fiction
I tried, and I did. I thought I would think of flowers, and of Dr.
Brown, for he is very cheerful to think of. So I thought of
Sunflowers, and how they eat the air, and go to sleep at night, and
perhaps look like the three women in the Fairy Tale. And I thought I
would always pick flowers in the morning now, and never at night, when
they want to go to sleep and not to be woke up in a parlor with
candles.
And then I wondered: Would they wake with candles if they had begun to
go to sleep? Would they wake with a jump, as I did, if Jael flashed
the Rushlight in their faces? Would the moon wake them? Were they
awake then, that very minute, like me, or asleep, as I was before Jael
came in? Did they look like the picture in the Fairy Book, with their
glory leaves folded over their faces? If I took a candle now, and held
it before S. George of England, looking like that, would he wake with
a start, and spread his glory leaves out all round, and stare at me,
broad--wide awake?
Then I thought how often I had gone out early, and wet my petticoats,
to see if any of them had no dew on their faces, and that I had never
gone out at night to see if they looked like the women in the Fairy
Tale; and I wondered why I never had, and I supposed it was because I
was silly, and perhaps afraid of going out in the dark.
Then I remembered that it wasn't dark. There was a moon: besides my
having a Rushlight.
Then I wondered if I was very very silly, and why Dr. Brown had called
me a Michaelmas Goose. But I remembered that it must be because
to-morrow was the 29th of September.
Then the stairs clock struck eleven.
I counted all the strokes, and then I saw that the Rushlight was
getting dim again, so I got up and snuffed it, and all the moons came
out as bright as ever; but I did not feel in the least sleepy.
I did not feel frightened any more. I only wished I knew for certain
what Sunflowers look like when they are asleep, and whether you can
wake them up with candles. And I went on wondering, and watching the
moons.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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