St. Nicholas Magazine for Boys and Girls, Vol. 5, No. 08, June 1878: Scribner's IllustratedVarious
General
St. Nicholas Magazine for Boys and Girls, Vol. 5, No. 08, June 1878: Scribner's Illustrated
Various
Children's literature -- Periodicals; Children's periodicals, American
Hear how he tells us that nothing that we do is
really "of no matter," as we so often think:
"I say, there is not a red Indian hunting by
Lake Winnepeg can quarrel with his squaw but the
whole world must smart for it: will not the price
of beaver rise?"
You think it would not make much difference if
the price of beaver should rise? Let us look at
the matter. First, Mr. B. Woods, the trader, must
pay a larger price for his beaver, and therefore
must sell for more to the firm of Bylow & Selhi.
These shrewd gentlemen do not intend to lose on
their purchase, so they pay a less sum to Mr.
Maycup, the manufacturer. This reduction in his
income causes Mr. Maycup to curtail family expenses.
So his subscription to ST. NICHOLAS is
discontinued, and the youthful Maycups are overwhelmed
with grief, because of that unfortunate
quarrel which raised the price of beaver.
But why should the price change because of that?
Really, Mr. Carlyle should answer you. Perhaps
the Indian in his quarrel forgets to set his traps, or
the whole neighborhood may become so interested
in the little affair that beavers are forgotten.
"Were it not miraculous could I stretch forth
my hand and clutch the sun? Yet thou seest me
daily stretch forth my hand and clutch many a
thing and swing it hither and thither. Art thou a
grown baby, then, to fancy that the miracle lies in
miles of distance, or in pounds avoirdupois of
weight; and not to see that the true miracle lies
in this, that I can stretch forth my hand at all?"
What is it that Carlyle thinks so wonderful?
See how quietly my hand rests on this table. Why
should it move any more than the table on which
it rests? Is not Carlyle right when he calls every
movement of my hand a wonder? You never
thought of it before? That is as Carlyle says:
"We do not look around a little and see what is
passing under our very eyes."
It was this great old man whose hand brushed
the clinging mud from a crust of bread, and placed
it on the curbstone, for some dog or pigeon, saying,
"My mother taught me never to waste anything."
Here is a word for those who are always planning
what great things they will do--who think so much
_about_ doing that no time is left _for_ the doing:
"The end of man is an action, and not a
thought, though it were the noblest."
Now, for our final crumb, comes a well-clothed
thought that I like better than quarreling Indians
or familiar wonders. It is the reason why selfish
people are never really happy. Carlyle thinks they
have only themselves to blame, for he says:
"Always there is a black spot in our sunshine;
it is even, as I said, _the shadow of ourselves_."
[Illustration: "JACK-IN-THE-PULPIT."]
JACK-IN-THE-PULPIT.
Hurrah for June!--bright, rosy June! "Joy
rises in me like a summer's morn!" as one of
those pleasant people, the poets, has said.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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