the winter was a delight, but the spring and summer were even more enchanting. the seminary did not close until late in july, and there was time for the blooming of more kinds of wild flowers than the little city girl had ever dreamed of. it was on one of her fishing trips with ned that she saw her first lady’s-slipper. she had left the big rock and was roaming about under the pines when in a dusky little hollow she caught sight of a stately pink flower veined with a darker pink. it rose from two large green leaves, a queen with her courtiers bowing low before her. there it stood, elegant, dignified, quietly at ease, although no other of its kind was in sight. ella wanted to break it off and carry it home to show to the mother, but there was something in the weird grace of the flower that held her back. she still believed that there might be a fairyland, and maybe this was the queen of the fairies. however this might be, she would not break the stem; she would ask the mother to come and see the blossom.
another flower that ella saw for the first time was the yellow daisy, the golden rudbeckia. she had no dream of fairyland about this, for it was a gorgeous, rollicking yellow blossom, ready to be picked and go[pg 31] wherever any one might wish to carry it and to make friends with anybody. it was away off in the middle of a field; and although ella had been taught never to trample down the tall grass, she could not resist the temptation to plunge into the midst of it and secure the wheel of gold that might have come from the end of the rainbow.
these were the rarities in flowers, but everywhere there were violets and daisies and anemones and hardhack and quaker ladies, and swamp azaleas, and dandelions and clover and all the other “common flowers” that are beloved by children. nestled on the sunny side of a stone wall at the north of the seminary there was what had once been a flower bed. little of the bed remained except a merry row of white narcissi, who perked up their red-edged ruffs and nodded their heads in friendly fashion as the child and the dog drew near.
between the narcissi and the gray old stone wall behind them was ella’s little burial ground. it happened sometimes that birds flew against the lighted windows of the seminary so violently that they were killed. ella was always grieved when she found one lying on the grass, and she chose this bit of ground as a resting place for them. “ponto,” she said to the big shaggy dog, “it was in our sunday school lesson yesterday that god always noticed when a little bird fell to the ground. the teacher said the verse didn’t mean exactly what it said, because god wouldn’t care for[pg 32] birds; but i think it did; and i think he would like it if you and i made a pretty place for them to lie in. we’ll do it, won’t we, ponto?” she held out her hand to the dog, and he laid his shaggy paw into it. “i knew you would understand,” said ella. “i wonder why dogs and cats and birds and horses understand so much better than people!”
after this, whenever ella picked up a little dead bird, she dug a tiny grave and lined it with fresh green ferns. she smoothed down the soft feathers, kissed the pretty little head, and laid the bird softly into its ferny bed. “a person would have to have a stone with poetry on it,” she said to ponto, “but i think a lovely white narcissus is much prettier for a little bird. remember that this is all a secret, ponto. nobody must know anything about it except you and me and god.”
down over the hill below the little cemetery was the island. this was really nothing more than a tussock just big enough to hold a few bushes, and the “body of water” which surrounded it was only a bit of swamp. ella could easily step across from what she called the “main land,” but a bridge made the place seem more like an island, so she laid a board across the narrow strait. when she was once across she always drew the board over after her; and then she stood in a kingdom that was all her own. there were white violets growing in this island kingdom, there were ferns and rushes and wild lilies of the valley.[pg 33] there was just one jack-in-the-pulpit, and on its seminary side ella had drawn the ferns together so as to screen it from the eager hands of passers-by.
then, too, there was the secret, and no one knew of this save the mother and the professor. on the highest part of the tiny island, just where the bushes were thickest, there was a bird’s nest with real eggs, and a little later, real birds in it. mother birds are shy of grown folk, but there are sometimes children of whom they feel no fear, recognizing perhaps some “call of the wild” that makes them akin. however that may be, these birds were not afraid of the little girl who always spoke to them softly and touched the young ones as gently as the mother bird herself. they made no objection when the child carefully lifted the half-grown fledglings out of the nest; and while she sat holding them and talking to them, the parent birds made little flights here and there as if, having now a reliable nurse for their children, they might allow themselves a little recreation.
when ella first saw the young birds with their wide-open mouths, she was sure that they were dying of hunger. but what could she give them? she had no more idea how to feed young robins than young fairies. there was just one person in the seminary who could tell her, for he always knew everything; but he was in a class, teaching some of the big boys algebra. what algebra was, ella had no idea; but she was absolutely certain that it could not be half so important[pg 34] as saving the life of a starving bird. she hurried to the house, and up stairs, then crept silently as a shadow along the corridor to the recitation room. the door was wide open. she stood on the threshold a moment, trying to get her courage up. the young men of the class smiled, for they were always interested in ella’s exploits and wondered what was coming now. the professor was standing at the board with his back to the door.
ella was a little frightened, but she screwed her courage up and said in a weak, thin little voice,
“professor, please may i see you only just one minute? it’s very important.”
the professor came out, and closing the door behind him, which the students thought was a little unkind, he asked the visitor what he could do for her.
“it’s the birds,” she explained. “they were only eggs, but now they’re little birds, and they’re so hungry they are starving. i don’t know what to do,” and the tale ended in what sounded much like the beginning of a sob.
“that’s all right,” said the professor gently. “the mother bird knows how to take care of them; but if you want to help, just dig some angle worms and put them on the island where she can see them.”
“oh, thank you,” cried ella. “i knew i must do something, but i didn’t know what.”
[pg 35]
ella’s mother told her that she ought to apologize to the professor for interrupting his class. she went to him obediently and said,
“professor, i am sorry i interrupted your class, but i don’t think i did—much—and anyway the birds had to be fed.”
“so they did,” said the professor kindly, “and more interruptions of that sort would be better for birds and for people.”
i am afraid that ella was not exactly a model child, for she cut her name on a tree in the circle with the christmas jackknife, much to the wrath of the man who cared for the grounds. she came in promptly when the mother, for fear of the lightning, called her in from the piazza during a heavy thunderstorm; but the next minute she was in the highest cupola. the time spent in the gloomy basement dining-room seemed to her so unbearably long that the mother sometimes yielded to her pleadings and excused her before the meal was over. this, the principal suggested, was not quite the thing to do, as it broke up the “uniformity,” whatever that may have been; so the mother told her she must remain through the meal. ella remained, but she brought a little story-book and quietly read through the last quarter of an hour. the big boys smiled in comprehension of the situation, and the principal made an unconditional surrender. to ella he said, “you need not wait if you would rather go out”; and to the boys, “if you[pg 36] would save every minute as that child does, you would accomplish a great deal more.”
the mother wrote to the grandmother in the mountains:
“ella is very obedient, but she always thinks of something else. i will describe her, so the children can fancy a little how she looks. she has on a black beaver cloak, black felt hat trimmed with scarlet velvet and plumes, a chinchilla muff, and chenille scarf. she has just come in from church, and now, before her things are taken off, is reading her sabbath-school book. she devours all the books that she finds.”
ella’s worst—and most innocent—exploit was her sudden disappearance on the most important day of the whole school year. the first class was to graduate. it consisted of two students. one was to have the valedictory and the other the salutatory; but it was to be just as real a graduation as if there had been forty to go out into the world with the seminary’s blessing upon them.
it was indeed a great day. every class was to recite. compositions were to be read, songs sung, the piano played, diplomas presented, speeches made, and trustee meetings held. there was to be a collation, and the village band was to play while people ate. surely nothing could be more festive than this. the building was crowded with guests. there were the people of the village, the home friends of the students, the people who used to be students in the[pg 37] early days, the thirty-six trustees whose fostering care was so necessary to the success of the school, and many other folk who came just because something was going on and they wanted to be in it.
everything began finely. at nine, ten, eleven, the big bell in the belfry rang, and the members of the first three series of classes made plain to the delighted visitors how learned the year’s work had made them. the bell struck twelve. this was the signal for ella’s french class, and after that the collation was to come. but where was ella? the classes were so small that the absence of even one student was noticeable, and a messenger was sent to the mother, who was hearing her class in botany.
in those days, the more difficult the wording of a textbook, the more intellectual good those who studied it were supposed to get from its pages, and a member of the class in botany was at that moment declaring that “the cypripedium is perfectly symmetrical, yet has irregular cohesion in the calyx, great inequality in the petals, cohesion, adhesion, and metamorphosis in the—” but the guests were never told by that class where “cohesion, adhesion, and metamorphosis” might be found, for their teacher dropped the book and forgot all about cypripedium and everything else except that her one little girl was missing. ella had established an enviable reputation for punctuality, and if she was not in her class, then something had happened.
[pg 38]
a general alarm was given. speeches, collation, graduating exercises were all forgotten, and a search was begun. the boys and girls and the faculty and the trustees and the guests all set out to explore the country. a man at work in a field said that he had seen a little girl in a red cape going toward the lake; and to the lake the whole company went. in the moist sand were prints of little feet going straight to the water’s edge, and the mother’s face turned white. but beside them were the marks of ponto’s sturdy paws.
“the dog is with her,” said the steward. “you need not be the least bit afraid. ponto would never let anything happen to her.”
but the mother was not comforted. just what dogs would do, she knew not; but she did know that water would drown little children.
some one had caught sight of a child in a red riding hood cape strolling leisurely down a little hill on the right. the dog was with her, and they were having a fine ramble together. the people shouted to her, and ponto answered with a deep and surprised “bow-wow!” which probably meant,
“of course i’m glad to see you, but what are you here for? can’t you let us take a little walk?”
“where have you been?” cried the mother, as the little girl came near.
“over on the hill to get some flowers,” ella replied serenely.
then the mother told her how the footprints leading into the water had frightened her.
[pg 39]
“did you think i would walk right into the water and be drowned?” exclaimed ella in disgust. “a baby a week old wouldn’t be so silly as to do that. i walked ever so far close to the water, but i suppose it washed the footprints away.” this was just what had happened, but no one had noticed that the wind was blowing toward the land. as to the french class, the mother had told her that it would meet at two in the afternoon, and when the hour was changed to twelve, she had forgotten to notify the small pupil, and then in the fear and confusion forgot that she had forgotten.
so they all went back through the lane to the seminary to gather up the fragments of the great day. the french class never welcomed its guests with a “comment vous portez-vous, mesdames et messieurs?” but the collation was still palatable, the speeches were made, the valedictory and the salutatory were read, the band played the pieces they had been practicing, and the two students were as thoroughly graduated as if a little girl in a red riding hood cloak had not interfered with the proceedings.
the mother had decided to return to the city, and this was ella’s last day at the seminary, and the end of her first year of school life. she would have been broken-hearted over leaving, had it not been that she was going to visit her grandmother; and a month with a grandmother will make up to little girls for many losses.
