there were two grandmothers. the one with white curly hair that glistened in the sunshine lived in the village where ella was born. it was a pretty village with hills and brooks and winding roads and meadows of flowers, and old-fashioned houses with piazzas and tall white pillars. back of ella’s home was a hill where great apple trees grew, and the very first thing that she remembered in the world was her father’s lifting her up into one of them, all sweet and dainty with pink-and-white blossoms, and telling her to pick as many as she pleased.
when they went to the grandmother’s, they walked straight up the village street, where a line of houses stood on one side and woods on the other. they were beautiful woods. columbines grew in the clefts of the rocks, delicate pink windflowers blossomed in the little glades and the brave and cheery dandelions came out to the very edge of the road to give a welcome to those who loved them.
the mother had told her little daughter that one of the names of the columbine was aquilegia canadensis; of the windflower was anemone nemorosa; and of the dandelion was taraxacum officinale, just for the pleasure of seeing how so small a child would manage[pg 41] the long names. ella felt especially well acquainted with those flowers whose “company names,” as she said, she had learned; and when she was alone with them and talked to them, she often called them by these names and pretended that she had come to make a call. “miss anemone nemorosa,” she would say, “are you sure that you are feeling quite well to-day?” or, “miss aquilegia canadensis, i think i saw a cousin of yours in the garden just now. your dress is red and yellow, but hers was pink. maybe she was your sister.” she fancied that they liked the little formality, and she was almost surprised that they did not answer her questions.
beyond the woods was a bridge hanging high over a deep black river. ella did not like dark, still water; and when they were crossing this bridge, she always held fast to her mother’s or her father’s hand. after they had crossed the bridge, they went up a little hill, not by the road, but through a field and over ledges where the sweet-smelling saxifrage grew; and then they came to grandmother’s little wooden gate that always closed of itself after they had gone through it.
they passed the balm of gilead tree with its sticky buds, the black currant bush, and the great bush of white roses with creamy centers. then ella ran across the grass to the door, for grandmother was almost sure to see them and to come to the doorway to give them a welcome.
grandmother’s house was one of a little group of[pg 42] white houses standing on the ledges at the top of the hill. these formed the tiny village within a village which was called the “new city.” ella was always so happy at her grandmother’s that long after she was old enough to go to sunday school, she always confused the “new city” with the “new jerusalem.”
this was the “village grandma,” as ella called her. but there was also the “mountain grandma,” and it was to her house that the little girl and her mother were going. now when good new englanders are starting for anywhere, they always begin by taking the morning train to boston; so of course that was what our two travelers did.
going to boston, even if she did not go any farther, was a great treat to ella. there were windows full of blankbooks, and what stories she could write in them, she thought longingly. there were whole stores full of toys; and in the window of one of these stores lay a box of tin soldiers. ella looked again. it was exactly like the box that she had wanted. maybe it was the very same one. it certainly was the same store.
“mother,” she said, “that is my box of tin soldiers that uncle did not give me; but i’m so old now that i don’t care for it. i’d rather have the muff.”
“don’t you love your uncle enough to forget that?” her mother asked.
“i love him better than almost anybody in the world,” said ella, “and i do forget it except when i[pg 43] happen to think of it. but he really did break his promise,” she added slowly.
they left the stores and went to the common. ella’s little book of history said that in the revolutionary war the americans pitched their tents on the common; and she fancied that she knew just where those tents stood. she had also read about the battle of bunker hill, and she never felt that she was really in boston until she had caught sight of the monument in memory of it standing tall and gray against the northern sky.
at one side of the common was the capitol. the mother told ella that the laws for the whole state of massachusetts were made in that building.
“do they ever make a mistake and make a bad law?” asked ella.
“perhaps they do sometimes,” the mother replied rather unwillingly, for she wanted her little girl to grow up with deep respect for the institutions of her country.
ella thought a minute; then she asked slowly,
“if they made a law that everybody must tell lies, which would be naughtier, to obey it or not to obey it?”
just then a man began to scatter grain for the pigeons, and ella forgot all about laws whether good or bad.
of all the pleasures of boston, there was one that ella wanted more than she had wanted the tin soldiers,[pg 44] but she feared she would never be permitted to enjoy it. this pleasure was, to have just one ride in the swan boats in the public garden. the mother was afraid of boats, especially of little ones, and ella saw no hope of the ride that she wanted so badly.
“couldn’t i go for just one minute?” she pleaded. “i couldn’t possibly drown in one minute if i tried. couldn’t i just get in and get out again?”
but the mother had no idea how deep the water might be, and she always answered,
“no, not until you are tall enough to wade out if the boat tips over.”
“but i’ll be a woman then,” said ella, “and tall women don’t ride in the swan boats.”
“you can take some little girl with you, and maybe the man with the boat will think you are a little girl too.”
“but i don’t want to take a little girl. i want some one to take me while i am a little girl. i don’t care for the tin soldiers now, and i’m afraid that by and by i shan’t care for the swan boats; and then i shan’t ever have had a ride in them, and i’ll be sorry all my life that i had to leave it out.”
but the mother was turning toward the railroad station. there would be only time enough to go there and to get some lunch, she said, and they must not stay in the garden any longer.
after lunch they went on board the train, and before long they had crossed the line and were in new[pg 45] hampshire. ella had a tiny yellow-covered geography at home, and she knew from the map just how new hampshire ought to look. it ought to look like a tall, narrow chair with a very straight back. but from the car window it looked like wide fields of grass and clover and daisies and hills and brooks and valleys. here and there were great elms, their branches swaying gracefully in every breeze. along the rail fences were bushes of what ella was almost certain were blackberries, and nearly ripe. there were deep woods, too, and now and then she caught a glimpse of a gleaming yellow or white blossom as the train hurried onward. sometimes they rode for quite a long way beside the blue merrimack river. it was low water, and she could see the markings that the current had left on the sand. they were just like the markings in the little brooks that she always liked so much, only these were larger.
early in the afternoon they came to concord, and the mother’s friend met them at the station. but what did this mean? ella’s eyes grew bigger and bigger, for the friend held by the hand a little girl about as tall as ella. after she had greeted them, she said to ella,
“this little girl has come to live just across the street from us, and i am sure that you will be good friends. her name is ida lester, and she has come to meet you and walk home with you.”
so the mother and her friend walked up the shady street, and the two little girls walked along behind[pg 46] them, looking shyly at each other. ella liked ida, and ida liked ella.
“do you like checkerberry candy?” asked ella.
“yes, i do,” ida replied. “i had a stick of red and white peppermint candy yesterday.”
“a lady on the cars gave me some checkerberry candy,” said ella. “i wish i had saved half of it for you.”
“i wish i had saved half of mine for you,” said ida heartily. “i will next time. are you going to live here?”
“oh, no,” replied ella. “we are just going to make a little visit, and then we’re going to see my grandmother in new hampshire.”
“but this is new hampshire,” said ida, looking puzzled.
“is it? i know it said ‘new hampshire’ on the tickets, but i don’t call it ‘new hampshire’ till i get where my grandmother is. but i’d just as soon,” she added quickly, for she was afraid she had not been exactly polite to this new friend, “and i’m so glad you live here.”
“i’m glad you’ve come,” said ida. “did you bring your dolls? do you like to play ‘house’ or ‘school’ better?”
“i like to play both,” said ella. “i brought my big doll, because she is the one i sleep with and the one i love best.”
“what is her name?”
[pg 47]
“minnie may ida may. i like ‘may’ and that’s why i put it in twice.”
“you put in my name, too,” cried ida joyfully. “i am so glad you chose it even before you ever saw me. i’m going to name my biggest doll over again, and call her minnie may ella may.”
“there wasn’t room for any more dolls in the trunk,” said ella, “but i brought ever so many paper dolls and some pretty paper to make them some more dresses. i’ll give you some.”
“oh, good!” ida exclaimed. “my front steps are a splendid place to play with paper dolls; and there’s a deep dark crack where we can put them when they are naughty. we’ll have to tie a string around them though, so we can pull them up again. come over now, will you? no, i forgot. my father raised some beans and they got mixed. he told me to pick them over this afternoon and put all the white ones in one box, the yellow in another, and the pink in another. he’s going to plant them in the spring.”
“i’ll help you,” ella cried eagerly, “and we’ll play that we are in a castle where a wicked giant lives, and that he will whip us just dreadfully if we make any mistakes; and we’ll be thinking up some plan to get away from him.”
and so it was that the two little girls became friends. they had fine times together playing “house” and “school,” and working on bits of canvas with bright-colored worsteds in cross stitch, and[pg 48] telling stories to each other. sometimes they wrote their stories and read them to the long rows of paper dolls standing up against the steps. ella had a great admiration for ida’s handwriting. ella’s own writing had perhaps improved a very little, but even now it looked much like a fence that had been caught in an earthquake, its pickets and rails sticking out in all directions; but ida’s was fair and round and looked quite as if she was grown up.
one reason why they liked to write stories was because they always tied the tiny books together with bright ribbons. ida had a big box of odds and ends of ribbon, and these she shared generously with ella. they had been given to her by her sunday school teacher, who had a little millinery store. ella did not wish to give up her own sunday school teacher, but she did think it would be very agreeable if she would open a millinery store.
the two little girls did all sorts of pleasant things together. when saturday came, ida ran across the street, her face all aglow with smiles, and gave ella’s mother a note. ella could hardly wait till her mother had read it, and she stood first on one foot, then on the other. the note said,
“will you please let ella put on a big apron and come to dinner with ida to-day?”
“oh, mother, may i go? may i? may i? may i?” cried ella, dancing about the room. “i know we are to do something nice. what is it, ida?”
ida only laughed, but the mother said yes, and the girls ran across the street and pinned on the big aprons. then ida opened a door into a little room back of the kitchen that ella had never seen.
“this is the saturday room,” she said.
“oh, that’s lovely!” ella cried. “i never saw such a beauty. can you really do things with it?”
“just like a big one,” replied ida, “and every saturday mother lets me cook my dinner on it.”
“it” was a little cookstove, the top not much more than a foot square. it had four little griddles and an oven and a little stovepipe that opened into the pipe of the big stove in the kitchen. beside the stove was a small closet, and on the low hooks hung a mixing-spoon, a steel fork and knife, a griddle, and a wire broiler. on the shelf above was a mixing-bowl, a little cake pan, a small kettle, and a muffin pan that was just large enough to hold six muffins. above these was a pretty set of blue-and-white dishes, and small knives, spoons, and forks. in one corner of the room was a table, and in its drawers were napkins and a tablecloth.
“and does your mother really let you get your own dinner?” cried ella.
“yes, she does,” said ida. “she says that little girls always like to cook, and they may as well learn the right way as to play with scraps of dough that their mothers have made. we’re going to have steak and sweet potatoes and lettuce to-day, and blackberries[pg 50] and cream for our dessert. i made the fire before i came over, and the potatoes are all washed and ready to boil.”
“and may i help?” cried ella.
“of course you may. if you will put the potatoes into the kettle, i will wash the lettuce. we’ll set the table together, and then you shall broil the steak while i go to mother’s refrigerator for the blackberries and the cream.”
once in a while ida’s mother looked in at the door to make sure that all was going on well, and when the little girls had sat down to the table, she came and looked it over and said,
“well, children, i think you have done everything as well as i could. i should really like to sit down and eat dinner with you.”
“oh, do, do!” the girls cried; but ida’s mother only smiled and shook her head.
“your father will be here soon,” she said, “and i’m afraid there would not be enough for us all. when you are a little older, you shall cook a dinner for us some day, and if ella is here, we will ask her to come and help.”
