Anti-slavery bugle. [volume] (New-Lisbon, Ohio) 1845-1861, 1847-03-05
MISCELLANEOUS.
THE LITTLE PILGRIM.
.6bridged from an old Engh,h Magazine.

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er. She lived with her grandmamma, and
two maiden aunts, whom she would have
called very old, indeed, though they by no
means were Of the same opinion.
She was, however, a very happy child,
though size durst not make any noise, except
in her own play.room, at the top of the house.
OF course, she had her troubles, like all 9TH
er little girls, even those whose voices are
never checked and she used to get into sad
scrapes sometimes; but then she used soon
to get out Of them, and she was neither per-
picked by regrets for the past, nor fears for
the future.
The very first serious difficulty Maria could
recollect finding herself in, occurred one day
when grandmamma and both aunts were gone
out TO dinner; an event Of very rare occur
renee, and Of momentous interest in the fam
lily. Both aunts had had some s%cruples about
the propriety Of leaving Maria so very long
alone, for company dinners at Oldtown were
celebrated at two o'clock; but as neither of
them seemed, for a moment, to contemplate
the possibility of staying home to take care
of her, their a~nxieties assumed the form OF
strict injunctions TO Mrs. Martha, the house
keeper, on no account TO let her 90 out of her
sight.
Maria was, in general, a very good little
girl, and if she had been allowed TO have her
childish curiosity reasonably g%ratifed, the
desire that filled her mind would have had
no place there. But Aunt Charlotte so in
variably insisted that little girls were never
allowed to ask questions, for that, when they
grew up, they would know every thing that
was good for them TO know and she had ve-
ry recently smarted so severely under the
laughter OF her aunts, when she had asked if
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resolved she would ask no questions, but try
10 md out herself what at present she so
much wished to know.
Maria's education had been far from nep-
lected. She could read very well-had be-
gun to learn TO write, and had received les
sons in geography and history /; though, from
the dry, tedious manner in which thew were
administered, her ideas of time and space
were very confused. She had formed a the
DRY OF her own, that all celebrated persons, of
oiHerent countries, hose names began with
the same sound, were contemporaries; that,
tor instance, Queen Anne and Hannibal.
queen Mary and Marius, Brutus and Bruce.
the traveller, might have known each other.
If they had but lived near enough. Her IDEAS
OF geography were not much less vague, as
may be inferred from the fact, that she BELLE
we'd certain mounds in the churchyard 10 he
really what Mrs. Martha asserted them TO be.
the graves of the infants slaughtered by He
rod. Her grandmamma told all her friends
what very great pains she took to give Maria
good principles. Her lectures on these points
might all be reduced to four heads; namely,
to put everything in its proper place, TO do
everything in its proper time, to be genteel,
and hate the French.
1t will not be surprising that, with such
training, the perusal of the Pilgrims Pro-
gress, a copy of which had recently been pre-
sented to her, gave an entirely new bias to
her thoughts. Sorely puzzled was she to
guess how much Of it might be true, when,
one day as they were riding out in the car
rage, she saw, at a little distance from the
road, a very handsome house. On some one
asking the name of it, she did not hear the
answer di'iinct'y, but was quite sure she
heard the word beautiful I; and as they i'm
mediately began to descend a hill, she at
once concluded that it was the palace Beau
tifnl, and that the hill was the hill Difficulty.
One great point was now ascer,ained, that
there were really such places; but she be-
gan to be sorely distressed, when it occurred
to her that they were travelling in the wrong
direction from what they ought TO be going.
Oldtown was a place where fewer changes
occurred than in more populous and modern
places, and Maria scarcely recollected ever 10
have heard OF any ones leaving it. Certain
ly she had never heard of any one going on
a pilgrimage and she wondered very much
how her annis, who had told her the Pill
grlm,s Progress was so very good a book,
snould have read 1t without thinking it ne
cessary to take the advice it convened.
The rector of the parish happened to call
the very next day at Mrs. Walkers, and as
he was going away, inquired so kindly after
the little girl, that she was called in from the
garden TO see him. He asked what book il
was she was reading, and when she said il
was the Pilgrims Progress, he stroked her
head, and said he hoped she would not de.
lay setting out on her pilgrimage till she was
as old as Christian, adding, that a youthful
prGtim was the most interesting object he
knew. This last observation was addressed
to her annts, who assented TO it, as thew did
10 everything Mr.. Roberts said, and it con-
hrmed the resolution which Maria had aIrea-
ny taken, of setting out alone. The day she
hxed upon was the one in which her grand
mother and annts went to the dinner party.
Tie housekeeper suffered her TO amuse
herself IN the garden while she entertained
SOM friends. She thus slipped away, un-
perceived. She was soon missed, and Mrs.
MARINA ana her guests spent the afternoon in
me greatest distress, searching all over the
helds and forests in the neighborhood.-
when the ladies' came home they were terri
r ply alarmed for poor Maria. They blamed
the housekeeper, reflected on their own i'm.
prudence, and mourned over the poor girls
rashness. A boy soon brought a lille shoe
which had belonged to Maria, but he couId
mol tel where It was found. Many tears
were shed over it that night, which was a
time of mourning for the poor lost girl.
But II is time that we should return IN Ma.
ria. When she had made up her mind to Sc,
out, it was a distressing thought to her thai
she knew not the direction in which TO turn
for the purpose Of finding the path which
she was TO pursue; and she was determined
to ask no one by the way, for fear of encoun,
sering Mr.. Worldly Wiseman. The road
ny which they same in the carriage, she