The daily phoenix. [volume] (Columbia, S.C.) 1865-1878, 1869-09-15
THE ORGAN GRINDER.

side fair-haired creature, whose features
looked blue and pinUhed with cold.
Z It was in West End street, and be-
fore the door Of an elegant mansion. He
swung the organ from his back, and be-
gan that exquisite little melody, "Rock
me to Sleep, Mother "tlpi .- '.
A fair pale face looked down through
the closed blind of one of the upper win
dows, with eyes dimmed with constant
weeping. Even now, great tears were
swelling in thair depths, and dropping
silently down on the sable dress, with its
heavy folds OF Grape. She had been
standing there, looking istlessly down
into the street, seeing, without marking
anything. She had followed the organ
grinders passage across the street, saw
then had turned to son sss..L:cg else with
that vague wandering that comes with
sorrow. q .a.4tr t
The plaintive notes rose to her ear,
and THE quick up-springing tears told
that they had found their way to the
heart. The fountain was touched, and
the smarting wound was made to bleed
afresh--and memory did it. A few
short weeks before, she had stood in the
self-same spot, hearing the very air; lis
tening not for the musio's sake, but to
please golden-haired prattler at her
side, who had coaxed mamma to give the
new boots, her special pride, to the poor
little girl with the cold shoes, whose little
toes, showing redly through two great
rents, had excited the warm-hearted
child's compassion. The mother drew
the little pleader to her heart, and telling
her how useless would be the boots, gave
her warm worsted dress and pair of
stout shoes; and to encourage her child's
generous impulses, left her to bestow
them herself on the poor little starveling,
shivering in the streets below. It was a
beautiful sight, at which the angels might
have smiled; and the mothers heart had
glowed with deeper pride, deeper ten
derness. g..
"Clasped to your, heart in loving en-
brace'-the chorus rolled forth with
thrilling power. She forgot that it was
but street organ, whose music she
would have turned from in disdain,
amonth before. The music seemed almost
to speak to her, as the words chased each
other through her mind. Crook me to
sleep, mother, rock me to sleep" She
had rocked her treasure, clasped it to
her heart for the last, last time; held it
close till the white limbs grew cold and
rigid beneath the touch of death; and
even then, her frenzied clasp refused to
release itself, and only when nature be-
came exhausted, and she fell fainting to
the floor, could they take the dead child
from her arms Days of dark delirium
followed; and while her tongue called
wildly upon them to leave her child, they
put her darling from her sight-shut the
little face, with its halo of golden hair,
under the coffin-lid, and laid the tiny
form in its last resting place; and when
she awoke to consciousness and sense
OF her loss, little grave in the cemetery
was all that remained of her idol.
Memory flew swiftly over the interval
between--the drear, aching void-the
lonely night hours, when, waking from
sleep with fitful start, she again seemed
to hear the sweet, childish lips calling
Mother !" only the next instant to turn
with hopeless sigh from the mocking
fancy.
The organ took up the strain again,
this time with an added plant, and the
hot tears fell faster. Why should He
take her child, precious to her as her
own life, and leave such children as the
one below, to be brought up in misery
and vice? And she looked, through
angry, rebellious tears, at the little figure
standing so patiently at tho side of the
OIBuus GLhb IchCucQ ABOVE her head.
"Suffer little children to come unto HE.
The words forced themselves into the
wild tumult of thought like holy bene.
diction, and the angry heart softened.
Would the Saviour turn from that for
lorn little one for the garb of poverty
that covered the shrinking form-cast
her off for the wretchedness in wisdom
ordered? Perhaps some mothers heart
would ache over her loss, just MS did hers
over the baby-form now cold in dust.
The very thought, the picture of another
mothers pain and desolation, struck a
tender chord that made her look with
newly-awakened interest at the child.
She noticed the delicate, clean-cut fea-
lures, so unusual in children of her class,
and the tangled, curly hair, creeping
from under the old hat, and hanging on
her shoulders in little yellow rings, Just
like the bright locks she had so often
twined above the brow of her own child
her lost Ida. There were the very
shoes, only looking poorer now, that
once pressed the little dead feet, now
doing service in many a weary tramp,
many weary hour of patient standing,
as the old organ went through its round
of melody-the shoe Ida had given to
the "organ mans little girl" Why
should she not continue the lesson Of