Green-Mountain freeman. [volume] (Montpelier, Vt.) 1844-1884, 1871-03-29
Five Little Stitches.

Five little stitches And they were tax I
en- more than twenty-five years ago. And
why should they be remembered more than
thousands of other stitches taken by the |
same fingers l will tell you.
Little Rose went to the infant school
then. 1t was very happy place for the
little folks They had no hard lessons in
arithmetic or geography. The nearest APP
proach to lessons was saying over the null
Duplication table, in sort of rhyming con-
cert Twice one are two, twice two are
four : while the teacher slid aloug the
little wooden balls on the wire frame, to
suit the words. No, but when the march
ing and singing were over, there were
plenty of busy fingers learning to sew.
Rose was making blocks of patch work
- nine patch her mother called it,
Roses mother cut the small squares and
basted them neatly for Rose to sew over
and over one block a day. And 1t was
Roses special delight to show her mother
the neatly finished block each night, aud
be able to say, did it all myself One
warm June day Rose found her needle
rather dull, and the new pink chintz so
hard to sew her fingers trembled, when
she came to where the four corners met,
and she tried in vain, with her little thin
bleess finger, to push the needle through
so many thicknesses of cloth. She looked
at the little girl who sat next her on the
long bench-an older girl than Rose by
two years, and rich IN the possession of q
real silver thimbe Rose passed the
block to Pogue "a curious name, but her
very OWN, and motioned to the little hard
corner, touching her thimble and nodding
and winking significantly. Pogue under
stood, and taking the nine patch sewed
very neatly over the hard place-Rose
watching carefully lest she should do too
much One two, three, four, FIVE stitches,
and Oh, so neatly done Rose bowed and
smiled her thanks, and put in a stitch OF
two as neatly as possible next to the FIVE,
when she stopped in dismay at tue thought
that popped into her conscientious little
\ head can't tell mother | did it all
myself 1t would have taken away half
\ her pleasure not TO be able TO say this.
| And yet it was so rery little-only I5lSt
/ FIVE stitches | needn't mind that, came
the temptation, l can say | did it myself
/ for that's almost nothing But ii is help,
another voice said, and you'd letter say.
4 did it nearly all But Rose couldn't
make up her mind to say this. Her moth
er would be sure TO think if Pogue sewed
any of it, likely she made half the block,
\ at least one seam across. SO you see it
was real struggle. And how do you
suppose she settled it ? After looking at
it about as long as it has taken me to tell
you this, unthreaded her needle and very
deliberately picked out those five stitches
and went to work aud sewed them over
herself And she Is glad to-day that she
did. Not because it might not have been
foolish for her to be so anxious about the
credit of doing the work all herSelf-no ::
but because it was her first resistance TO
the temptation to tell Ealsehood And
resisting once always makes 1t easier to
resist again. So | do not think Rose ever
told a deliberate falsehood since that dav
when she came so near making black
spot in her memory instead of bright
one Does any little girl think Rose made
too much of such little thing? Oh, no.
1t is Just as much stealing to take FIVE
pennies from another purse as five dol
lars, and it would have been as much a
I falsehood for Rose to have left Pogue ;
I FIVE little stitches in her work and said she
did it all, as if Pogue had sewed half
/ the block, and she had said the same thing.
And Rose knew it, and is glad to-day, as
she was then, that she picked out those
FIVE little stitches Airs Julia T. Bal
I lard. az Christian Union.