The new Northwest. [volume] (Portland, Or.) 1871-1887, 1876-01-07
Keep Your Eyes Open.


There is much pleasure to be found in
the little everyday things about us, if
We only have the faculty 10 draw the
pleasure therefrom. / will tell you
some of them. We will suppose you
are farmers wife, and rise very early
in the summer morning. AS you step
out to the pump to wash, and stand
there looking around and slowly turn
ing back the cuffs of your morning
wrapper, you hear the birds; some are
wide awake aud full of song, while you
hear others just beginning to peep, like
little children when they rub their eyes
open and peep over at their bed-fellows.
You smile at the pretty, half-awake
twitterer.
Then you see the dawn in the east.
Glorious! The tintings reach away to
peaked hills in the southwest. While
you are getting breakfast, a robin
alights in one of the door-yard trees,
and pours out song full of trills and
warbles and ups and downs, the most
delicious music, yours without any So
licitation.
Then, while you are busy about your
household duties, pretty things will
come to you, whether you see them or
not-the morning-glory vine a-sparkle
with dew and full of dropping bells; the
lambs skipping in frolicsome mood, all
in heap, up on pile of rails or on a
stump, every movement the very per-
lection of grace and beauty; the gay
party of young men and maidens going
to a picnic; the exquisite laughter that
reaches you from one whom you know
not, but whose musical ha! ha made
you laugh in spite of yourself; the troop
of passing sGhoOl-children, who were
sure to say something very original and
very funny. And thus, if your heart
be attuned to pleasurable emotions, will
little, pleasant surprises come to you
all the long day. An odd fancy, or
singular colOring of the clouds; patch
of cream-white violets on the brook-side
bank; ruby berries right under your
feet, where you least expected to find
them; a new tune, strange bird, a de-
liciOus breeze, a neighbours gift, baby's
face, grand poem, a book to read, a
churning of superior butter, a new dis
covery in making pies or baking cook
les, pattern you had long wished for,
the shadow on a distant mountain, go
ing for the COWS yourself, going with
| the children for moses, or an unusually
magnificent sunset that glorified the
woody hill-tops, and bathed them as
with the siftings of fine gold, while the
hOllOws and ravines were thrown into
shadow and darkness. All these are
common things little things, you
might call them-but don't overlook
them, don't undervalue them, these
things you call trifles, lying all within
reach of your eye and your heart. Use
them, my dears; they will do you good,
and keep you young, and beauty-loving,
and cheerful. Don't let them all go
while you are grasping for the larger
good just out of your reach-a fancied
good that may never come TO you, and,
if it does, you may be embittered with
disappointment.
Do you sneer and say one must have
a small capacity for happiness that such
trifies can fill and satisfy? They do not
satisfy, but they keep the faculty in
pleasurable exercise, and the happiness
which comes by larger and more i'm
portant channels is more wisely and
more truly enjoyed.
Let US keep open eye and ear to such
gentle ministries as these. Remember
and not go through life with eyes too
high for seeing the little blessings that
cling about your feet.