Wessington Springs herald. (Wessington Springs, Aurora County, Dakota [S.D.]) 1883-1891, 1883-04-28
A LITTLE QUEEN.

That blossomed in her eyes,;
Could you have kissed that golden hair
And drunk her baby sighs,
You would have been her firing maid
As joyfully as l;
Content to deck your little Queen
And let the world go by"
They used to 60 past house every
fine day, summer and winter-the man,
shabby, emaciated as with a long sick
hess, and with a feeble hesitating step,
and an old-young face that was far from
progressing; the child, beautiful, re-
falfy dressed, seated in summer in q
pretty carriage tastefufly decorated; in
Winter, wrapped in soft fur robes in her
little sleigh that was hung with musical
bells, and drawn always by the faithful
tervitor, who from much practice seemed
to have managed the difficulty of going
two ways at once; at least, he walked
forward and looked backward, and never
fell over anything or endangered the life
Of his precious charge.
do not remember who it was told us
that the man was a servant, or whether
we gathered it ourselves from him, as we
stopped to notice the beautiful child.
We were two old maids, sisters, and with
enough Of an income to enable us to live
in a genteel neighborhood, but not rich
enough to be able to associate with the
owners of the more splendid dwellings
around us. We were, however, quite too
rich to be %patronized, 20 the good people
left us severely alone. This explanation
is necessary to account for our interest
in all that passed our door. We had lit
tie else to do but to speculate on people,
not in a general gossipy way, but in that
semi-romantic strain of expression which
people are apt to acquire who live much
alone.
So we made a history of our own for
the little Queen, as we called her, and it
certainly seemed to fit her. She was, we
decided, the only child of very rich par
ents, and this faithful man,, who was not
exactly a servant-not being in livery, or
as we'll dressed as servants in such fami-
lies usually are-was a sort of attachc to
the little Queen, and kept to attend her
because he was SO very fond of her
maids not being trustworthy out of sight.
We felt that she came of a long line of
heroic ancestry-there was no ditch wa
ter in those veins that traced her pearly
skin, and the fearless blue of her lovely
eyes was that of a conqueror. Then the
small shapely ears, the dainty hands and
feet-oh! yes, blood will tell! The very
fact that 10 ladies every appeared on the
street with her told the story of select
humanity by right Of birth. We were
just enough tainted with inherited aris-
tocracy ourselves to approve of the baby's
lineage.
But, strange to say, we never became
well acquainted. The man had a quiet
way of going right on with his little mis-
tress, and whenever we saw our bright
bird she was on the wing. She would
smile and throw us kisses and toss her
fine, richly-dressed doll in her arms for
us to see, and then her patient steed
would start into a gentle trot, and the
little equipage would be gone, and it
would seem to US two lonely women as
if cloud had shut offthe sun.
1t went on this way for years, and the
baby could walk and was quite a large
child, with long, curling, golden hair,
and the fairest complexion l ever saw,
with the color Of dog-rose on her cheeks,
and just trimming with health and hap
piness. The man was always with her,
seedy, detected looking, but absorbed in
the child, often looking at her with a
sort of rapture in his face as if he i'm
agued she might vanish in Heaven while
he watched her, and when he touched
her to arrange her wrappings, doing it in
a deprecating way as if he were not half
good enough. Inever saw such devotion,
wen in a lover, and but this is not of
myself.
Three summers and winters we saw
these two 60 past Jul door, in their little
happy journeys, where one was blest in
giving and the other in receiving, when
they both disappeared. Days went by
and they did not come; the trees which
were bare and leafess blossomed out in
living green; birds sang-where was our
little Queen? Sister and | took turns in
watching for her, but we were disap-
pointed until one morning early, when
looked up the street l saw, not the little
carriage with its pretty burden, but
the man attendant running distractedly
toward ME. AS he came near l saw that
his face was white and haggard, his eye
lids red, lips compressed; he would have
passed directly along, but I called to
him.
GLOW is the little one"
every sick" he called back, and sped
on his way.
He had reluctantly told me once that
her home was OF the corner of certain
streets above us, but / was not familiar
even with u W locality, and had only
an idea that it was distant, perhaps two
OF three blocks. Now 1 caught up a
wrap, threw something on my head and
hurried away, determined to know if the
beautiful child was in danger, and feel
ing no fear of intrusion, for to those peo-
pie would not be of the slightest i'm
portance; but | hoped. some of the domes-
tics would kindly relieve my anxiety, for