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A BRIGHT THOUGHT, AND WHAT CAME OF IT.

I.

MOTHER! you will let me send this basket of primroses to poor little Freddie Watson, won't you ?'

So spoke a rosy-faced child, one bright spring morning, and her mother answered promptly:

'Yes, my little one, you shall send it if you like. We will ask cook to stop the carrier as he passes. Run into the store-room and fetch me a piece of string and a label, that we may tie down the lid and put the address on the basket.'

Away ran Nina Simpson, and in less than five minutes she was tripping back into the parlour with a ball of twine in her hand. She was very helpful, this little maid of nine, and quite equal to the task which was set her of writing the direction, and tying it firmly on the handle of the market-basket.

'There,' she cried, 'I am just in time, for I hear the horn in the distance.'

Pratt, the carrier, always sounded his bugle at the entrance of the village, and then all who had parcels to entrust to his care ran out to meet him as he passed their doors. Sedhurst was within eight or ten miles of London, so the old man had not a very long drive, for he started from a country town about two miles on the other side.

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Mrs. Simpson went out to speak to the cook, and the cook walked to the garden-gate to stop the cart; and Nina watched at the window, and saw her well-laden basket borne away to the great metropolis.' The child had once heard London spoken of by this name, and from that day she had been very fond of using the expression, hard as it was to pronounce. She had never been to London as yet, but in her imagination it was a city of perfection-a place of fairy-like splendour -though she had lately been a little puzzled on hearing some reports of Freddie Watson's new home. Could this be really in the same 'metropolis,' of whose streets and palaces she had dreamt so often? It seemed hardly possible; but if so, and if the sick boy missed his country home, as the villagers said he did, then surely some wild flowers from the meadows would cheer him, and carry him back, at least in fancy, to the cottage by the stream.

This was how it happened that Nina brought in a large gathering of primroses, as we have seen, and asked leave to send them to little Freddie.

"I watched them carried off, mother,' said she, as Mrs. Simpson returned to the sitting-room.

'Aye, little one, but you didn't hear our good old cook's blessing as she sped them on their way.'

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'What do you mean?' inquired Nina. 'I don't understand.' "Why, as she handed them to Pratt, and told him what they were, I heard her mutter : May joy go wi' you, ye bonnie blossoms! Í doubt not ye'll cheer the heart o' the puir bairn in the big town."' The little girl only half understood the words, for she was not much used to the dialect. The old Scotch woman, who had lived many a long year with the Simpso: family in the South of England, only spoke now and then in her native tongue, and that when something occurred to excite her pity.

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A BRIGHT THOUGHT, AND WHAT CAME OF IT.

A Bright Thought, and what came of it.

II.

IF Nina had seen the welcome that her primroses received she would, indeed, have been delighted; but if she had first been led into the room which her little sick friend occupied, then, oh! then her heart would have been very sore. In the very depths of the City, streets are astir from morning till night with busy passengers, every one too full of his own affairs to cast even a glance at his neighbour.

Here it was, though not in a public thoroughfare, that Freddie Watson had come to live. His father, who was a navvy, had heard of work on the metropolitan line of rail, and having had nothing to do for some weeks was glad to catch at the chance. And thus it came about that the man and his wife and two children removed from their pleasant, though tiny rural home, to a dingy room in Pepper's Court. And, oh! it was a sad, sad change, especially for him, whose young life at the best was but dreary, compelled as he was to lie always on his bed, a helpless sufferer. They were all kind to him, his father, mother, and little sister; but they could not bring back the pretty sights and sounds of the country. The meadow, with its buttercups and daisies, which he had been used to gaze upon from his lattice window, were far, far away now; and the bleating of the lambs, and the song of the thrush and the skylark, no longer reached his ear.

For this sweet music he had only the harsh sounds of the human voice, speaking often in hot anger or profane jests; while the sight which generally met his eyes was the bare paved court, surrounded by dingy, miserable dwellings.

When old Pratt arrived in London on the day that he carried the basket of primroses, he found the place wrapped in a dense yellow fog. He unloaded his cart at the stables, and sent round any goods which were for places near at hand by an errand-boy. This little lad of twelve threaded his way through the narrow, darkened streets.

Freddie Watson was lying, as always, on his bed on the groundfloor, when the door-handle turned and a basket was laid on the table, and a boy's voice said: 'Empty it, please; I'm to take it back sharp.' 'What is it, mother?' asked Freddie. What can it be?'

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I must look and see if it be right,' she answered, and she read the direction. It is for us, sure enough,' she added, pointing to the label; 'see, your name is upon it.'

Then Mrs. Watson opened the basket and emptied its contents without more ado.

Oh, my!' exclaimed the errand boy; they are fine! And what a lot! Do they grow where you come from, missus? Why, it must be a beauty place! Oh, my!'

Give him some, mother; some for himself; poor little chap!' said the sick boy. He's not used to such things.'

'Yes, do,' added Martha, jumping up from her seat, and collecting a handful of the pale yellow blossoms.

So the little Londoner, who had never seen a flower growing wild in its native soil, accepted the gift in his rough and ready manner, and went his way, beaming with delight.

Very quietly did Freddie and his sister take the surprise which the

receipt of the parcel had given them; but it certainly was a surprise and a real pleasure. On this gloomy day, the gloomiest that they had ever seen in their lives, the gay visitants from their lost home brought them their one only gleam of joy.

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'Look ye here, my child,' said Mrs. Watson, laying a hand on Martha's shoulder, it will be a cheery half-hour's work for you to put them out daintily, and make the place look a bit home-like against father comes home from his work."

'So it will,' replied Martha, gleefully; but in another instant her eyes drooped, and she added: "There's nothing to put the flowers into; the vases are all gone that used to stand on the shelf.'

'Ah! to be sure,' returned her mother; 'I never thought to have a use for them any more. But stop, child! I'll give ye the bowl, the old china bowl that I've kept stowed away in my box.'

So the precious bowl was brought out of its hiding-place, and Martha set to work to fill it with water. Then, drawing the little table close up to the bed, she asked Freddie to help her, knowing that it would please him to have a hand in the arrangement of the first spring nosegay.

The fog did not clear off till late in the afternoon, but the little event which had brought joy to the hearts of these children had made this day, in spite of its natural dulness, the brightest and merriest which they had passed since first setting foot in Pepper's Court.

III.

THIS was not by a great many the last nosegay which was sent up from Sedhurst to London; and Nina Simpson had little guessed what results would come from her kindly thought for Freddie Watson.

Very shortly Pratt, the carrier, took the errand-boy regularly into his service, so that Tom had to travel up and down with the cart three times a-week. The lad was positively beside himself with joy at the first sight of the country.

" Look ye there, master!' cried he, on nearing a row of maybushes; the trees with the beauty-white blossoms-what can they be, I'm a-wondering? The sun shines on 'em so gay, and the wind scatters the white things about in the lane! It all looks so strange to me, I scarce know what I'm about.

The old man smiled, and asked him if he liked it better than the streets of the City.

'Don't I just ?' replied Tom. It feels so fresh like; I can breathe and breathe out here in the free air.'

No cause to complain of your breathing, my lad,' said the carrier. In all the smoke and the fog, I don't think you ever ailed.' Tom felt more blithesome to-day than he had ever felt in his life. But if to a youth born and brought up in the City the sweet breath of green pastures had such a charm, what sadness must be forced upon those who are compelled to leave their rural homes and settle in a narrow street or dirty court of a large town!

The little world of Sedhurst soon learned to set a higher value upon their flowers and fruits than they had done hitherto. Tom

A Bright Thought, and what came of it.

told to one and another of the villagers the story of his first primroses, and made some feeling remarks upon the hardness of Freddie Watson's lot. He had not failed to notice the smile which had lighted up the boy's pale face as the basket was opened, and was not ashamed to say how he should like to be the bearer of similar gifts to other homes.

His entreaties set some of the poor folk thinking, and foremost among them was Emily Jones, a monitor in the National School. She asked some of her girls if they would like to go with her into the woods every Saturday morning to make a gathering of flowers, if she could get Pratt to carry them at a trifling charge.

'What a capital plan!' burst from many voices at once, and Emily had a dozen volunteers. She told the scheme to Mrs. Simpson, who was a visitor at the school, and who said that the supply of flowers would be enough to divide between several poor families.

Emily thought so too, but wondered how it was to be done.

In some parts of London,' returned Mrs. Simpson, there are ladies who sit together on certain days to receive flowers, and make them up into nosegays for the poor. I can inquire if there be such a Society in any of the poorest neighbourhoods.'

Accordingly, Mrs. Simpson made the inquiry of a clergyman, who replied that he was not aware of there being a flower committee for miles round, but that there were gentlewomen in his parish who would gladly form one if only they had materials to work upon. He had a staff of district visitors, through whose kindness nosegays could be sent round to the homes of the sick.

All necessary plans were settled without loss of time; and before the spring had glided into summer, Sedhurst village was astir every Saturday morning with the tramp of children, vying with one another in their labour of love, and trying whose pinafore would be the soonest filled with blue-bells, and foxgloves, and sprays of the pale hedge-rose.

These simple offerings were all taken to Mrs. Simpson's door, that she and her little daughter might pack them up carefully, and send them off in the cart. Not a farthing would poor old Pratt take for his trouble. He was far too glad that he might share in the work of ministering to the poor in their dull and dingy dwellings.

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In London at two o'clock on Saturday the ladies' committee met, to sort the bright flowers and tie them up in tasteful little bunches, and long before the shadows of evening fell many an invalid was gladdened by the gift which thoughtful heads and busy hands had laboured to provide. Some of the sick people were wont to say that it came just in time to brighten the Sunday.

Ah, ma'am ! it minds me of the days of health, when I used to sit in the old seat in God's house; for when Christian folk think and toil for us like this, it tells me the old story, that we're all one family-brothers and sisters, you know-in our dear Lord's Church.'

Nina Simpson was not quite satisfied, however, for she found that Freddie Watson lived outside of the parish to which the new

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