OUR BOYS & GIRLS.

New Zealand Mail, Issue 858, 10 August 1888, Page 5

OUR BOYS & GIRLS.

LITTLE ROSALIE,

By Harriet Prescott Spot toed, (St. Nicholas.) (Continued.)

* It wouldn’t attract you iu the least,’ said Aunt Lydia. ‘ All that part of the house where.the audience 3its is dark ; black cambric covers the seats, aud keeps the dust from the velvet and gilding, and on tho stage the scenes are not set, so you see only odd pieces of painted boards and ropes and pulleys; while carpenters and their men are running about with their coats. The players aro in their everyday clothes, and rattle over their parts, going through only the necessary motions, or trying certain of the mechanical effects, —the things that are done by machinery, you know,—such as riding away on clouds, or sailing upon a river, and so on. Oh, they are not at all interesting, rehearsals,’ said Aunt Lydia. ‘ You make the thing altogether too attractive, Margaret.’ ‘Well then, rehearsal over,’ resumed their mother, with a smile, * our Little Rosalie goes to market, and comes home, gets dinner and clears it away. And if she has a new part to learn, bhe sits down to study it; and the study is severe, for she has to learn by heart every word she is to say, every gesture she is to make, and every step she is to take. She has to practice her dances, sometimes for hours, and her songs, too. Oh, she works every day for many-hours harder than you ever worked any hour in your lives. . She has also to make and mend for the others, though the old grandmother gives some little help; and, when night comes, the twins and the three other children put themselves to bed, while off she goes with liei basket of costumes on her arm. Nobody thinks of troubling her, for all the policemen and poople about there know her and are bn the look-out to see her safely ou her way.

* When the play is over she comes out of the stage-door into the night. It is often snowy and slippery, or dark and muddy from a heavy rain, with not a star to be seen, the long reflections of the street-lamps shining on the wet pavements. Sometimes she has a little supper with her grandmother before she creeps into bed, tired out ; but often she goes to bed hungry.' ‘ I suppose she may be abl9 to play her fairy and childish parts for some years yet; for poor food and not enough of it, late hours and little Bleep, and her hard life, altogether, will perhaps have the effect of making her grow very Blowiy, and it is probable that she will aiwnys be rather undersized. But her beautiful voice ought to be carefully trained.’

‘Oh, Mamma ! ’ cried Maidie, with tears in her sweet eyes, ‘ I think it is t-o cruel. If she could only come and live with us ! ’ ‘And what would become then of her mother and grandmother, of her sisters and brothers ? They have nobody but Rosalie to do anything for them, and would have to go to tho almshouse or die of starvation if it were not for her earnings.’ • Oh, I forgot !' ‘ Papa oould tako care of them 1’ exclaimed Johnny. *Do you think Papa could take care of another family of eight persons, and educate and bring up the younger ones ’ ‘ I suppose you think he is made of gold !’ cried Joe.

‘ There are people worse off than these,’ resumed Mamma ; ‘ people who haven’t even any Rosalie to earn money for them. And such people need all the time and money Papa and I have to spare.’

‘But it all seems so strange,’said Fanny, ‘ that I can’t quite get used to it. She lives around the oorner there, in some rooms, aud cooks, and sweeps, and sows, and has a mother, and brothers, and sisters, as we do?’

‘ Yes ; and I suppose her mother’s heart aches to have poor little Rosalie doing so muoh; no doubt she often grieves over it. I’ve no doubt, too, that she may feel a sort of terror, dreading what would become of the other children if anything happened to Roealie. So, too, all the children look upon Rosalie as the one who gives them everything they have, as their protector—in short, their guardian-angel. When you saw her in that singing-play hovering over the children asleep in the wood, with the great rosy wings arching up above her head and pointing down below her feet, you didn't dream that Bhe really waß a guardian-angel to so many,—did you ?’ ‘ Oh, Mamma,’ cried Mairlie, with tears in her eyes, ‘ and lamof no use at all!’ and Bhe couldn’t see a word of Bessy’s French exercise, which she had been looking over for her sister, when the talk began, beoause of those tears. .

‘I think,’ said Besay, * I don’t like it quite so well to know about her really, though. Tom said once that when the play was over she was changed into a footlight and somebody turned her off, and when it was lighted again, she stepped out. But Maidie said that couldn’t be—it was the night Joe cut his hand and Maidie made him forget the pain by talking about Rosalie —and she said that perhaps, when the lights went out, Rosalie went down through one of the trap, doors and into a narrow passage that ran far away under all the city, and was lighted by a moon at the very farthest end ; a moon setting in the sea, for the passage comes out in a oave on the sea-coast; and that the cave was all lined, on top and sides, with belltones ; and every time that the light of the little breaking waves glanced up and struck them, all the bell-tones were set ringing, and it was little Rosalie’s work to polish off the bell-tones and tune them and make them ring just right, and when this was done those tones were what made all the music in the world.’ ‘ 1 didn’t believe it,’ said Johnny. ‘ How do her bell-tones make Mamma’s voice Bing, I’d like to know ?’ * How does the sunlight make this fire shine ?’ asked Tom, loftily. ‘Go along with ,your conundrums ! You think just because you’re in Philosophy, that nobody else knows anything ! ’ ‘I said “perhaps,” Johnny,’ said Maidie, cently. ‘lt was all only “maybe,” you know.’ * Well, I’m sure Rosalie makes just as much music In the world in the way she does, as Bhe could in that way,’ said Tom. * Can’t we go and see her at her real home, Mamma, or have her come to see us ?’ asked Maidie, wistfully. ‘There it is, Margaret! Just as I told you !’ said Aunt Lydia. ‘ I am afraid it would do her no good, my dear. It is no kindness to make her discontented with her own home. And our 3is very different.’ ‘At any rate,’ said Fanny, ‘ you said we might go to see her when Cousin Alice comes.’ ‘So I did, if you had money enough between you for a box.’ ‘lt is ten dollars for a box,’ exclaimed Aunt Lydia. ‘But there aro so many of us that it is cheaper to have a box, and in some respects it is more convenient.’ ‘ I don’t like a box half so well,’said Tom. ‘ There’s always somebody that doesn’t see anything,’ * Well, it is never you, Tom 1’ said Aunt Lydia. Tom colored up so that it was certain he would have answered back and spoiled everything, if Maidie’s hand had not stolen gently to his arm. Still he must say some thing sharp. ‘ Fan doesn’t care,’ he remarked, ‘ if I do have the best seat for seeing, so long as she’s in the front of the box where people can see her long curls.’ * Oh, I should think you’d be ashamed, Tom !’ cried Fanny. 1 never wished any. body but Rosalie to see them.’ * And we all wish Rosalie to like us,’ said Maidie.

* Rosalie’s too busy for that Bort of thing !’ said Tom, with great contempt. * I don’t know that she is,’ said Maidie. * Once—l—l never told anybody,—but once, when she was so very near our box, you know, I really did throw her a little Jaoe bag full of chocolates—those lovely chocolates that Uncle John gives us. And she caught it, and looked over and laughed, and actually slipped one into her mouth ’ * Then they weally do eat chocolates in fairyland,’ murmured Kitten, as she climbed into Maidie’s lap, for a 3 yet she had by no means settled everything clearly in her little head.

* Well,’ said Tom presently, looking up from the heavy calculations that he°had been making with a pencil on his wristbands ‘ we can’t go yet—unless Aunt Lydia “chips in ” —’ And to everybody’s amazement Aunt Lydia did “chip in” a bright tv.o-dollar-and-a-half gold piece on the spot. ‘That settles it!’ said Torn. *We could have borrowed some of our' church-money and let that wait, but Maidie said it wonldn t do. Now—Nur-e, and .-uni Lydia, and Mamma are three, and all the rest of. uo are —how nanny ?. No matte?; we can all Rqueeze in, I guess. Anil I say, Maidie ’ and here Homs voice softened to a whisper ‘have you am' more of the chocolates f"

That night, iu their iitclo beds in the big bedroom, most of the children, usual oould hardly close their eyes for joy at the expected outing. ‘ Say, Maidi, are you asleep ?’ whispered Bessie.

*Of course not, ’ answered Maidie. ‘ How do you suppose I can sleep, when I'm going over in my mind tho music that Rosalie’s going to sing and dance to, next Saturday ?’ " Oh, what is it like, Mnidia ?’ ' Yes, what is it like, Maidie?’ (To bo ontinued.)