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that age, a Frenchman could rarely see any good among a people
who were their hereditary foes. . .
Alexander Pope, the famous English poet, eulogized him; the
great Lexicographer, Dr. Samuel Johnson,'admired him: and the
Scotch poet, James Thomson,in his “Liberty,” sang of Georgia, and
celebrated her illustrious founder.
Unquestionably, Oglethorpe’s greatest title to fame is as the father
of a great sovereign State, whose founding was conceived in a spirit
of genuine philanthropy. When the charter was granted, m urging
immediate settlement, he said: “Let us cast our eyes on the multi
tude of unfortunate people in this kingdom, of reputable families and
of liberal education, some undone by guardians, some by law-suits,
some by accidents in commerce, some by stocks and bubbles, some
by suretyship; but all agree in this one circumstance, that they must
either be burdensome to their relations or betake themselves to little,
shifts for sustenance, which, it is ten to one, do not answer their pur
poses, and to which a well educated person descends with the utmost
constraint. These are the persons that may relieve themselves—
strengthen Georgia by resorting thither, and Great Britain by their
departure.”
The men who came to Georgia without means did not have to bind
themselves to a long service to pay their passage, as they did in some
of the colonies —where they were no better than slaves, for the time.
In this case, their way was paid and a competent estate was given
them, “without money and without price,” in a happier climate than
they had ever known before; and with a certainty of food and raiment,
these unfortunates forgot their sorrows.
“It does, indeed,” savsone of Georgia’s most learned sons, ‘appear
that a special Providence, regarding the enterprise with favoring eye,
raised up from out of the depths of the primeval forests which envi
roned the new plantation, a strong arm and a generous soul to aid
most singularly in the consummation of the doubtful endeavor. By
unseen, and to human eyes, unexpected influences, a Micoat the very
outset, freely and without reward consented, not only to extend to
the colony his personal friendship and that of his immediate tribe, the
Yamacraws, but, also to secure the good-will of neighboring and
powerful nations whose jealousy and opposition might otherwise
have been easily excited, whose animosities and positive hostilities
would, beyond all question, have proven most disastrous to the
hopes and material interests of the settlers. This action on his part
seems the more remarkable when we remember the natural sympa
thies which allied him to his people, their antipathies, and the pecu
liar trials which had been put upon the natives by rapacious traders
from Carolina on the one hand, and designing emissaries from the
Spaniards in Florida on the other. ”
This great, wise and good man, the Father of Georgia, died on the
ist. of July, 1785, having reached the venerable age of ninety
seven. For seventy-four years he had been in the British army, and
was the oldest officer in it.
On a mural tablet of white marble, in the chancel of Cranham
Church, there is a long and glowing inscription to his memory, which
contains ninety-two lines. The last twelve lines are verse, the rest
is prose.
“His grave is in England, but his monument is Georgia.
Bessie Chowning.
For Woman’s Work.
Desdemonia’s Flowers.
BY MABEL COOPER STODDARD.
OOHEY RAN merrily down the alley, hand in hand. Desdemonia
was seven and Beatrix was six. They were going to school.
“I love school, ’Demonia, don’t you?” said Batty.
“Indade!” replied ’Demonia, just the way her mother did, “111-
dade I do!”
It was in one of the poorest quarters of the great city, where most
of the inhabitantshad come from “over the seas,” and were fast be
coming good American citizens, through just such schools as the chil
dren attended.
The morning was cool for early May, but neither of them wore
head-covering or wrap of any kind. One button apiece kept Batty’s
ragged shoes from coming off, and Desdemonia’s were held in place
by bits of once white rag, tied carefully around them.
They lived in a rear house —one back of another —and the court
and the alley, too, had much of the refuse of both buildings scattered
around. But even Desdemonia, who was neat by nature, was so ac
customed to the surroundings that she did not mind it.
“Belave it or not,” her mother told a neighbor once, “belave it or
not, that child washes her face wance a day as regular as any lady,
an’ that widout tellin’ or ’mindin’.”
It was the mother, Mrs. McGill, who had given the children their
“fancy” names, from two fine soap advertisements, “Desdemonia”
and “Beatrix.” She lived in a neighborhood where washing was not
common, though most of the house-dwellers kept body and soul to
gether by means of it. She herself got “a good bit” by scrubbing
floors and cleaning windows; but it compelled her to be out all
day, and the children had to skirmish for themselves from early morn
ing till late evening, when her not always steady footsteps returned
home.
So it was that school became a new home to these little creatures,
and the privilege of attending it was highly prized.
They tripped along until they came to what had once been a row of
tenement houses, but had been made over and turned into a public
school. Not so beautiful or cheerful as many of these buildings in
the great city are, but lovely indeed to numbers of small beings, who
WOMAN’S WORK.
thronged up its narrow staircases into the class-rooms above.
The first thing that ’Demonia and Batty noticed this morning as
they entered their room, was that a new teacher stood behind the
desk. The Principal was beside her.
“Your regular teacher is ill, children,” she said, “and Miss Leslie
is going to take charge of you until she returns. See what good chil
dren you can be, and how little trouble you can give her.”
Then she went out, and teacher and children were left alone to
gether. They regarded each other with a look of mutual curiosity.
“Isn’t she lovely?” whispered Batty to her sister, as the coats and
hats were being collected; a very small pile they made.
But the teacher thought: “Poor little mites! What faces they
have!”
Sixty white, old-looking little faces stared back at her, and each •
small mind thought, as Batty did, “How lovely she is! ”
She was very young, just eighteen, and it was her first class.
Much of her life had been spent in the country, and, like most peo
ple, she had never noticed how a great part of the world lived.
She had never seen such children before. Their faces, their voices,
their small, dirty hands raised in answer to her questions, the ragged
clothing, or lack of clothing —all were new and strange to her.
The little attempts at neatness —here and there, a carefully darned
apron or smoothly braided head of hair—only impressed on her the
general lack of all this.
But Batty and ’Demonia did not know that their appearance was
at all out of the way, and when they reached home at noon-time, to
the few cold scraps left for them in the closet, felt more or less pleased
that they had gone to school that morning a little better scrubbed
than usual.
“I’d like to give her something,” said ’Demonia, when dinner
was over, and they paused before taking wing again, “something
nice.”
“So would I,” promptly responded Batty, “she’s awful kind, isn’t
she ?”
’Demonia was digging one little heel into the hard earth of the
court. “We might give her some of the flowers,” she said slowly.
“O, ’Demonia, you wouldn’t give her the flowers!” cried Batty.
“We could give her a little —just a little —*nd maybe the others
would grow. ’ ’
It was not a great gift, but a willing one, nevertheless; never more
generous feelings turned the four little feet toward one dark corner of
the wretched court. In this corner, made by a high wall and the
side of a building, grew Desdemonia’s “flowers.”
Flowers! You would have laughed had you seen the small plants
which had stolen the name—a bunch of weeds, nothing more nor less
than the kind known to happier children as “sour-grass. ” 't'he tall
est was not over three inches high. Even a weed had to struggle for
existence in Cleary’s Court.
But the children loved them. Many a rose and gay chrysanthe
mum has received less heartfelt admiration than these “flowers;” and
happy moments had passed in caring for them and watching them
grow.
Two were carefully picked from their native soil, “so the rest won’t
feel it,” ’Demonia said.
******* *
The teacher stood to see the line come in at one o’clock, but ’De
monia was so small that when she came up rather tardy, she slipped,
all unnoticed, to the desk and laid her offering on it.
********
It was later in the afternoon when Miss Leslie noticed two large
tears rolling down the face of a child in the front row. The small
girl next her was trying to soothe her without attracting the teacher’s
notice, but seemed on the verge of tears herself.
“What’s the matter, dear?”
At the kind- voice, Desdemonia broke down utterly. Through
streaming tears, in which poor Batty joined, she sobbed:
“They—they—will die —if —you don’t—put them—in water !”
“What will die?” asked the mystified teacher.
“The —the flowers.”
“Where are they?”
’Demonia arose, still weeping, walked over to the desk, lifted a pa
per which had fallen upon the “flowers,” and exposed them to view.
“I brought them for you,” she said.
Miss Leslie did not speak for a few moments, and when she did,
her voice was “shaky”.
“They ate beautiful! Thank you very much !” she managed to
say ; and I very much fear a third person came near crying.
A glass of water was procured, and the “flowers” revived.
The next day, and the next, ’Demonia added to her gift from the
stock in the corner by the wall, but On the fourth day it dropped
from her hand and lay forgotten on the floor.
Marvel of marvels ! The glass was filled with flowers ! real flow
ers ! blue as the sky !
After that it was hard to keep the delighted children’s gaze from
those violets, until the teacher hit on a happy expedient. She told
them the violets would be divided between the best girls—those who
gave good attention—at three o’clock.
But when three o’clock came Miss Leslie broke her word. They
were all so good ! The only “badness” had been the wandering eyes
that sought involuntarily that wonderful mass of bluest blue. So
she gave them all out, to bad and good, one or two to every one.
’Demonia and Batty squeezed each other’s hands for pure joy. They
had received two apiece.
Tears stood in the teacher’s eyes as she saw the radiant faces beam
ing over their glistening treasure, and she made a resolve that these
children should know more of real flowers, so far as she could help
them to. *