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PRAIRIE roses.
---
pA bedjje of roses, pink and sweet,
lean soft cheeks together there,
smile at love, with faces fair—
keeps the sunshine glinting near?
Young love, perchance.
A hedge grown dim with autumn's haze,
Tendrils that cling in loving maze,
jjT Through drear, the or cold, or cloudy days;
Across great expanse
Comes on the fierce September sun,
When rosy flush and perfume’s done;
The rays the faded flowers shun
* Without a glance.
Oh, homely loves that clasp her round.
May you enough for her be found—
| (Like sister roses on one mound
Amid a great expanse)—
May no gay wooer ask a smile—
Too lightsome wight with winsome wile!
But gaining love to hold awhile,
Then lose, perchance.
' M —Eli Shepherd in Boston Transcript.
THE SHOES OF BREAD.
p^n to toib story ~ tnrv that that the the gram irramb •
'aotiiers of Germany tell to their grand
children; Germany, a beautiful country
of legends and of reveries, where the
light, playing on the mists of old
|fthinc, creates a thousand fantastic vis
ons.
Jl poor woman lived alone at the far
r village in humble little
k! o the a
se; the dwelling was miserable enough
nd contained only the most necessary
urniture. An old bed with wreathed
oliimns, from which luing curtains of
flowed serge, a kneading trough to put
be bread in, a walnut chest shining with
leanness, but whose numberless worm
pies, filled up with wax, showed long
Lrvice; a stuffed arm chair, faded and
/orn by the shaking head of the
randam, a wheel polished smooth by
jittch using; that was all.
[ We were going to forget a child’s
kudle, quite new, O! so softly lined, and
bided down with a pretty flowered
pverlitl worked by a loving needle—that
if a mother decorating the manger of
fcr little Jesus.
FA11 the riches of 4 he poor house were
entered there. The child of a burgo
■raster or of an Aulic councilor would
Lot have been more tenderly' cradled,
l.fyly prodigality! Sweet folly of the
bother, who denies herself everything to
lake a little luxury, in the midst of her
rant, for her dear n £ rsling.
This cradle gave gave cs holiday air to the
k\che<l and small and dirty lodging, and
| 'iture, ever compassionate to those who
Ire unfortunate, brightened its bareness
fUth Ihpsses. tufts of house leek and with velvety
While seeming to be buf para
IKes these good, pitiful plants purposely
|rew [I in the holes in the roof, fillingthem
dent p and transforming them into resplen¬
lianging baskets which also served
± keep the rain from falling on the
pTadle; even the pigeons flattened them
Ulves gainst the windows and cooed
intil the child fell asleep.
A tiny bird, whom little Hanz had fed
tlth bread crumbs in the winter when
B file he snow whitened the ground, now, in
spring, let fall a grain from his beak
U &ung the foot of the wall, brier and from weed it vine had
jXiich, a beautiful
fastening itself to the stones with
'its green claws, had entered the room
through a broken pane, and crowned the
l ffd’s cradle with its garlands, so that
the morning the blue eyes of little
E efently e and at the at the each same blue other. time bells and of looked the vine in
Ab dwelling was, the then, poor, but not
ly. The mother of Hanz, whose
ind had died far away in the wars,
1 as best she could upon the few
Rubles _ and
her garden yielded, ,
that
™“what little she made from spinning;
^\*tle indeed, but Hanz wanted for
n F &. that was enough. and believing
she was a pious
woman, this mother of Hanz. She said
her prayers, worked and was virtuous;
but she committed one sin; she took too
much pride in her son. It happens some
times that mothers, seeing their beaut i
ful, rosy babies with their tiny, dimplevl
hands, and their white skin and their
pretty pink nails; imagine that they are
theirs forever; but God gives nothing, ho
lends only; and like a forgotten creditor
he comes sometimes suddenly to claim
w* due.
Because this fresh hud had been
grafted from her stem, the mother of
Har.z thought she had caused it to be
bora: and God—who from the depth of
his blue vaulted paradise that is studded
with golden stars Observes all that hap
pens on earth, and hears from the end of
infinity the noise that a blade of grass
makes in growing—saw not this with
pleasure. that Hanz greedy
He saw, too, was
and Hint hi:; mother was too indulgent
with him in this evil habit; often this
naughty child would cry when, alter
eating grnpi s and apples, ho would have
to finish hi, bread, that so many poor
people are in need of, and his mother
would let him throw away the piece he
littcn . ’ would linish it herself,
Nmv it , ned thal Hallz fell ill;
fever burned him, his throat was choked,
and bis breath came heavily with a rat
tling sound; ho has the croup, a terrible
disease that lias made the eyes of many
mothers and of many fathers red with
weeping. this sight felt
The poor woman at a
horrible pain at her liQart.
Without doubt you have seen in some
church the image of Our Lady clothed in
mourning and standing beneath the cross,
with her breast torn open showing the
bleeding heart in which are plunged seven
silver blades—three on one side and four
on the other. The meaning of this is that
there is no move frightful agony than that
of a mother who sees her child die; and
: this although the Holy Virgin believed in
the divinity of Jesus and knew that her
; Son would rise again,
Now the mother of Hanz had no such
hope. During the last days of his illness,
while she watched him, the mother me
chanically continued spinning, and the
hum of ‘her wheel mingled with the
child’s labored breathing,
If there are those—rich—who think it
strange that a mother should spin beni.ie
the dying bed of her child, it is that they
do not know what torture poverty holds
in its grasp for the soul. Alas! it doesn’t
alone destroy the body, it breaks the
heart also.
What she was spinning thus was the
thread for the shroud of her little Han*.
She did not wish to wrap his preciouj
body in linen that had been used, and she
had no money; and it was for this
reason that she made her wheel rumble
with such funereal activity; but she did
not moisten the thread with her lips, as
was her custom; enough team fell from
her eyes to wet it.
At the close of the sixth day Hanz
died. Whether it was from chance, or
whether from sympathy, the wreath of
the brier weed vine that caressed his
cradle languished, faded, dried and let
fall its last crisped blossom on his bed.
When the mother was convinced that
breath had flown forever from the lips
where death violets had replaced the
roses of life, she covered the beloved
dead, took her package of thread under
her arm, and directed her steps to the
weaver’s.
“Weaver,” said she, “here is some
verv even thread, very fine and without
knots. The spider does not spin thinner
between the rafters of the ceiling. Let
your shuttle come and go; with this
thread must you make for me a yard of
p nen ^ goft as the linen from Frise and
» f rorn Holland.”
The weaver took the skein, adjusted
; t j ie u - arp an( ] the busy shuttle, drawing
, thread after it, began to fly back and
j forth.
The hatchel tightened the woof and
•». -------- -- --- ------------- ----—-------- ~ *--------------------T -------- “
the linen grew on the frame without un
evenness, without hmik, as tine as the
chemise of an archduchess, or the linen
with which a priest dries the chalice at
the altar.
When the thread was all used the
weaver gave back the linen to the poor
mother and said to her, for lie had un
dendood all from the unhappy creature’s
look.of lixed despair:
. he nnant *on o. tho em]H'ror, w ho
died last year, m lus 1 title ebony co hn
with its silver nails, was not wrapped in
linen that softer finer. ’
was or
Having folded the linen the poor
mother pulled from her wasted linger a
thin ring of gold, quite worn.
“Good weaver," she said, “take this
ring—my marriage ring—the only gold I
have ever possessed." wish
The worthy weaver did not
take it. but she said to him;
“I have no need of a ring there where
I am / oha\ iV;\ ! fool it, my little boy’s
arms dvr;: me underground."
Then s; went to the carpenter's.
“Master, in kindness take some oak
that will not rot and that the worms
cannot destroy; cut from it five large
planks and two that are smaller and
make will, them a coffin of this mens
lire. 1 1
Ihe r.„ carpenter took Ms •'»’* «"<> h i, “ ia
plane, arranged the planlta, etrock «s
so, Ilyas be could with lna mallet, 80 tw
not to force the iron point, into the pool
woman’s heart Ixifore they entered the
" c ™
W hen the . work . was completed one
would have thought it, bo carefu ly a 1
well made it was. a 1 k>x to put jo
and lace in.
Carpenter, who have ma , le „„ _ a
4 4 su
beaut 1 ful cofhn for my little IJ. uz, I p^ e
you my house? at the end of tho ullage
and the little garden which » bohirnl and
the well vdh lts^vinc. Aoi 11
Hhe held under her arm, it waa so small
she went her way through the tillage
streels. and the children who do not
know what death is, cn.-d out
» t See what a beautiful l*>x or toys from
Nuremberg Ilaiiz s mother carries to him;
without doubt it is a city with its houses
in painted mul varnished wood, its steeple
surrounded with lead, its battlements and
belfry and the trees, for the promenades,
all frizzed and green: or else it is a pretty
fiddle, carved, with a bow like a horse s
mane. Oh! if we only had such a lx)x.
And the mothers, growing pale, kissed
them and made them still. “Impudent
ones that you are, do not say so; do not
envy her her jewel box, the violin case
which one carries under the arm weeping.
You will have it soon enough, poor chil¬
dren!” When the mother of Hanz
reached home she took the tiny and still
lovely body of her son and began to dress
him for the last time, a toilet which must
be a very careful one, as it will last
through eternity. She dressed him in Ids
Sunday clothing, in his silken dim. and
his pelisse, trimmed with fur, so that he
would not lie cold in the damp place
where he was going. She placed beside
him bis doll with the enameled eyes that
he had loved so much that it had always
slept beside him in Ins cradle.
How she lingered over the task! IIow
many thousand times she gave him his
last kiss! At the moment of smoothing
down the shroud, she perceived that she
had forgotten to put on tin? dead child
his pretty little red shoes.
She sought for them in the room, for
it hull her to see liare those feet that, be*
fore so mi)i t and so rosy, were now icy
and pale;, but during her absence the
rats, 1laving found the shoes under the
bed, for want of better food, had nibbled
and gnawed them, and had torn the kid.
It was a great grief for the poor mother
that her Ilanz was forced to go into the
other world with bare feet; for when the
heart is one great wound it is sufficient to
touch it to make it Heed. She wept be
fore these shoes; from those dry, in
flamed eyes a tear could btill gu&h forth.
she some shoes for Hanz,
£ne j j u:d givell awav j ier ,i n .r tim \ j ier
lou ^ e t ^ uc h was the thought that tor
men ted her. Bv dint of dwelling on it,
t j, cro caln0 j, ar an j,} ea .
In the hut there remained still an en¬
tire loaf of bread, for the unhappy one.
nourished * by her grief, had eaten noth¬
ing. y, remembering that
he l(rok(i tllia lou g
formerly, out of the sol t part, Hi > had
^ j . on;; Rucks, liens, sabots, boats
.
rl|iwMl l!)in , s to orau8e R a; .
wiUl
Ptoci, H( the soft bread in the hollow of
por j ^ ialu j an( j ; ine a('.ing it with her
thum and m0 :8tening it with her tears,
b1m , ma( j t , pa j r c f s i loeH with which she
t iu> eol<l and blue feet of the dead
n , )(1 j. rr } i0i , rt comforted, she
smoothed down the shroud and closed
the while she was kneading the
u i K >ggar had come to her thresh
t<Ki timid, asking for bread: but with
her band she had motional to him to bo
gone. f take the box,
The grave diggercaxnr? of to the
,- ia d buried it in a comer cemetery
ua der a clump cf •.Into kuse hushes; tlw
ait was sweet it dl l not rain, and the
cav th was not wet; this was a source cf
consolation to the mother, who thought
that her little Hanz would not be too un
vaHy j, is (irs ; n j K ht in the tomb,
aaok in her liougo. she placed
the cliilil's cradle next to her bod, lay
Exhausted nature
Sleeping, she had a dream, or at least
^ it waa dream . Hanz up
peaml U) her (lreH8e d, as in his coffin, in
his Sunday clothing, his pelisse trirmiu tl?o )
with swansdown, holding in his mms
d()il >vith the enameled eyes, and wea"
on llig f (H , t the slux-s made of bread,
“ Ho HC(line(1 m \. Around his head was
t lhat aurooJ() wilh which death should
rightly crown little innocents; for who a
‘ that death h d
W()0ii| on ,thite; c ., lreks
{ . ^ W) tears fell from hi.
Jomfc , , ash( . a , si ,, U , ,,,nt his liltlo
breas( T1 ,p vWon dUtpjwand and tbs
mo ther awoke, cold and shivering, over
j ov(H j ( () i uiv(i seen her son again, dir
hecausr* he was so sad; but sh i
reassured herself, saving; “Poor Hanz.
| own m p aru( p K0 } l(< CUJ mot forget me.”
T]w follow . ing n j,rh t the apparition
came onoe Iuore> ]| anz was still mow
Wld 8tiU immJ pa le. His mother,
stretching out her arms to him, said;
“Dear child, console thyself, and do not
become weary in heaven, I am going
there to join thee," The third night
Hanz came again; he groaned and cried
more than on the two preceding nights,
and he disappeared clasping his little
hands ns if in supplication; lie did not
carry his doll, but he wore, as always,
the tiny shoes made of bread.
The anxious mother went to consult jk
venerable priest, who «uid to her: ,
will watch with you to-night and I will
; qu «, tion the little ghost. .. Ho will an*
j HU . t , r Infl . j knovv (jio words that one
, use to innocent as well as to wicked
>
Hanz appeared at the usual hour and
^ challenged him, using the Con¬
secrated words, to tell him what it was
t | mt tormented him in the other world,
..jt j H the shoes of bread that eau e my
torment and iirevent me from n cendiug
^ diamond stairs of paradise; tin y an?
heavier to my feet than a po ‘ihon *
boots, and I cannot get beyond the tir.-H
! t wo or three steps, and that gin nie sc
j much grief, for 1 !«*<.* uti there a cloud
^ beautiful el,end v r *■ h rosv .wing*
w ho roll to me toe me and \ by, and
who show me their silver toys and theii
p 0 j t } 1>n ( 0 ys.** words, he vnnLhcd.
1 Having raid thm-e
ti 1( . holy father, to whom the mother ol
j Hanz hod confessed, now said to her;
| ; “You have commitUxl a grievous
f au ]t. You have \ :v » • : sc l the ‘<bi!y
bread,’ the bread that D sacred, the bread
,
if { Hie good God; the* bread that Jesus
Christ, at his last supper, chose to reprr-
