"ElizaLeeFollen-ThePedlerOfDustSticks" - читать интересную книгу автора (Follen Eliza Lee)

THE PEDLER OF DUST STICKS

BY MRS. FOLLEN



With illustrations by Billings





THE PEDLER OF DUST STICKS.


One day I went to visit a friend, a lady, who came from Hamburg, in
Germany. I was much pleased with a portrait which was hanging up in
her room, and I was particularly struck by the ornamental drawings
with which the picture was surrounded. They consisted of whip
handles, canes, piano keys, mouth-pieces for wind instruments, all
sorts of umbrellas, and many more things, of every sort, made of
cane and whalebone. The arrangement was so ingenious, the designs so
fanciful, and the execution so good, that nothing could be prettier.
But what of course was of the most importance, was the face and head
that they were meant to ornament. "What a benevolent, what a
beautiful face!" I said. "Who is it?"

"My father," the lady replied; "and he is more beautiful than the
picture, and he is still more kind than he looks there."

"What is the meaning of all these bits of bamboo and these little
canes, so fancifully arranged around the picture?" I asked.

"These little sticks," she replied, "tell the story of my father's
success, and of the beginning of his greatness. He began his noble
and honorable life as a little Pedler of Dust Sticks."

"Pedler of Dust Sticks?"

"Yes," she said; "if you would like to hear his history, I will
relate it."

I replied that nothing could please me better; that I considered the
life of a good, great man the most beautiful of all stories.

"I will tell it to you just as it was; and you may, if you please,
repeat it for the benefit of any one."

When I had returned home I wrote the story down, just as I
remembered it, as she had given me leave to do.