De La Salle Fifth Reader Part 10

"Who, do you say, is waiting for me?" said the lady to her servant. "I am already worn out with company."

"Only a very pretty little boy, with yellow curls, who says that if he can just see you, he is sure you will not be sorry, and he will not keep you a moment."

"Oh, well, let him come!" said the beautiful singer, with a smile; "I can never refuse children."

Little Pierre came in, his hat under his arm; and in his hand a little roll of paper. With a manliness unusual in a child, he walked straight up to the lady, and, bowing, said: "I have come to see you, because my mother is very sick, and we are too poor to get food and medicine. I thought that, perhaps, if you would only sing my little song at one of your grand concerts, some publisher might buy it, for a small sum; and so I could get food and medicine for my mother."

The beautiful woman rose from her seat; very tall and stately she was;--she took the little roll from his hand, and lightly hummed the air.

"Did you compose it?" she asked,--"you, a child! And the words?--Would you like to come to my concert?" she asked, after a few moments of thought.

"Oh, yes!" and the boy's eyes grew bright with happiness; "but I couldn't leave my mother."

"I will send somebody to take care of your mother for the evening; and here is a crown, with which you may go and get food and medicine. Here is also one of my tickets; come to-night; and that will admit you to a seat near me."

Almost beside himself with joy, Pierre bought some oranges, and many a little luxury besides, and carried them home to the poor invalid, telling her, not without tears, of his good fortune.

When evening came, and Pierre was admitted to the concert hall, he felt that never in his life had he been in so grand a place. The music, the glare of lights, the beauty, the flas.h.i.+ng of diamonds and the rustling of silks, completely bewildered him. At last _she_ came; and the child sat with his eyes riveted on her face. Could it be that the grand lady, glittering with jewels, and whom everybody seemed to wors.h.i.+p, would really sing his little song?

Breathless he waited:--the band, the whole band, struck up a little plaintive melody: he knew it, and clapped his hands for joy! And oh, how she sang it! It was so simple, so mournful, so soul-subduing. Many a bright eye was dimmed with tears, many a heart was moved, by the touching words of that little song.

Pierre walked home as if he were moving on the air. What cared he for money now? The greatest singer in Europe had sung his little song, and thousands had wept at his grief.

The next day he was frightened by a visit from Madame Malibran. She laid her hand on his yellow curls, and, turning to the sick woman, said: "Your little boy, madam, has brought you a fortune. I was offered, this morning, by the first publisher in London, a large sum for his little song. Madam, thank G.o.d that your son has a gift from heaven."

The n.o.ble-hearted singer and the poor woman wept together. As for Pierre, always mindful of Him who watches over the tried and the tempted, he knelt down by his mother's bedside and uttered a simple prayer, asking G.o.d's blessing on the kind lady who had deigned to notice their affliction.

The memory of that prayer made the singer even more tender-hearted; and she now went about doing good. And on her early death, he who stood by her bed, and smoothed her pillow, and lightened her last moments by his affection, was the little Pierre of former days,--now rich, accomplished, and one of the most talented composers of the day.

All honor to those great hearts who, from their high stations, send down bounty to the widow and the fatherless!

PIERRE (pe [^a]r'), Peter.

MALIBRAN, a French singer and actress. She died in 1836, when only 28 years old.

What does "he walked as if moving on air" mean?

BREATHLESS = _breath_+_less_, without breath, out of breath; holding the breath on account of great interest.

BREATHLESSLY, in a breathless manner. Use _breath, breathless, breathlessly,_ in sentences of your own.

p.r.o.nounce separately the two similar consonant sounds coming together in the following words and phrases:

humming; meanness; is sure; his spirit; send down; this shows; eyes sparkled; wept together; frequent trials.

Memory Gems:

A single sunbeam is enough to drive away many shadows.

_St. Francis of a.s.sisi._

Howe'er it be, it seems to me, 'Tis only n.o.ble to be good.

Kind hearts are more than coronets, And simple faith than Norman blood.

_Tennyson_.

_18_

SEPTEMBER.

The golden-rod is yellow; The corn is turning brown; The trees in apple orchards With fruit are bending down.

The gentian's bluest fringes Are curling in the sun; In dusty pods the milkweed Its hidden silk has spun.

The sedges flaunt their harvest In every meadow nook; And asters by the brookside Make asters in the brook.

From dewy lanes at morning The grapes' sweet odors rise; At noon the roads all flutter With yellow b.u.t.terflies.

By all these lovely tokens September days are here, With summer's best of weather, And autumn's best of cheer.

_Helen Hunt Jackson._