of the nest, you would have wanted to be running out every now and then, to see how it got on, til the bird would have found himself watched, and have forsaken it, to build somewhere else. Or you would have wanted to break the blue shells, to see if the insides of the eggs were growing into birds; just as you dug up your flower-seeds to know if they were sprouting; and pulled open the green rosebuds, to find out if the under leaves were turning red. So your seeds didn't come up, and your roses didn't bloom; all owing to your impatience and curi osity. If you had not done this, your continually coming would have drawn the attention of some of the boys or girls, to learn what was here, till they would have found the nest and robbed it. You've too much curiosity, Fanny. If you choose, tell your own secrets, and take the consequence. But they who can't keep their own, are not very likely to be trusted with those of others. And as to coming at them by prying, I should feel as if I was tiefing," as the Frenchman told his little boy he had been, when he cut a shoot from his grandpa's walnut-tree, to make him a ratan. If I discovered, by accident, what concerned another, and was not intended for my knowledge, I should feel sorry, and also that I had no more right to tell or expose it, than I should have to spend a piece of money that I saw another drop. "This secret was the bird's-and I should have caused her great distress by telling it. It is the kind of curiosity which makes you want to know what others are about, what they have, and so on, that gets you into your worst troubles, sis. You saw John bring in a covered basket, and put it on the shelf in the cellar closet. The next thing that was heard was the basket, eggs and all, fall smash upon the brick floor; and sister Fanny shouting lamentably, and crying, 'O, dear, dear! they are all over my feet!' So none of us had any pudding that day. Then, again, when you saw mother wet her eyes with a clear water from a phial, and thought you'd try it too, you found the sal volatile not quite so cooling to your eyes as the rose-water was to hers. No wonder that they wept! "Now, Fanny, since I have played minister, and preached you such a sermon on curiosity, over this nest, I know you will prove so good a hearer as not to shew that you know anything about the secret, till the birds are a few days older, and can fly away. Then they'll come and do the singing part of the service from the trees about our house.' Fanny looked thoughtful and serious; and only replied: "I am glad I did not break the bird's eggs. There would never have been any music, nor pretty birds come from those I did break. They would have been made into a pudding perhaps; the pudding would have made me heavy and sleepy, so that I should not have learnt my lesson so well, and I should have been mortified at school." THE EXPERIENCE OF ARMELLE NICOLAS. ARMELLE NICOLAS, generally called "the Good Armelle," was a French ervant-girl, and lived at Ploermel, in Brittany. She was remarkable for her charity and pious devotion, as shewn in her published life, entitled, "The Triumph of Divine Love in the Life of a Great Servant of God, 1676." She was born in 1606, and died at Vannes, in 1671, aged 65. 10 the God of my love, in the morning, said Olle she, Like a child to its parent, at waking I flee; With a longing to serve Him and please Him, I rise, And before Him kneel down, as if seen by I resign myself up to His absolute will, So supporting one's mind, that it thinks nothing hard! |