Louisa May Alcott: 16 Novels in One Volume (Illustrated Edition). Луиза Мэй Олкотт
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Название: Louisa May Alcott: 16 Novels in One Volume (Illustrated Edition)

Автор: Луиза Мэй Олкотт

Издательство: Bookwire

Жанр: Языкознание

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isbn: 9788075839770

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СКАЧАТЬ and father, and is a fair, heroic-looking baby, with a fine head, and serious eyes that look about him as if saying, "I am a Brown! Are these friends or enemies?" I wanted to cry once at the little scene the unconscious baby made. Some one caught and kissed him rudely; he didn't cry, but looked troubled, and rolled his great eyes anxiously about for some familiar face to reassure him with its smile. His mother was not there; but though many hands were stretched to him, he turned to Grandma Bridge, and putting out his little arms to her as if she was a refuge, laughed and crowed as he had not done before when she danced him on her knee. The old lady looked delighted; and Freddy patted the kind face, and cooed like a lawful descendant of that pair of ancient turtle doves.

      When he was safe back in the study, playing alone at his mother's feet, C. and I went and worshipped in our own way at the shrine of John Brown's grandson, kissing him as if he were a little saint, and feeling highly honored when he sucked our fingers, or walked on us with his honest little red shoes, much the worse for wear.

      Well, the baby fascinated me so that I forgot a raging headache and forty gabbling women all in full clack. Mrs. Brown, Sen., is a tall, stout woman, plain, but with a strong, good face, and a natural dignity that showed she was something better than a "lady," though she did drink out of her saucer and used the plainest speech.

      The younger woman had such a patient, heart-broken face, it was a whole Harper's Ferry tragedy in a look. When we got your letter, Mother and I ran into the study to read it. Mother read aloud; for there were only C., A., I, and Mrs. Brown, Jr., in the room. As she read the words that were a poem in their simplicity and happiness, the poor young widow sat with tears rolling down her face; for I suppose it brought back her own wedding-day, not two years ago, and all the while she cried the baby laughed and crowed at her feet as if there was no trouble in the world.

      The preparations had been made for twenty at the utmost; so when forty souls with the usual complement of bodies appeared, we grew desperate, and our neat little supper turned out a regular "tea fight." A., C., B., and I rushed like comets to and fro trying to fill the multitude that would eat fast and drink like sponges. I filled a big plate with all I could lay hands on, and with two cups of tea, strong enough for a dozen, charged upon Mr. E. and Uncle S., telling them to eat, drink, and be merry, for a famine was at hand. They cuddled into a corner; and then, feeling that my mission was accomplished, I let the hungry wait and the thirsty moan for tea, while I picked out and helped the regular Antislavery set.

      We got through it; but it was an awful hour; and Mother wandered in her mind, utterly lost in a grove of teapots; while B. pervaded the neighborhood demanding hot water, and we girls sowed cake broadcast through the land.

      When the plates were empty and the teapots dry, people wiped their mouths and confessed at last that they had done. A conversation followed, in which Grandpa B. and E. P. P. held forth, and Uncle and Father mildly upset the world, and made a new one in which every one desired to take a place. Dr. B., Mr. B., T., etc., appeared, and the rattle continued till nine, when some Solomon suggested that the Alcotts must be tired, and every one departed but C. and S. We had a polka by Mother and Uncle, the lancers by C. and B., and an étude by S., after which scrabblings of feast appeared, and we "drained the dregs of every cup," all cakes and pies we gobbled up, etc.; then peace fell upon us, and our remains were interred decently.

      CHAPTER VII.

       HOSPITAL SKETCHES.

       Table of Contents

      THOREAU'S FLUTE.

      We sighing said, "Our Pan is dead;

       His pipe hangs mute beside the river

       Around it wistful sunbeams quiver,

       But Music's airy voice is fled.

       Spring mourns as for untimely frost;

       The bluebird chants a requiem;

       The willow-blossom waits for him;–

       The Genius of the wood is lost."

      Then from the flute, untouched by hands,

       There came a low, harmonious breath:

       "For such as he there is no death;–

       His life the eternal life commands;

       Above man's aims his nature rose.

       The wisdom of a just content

       Made one small spot a continent,

       And tuned to poetry life's prose.

      "Haunting the hills, the stream, the wild,

       Swallow and aster, lake and pine,

       To him grew human or divine,–

       Fit mates for this large-hearted child.

       Such homage Nature ne'er forgets,

       And yearly on the coverlid

       'Neath which her darling lieth hid

       Will write his name in violets.

      "To him no vain regrets belong

       Whose soul, that finer instrument,

       Gave to the world no poor lament,

       But wood-notes ever sweet and strong.

       O lonely friend! he still will be

       A potent presence, though unseen,–

       Steadfast, sagacious, and serene;

       Seek not for him–he is with thee."

      MISS ALCOTT could not help feeling deeply the excitement of the hour when the war broke out. Her father had been one of the earliest Abolitionists, having joined the Antislavery Society with Garrison, and she well remembered the fugitive slave whom her mother had hidden in the oven. Now this feeling could be united with her patriotic zeal and her strong love of active life, and it was inevitable that she should long to share personally in the dangers and excitement of the war.

      Louisa had always been the nurse in the family, and had by nature the magnetic power which encourages and helps the feeble and suffering; therefore, since no other way of serving the cause opened to her, it was most like her to take her own life in her hands and join the corps of devoted nurses. She was accepted, and went to Washington. Her journal gives an account of her situation in the Union Hospital at Georgetown. It was a small hospital, much inferior in its appointments to those which were afterward arranged. Although Louisa had never been very ill up to that time, and thought herself exceptionally strong, yet she had not the rugged constitution fit to bear the labors and exposures of such a position; and the healthful habits of outdoor life and simple food to which she had always been accustomed made the conditions of the crowded, ill-ventilated hospital peculiarly perilous to her. She says, "I was never ill before this time, and never well afterward."

      But with all its hardships, Miss Alcott found in the hospital the varied and intense human life she had longed to know. Her great heart went out to all the men, black or white, the Virginia blacksmith and the rough Michigander. She even tried to befriend the one solitary rebel who had got left behind, and who was taken into the hospital to the disgust СКАЧАТЬ