"Self-praise Goes but little ways;"
a short piece of versification which all boys and girls would do well to remember.
Now it happened that, all this time, Rollo"s mother was sitting in a little bedroom, which had a door opening into the entry where Lucy and Rollo had been reading, and she heard all the conversation. She knew that though Rollo was generally a good boy, and was willing to know his faults, and often endeavored to correct them, still that he was, like all other boys, p.r.o.ne to selfishness and to vanity, and she thought that she must take some way to show him clearly what the truth really was, about his disinterestedness.
In a few minutes, therefore, she went out of the room, and took from the store closet an apple and a pear. They were both good, but the pear was particularly fine. It was large, mellow, and juicy. She then went back to her seat, and called, "Rollo."
Rollo came running to her.
"Here," said she, "is an apple and a pear for you."
"Is one for me and one for Lucy?" said he.
"That is just as you please. I give them both to you. You may do what you choose with them."
Rollo took the fruit, much pleased, and walked slowly back, hesitating what to do. He thought he must certainly give one to Lucy, and as he had just been boasting that he preferred another"s pleasure to his own, he was ashamed to offer her the apple; and yet he wanted the pear very much himself.
If he had had a little more time, he would have hit upon a plan which would have removed all the difficulty at once, by dividing both the apple and the pear, and giving to Lucy half of each. But he did not think of this. In fact his mother knew that, as he was going directly bark to Lucy, he would not have much time to think but must act according to the spontaneous impulse of his heart.
But though he did not think of dividing the apple and the pear, he happened to hit upon a plan, which occurred to him just as he was going back into the entry, that he thought would do.
He held the fruit behind him; the apple in one hand, and the pear in the other. Lucy saw him coming, and said,
"What have you got, Rollo?"
"Which will you have, right hand or left?" said he in reply.
"Right."
Rollo held forward his right hand, and, lo! it was the pear. But he could not bear to part with it, and he brought forward the other, and said,
"No, you may have the apple."
"No," said Lucy; "the pear is fairly mine; you asked me which I would have, and I said the right."
"But I want the pear," said Rollo; "you may have the apple. Mother gave them both to me."
"I want the pear too," said Lucy; "it is mine, and you must give it to me."
Just then a voice called from the bedroom,
"Children!"
"What, mother?" said Rollo.
"I want you both to come here."
Rollo and Lucy would both have been ashamed of their contention, were it not that the pear looked so very rich and tempting, that they were both very eager to have it.
"What is the difficulty?" said Rollo"s mother, as soon as they stood before her.
"Why, Lucy wants the pear," said Rollo, "and you gave them both to me, and said I might do as I pleased with them. I am willing to give her the apple."
"Yes, but he offered me my choice," said Lucy, "right hand or left, and I chose the right, and now he ought to give it to me."
"And are you willing that I should decide it?" said the lady.
"Yes, mother," and "Yes, aunt," said Rollo and Lucy together.
"You have both done wrong; not _very_ wrong, but a little wrong; and I think neither ought to have the whole of the pear. So I shall divide the pear and the apple both between you; and I will tell you how you have done wrong.
"You, Rollo, by asking her which she would have, implied that you would leave it to chance to decide, and that you would let her have her fair chance. Then you ought to have submitted to the result. If she had chosen the left hand, she ought to have been content. If she had got the apple, you would have had the credit of giving her an equal chance with you, and she ought therefore to have had the full benefit of the chance.
"And then you, Lucy, did wrong, for, although Rollo asked you to choose, he did not _actually promise_ you your choice, and as he was under no obligation to give you either, you ought not to have insisted upon his fulfilling his _implied promise_. Is it not so?"
The children both saw and admitted that it was.
"The best way, I think," she continued, "would have been for you, Rollo, to have given the _pear_ to Lucy, as she was your visitor, and a young lady too. Then she would have given you half in eating it. However, you were not very much in the wrong, either of you. It was a sort of a doubtful case. But I hope you see from it, Rollo, what I wanted to teach you, that you are no more inclined to prefer other persons"
pleasure to your own, than other children are. Remember Jonas"s couplet hereafter. I think it is a very good one. Now go and get a knife, and cut the fruit; and see, it does not rain but little; you can go and get your pea-pods now."
Away went the children out into the kitchen after a knife. Rollo wanted to cut the apple and the pear himself, and Lucy made no objection; and we must do him the justice to say that he gave rather the largest half of each to Lucy. They then went out into the shed, Rollo taking with him a dipper of water to wash his feet when he came back from the garden.
Rollo then took off his shoes, and gave Lucy his share of the fruit, to keep for him, and then sallied forth into the yard, holding the umbrella over his head, as a few drops of rain were still falling.
He waded into the little pond at the garden gate, and then turned round to look at Lucy and laugh. He began, too, to caper about in the water, but Lucy told him to take care, or he would fall down, and they could not wash his _clothes_, as they could his feet, with their dipper of water.
So he went carefully forward till he came to the peas, and gathered as many as he wanted, and then returned.
As he was coming back, he saw Jonas in the barn. Jonas called out to him to ask what he had got.
"I have been to get some pea-pods," said he, "to make boats with."
"Where are you going to sail them?" said Jonas.
"O, in this little pond, when it is done raining."
"But you had better have a little pond _now_, in the shed."
"How can we?" said Rollo.
"You might have it in a milk-pan."
"So we can. Could you come and get it for us?"
"Yes, in a few minutes--by the time you get your boats made."
Rollo and Lucy were much pleased with this, and they sat down, one on each side of the milk-pan pond, and sailed their boats a long time. He cut small pieces of the apple and of the pear for cargo, and Rollo put in the stem of the pear for the captain of his boat. Each one was good-humored and obliging, and the time pa.s.sed away very pleasantly, until it was near dinner-time. When they came in to dinner, they observed that it was raining again very fast.