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Gifts of the Child Christ-George MacDonald · In His Steps

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  Speaker 1: Chapter one of the Gifts of the Child Christ. This
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  Speaker 1: is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the
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  Speaker 1: public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit
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  Speaker 1: LibriVox dot org. Recording by Anne Boulay. The Gifts of
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  Speaker 1: the Child Christ by George mac donald, Chapter one, My hearers,
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  Speaker 1: we grow old, said the preacher. Be it summer or
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  Speaker 1: be it spring? With us now, autumn will soon settle
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  Speaker 1: down into winter, that winter whose snow melts only in
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  Speaker 1: the grave. The wind of the world sets for the tomb.
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  Speaker 1: Some of us rejoice to be swept along on its
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  Speaker 1: swift wings, and hear it bellowing in the hollows of
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  Speaker 1: earth and sky. But it will grow a terror to
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  Speaker 1: the man of trembling limb and withered brain, until at
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  Speaker 1: length he will long for the shelter of the tomb
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  Speaker 1: to escape its roaring and buffeting. Happy the man who
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  Speaker 1: shall then be able to believe that old age itself,
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  Speaker 1: with its pitiable decays and sad dreams of youth, is
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  Speaker 1: the chastening of the Lord, a sure sign of his
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  Speaker 1: love and his fatherhood. It was the first Sunday in advent,
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  Speaker 1: But the chastening of the lord came into almost every
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  Speaker 1: sermon that man preached eloquent. But after all, can this
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  Speaker 1: kind of thing be true? Said to himself, a man
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  Speaker 1: of about thirty, who sat decorously listening. For many years
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  Speaker 1: he had thought he believed this kind of thing, but
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  Speaker 1: of late he was not so sure. Beside him sat
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  Speaker 1: his wife in her new winter bonnet. Her pretty face
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  Speaker 1: turned up toward the preacher, but her eyes nothing else
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  Speaker 1: revealed that she was not listening. She was much younger
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  Speaker 1: than her husband, hardly twenty. Indeed, in the upper corner
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  Speaker 1: of the pew sat a pale faced child about five,
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  Speaker 1: sucking her thumb and staring at the preacher the sermon
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  Speaker 1: of They walked home in proximity. The husband looked gloomy
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  Speaker 1: and his eyes sought the ground. The wife looked more
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  Speaker 1: smiling than cheerful, and her pretty eyes went hither and thither.
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  Speaker 1: Behind them walked the child steadily, with level fronting eyelids.
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  Speaker 1: It was a late built region of large commonplace houses,
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  Speaker 1: and at one of them they stopped and entered. The
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  Speaker 1: door of the dining room was open, showing the table
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  Speaker 1: laid for their Sunday dinner. The gentleman passed on to
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  Speaker 1: the library behind it. The lady went up to her bedroom,
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  Speaker 1: and the child the stage higher to the nursery. It
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  Speaker 1: wanted half an hour to dinner. Mister Gretorrek sat down,
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  Speaker 1: drummed with his fingers on the arm of his easy chair,
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  Speaker 1: took up a book of Arctic exploration, threw it again
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  Speaker 1: on the table, got up and went to the smoking room.
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  Speaker 1: He had built it for his wife's sake, but was
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  Speaker 1: often glad of it for his own. Again, he seated himself,
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  Speaker 1: took a cigar and smoked gloomily. Having reached her bed,
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  Speaker 1: Missus Gratorrex took off her bonnet and stood for ten minutes,
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  Speaker 1: turning it round and round earnestly. She regarded it now
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  Speaker 1: gave a twist to the wire stem of a flower,
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  Speaker 1: then spread wider the loop of a beau. She was
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  Speaker 1: meditating what it lacked of perfection. Rather than brooding over
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  Speaker 1: its merits. She was keen in bonnets. Little Sophie, or
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  Speaker 1: as she called herself, by a transposition of consonate sounds
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  Speaker 1: common with children, Poesy found her nurse Alice in the nursery,
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  Speaker 1: but she was lost in the pages of a certain
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  Speaker 1: London weekly, which had found her in a mood open
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  Speaker 1: to its influences, and did not even look up when
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  Speaker 1: the child entered. With some effort, Poesy drew off her
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  Speaker 1: gloves and, with more difficulty, untied her hat. Then she
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  Speaker 1: took off her jacket, smoothed her hair, and retreated to
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  Speaker 1: a corner. There a large shabby doll lay upon her
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  Speaker 1: little chair. She took it up, disposed it gently upon
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  Speaker 1: the bed, seated herself in its place, got a little
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  Speaker 1: book from where she had left it under the chair,
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  Speaker 1: smoothed down her skirts, and began simultaneously to read and
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  Speaker 1: suck her thumb. The book was an unhealthy one, a
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  Speaker 1: cup filled to the brim with a poverty stricken and
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  Speaker 1: selfish religion. Such are always breaking out like an eruption,
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  Speaker 1: here and there over the body of the church, doing
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  Speaker 1: their part, doubtless in carrying off the evil humors generated
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  Speaker 1: by poverty of blood or the congestion of self preservation.
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  Speaker 1: It is wonderful out of what spoiled fruit, some children
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  Speaker 1: will suck sweetness. But she did not read far. Her
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  Speaker 1: thoughts went back to a phrase which had haunted her
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  Speaker 1: ever since she first went to church, whom the Lord
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  Speaker 1: loveth he chasteneth. I wish he would chasen me, she
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  Speaker 1: thought for the hundredth time. The small Christian had no
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  Speaker 1: suspicion that her whole life had been a period of chastening,
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  Speaker 1: that few children indeed had to live in such a
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  Speaker 1: sunless atmosphere. Hers Alice threw down the newspaper, gazed from
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  Speaker 1: the window into the back yard of the next house,
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  Speaker 1: saw nothing but an elderly man servant brushing a garment,
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  Speaker 1: and turned upon Sophie. Why don't you hang up your jacket, miss,
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  Speaker 1: she said sharply. The little one rose opened the wardrobe
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  Speaker 1: door wide, carried a chair to it, fetched her jacket
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  Speaker 1: from the bed, clambered up on the chair, and, leaning
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  Speaker 1: far forward to reach a peg, tumbled right into the
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  Speaker 1: bottom of the wardrobe. You clumsy, exclaimed the nurse angrily,
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  Speaker 1: and pulling her out by the arm, shook her. Alice
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  Speaker 1: was not generally rough to her, but there were reasons
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  Speaker 1: to day. Poesy crept back to her seat, pale, frightened,
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  Speaker 1: and a little hurt. Alice hung up the jacket, closed
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  Speaker 1: the wardrobe, and turning, contemplated her own pretty face and
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  Speaker 1: neat figure in the glass opposite the dinner bell rang there,
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  Speaker 1: I declare, she cried, and wheeled round on poesy, And
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  Speaker 1: your hair is not brushed yet, miss? Will you ever
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  Speaker 1: learn to do a thing without being told it? Thank goodness,
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  Speaker 1: I shan't be plagued with you long, But I pity
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  Speaker 1: her as comes after me. I do if the Lord would,
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  Speaker 1: but chasten me, said the child to herself, as she
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  Speaker 1: rose and laid down her book with a sigh. The
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  Speaker 1: maid seized her roughly by the arm and brushed her
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  Speaker 1: hair with an angry haste that made the child's eyes
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  Speaker 1: water and herself feel a little ashamed at the sight
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  Speaker 1: of them. How could anybody love such a troublesome chit,
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  Speaker 1: she said, seeking the comfort of justification from the child herself.
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  Speaker 1: Another sigh was the poor little damsel's only answer. She
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  Speaker 1: looked very white and solemn as she entered the dining room.
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  Speaker 1: Mister Gratorrex was a merchant in the city. But he
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  Speaker 1: was much more of a man than a merchant, which
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  Speaker 1: all merchants are not. Also, he was more scrupulous in
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  Speaker 1: his dealings than some merchants in the same line of business,
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  Speaker 1: who yet stood as well with the world as he.
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  Speaker 1: But on the other hand, he had the meanness to
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  Speaker 1: pride himself upon it, as if it had been something
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  Speaker 1: he might have done without, and yet held up his head.
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  Speaker 1: Some six years before he had married to please his parents,
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  Speaker 1: and a year before he had married to please himself.
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  Speaker 1: His first wife had intellect, education, and heart, but little individuality,
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  Speaker 1: not enough to reflect the individuality of her husband. The
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  Speaker 1: consequence was he found her uninteresting. He was kind and indulgent, however,
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  Speaker 1: and not even her best friend blamed him much for
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  Speaker 1: manifesting nothing beyond the average devotion of husbands. But in
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  Speaker 1: truth his wife had great capabilities, only they had never ripened,
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  Speaker 1: And when she died a fortnight after giving birth to Sophie,
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  Speaker 1: her husband had not a suspicion of the large amount
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  Speaker 1: of undeveloped power that had passed away with her. Her
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  Speaker 1: child was so like her, both in countenance and manner,
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  Speaker 1: that he was too constantly reminded of her unlamented mother,
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  Speaker 1: and he loved neither enough to discover that, in a
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  Speaker 1: sense as true as marvelous, the child was the very
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  Speaker 1: flower bud of her mother's nature, in which her retarded
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  Speaker 1: blossom had yet a chance of being slowly carried to perfection.
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  Speaker 1: Love alone gives insight, and the father took her merely
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  Speaker 1: for a miniature edition of the volume, which he seemed
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  Speaker 1: to have laid aside forever in the dust of the
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  Speaker 1: earth's lumber room. Instead therefore, of watering the roots of
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  Speaker 1: his little human slip from the well of his affections,
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  Speaker 1: he had scarcely as yet perceived more in relation to
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  Speaker 1: her than that he was legally accountable for her existence
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  Speaker 1: and bound to give her shelter and food. If he
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  Speaker 1: had questioned himself on the matter, he would have replied
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  Speaker 1: that love was not wanting, only waiting upon her growth
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  Speaker 1: and the development of something to interest him. Right as
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  Speaker 1: he had had to expect anything from his first marriage,
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  Speaker 1: he had yet cherished some hopes therein tolerably vague, it
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  Speaker 1: is true, yet hardly faint enough, it would seem, for
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  Speaker 1: he was disappointed in them when its bonds fell from him. However,
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  Speaker 1: he flattered himself that he had not warn them in vain,
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  Speaker 1: but had through them arrived at a knowledge of women
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  Speaker 1: as rare as profound. But whatever the reach of this knowledge,
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  Speaker 1: it was not sufficient to prevent him from harboring the
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  Speaker 1: presumptuous hope of so choosing and so fashioning the heart
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  Speaker 1: and mind of a woman that they should be as
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  Speaker 1: concave mirrors to his own. I do not mean that
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  Speaker 1: he would have admitted the figure, but such was really
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  Speaker 1: the end he blindly sought. I wonder how many of
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  Speaker 1: those who have been disappointed in such an attempt had
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  Speaker 1: been thereby aroused to the perception of what a frightful
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  Speaker 1: failure their success would have been. On both sides, it
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  Speaker 1: was bad enough that Augustus Gretorius's theories had his own development.
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  Speaker 1: It would have been tenfold worse had they been operative
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  Speaker 1: to the stunting of another soul. Letty Merriweather was the
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  Speaker 1: daughter of a bishop in Partubouse. She had been born
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  Speaker 1: tolerably innocent, had grown up more than tolerably pretty, and was,
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  Speaker 1: when she came to England at the age of sixteen,
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  Speaker 1: as nearly a genuine example of locks. She of a
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  Speaker 1: white paper as could well have fallen to the hand
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  Speaker 1: of such an experimenter as Graetoris would fain become in
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  Speaker 1: his suit. He had prospered, perhaps too easily. He loved
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  Speaker 1: the girl, or at least loved the modified reflection of
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  Speaker 1: her in his own mind, while she thoroughly admiring the dignity,
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  Speaker 1: good looks, and accomplishments of the man whose attentions flattered
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  Speaker 1: her self, opinion accorded him deference enough to encourage his
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  Speaker 1: vainest hopes. Although she knew little fluttering over the merest
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  Speaker 1: surfaces of existence, she had sense enough to know that
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  Speaker 1: he taught sense to her, and foolishness enough to put
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  Speaker 1: it down to her own credit. While for the sense
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  Speaker 1: itself she cared little or nothing, and gratorics, without even
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  Speaker 1: knowing what she was rough hewn for, would take upon
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  Speaker 1: him to shape her ends and ambition. The Divinity never
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  Speaker 1: permits to succeed he who fancies himself the carver finds
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  Speaker 1: himself but the chisel, or indeed, perhaps only the mallet
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  Speaker 1: in the hand of the true workman. During the days
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  Speaker 1: of his courtship. Then Letty listened and smiled or answered
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  Speaker 1: with what he took for a spiritual response, when it
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  Speaker 1: was merely a brain echo. Looking down into the pond
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  Speaker 1: of her being, whose surface was not yet rippled by
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  Speaker 1: a bubbling of springs from below, he saw the reflection
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  Speaker 1: of himself, and was satisfied. An able man on his
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  Speaker 1: hobby looks the centaur of wisdom and folly. But if
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  Speaker 1: he be at all a wise man, the beast will
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  Speaker 1: one day or other show him the jade's favor of
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  Speaker 1: unscas him. Meantime, Augustus Grehetorus was fooled, not by poor
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  Speaker 1: little Letty, who was not capable of fooling him, but
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  Speaker 1: by himself. Letty had made no pretenses, had been interested,
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  Speaker 1: and had shown her interest, had understood or seemed to understand,
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  Speaker 1: what he said to her, and forgotten it the next moment,
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  Speaker 1: had no pocket to put it in, did not know
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  Speaker 1: what to do with it, and let it drop into
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  Speaker 1: the limbo of vanity. They had not been married many
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  Speaker 1: days before the scouts of advancing disappointment were upon them.
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  Speaker 1: Augustus resisted manfully for a time, but the truth was
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  Speaker 1: each of the two had to become a great deal
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  Speaker 1: more than either was before any approach to unity was possible.
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  Speaker 1: He tried to interest her in one subject after another,
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  Speaker 1: tried her first, I am ashamed to say, with political economy.
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  Speaker 1: In that instance, when he came home to dinner, he
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  Speaker 1: found that she had not got beyond the first page
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  Speaker 1: of the book he had left her. But she had
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  Speaker 1: the best of excuses, namely that of that page she
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  Speaker 1: had not understood a sentence. He saw his mistake and
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  Speaker 1: tried her with poetry. But Milton, with whom unfortunately he
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  Speaker 1: commenced his approaches, was to her, if not equally unintelligible,
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  Speaker 1: equally uninteresting. He tried her next with the elements of science,
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  Speaker 1: but with no better success. He returned to poetry and
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  Speaker 1: read some of The Fairy Queen with her. She was,
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  Speaker 1: or seemed to be, interested in all his talk about it,
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  Speaker 1: and inclined to go on with it in his absence,
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  Speaker 1: but found the first stanza. She tried more than enough.
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  Speaker 1: Without him to give life to it, she could give
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  Speaker 1: it none, and therefore it gave her none. I believe
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  Speaker 1: she read a chapter of the Bible every day, But
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  Speaker 1: the only books she read with any real interest were
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  Speaker 1: novels of a sort that Augustus despised. It never occurred
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  Speaker 1: to him that he ought at once to have made
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  Speaker 1: friends of this moments of unrighteousness, for by them he
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  Speaker 1: might have found entrance to the sealed chamber. He ought
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  Speaker 1: to have read with her the books she liked, for
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  Speaker 1: by them only could he make her think, and from
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  Speaker 1: them alone could he lead her to better It is
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  Speaker 1: but from the very step upon which one stands, that
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  Speaker 1: one can move to the next. Besides these books, there
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  Speaker 1: was nothing in her scheme of the universe but fashion, dress,
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  Speaker 1: calls the park, other peopledom, concerts, plays, church going, whatever
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  Speaker 1: could show itself on the frosted glass of her camera obscura,
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  Speaker 1: make an interest of motion and color in her darkened chamber.
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  Speaker 1: Without these, her Bosom's mistress would have found life unendurable,
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  Speaker 1: for not yet had she ascended her throne, but lay
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  Speaker 1: on the floor of her nursery, surrounded with toys that
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  Speaker 1: imitated life. No wonder therefore, that Augustus was at length
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  Speaker 1: compelled to allow himself to sat appointment. That it was
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  Speaker 1: the fault of his self confidence made the thing, know
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  Speaker 1: what better. He was too much of a man to
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  Speaker 1: not cherish a certain tenderness for her. But he soon found,
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  Speaker 1: to his dismay that it had begun to be mingled
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  Speaker 1: with a shadow of contempt. Against this he struggled, but
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  Speaker 1: with fluctuating success. He stopped later and later at business,
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  Speaker 1: and when he came home, spent more and more of
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  Speaker 1: his time in the smoking room, where by and by
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  Speaker 1: he had bookshelves put up. Occasionally he would accept an
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  Speaker 1: invitation to dinner and accompany his wife, but he detested
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  Speaker 1: evening parties, And when Letty, who never refused an invitation
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  Speaker 1: if she could help it, went to one, he remained
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  Speaker 1: at home with his books. But his power of reading
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  Speaker 1: began to diminish. He became restless and irritable. Something kept
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  Speaker 1: gnawing at his heart. There was a sore spot in it.
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  Speaker 1: The spot grew larger and larger, and by degrees the
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  Speaker 1: center of his consciousness came to be soreness. His cherished
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  Speaker 1: idea had been fooled. He had taken a silly girl
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  Speaker 1: for a woman of undeveloped wealth, a bubble, a surface
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  Speaker 1: whereon fair colors chased each other for a hearted crystal.
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  Speaker 1: On her part, Letty too had a grief, which, unlike Augustus,
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  Speaker 1: she did not keep to herself, receiving in return from
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  Speaker 1: more than one of her friends the soothing assurance that
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  Speaker 1: Augustus was only like all other men, that women were
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  Speaker 1: but their toys, which they cast away when weary of them.
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  Speaker 1: Letty did not see that she was herself making a
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  Speaker 1: toy of her life, or that Augustus was right in
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  Speaker 1: refusing to play. Was such a costly and delicate thing.
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  Speaker 1: Neither did Augustus see that, having by his own blunder
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  Speaker 1: married a mere child, he was bound to deal with
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  Speaker 1: her as one, and not let the child suffer for
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  Speaker 1: his fault more than what could not be helped. It
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  Speaker 1: is not by pressing our insights upon them, but by
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  Speaker 1: bathing the sealed eyelids of the human kittens, that we
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  Speaker 1: can help them. And all the time, poor little Poesy
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  Speaker 1: was left to the care of Alice, a clever, careless,
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  Speaker 1: good hearted, self satisfied damsel, who, although seldom so rough
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  Speaker 1: in her behavior as we have just seen her, abandon
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  Speaker 1: the child almost entirely to her own resources. It was
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  Speaker 1: often she sat alone in the nursery, wishing the Lord
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  Speaker 1: would chasen her, because then he would love her. The
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  Speaker 1: first course was nearly over, ere Augustus had brought himself
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  Speaker 1: to ask, what did you think of the sermon to day?
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  Speaker 1: Letty not much answered, Letty, I am not fond of finery.
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  Speaker 1: I prefer simplicity. Augustus held his peace bitterly, for it
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  Speaker 1: was just finery in a sermon, Without knowing it that
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  Speaker 1: Letty was fond of what seemed to him a flimsy
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  Speaker 1: syllabub of sacred things beaten up with a wisk of
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  Speaker 1: composition was charming to Letty, while on the contrary, if
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  Speaker 1: a man such as they had been listening to what
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  Speaker 1: was carried away by the thoughts that struggled in him
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  Speaker 1: for utterance, the result, to her judgment was finery and
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  Speaker 1: the object display in excuse, it must be remembered that
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  Speaker 1: she had been used to her father's style, which no
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  Speaker 1: one could have a spurred with lack of sobriety. Presently,
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  Speaker 1: she spoke again. Gus, dear, could you make up your
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  Speaker 1: mind for once to go with me to Lady Ashdale's tomorrow.
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  Speaker 1: I am getting quite ashamed of appearing so often without you.
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  Speaker 1: There is another way of avoiding that unpleasantness, remarked her
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  Speaker 1: husband dryly. You cruel creature, returned Letty playfully. But I
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  Speaker 1: must go this once, for I promised Missus. Holden, you know, Letty,
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  Speaker 1: said her husband, after a little pause. It gets of
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  Speaker 1: more and more consequence that you should not fatigue yourself
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  Speaker 1: by keeping such late hours in such stifling rooms. You
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  Speaker 1: are endangering two lives. Remember that, Letty, if you stay
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  Speaker 1: and home tomorrow, I will come home early and read
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  Speaker 1: to you all evening, Gussie, that would be charming. You know,
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  Speaker 1: there is nothing in the world I should enjoy so much,
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  Speaker 1: but this time I really mustn't. She launched into a
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  Speaker 1: list of all the great nobody's and small somebodies who
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  Speaker 1: were to be there, and whom she positively must see.
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  Speaker 1: It might be her only chance. Those last words quenched
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  Speaker 1: a sarcasm on Augustus's lips. He was kinder than usual
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  Speaker 1: the rest of the evening and read her to sleep.
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  Speaker 1: With the pilgrim's progress. Poesy sat in a corner, listened
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  Speaker 1: and understood, or where she misunderstood, it was an honest misunderstanding,
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  Speaker 1: which never does much hurt. Neither father nor mother spoke
• 19:48
  Speaker 1: to her till they bade her good night. Neither saw
• 19:51
  Speaker 1: the hungry heart under the mask of the still face.
• 19:54
  Speaker 1: The father never imagined her already fit for the modeling
• 19:58
  Speaker 1: she was better without, and the my stepmother had to
• 20:01
  Speaker 1: become a mother before she could value her. Poesy went
• 20:04
  Speaker 1: to bed to dream of the Valley of Humiliation. End
• 20:10
  Speaker 1: of chapter one, chapter two of the Gifts of the
• 20:19
  Speaker 1: Child Christ by George MacDonald. This LibriVox recording is in
• 20:24
  Speaker 1: the public Domain, chapter two. The next morning, Alice gave
• 20:30
  Speaker 1: her mistress warning it was quite unexpected, and she looked
• 20:33
  Speaker 1: at her aghast Alice, She said at length, you're never
• 20:38
  Speaker 1: going to leave me at such a time. I'm sorry
• 20:41
  Speaker 1: it don't suit you, ma'am, but I must. Why Alice,
• 20:45
  Speaker 1: what is the matter? Has Sophie been troublesome? No, ma'am,
• 20:50
  Speaker 1: there's no harm in that child. Then what can it be? Alice?
• 20:54
  Speaker 1: Perhaps you are going to be married sooner than you expected.
• 20:58
  Speaker 1: Alice gave her chinnel little toss, pressed her lips together,
• 21:02
  Speaker 1: and was silent. I have always been kind to you,
• 21:06
  Speaker 1: resumed her mistress. I'm sure, ma'am. I never made no complaints,
• 21:11
  Speaker 1: returned Alice. But as she spoke, she drew herself up
• 21:15
  Speaker 1: straighter than before. Then what is it? Said her mistress.
• 21:20
  Speaker 1: The fact is, ma'am, answered the girl, almost fiercely. I
• 21:24
  Speaker 1: cannot any longer endure a state of domestic slavery. I
• 21:30
  Speaker 1: don't understand you a bit better, said missus Gratorrex, trying
• 21:34
  Speaker 1: but in vain to smile, and therefore looking angrier than
• 21:38
  Speaker 1: she was. I mean, ma'am, and I see no reason
• 21:42
  Speaker 1: as I shouldn't say it, for it's the truth. There's
• 21:45
  Speaker 1: a worm at the root of society, where one human
• 21:48
  Speaker 1: beIN's got to do the dirty work of another. I
• 21:51
  Speaker 1: don't mind sweepin up my own dust, but I won't
• 21:53
  Speaker 1: sweep up nobody else's. I ain't gonna to demean myself
• 21:57
  Speaker 1: no longer. There leave the room, Alice, said Missus Grotorix,
• 22:03
  Speaker 1: And when with a toss and a flounce the young
• 22:06
  Speaker 1: woman had vanished, she burst into tears of anger and annoyance.
• 22:10
  Speaker 1: The day passed, the evening came, she dressed without Alice's
• 22:14
  Speaker 1: usual help, and went to Missus Ashdale's with a friend. There,
• 22:18
  Speaker 1: a reaction took place, and her spirits rose unnaturally. She
• 22:23
  Speaker 1: even danced, to the disgust of one or two quick
• 22:26
  Speaker 1: eyed matrons who sat by the wall. When she came home,
• 22:29
  Speaker 1: she found her husband sitting up for her. He said
• 22:32
  Speaker 1: next to nothing and sat up an hour longer with
• 22:35
  Speaker 1: his book. In the night, she was taken ill. Her
• 22:39
  Speaker 1: husband called Alice and ran himself to fetch the doctor.
• 22:43
  Speaker 1: For some hours she seemed in danger, but by noon
• 22:46
  Speaker 1: was much better. Only the greatest care was necessary. As
• 22:50
  Speaker 1: soon as she could speak, she told Augustus of Alice's warning,
• 22:53
  Speaker 1: and he sent for her to the library. She stood
• 22:56
  Speaker 1: before him with flushed cheeks and flashing eyes. I understand, Alice,
• 23:02
  Speaker 1: you have given your mistress warning, he said gently, Yes, sir,
• 23:07
  Speaker 1: Your mistress is very ill. Alice, Yes, sir. Don't you
• 23:12
  Speaker 1: think it would be ungrateful of you to leave her
• 23:14
  Speaker 1: in her present condition? She's not likely to be strong
• 23:17
  Speaker 1: for some time to come. The use of the word
• 23:21
  Speaker 1: ungrateful was an unfortunate one. Alice begged to know what
• 23:24
  Speaker 1: she had to be grateful for. Was her work worth nothing?
• 23:28
  Speaker 1: And her master, as every one must who claims that
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: which can only be freely given, found himself in the wrong. Well, Alice,
• 23:37
  Speaker 1: he said, we won't dispute that point, and if you
• 23:41
  Speaker 1: are really determined on going, you must do the best
• 23:44
  Speaker 1: you can for your mistress for the rest of the month.
• 23:47
  Speaker 1: Alice's sense of injury was soothed by her master's forbearance.
• 23:51
  Speaker 1: She had always rather approved of mister Gratorret's, and she
• 23:54
  Speaker 1: left the room more softly than she had entered it.
• 23:57
  Speaker 1: Letty had a fortnight in bed, which she reflected a little.
• 24:02
  Speaker 1: The very day on which she left her room, Alice
• 24:05
  Speaker 1: sought an interview with her master, and declared that she
• 24:08
  Speaker 1: could not stay out her month. She must go home
• 24:11
  Speaker 1: at once. She had been very attentive to her mistress
• 24:14
  Speaker 1: during the fortnight. There must be something to account for
• 24:17
  Speaker 1: her strange behavior. Come now, Alice, said her master, what's
• 24:22
  Speaker 1: at the back of all this? You have been a good,
• 24:24
  Speaker 1: well behaved, obliging girl till now, and I am certain
• 24:28
  Speaker 1: you would never be like this if there weren't something
• 24:30
  Speaker 1: wrong somewhere, something wrong, sir. No, indeed, sir, except you
• 24:37
  Speaker 1: call it wrong to have an old uncle's dies and
• 24:40
  Speaker 1: leaves ever so much money, thousands on thousands, the lawyers say,
• 24:44
  Speaker 1: And does it come to you? Then, Alice? I get
• 24:47
  Speaker 1: my share? Sir? He left it to be parted even
• 24:50
  Speaker 1: between his nephews and nieces. Why, Alice, you are quite
• 24:54
  Speaker 1: an heiress, then returned her master scarcely, however, believing the
• 24:58
  Speaker 1: things so grand, Alice would have it. But don't you
• 25:02
  Speaker 1: think now it would be rather hard that your fortune
• 25:05
  Speaker 1: should be Missus Grattorox's misfortune. Well, I don't see how
• 25:09
  Speaker 1: it shouldn't, replied Alice. It's Missus's fortune, as has been
• 25:14
  Speaker 1: my misfortune, ain't it now? Sir? And why shouldn't it
• 25:18
  Speaker 1: be the other way next? I don't quite see how
• 25:22
  Speaker 1: your mistress's fortune can be said to be your misfortune, Alice,
• 25:26
  Speaker 1: anybody would see that, sir, as wasn't blinded by class prejudices.
• 25:31
  Speaker 1: Class prejudices, exclaimed mister Gratorix, in surprise at the word.
• 25:37
  Speaker 1: It's a term they use, I believe, sir, But it's
• 25:40
  Speaker 1: plain enough that if missus hadn't been better off than me,
• 25:44
  Speaker 1: she wouldn't have been able to secure my services, as
• 25:47
  Speaker 1: you calls it. That is certainly plain enough, returned mister Gratorix.
• 25:53
  Speaker 1: But suppose nobody had been able to secure your services,
• 25:56
  Speaker 1: what would have become of you? By that time? The
• 25:59
  Speaker 1: people rose up to assert their rights to what to
• 26:03
  Speaker 1: fortunes like yours to bread and cheese at least, sir,
• 26:07
  Speaker 1: returned Alice pertly, Well, but you've had something better than
• 26:11
  Speaker 1: bread and cheese. I don't make no complaints as to
• 26:15
  Speaker 1: the style of living in the house, sir, But that's
• 26:17
  Speaker 1: all one so long as it's on the vile condition
• 26:20
  Speaker 1: of domestic slavery, which as nothing can justify. Then, of course,
• 26:25
  Speaker 1: although you are now a woman of property, you will
• 26:28
  Speaker 1: never dream of having anyone to wait on you, said
• 26:31
  Speaker 1: her master, amused with the volume of human nature thus
• 26:35
  Speaker 1: open to him. All I say, sir, is it's my
• 26:39
  Speaker 1: turn now, and I ain't gonna to be sit upon
• 26:42
  Speaker 1: by no one. I know my duty to myself. I
• 26:46
  Speaker 1: didn't know there was any such duty, Alice said her master.
• 26:50
  Speaker 1: Something in his tone displeased her. Then you know now, sir,
• 26:55
  Speaker 1: she said, and bounced out of the room. The next moment, however,
• 26:59
  Speaker 1: a shamed of her rudeness, she re entered, saying, I
• 27:03
  Speaker 1: don't mean to be unkind, sir, but I must go home.
• 27:06
  Speaker 1: I've got a brother that's ill too and wants to
• 27:08
  Speaker 1: see me. If you don't object to me goin home
• 27:11
  Speaker 1: for a month, I promise you to come back and
• 27:13
  Speaker 1: see Missus through her trouble as a friend, you know, sir,
• 27:18
  Speaker 1: But just listen to me first, Alice, said mister grotoritx
• 27:22
  Speaker 1: I've had something to do with wills in my time,
• 27:24
  Speaker 1: and I can assure you it is not likely to
• 27:27
  Speaker 1: be less than a year before you can touch the money.
• 27:30
  Speaker 1: You had better stay where you are till your uncle's
• 27:32
  Speaker 1: affairs are settled. You don't know what may happen. There's
• 27:36
  Speaker 1: many a slip between cup and lip. You know, Oh,
• 27:40
  Speaker 1: it's all right, sir. Everybody knows. The money's left to
• 27:42
  Speaker 1: his nephews and nieces and me and my brother's as
• 27:45
  Speaker 1: good as any. I don't doubt it. Still, if you'll
• 27:50
  Speaker 1: take my advice, you'll keep a sound roof over your
• 27:52
  Speaker 1: head till another's ready for you. Alice only threw her
• 27:56
  Speaker 1: chin in the air and almost said threateningly, Am I
• 28:00
  Speaker 1: to go for a month? Sir? I'll talk to your
• 28:03
  Speaker 1: mistress about it, answered mister Gratorix, not at all sure
• 28:07
  Speaker 1: that such an arrangement would be for his wife's comfort.
• 28:11
  Speaker 1: But the next day missus Gratorix had a long talk
• 28:13
  Speaker 1: with Alice, and the result was that on the following Monday,
• 28:17
  Speaker 1: she was to go home for a month and then
• 28:19
  Speaker 1: return for two months more. At least, what mister Gratorix
• 28:22
  Speaker 1: had said about the legacy had had its effect, and besides,
• 28:26
  Speaker 1: her mistress had spoken to her with pleasure. In her
• 28:29
  Speaker 1: good fortune. About Sophie, no one felt any anxiety. She
• 28:34
  Speaker 1: was no trouble to anyone, and the housemaid would see
• 28:36
  Speaker 1: to her. End of chapter two, chapter three of the
• 28:48
  Speaker 1: Gifts of the Child Christ by George MacDonald, This LibriVox
• 28:53
  Speaker 1: recording is in the public domain. Chapter three. On the
• 28:59
  Speaker 1: Sunday evening, Alice's lover, having heard not from herself but
• 29:04
  Speaker 1: by a side wind, that she was going home the
• 29:06
  Speaker 1: next day, made his appearance in Wimborne Square, somewhat perplexed
• 29:11
  Speaker 1: both at the move and at her leaving him in
• 29:14
  Speaker 1: ignorance of the same. He was a cabinet maker, in
• 29:17
  Speaker 1: an honest shop in the neighborhood, and in education, faculty
• 29:21
  Speaker 1: and general worth considerably Alice's superior a fact that hitherto
• 29:26
  Speaker 1: rather pleased her, but now gave zest to the change
• 29:30
  Speaker 1: which she imagined had subverted her former relation. Full of
• 29:34
  Speaker 1: the sense of her new superiority, she had him draped
• 29:37
  Speaker 1: in an indescribable strangeness. John Jeffson felt at the very
• 29:42
  Speaker 1: first word as if her voice came from the other
• 29:44
  Speaker 1: side of the English channel. He wondered what he had done,
• 29:48
  Speaker 1: or rather what Alice could imagine he had done or
• 29:51
  Speaker 1: said to put her in such tantrums. Alice, dear, he said,
• 29:56
  Speaker 1: for John was a man to go straight at the enemy.
• 29:59
  Speaker 1: What's a min what's come over you? You ain't altogether like
• 30:03
  Speaker 1: your own self tonight? And here I find you're goin
• 30:06
  Speaker 1: away and narrow word to me about it? What have
• 30:10
  Speaker 1: I done? Alice's chin alone made reply. She waited the
• 30:14
  Speaker 1: fitting moment, with splendor to astonish and with grandeur to
• 30:18
  Speaker 1: subdue her lover, to tell the sad truth. She was
• 30:22
  Speaker 1: no longer sure that it would be well to encourage
• 30:24
  Speaker 1: him on the old footing. Was she not standing on tiptoe,
• 30:28
  Speaker 1: her skirts in one hand, on the brink of the
• 30:31
  Speaker 1: brook that parted serfdom from gentility, on the point of
• 30:34
  Speaker 1: stepping daintily across, and leaving domestic slavery, red hands, caps
• 30:39
  Speaker 1: and obedience behind her? How then was she to marry
• 30:43
  Speaker 1: a man that had black nails and smelt of glue.
• 30:47
  Speaker 1: It was incumbent on her, at least for propriety's sake,
• 30:50
  Speaker 1: to render him at once, Aware that it was in
• 30:53
  Speaker 1: condescension ineffable, she took any notice of him. Alice, my girl,
• 30:59
  Speaker 1: began John again, in expostulatory tone. Miss Cox, if you please,
• 31:04
  Speaker 1: John Jeffson interposed Alice. What on Earth's come over you?
• 31:10
  Speaker 1: Exclaimed John with the first throb of rousing indignation. But
• 31:14
  Speaker 1: if you ain't your own self no more? Why miss Cox?
• 31:18
  Speaker 1: Be it it seems to me as if I warn't
• 31:21
  Speaker 1: my own self no more, as if I'd got into
• 31:24
  Speaker 1: somethin else, or at least hadn't got my own ears
• 31:27
  Speaker 1: on my own head. Never saw or heared Alice like this, afore,
• 31:31
  Speaker 1: he added, turning in gloomy bewilderment to the housemaid for
• 31:35
  Speaker 1: a word of human sympathy. The movement did not altogether
• 31:38
  Speaker 1: please Alice, and she felt she must justify her behavior.
• 31:43
  Speaker 1: You see, John, she said, with dignity, keeping her back
• 31:46
  Speaker 1: towards him and pretending to dust the globe of a lamp.
• 31:50
  Speaker 1: There's things as no woman can help, and therefore as
• 31:53
  Speaker 1: no man has no right to complain of them. It's
• 31:56
  Speaker 1: not as if I'd got and done it, or changed
• 31:58
  Speaker 1: myself no more'n if I had took place in my cradle.
• 32:02
  Speaker 1: What can I help it? If the world goes and
• 32:04
  Speaker 1: changes itself? Am I to blame? Tell me that it's
• 32:09
  Speaker 1: not that I make no complaint. But I tell you
• 32:13
  Speaker 1: it ain't me. It's circumstances as gone and change theirselves.
• 32:17
  Speaker 1: And being as circumstances is changed, things ain't the same
• 32:20
  Speaker 1: as they was. And miss is the properer term for
• 32:23
  Speaker 1: you to me, John, Jeffson, dang it if I know
• 32:27
  Speaker 1: what you're driving at Alice, Miss Cox, I beg your pardon.
• 32:32
  Speaker 1: Miss I'm sure dang me if I do. Don't swear,
• 32:36
  Speaker 1: John Jeffson, leastways before a lady. It's not proper. It
• 32:42
  Speaker 1: seems to me, Miss Cox, as if the wind was
• 32:44
  Speaker 1: a settin' from bedlamb or maybe Calley Hatch. Said John,
• 32:48
  Speaker 1: who was considered a humorist among his comrades. I wouldn't
• 32:52
  Speaker 1: take no liberties with a lady, miss Cox, But if
• 32:55
  Speaker 1: I might be so bold as to arch the joke
• 32:58
  Speaker 1: of the thing, Joe indeed, cried Alice. Do you call
• 33:03
  Speaker 1: a dead uncle and ten thousand pounds a joke? God
• 33:07
  Speaker 1: bless me, said John. You don't mean it, Alice, I
• 33:12
  Speaker 1: do mean it, and that you'll find John Jeffson. I'm
• 33:15
  Speaker 1: going to bid you goodbye tomorrow. Hoy, Alice exclaimed, honest John,
• 33:21
  Speaker 1: aghast it's truth, I tell ye, said Alice, And for
• 33:26
  Speaker 1: how long gasped John, for feeling illimitable misfortune that depends
• 33:32
  Speaker 1: returned Alice, who did not care to lessen the effect
• 33:35
  Speaker 1: of her communication by mentioning her promised return for a season.
• 33:40
  Speaker 1: It ain't likely she added, as an heiress is gonna
• 33:44
  Speaker 1: to act. The nuts made much longer, but Alice said, John,
• 33:49
  Speaker 1: you don't mean to say it's not in your mind now.
• 33:53
  Speaker 1: It can't be, Alice. You're only jokin with me. Indeed,
• 33:57
  Speaker 1: I am not, interjected Alice with a sniff. I don't
• 34:02
  Speaker 1: mean it that way. You know what I mean is
• 34:05
  Speaker 1: you don't mean as how this ere money, dang it
• 34:08
  Speaker 1: all as how as to be all over between you
• 34:11
  Speaker 1: and me. You can't mean that. Alice ended the poor
• 34:14
  Speaker 1: fellow with a choking in his throat. It was very
• 34:18
  Speaker 1: hard upon him. He must look either as if he
• 34:21
  Speaker 1: wanted to share her money, or else as if he
• 34:24
  Speaker 1: were ready to give her up. Orest yourself, John Jeffson
• 34:28
  Speaker 1: answered Alice, whether it's likely a young lady of fortune,
• 34:32
  Speaker 1: we'll be keepin company with a young man as didn't
• 34:35
  Speaker 1: know how to take off his hat to her in
• 34:37
  Speaker 1: the park. Alice did not above half mean what she said.
• 34:41
  Speaker 1: She wished mainly to enhance her own importance. At the
• 34:44
  Speaker 1: same time, she did mean it half, and that would
• 34:47
  Speaker 1: have been enough for Jeffson. He rose grievously wounded, good bye. Alice.
• 34:53
  Speaker 1: Taking the hand, she did not refuse you're throwin from
• 34:57
  Speaker 1: ye what all your money won't buy. She gave a
• 35:00
  Speaker 1: scornful little laugh, and John walked out of the kitchen.
• 35:04
  Speaker 1: At the door, he turned with one lingering look, but
• 35:07
  Speaker 1: in Alice there was no sign of softening. She turned
• 35:10
  Speaker 1: scornfully away, and no doubt enjoyed her triumph to the full.
• 35:14
  Speaker 1: The next morning she went away. End of chapter three,
• 35:26
  Speaker 1: chapter four of The Gifts of the Child Christ by
• 35:30
  Speaker 1: George mac Donald. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain.
• 35:35
  Speaker 1: Chapter four mister Gratorgs has ceased to regard the Advent
• 35:40
  Speaker 1: of Christmas with much interest. Naturally gifted with a strong
• 35:44
  Speaker 1: religious tendency, he had, since his first marriage taken not
• 35:48
  Speaker 1: to denial but to the side of objection, spending much
• 35:52
  Speaker 1: energy in contempt for the foolish opinions of others, a
• 35:56
  Speaker 1: self indulgence which does less than little to further the
• 35:59
  Speaker 1: growth of one's own spirit in truth and righteousness. The
• 36:03
  Speaker 1: only person who stands excused, I do not say justified
• 36:07
  Speaker 1: in doing so, is the man, who, having been taught
• 36:10
  Speaker 1: the same opinions, has found them a legion of adversaries
• 36:14
  Speaker 1: barring his way to the truth. But having got rid
• 36:17
  Speaker 1: of them himself. It is I suspect worse than useless
• 36:21
  Speaker 1: to attack them again, save as the ally of those
• 36:24
  Speaker 1: who are fighting their way through the same ranks. To
• 36:27
  Speaker 1: the truth. Grhetorics had been indulging his intellect at the
• 36:31
  Speaker 1: expense of his heart. A man may have light in
• 36:34
  Speaker 1: the brain and darkness in the heart. It were better
• 36:37
  Speaker 1: to be an owl than a strong eyed Apterix. He
• 36:40
  Speaker 1: was on the path which naturally ends in blindness and unbelief.
• 36:44
  Speaker 1: I fancy if he had not been neglectful of his child,
• 36:48
  Speaker 1: she would er this time have relighted his Christmas candles
• 36:51
  Speaker 1: for him. But now his second disappointment in marriage had
• 36:55
  Speaker 1: so dulled his heart that he had begun to regard
• 36:58
  Speaker 1: life as a stupid affair in which the most enviable
• 37:02
  Speaker 1: fool was the man who could still expect to realize
• 37:05
  Speaker 1: an ideal. He set out on a false track altogether,
• 37:09
  Speaker 1: but had not yet discovered that there had been an
• 37:11
  Speaker 1: immoral element at work in his mistake. For what right
• 37:15
  Speaker 1: had he to desire the fashioning of any woman after
• 37:18
  Speaker 1: his ideas? Did not the angel of her eternal ideal
• 37:23
  Speaker 1: forever behold the face of her father in heaven. The
• 37:26
  Speaker 1: best that can be said for him, is that, notwithstanding
• 37:29
  Speaker 1: his disappointment and her faults. Yea, notwithstanding his own faults,
• 37:34
  Speaker 1: which were, with all his cultivation and strength of character,
• 37:38
  Speaker 1: yet more serious than hers, he was still kind to her. Yes,
• 37:42
  Speaker 1: I may say for him that notwithstanding even her silliness,
• 37:47
  Speaker 1: which is a sickening fault and one which no supremacy
• 37:50
  Speaker 1: of beauty can overshadow, he still loved her a little.
• 37:54
  Speaker 1: Hence the care he showed for her in respect of
• 37:56
  Speaker 1: the coming sorrow was genuine. It did not all belong
• 38:00
  Speaker 1: to his desire for a son to whom he might
• 38:02
  Speaker 1: be a father, indeed, after his own fancies. However, Letty
• 38:06
  Speaker 1: on her part, was as full of expectation as the
• 38:10
  Speaker 1: girl who has been promised a doll that can shut
• 38:13
  Speaker 1: and open its eyes and cry when it is pinched.
• 38:16
  Speaker 1: Her carelessness of its safe arrival came of ignorance and
• 38:20
  Speaker 1: not indifference. It cannot but seem strange that such a
• 38:23
  Speaker 1: man should have been so careless of the child he had.
• 38:27
  Speaker 1: But from the first she had painfully reminded him of
• 38:30
  Speaker 1: her mother, with whom, in truth he had never quarreled,
• 38:34
  Speaker 1: but with whom he had not found life the less
• 38:36
  Speaker 1: irksome on that account. Add to this, he had been
• 38:39
  Speaker 1: growing fonder of business, a fact which indicated in a
• 38:44
  Speaker 1: man of his endowment and development, an inclination downwards of
• 38:48
  Speaker 1: the plane of his life. It was sometime since he
• 38:51
  Speaker 1: had given up reading poetry. History had almost followed. He
• 38:55
  Speaker 1: now read little except politics, travels, and popular expositions of
• 38:59
  Speaker 1: scientific progress. That year, Christmas Eve fell upon a Monday.
• 39:05
  Speaker 1: The day before, Letty was not feeling very well. Her
• 39:08
  Speaker 1: husband thought it better not to leave her and gave
• 39:11
  Speaker 1: up going to church. Phosy was utterly forgotten, but she
• 39:15
  Speaker 1: dressed herself and at the usual hour appeared with her
• 39:18
  Speaker 1: prayer book in her hand, ready for church. When her
• 39:22
  Speaker 1: father told her that he was not going, she looked
• 39:25
  Speaker 1: so blank that he took pity upon her and accompanied
• 39:28
  Speaker 1: her to the church door, promising to meet her as
• 39:31
  Speaker 1: she came out. Phosy sighed with relief as she entered,
• 39:35
  Speaker 1: for she had a vague idea that by going to
• 39:37
  Speaker 1: church to pray for it, she might move the Lord
• 39:40
  Speaker 1: to chasten her. At least he would see her there
• 39:43
  Speaker 1: and might think of it. She had never had such
• 39:45
  Speaker 1: an attention from her father before, never such dignity conferred
• 39:49
  Speaker 1: upon her as to be allowed to appear in church alone,
• 39:53
  Speaker 1: sitting in the pew by herself, like a grown damsel.
• 39:56
  Speaker 1: But I doubt if there was any pride in her
• 39:58
  Speaker 1: stately step, or any vanity in the smile. No, not smile,
• 40:03
  Speaker 1: but illuminated mist, the vapor of smiles which haunted her
• 40:07
  Speaker 1: sweet little solemn church window of a face as she
• 40:10
  Speaker 1: walked up the aisle. The preacher was one of whom
• 40:14
  Speaker 1: she had never heard her father speak, sliding word in
• 40:17
  Speaker 1: whom her unbounded trust had never been shaken. Also, he
• 40:21
  Speaker 1: was one who believed with his whole soul in the
• 40:24
  Speaker 1: things that make Christmas precious to him. The birth of
• 40:27
  Speaker 1: the wonderful Baby hinted at hundreds of strange things in
• 40:30
  Speaker 1: the economy of the planet. That a man could so
• 40:33
  Speaker 1: thoroughly persuade himself that he believed the old fable was
• 40:37
  Speaker 1: matter of marvel to some of his friends, who held
• 40:40
  Speaker 1: blind nature the eternal Mother and Knight, the everlasting grandmother
• 40:45
  Speaker 1: of all things. But the child foesy in her dreams
• 40:48
  Speaker 1: or out of them in church or nursery, with her
• 40:52
  Speaker 1: book or her doll, was never out of the region
• 40:54
  Speaker 1: of wonders, and would have believed or tried to believe,
• 40:58
  Speaker 1: anything that did not involve a moral impossibility. What the
• 41:03
  Speaker 1: preacher said, I need not even partially repeat. It is
• 41:06
  Speaker 1: enough to mention a certain metamorphose deposited from the stream
• 41:10
  Speaker 1: of his eloquence, carried home in her mind by Poesy
• 41:14
  Speaker 1: from some of his sayings about the birth of Jesus
• 41:16
  Speaker 1: into the world, into the family, into the individual human bosom.
• 41:21
  Speaker 1: She had got it into her head that Christmas Day
• 41:24
  Speaker 1: was not a birthday like that she had herself last year,
• 41:27
  Speaker 1: but that, in some wonderful way, to her, requiring no explanation,
• 41:32
  Speaker 1: the baby Jesus was born every Christmas Day afresh. What
• 41:36
  Speaker 1: became of him afterwards she did not know, and indeed
• 41:40
  Speaker 1: she had never yet thought to ask how it was
• 41:43
  Speaker 1: that he could come to every house in London, as
• 41:45
  Speaker 1: well as Number one Wimborne Square, little of a home
• 41:49
  Speaker 1: as another might think it, that house was yet to
• 41:52
  Speaker 1: her the center of all houses, and the wonder had
• 41:55
  Speaker 1: not yet widened, rippling beyond it into the spot of
• 41:59
  Speaker 1: the pool the eternal gift would fall. Her father forgot
• 42:03
  Speaker 1: the time over his book, but so entranced was her
• 42:06
  Speaker 1: heart with the expectation of the promised visit now so
• 42:10
  Speaker 1: near the day after tomorrow, that if she did not
• 42:13
  Speaker 1: altogether forget to look for him. As she stepped down
• 42:16
  Speaker 1: the stair from the church door to the street, his
• 42:19
  Speaker 1: absence caused her no uneasiness, And when just as she
• 42:23
  Speaker 1: reached it, he opened the house door in tardy haste
• 42:26
  Speaker 1: to redeem his promise, she looked up in him with
• 42:29
  Speaker 1: a solemn smileless repose born of spiritual tension, and speechless
• 42:34
  Speaker 1: anticipation upon her face, and walking past him without change
• 42:39
  Speaker 1: in the rhythm of her motion, marched stately up the
• 42:42
  Speaker 1: stairs to the nursery. I believe the center of her
• 42:45
  Speaker 1: hope was that when the baby came, she would beg
• 42:48
  Speaker 1: him on her knees to ask the Lord to chasen her.
• 42:52
  Speaker 1: When dessert was over, her mother on the sofa in
• 42:55
  Speaker 1: the drawing room, and her father in an easy chair
• 42:58
  Speaker 1: with a bottle of his favorite wine by his side,
• 43:01
  Speaker 1: she crept out of the room and away again to
• 43:03
  Speaker 1: the nursery. There she reached up to her little bookshelf,
• 43:07
  Speaker 1: and full of the sermon, as spongy mists are full
• 43:10
  Speaker 1: of the sunlight, took thence a volume of stories from
• 43:13
  Speaker 1: the German the re reading of one of which narrating
• 43:16
  Speaker 1: the visit of the Christ Child, laden with gifts to
• 43:20
  Speaker 1: a certain household, and what he gave to each and
• 43:23
  Speaker 1: all therein she had, although sorely tempted, saved up until now,
• 43:27
  Speaker 1: and sat down with it by the fire, the only
• 43:30
  Speaker 1: light she had, when the housemaid, suddenly remembering she must
• 43:34
  Speaker 1: put her to bed, and at the same time discovering
• 43:37
  Speaker 1: it was a full hour past her usual time, hurried
• 43:40
  Speaker 1: to the nursery. She found her fast asleep in her
• 43:43
  Speaker 1: little armchair, her book on her lap, and the fire
• 43:46
  Speaker 1: self consumed into a dark cave with a somber glow
• 43:50
  Speaker 1: in its deepest hollows. Dreams had doubtless come to deepen
• 43:54
  Speaker 1: the impressions of Sermon and Marquen, For as she slowly
• 43:57
  Speaker 1: yielded to the hands of Polly, putting her to her lips,
• 44:01
  Speaker 1: unconsciously moved of the slumbering but not sleeping spirit, more
• 44:05
  Speaker 1: than once murmured the words, Lord, loveth and chasteneth, write,
• 44:11
  Speaker 1: blessedly would I enter the dreams of such a child,
• 44:14
  Speaker 1: revel in them as a bee in the heavenly gulf
• 44:17
  Speaker 1: of a captus flower end of chapter four, chapter five
• 44:29
  Speaker 1: of the Gifts of the Child Christ by George MacDonald.
• 44:34
  Speaker 1: This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Chapter five.
• 44:39
  Speaker 1: On Christmas Eve, the church bells were ringing through the
• 44:42
  Speaker 1: murky air of London, whose streets lay flaring and steaming below.
• 44:47
  Speaker 1: The brightest of their consolations were the butcher's shops, with
• 44:50
  Speaker 1: their shows of prize beef around them. The eddies of
• 44:54
  Speaker 1: the human tides were most confused and nodded, but the
• 44:57
  Speaker 1: toy shops were brilliant. Also to Poesy, they would have
• 45:01
  Speaker 1: been the treasure caves of the Christ Child, all mysteries,
• 45:05
  Speaker 1: all with insides to them, boxes and desks, and windmills
• 45:10
  Speaker 1: and dovecots, and hens with chickens, and who could tell
• 45:13
  Speaker 1: what all in every one of those shops. Her eyes
• 45:16
  Speaker 1: would have searched for the Christ's Child, the giver of
• 45:19
  Speaker 1: all their wealth. For to her he was everywhere that night,
• 45:23
  Speaker 1: ubiquitous as the luminous mist that brooded over London, of
• 45:28
  Speaker 1: which however, she saw nothing but the glow above the meuse.
• 45:32
  Speaker 1: John Jeffson was out in the middle of all the show,
• 45:35
  Speaker 1: drifting about in it. He saw nothing that had pleasure
• 45:38
  Speaker 1: in it. His heart was so heavy he never thought
• 45:42
  Speaker 1: once of the Christ's child, or even of the Christ's Man.
• 45:45
  Speaker 1: As the giver of anything. Birth is the one standing promise,
• 45:49
  Speaker 1: hope for the race. But for poor John this Christmas
• 45:52
  Speaker 1: held no promise. With all his humor, he was one
• 45:56
  Speaker 1: of those people generally dull and slow. God grant and
• 46:00
  Speaker 1: mine such dulness and such sloth, who, having once loved,
• 46:04
  Speaker 1: cannot cease. During the fortnight he had scarce had a
• 46:08
  Speaker 1: moment's ease from the sting of Alice's treatment. The honest
• 46:11
  Speaker 1: fellow's feelings were no study to himself. He knew nothing
• 46:15
  Speaker 1: but the pleasure and the pain of them. But I
• 46:17
  Speaker 1: believe it was not mainly for himself that he was sorry.
• 46:21
  Speaker 1: Like Othello, The pity of it haunted him. He had
• 46:25
  Speaker 1: taken Alice for a downright girl about whom there was
• 46:29
  Speaker 1: and could be no mistake, and the first hot blast
• 46:32
  Speaker 1: of prosperity had swept her away like a hectic leaf.
• 46:36
  Speaker 1: What were all the shops dressed out in holly and mistletoe?
• 46:40
  Speaker 1: What were all the rushing, flaming gas jets. What the
• 46:43
  Speaker 1: fattest of prize pigs? To John, who could never more
• 46:47
  Speaker 1: imagine a spare rib on the table between Alice and
• 46:49
  Speaker 1: him of a sunday. His imagination ran on seeing her
• 46:53
  Speaker 1: pass in her carriage and drop him a nod of condescension,
• 46:57
  Speaker 1: as she swept noisily by him, trudging home, weary from
• 47:01
  Speaker 1: his work to his lovelas fireside. He didn't want her money, honestly,
• 47:06
  Speaker 1: he would rather have her without than with money, for
• 47:10
  Speaker 1: he now regarded it as an enemy, seeing what evil
• 47:13
  Speaker 1: changes it could work. There be some devil in it, sure,
• 47:17
  Speaker 1: he said to himself. True he had never found any
• 47:21
  Speaker 1: in his week's wages, but he did remember once finding
• 47:24
  Speaker 1: the devil in a month's wages received in a lump.
• 47:28
  Speaker 1: As he was thus thinking with himself, a carriage came
• 47:31
  Speaker 1: suddenly from a side street into the crowd, and while
• 47:34
  Speaker 1: he stared at it, thinking Alice might be sitting inside it,
• 47:38
  Speaker 1: while he was tramping the pavement alone, she passed him
• 47:41
  Speaker 1: on the other side on foot, was actually pushed against him.
• 47:45
  Speaker 1: He looked round and saw a young woman carrying a
• 47:48
  Speaker 1: small bag disappearing in the crowd. There's an air of
• 47:52
  Speaker 1: Alice about her, said John to himself, seeing her back only.
• 47:58
  Speaker 1: But of course it couldn't be alice for her. He
• 48:01
  Speaker 1: must look in the carriages now, and what a fool
• 48:04
  Speaker 1: he was. Every young woman reminded him of the one
• 48:07
  Speaker 1: he had lost. Perhaps if he was to call the
• 48:10
  Speaker 1: next day, Polly was a good natured creature, he might
• 48:13
  Speaker 1: hear some news of her. It had been a troubled
• 48:16
  Speaker 1: fortnight with missus Gratorix. She wished much that she could
• 48:20
  Speaker 1: talk with her husband more freely, but she had not
• 48:23
  Speaker 1: learned to feel at home with him. Yet. He had
• 48:26
  Speaker 1: been kinder and more attentive than usual all the time,
• 48:29
  Speaker 1: so much so that Letty thought with herself, if she
• 48:33
  Speaker 1: gave him a boy, he would certainly return to his
• 48:36
  Speaker 1: first devotion. She said boy, because anyone might see he
• 48:40
  Speaker 1: cared little for Poesy. She had never discovered that he
• 48:44
  Speaker 1: was disappointed in herself, But since her disregard of his
• 48:48
  Speaker 1: wishes had brought evil upon her, she had begun to
• 48:51
  Speaker 1: suspect that he had some ground for being dissatisfied with her.
• 48:55
  Speaker 1: She never dreamed of his kindness as the effort of
• 48:58
  Speaker 1: a conscientious nature to make the best of what could
• 49:01
  Speaker 1: not now be otherwise helped her own poverty of spirit
• 49:05
  Speaker 1: and lack of worth achieved, she knew as little of
• 49:08
  Speaker 1: as she did of the riches of Michael. The archangel
• 49:12
  Speaker 1: one must have begun to gather wisdom before he could
• 49:14
  Speaker 1: see his own folly. That evening, she was seated alone
• 49:19
  Speaker 1: in the drawing room, her husband having left her to
• 49:21
  Speaker 1: smoke his cigar, when the butler entered and informed her
• 49:25
  Speaker 1: that Alice had returned, but was behaving so oddly that
• 49:29
  Speaker 1: they did not know what to do with her. Asking
• 49:31
  Speaker 1: wherein her oddness consisted, and learning that it was mostly
• 49:35
  Speaker 1: in silence and tears, she was not sorry to gather
• 49:38
  Speaker 1: that some disappointment had befallen her, and felt considerable curiosity
• 49:43
  Speaker 1: to know what it was. She therefore told him to
• 49:46
  Speaker 1: send her upstairs. Meantime, Polly the housemaid, seeing plainly enough
• 49:51
  Speaker 1: from her return in the middle of her holiday and
• 49:54
  Speaker 1: from her utter dejection, that Alice's expectations had been frustrated,
• 49:59
  Speaker 1: and cherishing no little resentment against her because of her
• 50:03
  Speaker 1: uppishness on the first news of her good fortune, had
• 50:06
  Speaker 1: been ungenerous enough to take her revenge in a way
• 50:09
  Speaker 1: as stinging in effect as bitter in intention, For she
• 50:13
  Speaker 1: loudly protested that no amount of such luck as she
• 50:17
  Speaker 1: pretended to suppose in Alice's possession would have induced her
• 50:21
  Speaker 1: to behave herself so that a handsome, honest fellow like
• 50:25
  Speaker 1: John Jeffson should be driven to despise her and take
• 50:28
  Speaker 1: up with her betters. When her mistress's message came, Alice
• 50:32
  Speaker 1: was only too glad to find refuge from the kitchen
• 50:35
  Speaker 1: in the drawing room. The moment she entered, she fell
• 50:39
  Speaker 1: on her knees at the foot of the couch on
• 50:41
  Speaker 1: which her mistress lay, covered her face with her hands,
• 50:44
  Speaker 1: and sobbed grievously. Nor was the change more remarkable in
• 50:48
  Speaker 1: her bearing than in her person. She was pale and worn,
• 50:52
  Speaker 1: and had a hunted look, was in fact a mere
• 50:54
  Speaker 1: shadow of what she had been. For a time. Her
• 50:57
  Speaker 1: mistress found it impossible to quiet her so as to
• 51:00
  Speaker 1: draw from her her story. Tears and sog combined with
• 51:04
  Speaker 1: repugnance to hold her silent. Oh ma'am, she burst out
• 51:09
  Speaker 1: at length, wringing her hands. However, can I tell you
• 51:14
  Speaker 1: you will never speak to me again? Little did I
• 51:17
  Speaker 1: think such a disgrace was waiting me. It was no
• 51:21
  Speaker 1: fault of yours if you were misinformed, said her mistress,
• 51:24
  Speaker 1: or that your uncle was not the rich man you fancied, Oh, ma'am,
• 51:29
  Speaker 1: there was no mistake there. He was more than twice
• 51:32
  Speaker 1: as rich as I fancied. If he had only died
• 51:35
  Speaker 1: a beggar and left things as they was, then he
• 51:39
  Speaker 1: didn't leave it to his nephews and nieces as they
• 51:42
  Speaker 1: told you. Well, there's no disgrace in that. Oh but
• 51:46
  Speaker 1: he did, ma'am. That was all right, no mistake there either, ma'am.
• 51:51
  Speaker 1: And to think of me, misbehaven as I did to you,
• 51:54
  Speaker 1: and master as was so good to me, Who will
• 51:57
  Speaker 1: ever take any more notice of me now after what
• 52:00
  Speaker 1: has come out? As I'm sure I no more dreamed
• 52:03
  Speaker 1: on than the child unborn. An agonized burst of fresh
• 52:07
  Speaker 1: weeping followed, and it was with prolonged difficulty and by
• 52:11
  Speaker 1: incessant questioning, that Missus Grahtorix at length drew from her
• 52:15
  Speaker 1: the following facts. Before Alison her brother could receive the
• 52:20
  Speaker 1: legacy to which they laid claim, it was necessary to
• 52:23
  Speaker 1: produce certain documents, the absence of which, as of any
• 52:27
  Speaker 1: proof to take their place, led to the unavoidable publication
• 52:30
  Speaker 1: of a fact previously known only to a living few,
• 52:34
  Speaker 1: namely that the father and mother of Alice Hopwood had
• 52:38
  Speaker 1: never been married, which fact deprived them of the smallest
• 52:41
  Speaker 1: claim on the legacy, and fell like a millstone upon
• 52:45
  Speaker 1: Alison her pride. From the height of her miserable arrogance.
• 52:49
  Speaker 1: She fell prone, not merely hurled back into the lowly
• 52:52
  Speaker 1: condition from which she had raised her head, only to
• 52:55
  Speaker 1: despise it with base unrighteousness, and to adopt and reassurt
• 53:00
  Speaker 1: the principles she had aboard when they affected herself. Not
• 53:03
  Speaker 1: merely this, but in her own judgment at least, no
• 53:07
  Speaker 1: longer the respectable member of society she had hitherto been
• 53:11
  Speaker 1: justified in supposing herself. The relation of her father and mother,
• 53:16
  Speaker 1: she felt overshadowed her with a disgrace unfathomable, the more
• 53:20
  Speaker 1: overwhelming that it cast her from the gates of the
• 53:23
  Speaker 1: paradise she had seemed on the point of entering. Her
• 53:27
  Speaker 1: fall she measured by the height of the social ambition
• 53:30
  Speaker 1: she had cherished, and had seemed on the point of attaining.
• 53:34
  Speaker 1: But it is not an evil that the devil's money,
• 53:36
  Speaker 1: which this legacy had from the first proved to Alice,
• 53:40
  Speaker 1: should turn to a hot cinder in the hand. Rarely
• 53:43
  Speaker 1: had a more haughty spirit than hers gone before a fall,
• 53:47
  Speaker 1: and rarely has the fall been more sudden and more abject.
• 53:51
  Speaker 1: And the consciousness of the behavior into which her false
• 53:54
  Speaker 1: riches had seduced her changed the whip of her chastisement
• 53:58
  Speaker 1: into scorpions. Worst of all, she had insulted her lover
• 54:02
  Speaker 1: as beneath her notice, and the next moment had found
• 54:06
  Speaker 1: herself too vile for his judging by herself. In the
• 54:10
  Speaker 1: injustice of bitter humiliation, she imagined him scoffing with his
• 54:14
  Speaker 1: mates at the baseborn menial who had set up for
• 54:17
  Speaker 1: a fine lady. But had she been more worthy of
• 54:20
  Speaker 1: honest John, she would have understood him better. As it was.
• 54:25
  Speaker 1: No really good fortune could have befallen her, but such
• 54:28
  Speaker 1: as now seemed to her the depth of evil fortune
• 54:31
  Speaker 1: without humiliation. To prepare the way for humility, she must
• 54:35
  Speaker 1: have become capable of more and more baseness, until she
• 54:38
  Speaker 1: lost all that makes life worth having. When Missus Grotorig's
• 54:43
  Speaker 1: had given her what consolation she found handy, and at
• 54:46
  Speaker 1: length dismissed her, the girl, unable to endure her own company,
• 54:51
  Speaker 1: sought the nursery, where she caught Sophie in her arms
• 54:54
  Speaker 1: and embraced her with fervor, Never in her life having
• 54:58
  Speaker 1: been the object of such display of he feeling, Posy
• 55:01
  Speaker 1: was much astonished when Alice had set her down and
• 55:04
  Speaker 1: she had resumed her seat by the fireside. She went
• 55:07
  Speaker 1: on staring for a while, and then a strange sort
• 55:10
  Speaker 1: of miming ensued. It was Phosy's habit, one less rare
• 55:15
  Speaker 1: with children than may by most be imagined, to do
• 55:19
  Speaker 1: what she could to enter into any state of mind
• 55:21
  Speaker 1: whose shows were sufficiently marked for her observation. She sought
• 55:25
  Speaker 1: to lay hold of the feeling that produced the expression,
• 55:29
  Speaker 1: less than the reproduction of a similar condition in her
• 55:32
  Speaker 1: own imaginative sensorium subject to her leisurely examination, would in
• 55:38
  Speaker 1: no case satisfy the little metaphysician. But what was indeed
• 55:42
  Speaker 1: very odd was the means she took for arriving at
• 55:44
  Speaker 1: the sympathetic knowledge she desired. As if she had been
• 55:48
  Speaker 1: the most earnest student of dramatic expression through the facial muscles.
• 55:53
  Speaker 1: She would sit watching the countenance of the object of
• 55:55
  Speaker 1: her solicitude, all the time with full consciousness, fashing her
• 56:00
  Speaker 1: own as nearly as she could into the lines and
• 56:03
  Speaker 1: forms of the other. In proportion. As she succeeded, the
• 56:07
  Speaker 1: little psychologist imagined she felt in herself the condition that
• 56:11
  Speaker 1: produced the phenomenon. She observed as if the shape of
• 56:15
  Speaker 1: her face cast inward its shadow upon her mind, and
• 56:18
  Speaker 1: so revealed to it through the two faces, what was
• 56:22
  Speaker 1: moving and shaping in the mind of the other. In
• 56:25
  Speaker 1: the present instance, having at length, after modeling and remodeling
• 56:29
  Speaker 1: her face like that of a Gouda percha doll for
• 56:32
  Speaker 1: some time, composed it finally into the best correspondence she
• 56:36
  Speaker 1: could effect. She sat brooding for a while with Alice's
• 56:40
  Speaker 1: expression as it were frozen upon it. Gradually the forms
• 56:44
  Speaker 1: assumed melted away and allowed her still solemn face to
• 56:48
  Speaker 1: look out from behind them. The moment this evanishment was complete,
• 56:53
  Speaker 1: she rose and went to Alice, where she sat staring
• 56:55
  Speaker 1: into the fire, unconscious of the scrutiny she had been undergoing,
• 57:00
  Speaker 1: and looking up in her face, took her thumb out
• 57:03
  Speaker 1: of her mouth and said, is the Lord chastening Alice?
• 57:08
  Speaker 1: I wish he would chasen Poesy. Her face was calm
• 57:12
  Speaker 1: as that of the sphinx. There was no mist in
• 57:15
  Speaker 1: the depth of her gray eyes, not a cloud on
• 57:17
  Speaker 1: the wide heaven of her forehead. Was the child crazed?
• 57:22
  Speaker 1: What could the atom mean? With her big eyes looking
• 57:24
  Speaker 1: right into her? Alice never had understood her. It was
• 57:28
  Speaker 1: indeed strange if the less should comprehend the greater. She
• 57:32
  Speaker 1: was not yet capable of recognizing the word of the
• 57:36
  Speaker 1: Lord in the mouth of babes and sucklings. But there
• 57:39
  Speaker 1: was something in Poesy's face besides its calmness and unintelligibility.
• 57:44
  Speaker 1: What it was, Alice could never have told, Yet it
• 57:47
  Speaker 1: did her good. She lifted the child on her lap.
• 57:51
  Speaker 1: There she soon fell asleep. Alice undressed her, laid her
• 57:55
  Speaker 1: in her crib, and went to bed herself. But weary
• 57:59
  Speaker 1: as she was, she had to rise again. Before she
• 58:02
  Speaker 1: got to sleep, her mistress was again taken ill. Doctor
• 58:06
  Speaker 1: and nurse were sent for in hot haste. Handsome cabs
• 58:09
  Speaker 1: came and went throughout the night like noisy moths to
• 58:13
  Speaker 1: the one lighted house in the street. There were soft
• 58:16
  Speaker 1: steps within, and doors were gently opened and shut. The
• 58:19
  Speaker 1: waters of Mara had risen and filled the house. Towards morning,
• 58:24
  Speaker 1: they were ebbing slowly away. Letty did not know that
• 58:27
  Speaker 1: her husband was watching by her bedside. The street was quiet,
• 58:31
  Speaker 1: Now so was the house. Most of its people had
• 58:34
  Speaker 1: been up throughout the night, but now they had all
• 58:37
  Speaker 1: gone to bed, except the strange nurse and mister Gratorix.
• 58:41
  Speaker 1: It was the morning of Christmas Day, and little Poesy
• 58:44
  Speaker 1: knew it in every cranny of her soul. She was
• 58:47
  Speaker 1: not of those who had been up all night. And
• 58:50
  Speaker 1: now she was awake early and wide. And the moment
• 58:53
  Speaker 1: she awoke, she was speculating he was coming to day?
• 58:57
  Speaker 1: How would he come? Where sh she she find the
• 59:00
  Speaker 1: baby Jesus? And when would he come in the morning,
• 59:04
  Speaker 1: in the afternoon, or in the evening? Could such a
• 59:07
  Speaker 1: grief be in store for her as that he would
• 59:10
  Speaker 1: not appear until night, when she would be again in bed.
• 59:13
  Speaker 1: But she would not sleep till all hope was gone.
• 59:16
  Speaker 1: Would everybody be gathered to meet him? Or would he
• 59:19
  Speaker 1: show himself to one after another, each alone? Then her
• 59:23
  Speaker 1: turn would be last? And oh, if he could come
• 59:26
  Speaker 1: to the nursery. But perhaps he would not appear to
• 59:29
  Speaker 1: her at all, For was she not one whom the
• 59:32
  Speaker 1: Lord did not care to chasen expectation grew and wrought
• 59:36
  Speaker 1: in her until she could lay in bed no longer.
• 59:39
  Speaker 1: Alice was fast asleep. It must be early, but whether
• 59:43
  Speaker 1: it was yet light or not she could not tell
• 59:45
  Speaker 1: for the curtains. Anyhow, she would get up and dress,
• 59:49
  Speaker 1: and then she would be ready for Jesus whenever he
• 59:52
  Speaker 1: should come. True, she was not able to dress herself
• 59:55
  Speaker 1: very well, but he would know and would not mind.
• 59:58
  Speaker 1: She made all the haste she could could consistently with
• 1:00:01
  Speaker 1: taking pains, and was soon attired. After a fashion, she
• 1:00:05
  Speaker 1: crept out of the room and down the stair. The
• 1:00:08
  Speaker 1: house was very still. What if Jesus should come and
• 1:00:11
  Speaker 1: find nobody awake? Would he go again and give them
• 1:00:14
  Speaker 1: no presents? She couldn't expect any herself, But might he
• 1:00:18
  Speaker 1: not let her take theirs for the rest? Perhaps she
• 1:00:21
  Speaker 1: ought to wake them all, but she dared not without
• 1:00:23
  Speaker 1: being sure. On the last landing above the first floor,
• 1:00:27
  Speaker 1: she saw, by the low gas light at the end
• 1:00:30
  Speaker 1: of the corridor, an unknown figure passed the foot of
• 1:00:33
  Speaker 1: the stair. Could she have anything to do with the
• 1:00:35
  Speaker 1: marvel of the day? The woman looked up, and Poesy
• 1:00:39
  Speaker 1: dropped the question. Yet she might be a charwoman whose
• 1:00:43
  Speaker 1: assistance the expected advent rendered necessary. When she reached the
• 1:00:47
  Speaker 1: bottom of the stair, she saw her disappearing in her
• 1:00:50
  Speaker 1: stepmother's room that she did not like. It was the
• 1:00:54
  Speaker 1: one room into which she could not go. But as
• 1:00:57
  Speaker 1: the house was so still, she would search everywhere else,
• 1:01:00
  Speaker 1: and if she did not find him, would sit down
• 1:01:03
  Speaker 1: in the hall and wait for him. The room next
• 1:01:06
  Speaker 1: the foot of the stair, and opposite her stepmother's was
• 1:01:09
  Speaker 1: the spare room with which she associated ideas of state
• 1:01:13
  Speaker 1: and grandeur. Where better could she begin than at the
• 1:01:17
  Speaker 1: guest chamber there could it be? Yes through the chink
• 1:01:22
  Speaker 1: of the scarce closed door, she saw a light. Either
• 1:01:25
  Speaker 1: he was already there, or there they were expecting him.
• 1:01:28
  Speaker 1: From that moment she felt as if lifted out of
• 1:01:31
  Speaker 1: the body, far exalted above all dread. She peeped modestly in,
• 1:01:36
  Speaker 1: and then entered. Beyond the foot of the bed. A
• 1:01:39
  Speaker 1: candle stood on a little low table, but nobody was
• 1:01:42
  Speaker 1: to be seen. There was a stool near the table.
• 1:01:45
  Speaker 1: She would sit on it by the candle and wait
• 1:01:48
  Speaker 1: for him. But ere she reached it, she caught sight
• 1:01:51
  Speaker 1: of something upon the bed that drew her thither. She
• 1:01:54
  Speaker 1: stood entranced. Could it be? It might be? Perhaps he
• 1:01:59
  Speaker 1: had left it there while he went into her Mamma's
• 1:02:02
  Speaker 1: room with something for her, the loveliest of dolls ever imagined.
• 1:02:07
  Speaker 1: She drew nearer. The light was low and the shadows
• 1:02:10
  Speaker 1: were many. She could not be sure what it was,
• 1:02:13
  Speaker 1: but when she had gone close up to it, she
• 1:02:16
  Speaker 1: concluded with certainty that it was, in very truth, a doll,
• 1:02:20
  Speaker 1: perhaps intended for her, but beyond doubt, the most exquisite
• 1:02:24
  Speaker 1: of dolls. She dragged a chair to the bed, got up,
• 1:02:28
  Speaker 1: pushed her little arms softly under it, and, drawing it
• 1:02:31
  Speaker 1: gently to her, slid down with it. When she felt
• 1:02:35
  Speaker 1: her feet firm on the floor, filled with the solemn
• 1:02:37
  Speaker 1: composure of Holy awe, she carried the gift of the
• 1:02:40
  Speaker 1: Child Jesus to the candle, that she might the better
• 1:02:43
  Speaker 1: admire its beauty and know its preciousness. But the light
• 1:02:47
  Speaker 1: had no sooner fallen upon it than a strange, undefinable
• 1:02:51
  Speaker 1: doubt awoke within her. Whatever it was, it was the
• 1:02:55
  Speaker 1: very essence of loveliness, the little darling, with its alabaster
• 1:02:59
  Speaker 1: face and its delicately modeled hands and fingers. A long
• 1:03:03
  Speaker 1: nightgown covered all the rest. Was it possible? Could it be? Yes?
• 1:03:08
  Speaker 1: Indeed it must be. It could be nothing else than
• 1:03:12
  Speaker 1: a real baby. What a goose she had been. Of course,
• 1:03:16
  Speaker 1: it was baby Jesus himself, For was not this his
• 1:03:19
  Speaker 1: very own Christmas Day, on which he was always born?
• 1:03:23
  Speaker 1: If she had felt all of his gift before, what
• 1:03:26
  Speaker 1: a grandeur of adoring love, What a divine dignity possessed her,
• 1:03:30
  Speaker 1: Holding in her arms the very child himself. One shudder
• 1:03:34
  Speaker 1: of bliss passed through her, and in an agony of possession,
• 1:03:38
  Speaker 1: she clasped the baby to her great heart. Then at
• 1:03:41
  Speaker 1: once became still with the satisfaction of eternity, with the
• 1:03:45
  Speaker 1: peace of God. She sat down on the stool near
• 1:03:48
  Speaker 1: the little table, with her back to the candle, that
• 1:03:51
  Speaker 1: its rays should not fall on the eyes of the
• 1:03:53
  Speaker 1: sleeping Jesus and wake him. There she sat, lost in
• 1:03:58
  Speaker 1: the very majesty of bliss, at once the mother and
• 1:04:01
  Speaker 1: the slave of the Lord Jesus. She sat for a
• 1:04:05
  Speaker 1: time still as Marble, waiting for Marble to awake, heedful
• 1:04:09
  Speaker 1: as tenderest woman not to rouse him before his time,
• 1:04:13
  Speaker 1: though her heart was swelling with the eager petition that
• 1:04:16
  Speaker 1: he would ask his father to be as good as
• 1:04:18
  Speaker 1: chasten her. And as she sat, she began after her
• 1:04:22
  Speaker 1: wont to model her face to the likeness of his,
• 1:04:26
  Speaker 1: that she might understand his stillness, the absolute peace that
• 1:04:30
  Speaker 1: dwelt on his countenance. But as she did so again,
• 1:04:34
  Speaker 1: a sudden doubt invaded her. Jesus lay so very still,
• 1:04:38
  Speaker 1: never moved, never opened his pale eyelids, and now set thinking,
• 1:04:43
  Speaker 1: she noted that he did not breathe. She had seen
• 1:04:46
  Speaker 1: babies asleep, and their breath came and went, their little
• 1:04:49
  Speaker 1: bosoms heaved up and down, and sometimes they would smile,
• 1:04:53
  Speaker 1: and sometimes they would moan and sigh. But Jesus did
• 1:04:56
  Speaker 1: none of these things. Was it not strange? And then
• 1:05:00
  Speaker 1: he was cold, oh so cold. A blue silk coverlid
• 1:05:05
  Speaker 1: lay on the bed. She half rose and dragged it off,
• 1:05:09
  Speaker 1: and contrived to wind it around herself, and the baby
• 1:05:12
  Speaker 1: sat at heart, very sad but undismayed. She sat and
• 1:05:16
  Speaker 1: watched him on her lap. End of chapter five, chapter
• 1:05:28
  Speaker 1: six of The Gifts of the Child Christ by George
• 1:05:31
  Speaker 1: mac Donald. This LibriVox recording is in the public domain.
• 1:05:36
  Speaker 1: Chapter six. Meantime, the morning of Christmas Day grew, the
• 1:05:42
  Speaker 1: light came and filled the house. The sleeper slept late,
• 1:05:45
  Speaker 1: but at length they stirred. Alice woke last from a
• 1:05:48
  Speaker 1: troubled sleep in which the events of the night mingled
• 1:05:51
  Speaker 1: with her own lost condition and destiny. After all, Polly
• 1:05:55
  Speaker 1: had been kind, she thought, and got Sophie up without
• 1:05:58
  Speaker 1: disturbing her. She had been but a few minutes down
• 1:06:02
  Speaker 1: when a strange and appalling rumor made itself I cannot
• 1:06:05
  Speaker 1: say audible, but somehow known through the house, and every
• 1:06:09
  Speaker 1: one hurried up in horrible dismay. The nurse had gone
• 1:06:13
  Speaker 1: into the spare room and missed the little dead thing
• 1:06:16
  Speaker 1: she had laid there. The bed was between her and Foesy,
• 1:06:19
  Speaker 1: and she never saw her. The doctor had been sharp
• 1:06:22
  Speaker 1: with her about something the night before. She now took
• 1:06:26
  Speaker 1: her revenge in suspicion of him, and, after a hasty
• 1:06:29
  Speaker 1: and fruitless visit of inquiry to the kitchen, hurried to
• 1:06:32
  Speaker 1: mister Gratorix. The servants crowded to the spare room, and
• 1:06:36
  Speaker 1: when their master, incredulous, indeed yet shocked at the tidings,
• 1:06:40
  Speaker 1: brought him hastened to the spot, he found them all
• 1:06:43
  Speaker 1: in the room, gathered at the foot of the bed.
• 1:06:46
  Speaker 1: A little sunlight filtered through the red window curtains and
• 1:06:49
  Speaker 1: gave a strange, pallid expression to the flame of the candle,
• 1:06:53
  Speaker 1: which had now burned very low. At first he saw
• 1:06:56
  Speaker 1: nothing but the group of servants, silent, motionless, with their
• 1:07:00
  Speaker 1: heads leaning forward intently gazing. He had come just in time.
• 1:07:05
  Speaker 1: Another moment and they would have ruined the lovely sight.
• 1:07:08
  Speaker 1: He stepped forward and saw Poesy, half shrouded in blue,
• 1:07:12
  Speaker 1: the candle behind illuminating the hair she had found too
• 1:07:16
  Speaker 1: rebellious to brush, and making of it a faint oureel
• 1:07:19
  Speaker 1: about her head and white face. Whence cold and sorrow
• 1:07:23
  Speaker 1: had driven all the flesh, rendering it colorless as that
• 1:07:27
  Speaker 1: upon her arm, which had never seen the light. She
• 1:07:30
  Speaker 1: had poured on the little face until she knew death.
• 1:07:33
  Speaker 1: And now she sat, a speechless mother of sorrow, bending
• 1:07:37
  Speaker 1: in the dim light of the tomb over the body
• 1:07:39
  Speaker 1: of her holy infant. How it was I cannot tell,
• 1:07:43
  Speaker 1: But the moment her father saw her, she looked up
• 1:07:46
  Speaker 1: and the spell of her dumbness broke. Jesus is dead,
• 1:07:51
  Speaker 1: she said, slowly and sadly, but with perfect calmness. He
• 1:07:56
  Speaker 1: is dead, she repeated. He came to early and there
• 1:08:01
  Speaker 1: was no one up to take care of him, and
• 1:08:03
  Speaker 1: he's dead, dead, dead. But as she spoke the last words,
• 1:08:10
  Speaker 1: the frozen lump of agony gave way. The well of
• 1:08:13
  Speaker 1: her heart suddenly filled, swelled, overflowed. The last word was
• 1:08:18
  Speaker 1: half sob half shriek of utter despair and loss. Alice
• 1:08:22
  Speaker 1: darted forward and took the dead baby tenderly from her.
• 1:08:26
  Speaker 1: The same moment, her father raised the little mother and
• 1:08:29
  Speaker 1: clasped her to his bosom. Her arms went round his neck,
• 1:08:33
  Speaker 1: her head sank on his shoulder and sobbing in grievous misery,
• 1:08:37
  Speaker 1: yet already a little comforted. He bore her from the room. No, no, Poesy,
• 1:08:43
  Speaker 1: they heard him say, Jesus is not dead, Thank God.
• 1:08:47
  Speaker 1: It is only your little brother that hadn't life enough
• 1:08:50
  Speaker 1: and is gone back to God. For more weeping, the
• 1:08:53
  Speaker 1: women went down the stairs. Alice's tears were still flowing
• 1:08:57
  Speaker 1: when John Jeffson entered, her own troubles Forgotten in the
• 1:09:01
  Speaker 1: emotion of the scene she had just witnessed, She ran
• 1:09:05
  Speaker 1: to his arms and wept on his bosom. John stood
• 1:09:08
  Speaker 1: as one astonished. Oh Lord, this is Christmas, he sighed.
• 1:09:14
  Speaker 1: At last, Oh John, cried Alice, and tore herself from
• 1:09:19
  Speaker 1: his embrace. I forgot You'll never speak to me again, John,
• 1:09:24
  Speaker 1: don't do it, John, And with the words she gave
• 1:09:27
  Speaker 1: a stifled cry and fell a weeping again behind her
• 1:09:30
  Speaker 1: two shrieking hands. Why Alice, you ain't married, are you,
• 1:09:36
  Speaker 1: gasped John, to whom that was the only possible evil. No, John,
• 1:09:40
  Speaker 1: and shall never be. A respectable man like you would
• 1:09:44
  Speaker 1: never think of looking twice on a poor girl like me.
• 1:09:48
  Speaker 1: Let's have one more look, anyhow, said John, drawing her
• 1:09:52
  Speaker 1: hands from her face. Tell me what's the matter. And
• 1:09:55
  Speaker 1: if there's anything can be done to write you, I'll
• 1:09:58
  Speaker 1: work day and night. Do it, Alice. There's nothing can
• 1:10:03
  Speaker 1: be done, John, replied Alice, and would again have floated
• 1:10:07
  Speaker 1: out on the ocean of her misery. But in spite
• 1:10:09
  Speaker 1: of wind and tide, that is, sobs and tears, she
• 1:10:12
  Speaker 1: held on by the shore at his entreaty, and told
• 1:10:15
  Speaker 1: her tale, not even omitting the fact that when she
• 1:10:19
  Speaker 1: went to the eldest of the cousins inheriting through the
• 1:10:22
  Speaker 1: misfortune of her and her brother so much more than
• 1:10:25
  Speaker 1: their expected share, and demeaned herself to beg a little
• 1:10:28
  Speaker 1: help for her brother, who was dying of consumption, he
• 1:10:32
  Speaker 1: had all but ordered her out of the house, swearing
• 1:10:35
  Speaker 1: he had nothing to do with her or her brother,
• 1:10:37
  Speaker 1: and saying she ought to be ashamed to show her face,
• 1:10:41
  Speaker 1: and that when we used to make mud pies together,
• 1:10:45
  Speaker 1: concluded Alice with indignation. There, John, you have it all,
• 1:10:50
  Speaker 1: she added, And now with the word she gave a deep, humbling,
• 1:10:56
  Speaker 1: questioning look into his honest eyes. Is that all, Alice?
• 1:11:00
  Speaker 1: He asked, Yes, John, Ain't it enough? She returned? Morn enough,
• 1:11:07
  Speaker 1: answered John, I swear to you, Alice, you're worth to
• 1:11:10
  Speaker 1: me ten times what you would had been, even if
• 1:11:13
  Speaker 1: you'd had had me with ten thousand pounds in ridicule. Why,
• 1:11:17
  Speaker 1: my woman, I never saw you look one alf as
• 1:11:19
  Speaker 1: handsome as you do now. But the disgrace of it,
• 1:11:24
  Speaker 1: John said Alice, hanging her head and so hiding the
• 1:11:27
  Speaker 1: pleasure that would dawn through all the mist of her misery.
• 1:11:31
  Speaker 1: Let your father and mother settle that betwixt them. Alice,
• 1:11:35
  Speaker 1: tain't none o my business. Please God, we'll do different.
• 1:11:39
  Speaker 1: When shall it be, my girl? When you like? John,
• 1:11:43
  Speaker 1: answered Alice, without raising her head thoughtfully. When she had
• 1:11:47
  Speaker 1: withdrawn herself from the too rigorous embrace with which he
• 1:11:51
  Speaker 1: received her consent, she remarked, I do believe John, money
• 1:11:55
  Speaker 1: ain't a good thing. Sure as I live with the
• 1:11:58
  Speaker 1: very wind of that money the devil entered into me.
• 1:12:01
  Speaker 1: Don't you hate me? John? Speak the truth? Now? No, Alice,
• 1:12:05
  Speaker 1: I did cry a bit over you, though you was
• 1:12:08
  Speaker 1: possessed like I was possessed. I do believe if that
• 1:12:13
  Speaker 1: money hadn't been took from me, i'd never ha had you, John,
• 1:12:17
  Speaker 1: ain't it awful to think on? Well? No, of course,
• 1:12:22
  Speaker 1: how could ye? Said Jeffson with reluctance. Now, John, don't
• 1:12:27
  Speaker 1: ye talk like that, for I won't stand for it.
• 1:12:30
  Speaker 1: Don't you go for to set me up again with
• 1:12:32
  Speaker 1: excusing of me. I'm a nasty, conceited cat I am,
• 1:12:36
  Speaker 1: and all for nothing but mean pride. Mind? Ye Ye're
• 1:12:41
  Speaker 1: mine now, Alice, And what's mine's mine? And I won't
• 1:12:45
  Speaker 1: have it abused. I knows you twice the woman you
• 1:12:48
  Speaker 1: was afore and all the world couldn't get me such
• 1:12:51
  Speaker 1: another Christmas box, No, not if it was all gold
• 1:12:54
  Speaker 1: watches and roast beef. When mister Grattorax returned to his
• 1:12:58
  Speaker 1: wife's room and thought of find her asleep as he
• 1:13:01
  Speaker 1: left her, he was dismayed to hear sounds of soft
• 1:13:04
  Speaker 1: weeping from the bed some tone or stray word never
• 1:13:07
  Speaker 1: intended to reach her ear, had been enough to reveal
• 1:13:11
  Speaker 1: the truth concerning her baby. Hush, hush, he said, with
• 1:13:16
  Speaker 1: more love in his heart than had moved there for
• 1:13:18
  Speaker 1: many months, and therefore more in his tone than she
• 1:13:22
  Speaker 1: had heard for as many If you cry, you will
• 1:13:25
  Speaker 1: be ill. Hush, my dear. In a moment ere he
• 1:13:29
  Speaker 1: could prevent her, she had flung her arms around his
• 1:13:32
  Speaker 1: neck as he stooped over her husband. Husband, she cried,
• 1:13:38
  Speaker 1: is it my fault? You behave perfectly? He returned, No
• 1:13:43
  Speaker 1: woman could have been braver. Ah, but I wouldn't stay
• 1:13:46
  Speaker 1: at home when you wanted me. Never mind that, now,
• 1:13:49
  Speaker 1: my child, he said. At the word, she pulled his
• 1:13:53
  Speaker 1: face down to hers. I have you, and I don't care,
• 1:13:58
  Speaker 1: he added. Do you do you care to have me?
• 1:14:01
  Speaker 1: She said with a sob that ended in a loud cry. Oh,
• 1:14:05
  Speaker 1: I don't deserve it. But I will be good after this,
• 1:14:08
  Speaker 1: I promise you I will. Then you must begin now,
• 1:14:12
  Speaker 1: my darling. You must lie perfectly still and not cry
• 1:14:16
  Speaker 1: a bit, or you will go after the baby and
• 1:14:18
  Speaker 1: I shall be left alone. She looked up at him
• 1:14:22
  Speaker 1: with such a light in her face as he had
• 1:14:24
  Speaker 1: never dreamed of there before, He had never seen her
• 1:14:27
  Speaker 1: so lovely. Then she withdrew her arms, repressed her tears, smiled,
• 1:14:32
  Speaker 1: and turned her face away. He put her hands under
• 1:14:35
  Speaker 1: the clothes, and in a minute or two she was
• 1:14:38
  Speaker 1: again fast asleep. End of chapter six, chapter seven of
• 1:14:51
  Speaker 1: The Gifts of the Child Christ by George mac donald.
• 1:14:55
  Speaker 1: This LibriVox recording is in the public domain. Chapter seven.
• 1:15:01
  Speaker 1: That day, when Poesy and her father had sat down
• 1:15:04
  Speaker 1: to their Christmas dinner, he rose again, and taking her
• 1:15:07
  Speaker 1: up as she sat chair, and all set her down
• 1:15:11
  Speaker 1: close to him on the other side of the corner
• 1:15:13
  Speaker 1: of the table. It was the first of a new
• 1:15:16
  Speaker 1: covenant between them, the father's eyes having been suddenly opened
• 1:15:20
  Speaker 1: to her character and preciousness, as well as to his
• 1:15:23
  Speaker 1: own neglected duty. In regard to her, it was as
• 1:15:26
  Speaker 1: if a well of life had burst forth at his feet.
• 1:15:30
  Speaker 1: And every day as he looked in her face and
• 1:15:32
  Speaker 1: talked to her, it was with more and more respect
• 1:15:35
  Speaker 1: for what he found in her, with growing tenderness for
• 1:15:38
  Speaker 1: her predilections, and reverence for the divine idea enclosed in
• 1:15:43
  Speaker 1: her ignorance, for her childish wisdom and her calm seeking,
• 1:15:47
  Speaker 1: until at length, he would have been horrified at the
• 1:15:50
  Speaker 1: thought of training her up in his way, had she
• 1:15:54
  Speaker 1: not a way of her own to go, following not
• 1:15:57
  Speaker 1: the dead Jesus, but him who lived for evermore. In
• 1:16:01
  Speaker 1: the endeavor to help her, he had to find his
• 1:16:04
  Speaker 1: own position towards the truth, and the results were weighty.
• 1:16:07
  Speaker 1: Nor did the child's influence work forward merely In his
• 1:16:11
  Speaker 1: intercourse with her. He was so often reminded of his
• 1:16:15
  Speaker 1: first wife, and that with the gloss or comment of
• 1:16:18
  Speaker 1: a childish reproduction, that his memories of her at length
• 1:16:22
  Speaker 1: grew a little tender, And through the child he began
• 1:16:25
  Speaker 1: to understand the nature and worth of the mother. In
• 1:16:28
  Speaker 1: her child, she had given him what she could not
• 1:16:30
  Speaker 1: be herself. Unable to keep up with him, she had
• 1:16:34
  Speaker 1: handed him her baby and dropped on the path. Nor
• 1:16:38
  Speaker 1: was little Sophie his only comfort. Through their common loss
• 1:16:41
  Speaker 1: and her husband's tenderness, Letty began to grow a woman,
• 1:16:45
  Speaker 1: and her growth was the more rapid that himself taught
• 1:16:48
  Speaker 1: through Foesie. Her husband no longer desired to make her
• 1:16:52
  Speaker 1: adopt his tastes and judge with his experiences, But as
• 1:16:56
  Speaker 1: became the elder and the tribe entered into her tastes
• 1:16:59
  Speaker 1: and experiences became, as it were, a child again with her,
• 1:17:03
  Speaker 1: that through the thing she was, he might help the
• 1:17:06
  Speaker 1: thing she had to be. As soon as she was
• 1:17:08
  Speaker 1: able to bear it. He told her the story of
• 1:17:11
  Speaker 1: the Dead Jesus, and with the tale came her heart
• 1:17:14
  Speaker 1: love for Poesy. She had lost a son for a season,
• 1:17:18
  Speaker 1: but she had gained a daughter forever. Such were the
• 1:17:21
  Speaker 1: gifts the Christ Child brought to one household that Christmas,
• 1:17:24
  Speaker 1: and the days of the morning of that household were ended.
• 1:17:29
  Speaker 1: End of Chapter seven, End of The Gifts of the
• 1:17:33
  Speaker 1: Child Christ by George mac donald