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854 tf)r Healre r* [Saturday, - — m-mim ...
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We should do our utmost to encourage the...
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TRIALS AND TROUBLES OF A POOR WORKING AS...
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Part the Last.—Retribution. The evening ...
Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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Transcript
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Note: This text has been automatically extracted via Optical Character Recognition (OCR) software. The text has not been manually corrected and should not be relied on to be an accurate representation of the item.
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854 Tf)R Healre R* [Saturday, - — M-Mim ...
854 tf ) r Healre r * [ Saturday , - — m-mim m i t * ¦ n —¦ * — ii
^Nrtfnltd.
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We Should Do Our Utmost To Encourage The...
We should do our utmost to encourage the Beautiful , for the Useful encourages it 3 elf . —Gokthe .
Trials And Troubles Of A Poor Working As...
TRIALS AND TROUBLES OF A POOR WORKING ASS . ( Concludedfrom our last , p . 829 . ) Part III . —The Weakest goes to the Wall . Several years had passed since the gathering on the moor , and once again our old friend Gaberlunzie was seen wandering disconsolately along the road opposite the old farm-house ; and peering vainly about what once had been a garden , looking for stumps of cabbages . The door was swinging on its rusty hinges , the roof was half thrown off , the north wind swept
through the wreck of the old barn , and the grass was growing in straggling , unwholesome patches over the courtyard . The last cabbage had been long dead , and nothing was left in the once bright garden but brambles and sting nettles . The Ass was grown very old , and grey , and thin ; and his lank cheeks made his face look a great deal wiser thun it used to look . He was stretching himself feebly towards a bunch of wild clematis which was lingering in flower into the autumn , when a bee flew out close to him .
44 Ah ! little black vagabond , " said the Ass , " would that I had never seen any one of your race Oh ! to think of what I was , and what I might hare been ! and then to look at these lean sides !" The Bee had turned her tail into the flower on which she had settled , and had been watching the Ass carefully over . Presently she burst out into a buzzing . " Why , it is you ! " she said . Who would have thought it after all these years ? Well , and how are you ? and how have you been getting on ?"
" What I" said the Ass , " are you that Bee ? that same Bee ? Oh ! that . I had you inside this mouth of mine , sting and all . I'd make you sure , I would . You shouldn ' t tell poor innocent creatures any more of your lies . ' " Ay , " said the Bee , " very pretty , so much for gratitude ' . This is what comes of giving advice . It is the old story . As the smoke of brimstone in the Bee ' s nostril , so are the words of the wise in the fool ' s head . " "Ah ! Bee , Bee , " said the Ass , " look at these cheeks of mine . Crawl down the hollows between my ribs and see the mountains whi ^ h will rise on either side of you ; and it is your doing , it is ; yes , it is . "
" Well , but what do you stop here for ? It is your own fault . There is the old meadow , and plenty of grass on it . Why don't you go there ? You have no master now . " " No , indeed , " said the Ass ; " I wish I had . Grass in the meadow ! Look at the horses there , and those long-horned mad bulls . If I whs to go in there , I should find a pair of heels in my mouth and a pair of horns in my belly long enough before I got any grass into either . "
" You surprise me , " said the Bee . " I told you my story the last time we met . You tell me yours . " " Gladly would I , " said the Ass , "if it would make you smart as yours made me . However , I may as well lie down and do that as look about here for cabbages . I suppose you meant well , Bee . I hope , I try to think you did . But never tell that story to an Ass again ; with all the heart that is left me , I beseech you , don't " " But tell me what happened to you , Ass . There has been a miutakc somewhere , that is plain , from the look of you . But let me hear all about it . "
" Well , Bee , after that unlucky day when you sate in my ear and tulked to me , you must know we did as well as we could just what you said . " " I didn ' t say anything , " said the Bee . " However , go on . " " I did the heat I could to understand , Bee . We put our wits together , and we told the men we couldn ' t work without pens and cabbages . The first thing which came of that was that we got a great beating . However , we bore that , and wouldn't give in , nnd they wouldn ' t give in , and for a time it went very hard with us ; for they got . the hor . se » and the oxen to do our work , and they tried to starve us . At last , however , they found horses expensive
keeping , and they put them on the old living they used to give uh , and the horses would n't stand that ; and the oxen wouldn't ; and I and one or two more got at them and talked to them ; and they all nettled to do as we had done—so they wouldn t work either ; and then the men got frightened and agreed to give us what w <; wanted—particularly they promised they would put our little asses to school , and give them a chance of turning into better , if better was in them . But we , foolish fellows , seeing that we had got ho much , were not contented hut what wo must have more . We said to ourselves asses ore as clever m men , and more too , because th « y havo boat the men ; and as to the work , if thero is enough to Jteop an an » !
and his driver , supposing the ass can do without the driver , he will get twice as much for his dinner . " Quite right , " said the Bee , " that is what we found with the drones . " "Ah , " said the ass , " I think there must be some sort of a difference—at least we found it so . However , we didn ' t find it so at first ; we had our little carts and our panniers , and we trotted about with nobody to manage us . Quite at the beginning the men didn't like to trust us . But they soon
found they couldn ' t help themselves , and they had to let us go our own way . And a brave time we had oi it . For three or four years life went as well as lite could go . We blessed the Bee who had given us so good a thought , and we supposed it would always be as it was : we married and married , and somehow we liked our life so well , and our young ones liked it so well that we let well alone , and didn t trouble ourselves anv more about school ; but we did as little
as we pleased . We made the men pay us our price out of the best of their gardens , and we ate and drank , and the number of children we had was quite enormous . You wouldn ' t believe it , Bee . I am not such a very old fellow , and I am a great , great , great , I do not know how many great grandfathers . They came so thick that at last there was hardly room for them all ; well , and as we throve so well the men didn ' t , and somehow it was first we who wouldn t work as much as they wished , and then as we got so many , it was they that couldn't find work for all of us to do . They didn ' t dig and sow as they used , and we couldn ' t do that , so it came about that while there were more mouths to fill , there was less food to fill them with . tt " You should have come to me about the children ,
said the Bee . " 1 would have told you how to manage—we had just the same trouble . ' " Why , how do you manage ? " said the Ass . " Drive them away , " said the Bee . " Oh , for 6 hame ! " said the ass , " you unnatural Bee !' " We do , though , " said the Bee sharply , " and what is more , if they won't go we just kill them . " " Ah , " said the ass , "I see it all ; I see , I see , we must go the whole devil or we had better not begin . However , I'll tell you the rest , and I'll be short with it , for I can't bear to think of it all .
? ' Just when we got so many , the men had got ruined altogether . The farm was ruined , and the town fell to pieces ; and some of the people died , and * the rest turned wild . And it nil went to waste tvery where ; we thought it didn ' t matter , for there was plenty of grass in the meadows , und nobody to say we shouldn ' t go there . But we found the difference —we did to our cost . As we grew to such numbers , so the hordes grew and the bulls too : and in as much as they were big and strong , and running wild grew bigger and stronger and fiercer ; and as our ears didn ' t turn to horns , and we didn ' t get bigger and stronger , they forgot that it was we who had done it all for them , and drove us ] fairly away out of the pastures into the old lanes and hedgerows r . o live or to die as we could . Misfortunes never come
single . I might still have been happy with my own family ; but a handsome young nt 6 cal of a pony came up one morning , and telling me there was no such thing as one ' s own anything any more , fairly turned my poor wife ' s head , and flipping me in the face with a hind loot as u last blessing , carried off the silly creature , and left me here to make a last dinner in the ruins of my old home and die brokenhearted . Old fool that I was ; and I ' m only wiser now when life is gone , which only comes once ; and it is too late to mend .
Part The Last.—Retribution. The Evening ...
Part the Last . —Retribution . The evening had set in damp and cold : the Bee , after wishing her companion a pleasanter evening than , as she observed , he was likely to get ; and apologizing somewhat tauntingly for being unable to offer him a lodging , hid flown away to her nest ; and the Ass had crept away to forget his sorrow and his hunger into a corner of the well-remembered shed , which was better proof once against wind and weather than now he found it . He scraped up a heap of the straw which in old times had been its roof , and after an ineffectual attempt at staying his appetite with few morsels
a , he lay down with a groan and called on sleep or death , whichever pleased , to come and comfort him . Nature , which through good and evil had been still hiH friend , had already come to his help , and he was sinking off into a doze , when he was suddenly staitlcd with hearing a sigh from the other end of the hut . He was not . constitutionally very brave ; but wretchedness liko his could hardly have much to fear . However , as often happens , those who have the leant left to them to suffer aro often most afraid when that little threatens to fall on them ; nnd as it wan too dark to neo he crouched down in the straw , shaking from ear to tail .
Presently a voice began to speak : — " Well , it said we are near the end now ; and , considering what thing * have come to the world , may an well Jnd too for all I see . . . . Poor brutes ! They didn ' t know what they were doing . . . . Umi twaaour faults . Nostra culpa ; uostra maxima culpa , and past
that ; he forgot the beatings , the hard fare , and hard words ; he forgot his present troubles ; he remembered nothing but his master and his master ' s miserable plight . In a flood of tears he crawled out of his straw . " Master , master , " he said , " Oh ! it is I . It is your old ass . Here I am ; it was I that did it . Fool that I was , ungrateful that I was ! What shall I do ? Punish me , master ; make me suffer for it . You are hungry ; kill me , eat me . I am very thin , but you will find something . "
absolving this side the grave . . . We lived by their sweat , and we only cared for ourselves . "We forgot the poor backs that ached for us , and now we are justly served . ' * Well did the ass know that familiar voice . Often in old times he had shaken at the oaths it had growled out . And once during his own short-lived prosperity he had met his old master in the road , and in his foolish way had mocked him and reviled him . Oh ! how did he repent it now ! He forgot all but
The shower had cleared off . The moon began to shine in through the rents in the broken roof , and by its light an aged greyhaired man might be made out sitting against the wall . The ass saw him , and fell at his feet . " What ?" said the man . " Is it really you ? Poor fellow ! you have suffered enough , you as well as I ; and you too much , perhaps . For you knew no belter . It was I . I that was to blame . I knew , or should have known ; but I forgot all . Eat you now ? No , no ; there was too much of that before . I forgot your services , your faithfulness . I forgot that you were flesh and blood . " "Oh , don ' t , don ' t , " blubbered the ass . " Please don ' t ; it is worse than beating . "
«• Yes , " said the man , "it is true . It is my doing . Our doing . We were set over you for your good as well as ours . We neglected you , starved you , illused you ; and , therefore , we are thrown down from our place which we disgraced ; and who shall say it is not just ?" Sobs choked the poor ass . His master tried to comfort him ; he patted him ; he stroked his ears ; but tenderness only made it worse . At last he faltered out , " Forgive me master . I'll work for you , I'll do anything for you . It will all be right again . It will . It shall . Oh that I had never seen that wicked , wicked Bee !"
" You and I are too old to mend now , " said the man . " We have done with our work , and we must leave it now to those that come after . Our business now is to take ourselves off ; and the eand is near run for both of us ; but I am glad to have seen you once more , old friend , to exchange a kind word . " " Oh , the Bee ! the Bee ! " again groaned the ass . " What about the Bee ? " asked his master . The Ass told him all about it . It relieved him unspeakably to get it out ; he felt sure his masttr would think less hardly of him .
" Ah ! " said the man , when the a 98 had finished , " you eee we were not altogether drones , and you could not get on without us . We were not drones , we were workers in our way , master workers , though you couldn't see what we did ; but we were bad masters , and , therefore , evil has befallen us . The Bee , the rogue , knew the difference well ; but it was her wicked mischief , she hated us , and she was playing and practising upon you . Do you know where she lives , Ass ? I should like to talk to her . " Yes , I do , " said the Ass . " She lives in a hollow tree down the road . I know where it is . She told me ; and she said she would be happy to see me as soon as I had grown thin enough to be able to get in . "
" Just take a little of that straw on your back , said the man , " and come along . The night is nno now . I have got a tinder-box . We will go and take a look at her . " The Ass said nothing , but took up his bundle . At made him quite happy to be doing something that he was told , once more . He crept out of the hut , and led the way . " Now , " said the man as they stopped ; " more piece of justice at least shall bo done in tlufl world "
. The Ass put down the straw . The man cut ft sod of turf , and then kindling a handful , ho thrust " into the hole , which he carefully closed with tlio turf , leaving the smoke and the fire to do their worK . " There , " said he , " that comes of being over busy in other body ' s matters , You , at any rate , shall no laugh at the mischief which you have made . An < that you may know that , after all , your own worK shall not pronper even for yourself in the way y ° better U
manage it ; the Ass and I will make a » PP * than we have had these many daya out of your stor house . " They turned away as the flame blazed up » wrapping tree and hivo in ruin ; a deep fierce cry agony burst for a few seconda behind the lire , an the blackened bodies fell in thousands among ti » ashes as the wretched beos struggled in v » m l break through into the night . Only one articuiaw ahrick was heard in tho midst of the contusion" Fool , fool that I was , not to tell him what we ai « with our drones ! "
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Citation
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Leader (1850-1860), Sept. 6, 1851, page 18, in the Nineteenth-Century Serials Edition (2008; 2018) ncse.ac.uk/periodicals/l/issues/cld_06091851/page/18/
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