CHAPTER VII.
MAURICE LEARNING PATIENCE.
THE visits of Maurice to the cottage were not always as sad as his first one had been. He was there when Kitty lay swinging in her hammock, and was delighted to be trusted to pull the rope softly, since the gentle motion was all she could bear.
He saw her face flush with pleasure as she thanked his mamma for the beautiful dressing-gown which her sister had found so mysteriously hanging under an old coat in the closet, and knew no one but dear Mrs. Seyton could have selected a print so exactly to her taste.
He saw her again, raised a little by pillows, her hands busy in forming a thread-case from the bits of silk and leather sorted so neatly in a basket before her.
He heard her as she sang in a low, sweet voice, her favorite hymn:—
"Whene'er I take my walks abroad. How many poor I see! What shall I render to my God, For all his gifts to me?
"Not more than others I deserve; Yet God hath given me more; For I have food while others starve, Or beg from door to door."
He heard her, too, when, with eyes partly closed and every nerve quivering with pain, she repeated the sacred words:—
"Be ye also patient; stablish your hearts, for the coming of the Lord draweth nigh."
"Take my brethren, the prophets, who have spoken in the name of the Lord, for an example of suffering affliction and of patience. Behold, we count them happy which endure. Ye have heard of the patience of Job, and have seen the end of the Lord, that the Lord is very pitiful and of tender mercy."
"Let patience have her perfect work, that ye may be perfect and entire, wanting nothing."
Maurice, though a little boy, observed all this, and one evening his mamma was delighted to hear an addition of this petition to his prayer:—
"Please, O God, when I have any lessons to learn, or any peas to shell for grandma; or, when I have the toothache, make me patient like poor, darling Kitty."
This prayer was from his heart.
He did not merely repeat the words, as too many children do, and thus give to God what he despises, only lip-service. In answer, his Heavenly Father did help him. Before they left the country for their own home, all the family noticed that he was learning to practice this virtue. Sometimes, indeed, his old peevishness and impatience would break out; but he tried to check it; and the thought of Kitty lying in pain year after year, without a murmur, helped him to do it.
Mr. Seyton had been in the habit, ever since the accident to his little favorite, of giving twenty-five dollars a year toward her support. He now with great cheerfulness, doubled this contribution to enable her to have a skilful physician from the city to consult upon her case. The effect of the new treatment was most favorable.
Even in the few weeks before they left F—, Mrs. Seyton could perceive a change for the better; and by the time they came to the country the next year, the improvement was very marked.
But before I go on to state what happened the next summer, I must tell you how Mr. and Mrs. Seyton were paid for all they had done for poor Kitty.
In the winter Maurice was taken sick; and the doctor said he had scarlet-fever. He suffered greatly at times with his throat, and afterwards with his eyes, being obliged to stay in a darkened room, but he never once complained. Of course, he used to long to be well; and both he and his parents earnestly prayed that he might be so; but he never gave way to his old habit.
Once at midnight, when his father was giving him some medicine, he said, tenderly,—
"My darling, patient boy!"
It was very painful for Maurice to speak; but he tried to articulate the words,—
"Am I patient, papa? I'm trying to be. Kitty says, 'that's the way to please Jesus.'"
He referred to it again in the morning, and asked his mamma to read the verse about being patient in tribulation.
"Kitty told me what it meant," he said. "I'm in tribulation now, and I pray to God to help me bear it, as he does her."
Mr. Seyton was so much delighted that he wrote Kitty a letter about it, and told her he should consider four times the money he had given her well-spent, since his little son had so greatly improved under her example and influence.
Before this letter, Kitty and all her family had been very fond of Maurice, and you may be sure they were not less so when they learned what a patient child he had become.
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