Hildegarde's Home

"Indeed, you would not be a good one!" his cousin said; "but, considering that one must make bows, Jack, isn't it just as well to do it well as to do it badly?"

"Who cares?" cried the boy, shaking his head wildly. "If a man is going to be anything, who cares how he bows? And – oh, of course that is one item. I am to go to Harvard, and learn to bow and to dance, and to be a classical scholar, and to play base-ball. I hate base-ball, Hilda! it's perfect idiocy, and it makes my head ache, and any one can see that I'm not cut out for athletics. Are you laughing at me?"

"Indeed I am not!" said Hildegarde, heartily. "But, tell me! you want to go to Leipsic, to study music?"

"Of course!" was the reply. "And Daddy wants me to go, and Herr Geigen is going over in the autumn, and he would place me, and all; but Uncle Tom hates music, you know, and if I speak of it he goes off in a rage, and talks about rascally Dutch fiddlers, and says I walk like a giraffe with the palsy. At least, that was the animal this morning. Yesterday I was a gouty ostrich, and I suppose we shall go through the whole menagerie."

"You like him?" Hildegarde said interrogatively.

"He is very kind, in his way," replied Jack. "Awfully kind, and he loves my father, and I know he wants to do things for me; but – it all has to be done in his way, don't you see? And – well, there isn't anything in me except music. I know that, you see, Hildegarde. Just nothing!"

"I don't feel so sure of that!" Hildegarde said. "Perhaps you never tried to develop the other side of you. There must be other sides, you know."

"No, there aren't!" said Jack positively. "None at all!"

"But that is nonsense!" cried Hildegarde impatiently. "Do you mean to say that you are a flat surface, like a playing-card, with 'music' painted on you?"

"I didn't know I was flat!" rather stiffly.

"You see, you are not! then why not try to care for something else beside music, without caring any the less for that?"

"What is there to care for? a parcel of musty old books, such as Uncle Tom is forever reading."

"Oh! oh! you Goth! As if it were not a rapture simply to look at the outside of your uncle's books. To see my heart's own Doctor in dark blue calf, with all that beautiful tooling – "

"What Doctor? what are you talking about, Hildegarde?"

"Johnson, of course! Is there another? as the man in Punch says about his hatter. And even in your own line, you foolish boy! Have you never read that beautiful 'Life of Handel'? I looked into it the other day, and it seemed delightful."

"No," said Jack, looking blank. "Where is it? I never saw it."

"Bookcase between the south windows, fourth shelf, about the middle; three fat volumes in green morocco. And you never saw it, because you never look at the books at all. What do you look at, Jack, except your music and your violin? For example, do you ever look in the glass? I know you don't."

"How do you know?" and Jack blushed hotly.

"Because – you won't mind? I am your cousin, you know! – because your necktie is so often crooked. It is crooked now; a little more to the right! that's it! And – and you ought to brush that spot off your coat. Now, if you made it a point always to look in the glass before leaving your room – "

"Is that one of the sides you want me to develop?" asked Jack slowly. "Caring about dress, and looks, and that sort of thing? I didn't know you were of that kind, Hildegarde."

"Of what kind?" cried our heroine, blushing furiously in her turn, and feeling that she was in great danger of losing her temper. "I certainly do care about my dress and looks, as every one ought to do. Suppose the next time you came to tea, you found me with my hair tumbling down, and a great spot of ink on my gown, and my ruffles torn! Is that the kind of person you like to see? I always thought Herrick's Julia was a most untidy young woman, with her shoe-strings, and her 'erring lace' and all."

"I don't know who she is," said Jack meekly. "But I beg your pardon if I was rude, Hilda; and – and I will try to 'spruce up,' as Uncle Tom is always trying to make me. You see," he added shyly, "when you look in the glass you see something nice, and I don't!"

"Nonsense!" said Hildegarde, promptly. "And then, Jack – that is only one thing, of course. But if you had the habit of using your eyes! Oh! you don't know what a difference it would make. I know, because I used to be as blind as you are. I never looked at anything till about two years ago. And now – of course I am only learning still, and shall be learning all my life, I hope; but – well, I do see things more or less. For example, what do you see at our feet here?"

"Grass!" said Jack, peering about. "Green grass. Do you think I don't know that?"

Hildegarde laughed, and clapped her hands.

"Just what I should have said two years ago!" she cried. "There are twelve different plants that I know – I've been counting them – and several more that are new to me."

"Well, they're all green, anyhow!" said Jack. "What's the difference?"

Hildegarde scorned a direct reply, but went on, being now mounted on her own hobby.

"And as for moths, Jack, you can have no idea of what my ignorance was in regard to moths."

"Oh, come!" said Jack. "Every one knows about moths, of course. They eat our clothes, and fly into the lamps. That is one of the things one finds out when one is a baby, I suppose."

"Indeed!" cried Hildegarde. "And that is all there is to find out, I suppose. Why – " she stopped suddenly; then said in a very different tone, "Oh, Jack! this is a wonderful coincidence. Look! oh, will you look? oh! the beautiful, beautiful dear! Get me something! anything! quick!"

Jack, who was not accustomed to feminine ways, wondered if his fair cousin was going out of her mind. She was gazing intently at a spot of lighter green on the "grass" at her feet. Presently the spot moved, spread; developed two great wings, delicate, exquisite, in colour like a chrysoprase, or the pure, cold green one sometimes sees in a winter sunset.

"What is it?" asked Jack, in wonder.

"A Luna!" cried Hildegarde. "Hush! slip off on the other side, quietly! Fly to the house, and ask auntie for a fly-screen. Quick, Jack!"

Jack, greatly wondering, ran off none the less, his long legs scampering with irreverent haste through the Ladies' Garden. Returning with the screen, which auntie gave him without question, being well used to the sudden frenzies of a moth-collector, he found Hildegarde on her knees, holding her handkerchief over the great moth, which fortunately had remained quiet, being indeed stupid in the strong light. The girl's face was all aglow with triumph and delight.

"A perfect specimen," she cried, as she skilfully conveyed the great moth under the screen. "I have two, but the tails are a little broken. Isn't he glorious, Jack? Oh, happy day! Come, good cousin, and let us take him home in a triumphal procession."

Jack looked rather blank. "Are you going home now?" he asked.

"Of course, to put my beauty in the ammonia jar."

"What is it?" she added, seeing that her cousin looked really vexed.

"Oh – nothing!" said Jack. "Nothing of any consequence. I am ready."

"But what is it?" Hildegarde repeated. "You would a great deal better tell me than look like that, for I know I have done something to vex you."

"Well – I am not used to girls, you know, Hildegarde, and perhaps I am stupid. Only – well, I was going to ask you seriously what you thought about – my music, and all that; and first you tell me to look in the glass, and then you go to catching moths and forget all about me. I suppose it's all right, only – "

He blushed, and evidently did not think it was all right. Hildegarde blushed, too, in real distress.

"My dear Jack," she cried, "how shall I tell you how sorry I am?"

She looked about for a suitable place, and then carefully set down the fly-screen with its precious contents.

"Sit down again," she cried, motioning her cousin to take his place on the fallen tree, while she did the same. "And you will not believe now how interested I really am," she said. "Mamma would never have been so stupid, nor Rose either. But you must believe me. I was thinking about you till – till I saw the Luna, and you don't know what a Luna means when one hasn't a perfect specimen. But now, tell me, do you think it would be quite impossible to persuade your uncle? Why, you must go to Leipsic, of course you must. He – has he ever heard you play, Jack?"

Jack laughed rather bitterly. "Once," he said. "He cried out that when he wanted to listen to cats with their tails tied together, he would tie them himself. Since then I always go up into the garret to practise, and shut all the doors and windows."

"What a pity! and he is so nice when one knows him. I wonder – do you know, Jack, what I am thinking of?"

Her face was so bright that the boy's face brightened as he looked at it.

"I hope it is what I was thinking of," he said; "but I didn't dare – "