Democratic Sentinel, Volume 20, Number 13, Rensselaer, Jasper County, 3 April 1896 — LISBETH'S EASTER LILY [ARTICLE+ILLUSTRATION]

LISBETH'S EASTER LILY

HER clothes were certainly very ragged; no one could dispute that. Her toes were rebellious and objected to staying in her boots. ’Lis’beth looked at them despairingly. She was only nine, yet she could reason. “If I was as cold as my feet am,” she mused, “and had any place to go, I just wouldn’t stay out in the cold.” Nearly all that day she had wandered up and down the city street looking for a home. Her father had left her three days before on a drunken spree, with no place in particular to lay her head. During those three days she had eaten nothing but a piece of bread an old Irish woman had given her. Suddenly she made up her mind She would go up where the rich people lived and see if they didn’t want a little girl. “So much money to spare,” said ’Lis’beth, “somebody’ll surely take me.” Poor little trusting soul! She turned her steps and went toward the west. The short winter twilight had already commenced to deepen as she climbed a flight of long stone steps and timidly rang the bell. How warm it looked inside, she thought. A servant came to the door and regarded the ragged mite before her curiously. “What do you wish for?” she asked, not unkindly. “Please, marm, a home,” said ’Lis’beth. The girl laughed. “There is none here for you,” she answered, and closed the

door. ’Lis’beth sank down on the doorstep, stunned and sobbing. The door behind her opened softly once more, and a little boy looked out. He had heard the servant’s description of the little waif, and his childish heart was touched. “I’ve brought you somefin’," he said, putting a large napkin into her hands, filled with hastily snatched goodies from the dining room. “Eat it quick, before Nurse finds me! No, wait a minute, and I’ll get you a present.” And he ran into the house”. His little heart was filled with pity for this poor little girl whose mamma was dead, and whose papa was drunk—most always. He came back in a moment and pressed a flower pot into ’Lis'beth’s hands. “Keep it where it’s warm and sunny,” he said hurriedly. “By and by it’ll be pretty. It’s an Easter lily. I must go now. Nurse is calling me. Good-by, little girl.” He stooped and touched his childish Ups to hers, then shut the door, leaving ’Lis’beth alone once more, this time thoroughly dazed. No one had ever kissed her since her mother died, and the unfamiliar caress burned deep into her warm little heart and comforted it. Down the avenue, past the beautiful houses she went, knowing now they were not for her. It snowed faster and faster, and ’Lis’beth’s tired little -feet just managed to drag themselves over the ground. By and by she crawled under the shelter of a friendly porch and wrapped her precious plant tight in her skirts to keep it warm. All around her that night people lay in soft, warm beds, and shivering said how cold it was. ’Lis’beth said nothing. She only waited. God must have made a mistake, she thought, that would come < right in time. Perhaps her prayers hadn’t j reached him yet. It was a long way to heaven.

When she opened her eyes again, it was to find herself in a clean, white bed, with sunlight streaming in at the window opposite, and a pleasant warmth in the air. On a little stand beside her bed was her pet companion, the Easter lily. “Is this heaven?” said 'Lis’beth. “Has God got my prayer? Do you help God take care of folks?” “No, dear,” answered a woman. “This is only the hospital, and I am your mirse. I am going to take care of you and get you nice and strong.” February passed, March came and went and April dawned. ’Lis’beth still lay in her bed, making no complaint, but wasting day by day. The wonderful lily had a wonderful bud, and ’Lis’beth watched it grow and swell with eager eyes. “It will be open for Easter, dear,” one of the nurses said to her one day. “What's Easter?” asked ’Lis’beth, wonderingly. So Nurse Mary told her of the Lord of the children, pointing Him out in the picture that hung on the wall, among the little throng. Told of how He died, and how on the third day the angels rolled the stone away from the tomb, and the living Lord came out, “and that is Easter,” said Nurse Mary. ’Lis'beth pondered and her eyes turned wistfully toward the lily bud, but she said nothing. Easter morning dawned clear and beautiful, the lily had opened. ’Lis’beth eagerly stretched out her lean little arms towards it. “Will you break it off for me?” she asked, and looked at it attentively for a moment. “I think it is very pretty,” she said, “hut I don’t know about the Lord. I mean to give it to him. Is it good enough, do you think?” “Darling,” said the nurse, “to-day you shall go to the Lord and take him your lily. He will like it, I know.” She heaved a contented little sigh. “It'll be a long ways,” she whispered. “I guess

I'll go to sleep and rest a bit.” The nurse bent over the dying child with eyes filled with tears, and watched the breath flutter between the pale lips. It was only a slight flutter, fainter and fainter! Then it went out, and ’Lis’beth gave her Easter lily to the Lord on Easter morn.—Ladies’ Home Journal.

THE BOY TOUCHED HIS LIPS TO HERS.