Part 1 (1/2)

Fireside Stories for Girls in Their Teens.

by Margaret White Eggleston.

FOREWORD

”Given a Camp-fire, a group of friendly girls and a good story-teller who knows and loves the girls, and the ideals of a whole community may be lifted in a night.”

The teen age girl is a great problem and at the same time a great opportunity. Her ideals seem low, yet there is no time in her life when she will more gladly follow a great ideal. She seems fickle, yet she is putting her friends to a test that is most worth while. She is misunderstood and she can not understand herself. She is searching for something, yet she does not know what it is.

Her problems are many, and most of them she must solve alone. If she follows the crowd and goes in the way of least resistance, there is a big chance that she will fall by the way. If she does not follow the crowd, it is because somewhere, some time, she has found a compelling ideal and is following it. Sometimes that ideal comes to her in the form of a friend.

Sometimes she is fortunate enough to have found that ideal in her mother.

But often and often it comes to her through a little story that lives with her, and works for her, and helps her to hold to the best, in spite of the manifold temptations to do otherwise.

Recently I met a young woman whom I had seen only once and that was twelve years ago. She came to me after a service and said, ”Will you tell Van d.y.k.e's 'Lump of Clay' to-night? Twelve years ago I heard you tell it. I was so discouraged at the time, for everything seemed going wrong and life seemed so useless. But I dropped into a church and heard you tell the story. You have no idea what it has done for me. I am teaching in the college near by and I should like to have my girls hear the story. Perhaps they need it as I did.”

Many of the workers with girls have seen this need and have wanted to meet it and yet have been unable to find the story that was needed by the girl.

It is because of this very need in my own work that I am sending out these stories, most of which I have told over and over to my girls. Many of them have been written because of special problems that needed to be met--problems peculiar to adolescence--problems found in every cla.s.s and club of girls the country over.

The stories are not to amuse, for we have no time to amuse girls in the story hour. We have little enough time, at the best, for implanting ideals and every story hour should leave a vital message. That is the thing the girls want and why should we give them less.

The stories are not to be read. They need the personal touch, the sympathetic voice, the freedom of eye that tells the story-teller which girls are finding the message of the story. Some of them will hurt--but experience has shown me that these are the very ones that one has to tell over and over. Can you imagine the Master reading to the groups gathered about him the stories that you and I love to read in his word? When you go into the heart life of a girl, let all your personality help you to carry the message. It was the Master's way of story-telling.

”'Twas only a little story, Yet it came like a ray of light; And it gave to the girl who heard it Real courage to do the right.”

FIRESIDE STORIES FOR GIRLS IN THEIR TEENS

I WOULD BE TRUE

'Twas a beautiful day in the late fall and the roadside was lined with the late asters and goldenrod. The sun was s.h.i.+ning so brightly and the sky was as blue as a New Hamps.h.i.+re sky could be, yet the girl, walking along the winding, climbing road, saw none of them. The little brook by the roadside whispered and chattered as it ran along, yet she did not hear; a few late birds still twittered to her from the trees, but she did not notice; a chipmunk called to her from a dead tree by the roadside, but she paid not the least attention. She was alone with her thoughts and they were far from pleasant.

How different it all seemed from what it had seemed six months before!

Then she had stood in the office of a great doctor in Philadelphia and heard him say to her father, ”Unless you leave the city at once and go where there is pure air and simple food and real quiet, there is no help for you.”

The father had looked at the doctor for a moment in silence and then answered, ”Well, if that is the case, I am sorry, for I cannot leave the city. My business needs me; Katherine is in college and she must be here.

I shall stay.”

But with flas.h.i.+ng eyes the girl had stepped to the doctor and said, ”Father is mistaken, doctor. His business can do without him and there is no need at all why he should stay here for me. There is a dear little old place in the hills of New Hamps.h.i.+re that belongs to us, where grandfather used to live. We can go there and have all the things that you have said he must have. You may leave the matter with me. We shall be out of the city within two weeks.”

Then turning to her father she had put her arms about his neck and said, ”Of course we can go, daddy, for what is college and money and friends compared with your health? Gladly will I give them up for you. We shall have a wonderful time there in the hills--just you and mother and I.”

So they had come. Then it was early in the spring and the country was beginning to show green. Into the little old farmhouse under the hill they moved. Of course there were no electric lights, and no telephones, and no faucets out of which the water could be drawn. But there were the quaint old candle holders on the big mantels; there was the fireplace so large that a log could be drawn into it; there was a well in the yard with water as cold as ice. And outside the home--oh, there were the most wonderful things to see. The trailing arbutus trailed everywhere; the lady slippers grew even in the front dooryard. The old trees in the yard were soon filled with nesting birds; the apple and pear trees in bloom were a sight never to be forgotten.

So the days fled by and the little family under the hill were so happy to see the color coming back to the face of the sick one and the smile once more on his face. Katherine loved it all--the home--the flowers--the mountains and even the quiet of the little hamlet.

Then the summer had come and with it the stream of visitors who come every year to the New Hamps.h.i.+re mountains. Within a short distance of the home were large hotels, and the guests soon learned of the cool water in the well in front of the house; of the father who was such a pleasant companion; of the pretty girl who could sing, and climb, and play so well.

So there had been picnics, and parties, and auto rides, and the summer had fled.