Part 54 (1/2)
”Then I shouldn't wonder if you might have it as well as another. Is Clarissa Parks more loved than any one in your cla.s.s?”
”Oh, no. She is not a favorite at all.”
”Then, child, I don't see that you are proving your a.s.sertion.”
”I know I'm not,” laughed Marjorie. ”Clarissa Parks is engaged; but so is f.a.n.n.y Hunting, and f.a.n.n.y is the plainest little body. But I did begin by really believing that beautiful faces had the best of it in the world, and I was feeling rather aggrieved because somebody described me yesterday as 'that girl in the first cla.s.s who is always getting up head; she is short and rather stout and wears her hair in a knot at the back of her head?' Now wasn't that humiliating? Not a word about my eyes or complexion or manner!”
Miss Prudence laughed at her comically aggrieved tone.
”It is hard to be nothing distinctive but short and stout and to wear your hair in a knot, as your grandmother does! But the getting up head is something.”
”It doesn't add to my beauty. Miss Prudence, I'm afraid I'll be a homely blue stocking. And if I don't teach, how shall I use my knowledge? I cannot write a book, or even articles for the papers; and I must do something with the things I learn.”
”Every educated lady does not teach or write.”
”You do not,” answered Marjorie, thoughtfully; ”only you teach Prue. And I think it increases your influence, Miss Prudence. How much you have taught Linnet and me!”
”I'm thinking about two faces I saw the other night at Mrs. Harrowgate's tea table. Both were strangers to me. As the light fell over the face of one I thought I never saw anything so exquisite as to coloring: the hair was s.h.i.+ning like threads of gold; the eyes were the azure you see in the sky; lips and cheeks were tinted; the complexion I never saw excelled for dazzling fairness,--we see it in a child's face, sometimes. At her side sat a lady: older, with a quiet, grave face; complexion dark and not noticeable; hair the brown we see every day; eyes brown and expressive, but not finer than we often see. Something about it attracted me from her bewitching neighbor, and I looked and compared. One face was quiet, listening; the other was sparkling as she talked. The grave dark face grew upon me; it was not a face, it was a soul, a human life with a history. The lovely face was lovely still, but I do not care to see it again; the other I shall not soon forget.”
”But it was beauty you saw,” persisted Marjorie.
”Not the kind you girls were talking about. A stranger pa.s.sing through the room would not have noticed her beside the other. The lovely face has a history, I was told after supper, and she is a girl of character.”
”Still--I wish--story books would not dwell so much on att.i.tudes; and how the head sets on the shoulders; and the pretty hands and slender figures.
It makes girls think of their hands and their figures. It makes this girl I know not wrap up carefully for fear of losing her 'slender' figure. And the eyelashes and the complexion! It makes us dissatisfied with ourselves.”
”The Lord knew what kind of books would be written when he said that man looketh on the out ward appearance--”
”But don't Christian writers ever do it?”
”Christian writers fall into worldly ways. There are lovely girls and lovely women in the world; we meet them every day. But if we think of beauty, and write of it, and exalt it unduly, we are making a use of it that G.o.d does not approve; a use that he does not make of it himself. How beauty and money are scattered everywhere. G.o.d's saints are not the richest and most beautiful. He does not lavish beauty and money upon those he loves the best. I called last week on an Irish washerwoman and I was struck with the beauty of her girls--four of them, the eldest seventeen, the youngest six. The eldest had black eyes and black curls; the second soft brown eyes and soft brown curls to match; the third curls of gold, as pretty as Prue's, and black eyes; the youngest blue eyes and yellow curls. I never saw such a variety of beauty in one family. The mother was at the washtub, the oldest daughter was ironing, the second getting supper of potatoes and indian meal bread, the third beauty was brus.h.i.+ng the youngest beauty's hair. As I stood and looked at them I thought, how many girls in this city would be vain if they owned their eyes and hair, and how G.o.d had thrown the beauty down among them who had no thought about it. He gives beauty to those who hate him and use it to dishonor him, just as he gives money to those who spend it in sinning. I almost think, that he holds cheaply those two things the world prizes so highly; money and beauty.”
After a moment Marjorie said: ”I do not mean to live for the world.”
”And you do not sigh for beauty?” smiled Miss Prudence.
”No, not really. But I do want to be something beside short and stout, with my hair in a knot.”
The fun in her eyes did not conceal the vexation.
”Miss Prudence, it's hard to care only for the things G.o.d cares about,”
she said, earnestly.
”Yes, very hard.”
”I think _you_ care only for such things. You are not worldly one single bit.”
”I do not want to be--one single bit.”
”I know you do give up things. But you have so much; you have the best things. I don't want things you have given up. I think G.o.d cares for the things you care for.”