2. Ella
" But, upon thy youthful forehead Something like a shadow lies ; And a serious soul is looking From thy earnest eyes."- WHITTIER
The next morning, Delia was commanded to prepare for a visit from the family physician. The mandate was received with apparent indifference. But, had the truth been known, the young lady actually rejoiced. She knew that, once under the care of a medical practitioner, she should be comparatively free from the opinions of well-meaning but officious friends, who were constantly prescribing adverse plans of treatment. These, however good in some particular cases, were about as inefficient for the relief of " all the ills that flesh is heir to," as the various patent medicines trumpeted through the world by empirics.
As Ella was preparing for school, Mr. Thornton directed her to call, as she went, upon Dr. Perry, and request his attendance.
Little Carrie raised her eyes, and said, " Ella does all the errands. Why don't you send Jamie ?"
" Because, my pet, Jamie is a shy lad, and I can not bear to torture him. Ella should have been a boy, for she has all the boldness and hardihood which ought to have fallen to the lot of her brother. She shall do the boy's work, and Jamie may stay with his mamma."
Poor, bashful James blushed with pain and mortification, while Ella sagely shook her head, saying, in a low tone, " I have no objection. I will now do boy's work. Ten years hence, I will do man's work. I will now collect bills, deliver messages, and cast partial payments for my father. By-and-by, I will go through the country, lecturing on the rights of my sex. The women have more power now than the men. With equal privileges, they would rise far higher."
" Ella, Ella," called her mother, " what absurd nonsense are you muttering ?"
But Ella had gone. Her father watched her from the window as long as her sturdy little figure continued visible. The child proceeded rapidly, and with an energy which might have satisfied even Dr. Franklin. The philosopher would have acknowledged that she indeed walked as if she had an object in view.
The father resumed his seat for a few moments before going to his counting-room. James, with a humiliating consciousness of his insignificance, and a groan as he thought of his unfinished lessons, crept timidly to school. Carrie, engaged in the absorbing occupation of fabricating a lilac-colored silk bonnet for her doll to wear during the ensuing summer. Charles opened his writing-desk, and arranged thereupon pen and paper, with the laudable intention of writing an elegant essay, which he hoped to be invited to deliver before some literary society. Delia reclined in the lolling chair, and gazed vacantly upon the ceiling. The parents alternately looked at each other and at their invalid daughter.
" Delia," observed the father, " I wish that you were as well as Ella."
" Delia was never so strong as Ella," interposed the mother; "but she was as well at her age."
" Heaven preserve the health of Ella !" ejaculated the father ; " but she is a strange child, not at all like a girl."
Mrs. Thornton, as if her ideas of propriety were outraged by the thought of Ella's peculiar habits, assumed her most rigid look, and exclaimed : " Ella does not satisfy me. She is too masculine ; too independent. She will never be married."
"Then, my dear wife, we shall always have the pleasure of her society. I should be truly sorry to give away my darling Ella."
The mother looked lovingly upon her drooping, dejected Delia, and remarked : " I dislike to see a girl with Ella's habits of thought and expression. A woman should be a true woman, exhibiting the grace and beauty of the feminine character. Not a doubtful kind of being, reminding you now of one sex, and now of the other."
She paused, and glanced toward Charles. Perceiving that he was evidently lost in thought, she continued : " Ella is too much like Adelaide."
Charles abruptly rose from his writing, and with the remark, " You could not give your daughter a greater compliment, madam," retired to the solitude of his own room.
At that moment Ella rushed into the house, her mouth open, her eyes starting, and her hair disheveled.
"What is the matter, Ella?" asked her mother, half angrily ; "I did hope that I should not again see you till eleven o'clock."
" I forgot my theme, mamma."
"While Ella was searching for the missing document, her father asked, " Did you deliver my message?"
" Yes, papa ; and the doctor promised to come in the course of the morning. O, dear, I shall certainly be tardy !"
" If you are, you will be justly punished for your carelessness," remarked her mother.
" Ah, here it is !" and the eager girl was darting from the room, when her mother stopped her, saying, " Ella Thornton, you shall not go in that plight. Tie your shoes, and sew on your bonnet string."
Ella silently obeyed, but with a portentous frown upon her brow.
"There, now you may go, and do try to keep your mouth closed. You look as if you were going to harangue all whom you meet."
"I can't help it, mamma. My upper lip is so short, that if I close my mouth my chin will be completely puckered. But I don't care. It proves that I shall be an orator. Then I have another sign. I was born on the ninth day of the month. The ninth verse of the thirty -first chapter of Proverbs is, ' Open thy mouth, judge righteously, and plead the cause of the poor and needy.' My destiny is marked. I shall open my mouth, not only for those who . are physically poor and needy, but for the countless multitudes who are mentally oppressed and indigent."
In her ardor, the child forgot the danger of delay in reaching school. She stood with her eyes dilating, and her chest heaving with emotion. Her mother was silent, with half-suppressed rage. Her father's countenance expressed triumph slightly tinged with displeasure. Ella looked fondly upon her paper.
"What is the subject of your theme, Ella?"
The little girl raised her eyes, and joyously answered, " ' The Female Lecturers of the Present Day.' Miss Adams said that we must all take sides, either for or against the practice of public speaking by women. The school is divided into two sections. "We rank ourselves as we please with regard to the discussions."
"Which side have you taken?"
" That it is not only right and proper, but very desirable that women should speak in public."
Without a word, Mrs. Thornton seized the theme, and threw it among the blazing coals. Mr. Thornton started with an expression of regret. Ella uttered one cry of anguish, and then, with quivering lip, wended her way to school. As the father watched the now sorrowful figure of his child, he observed -
"I am sorry, my dear wife, that you burned Ella's theme. I never before saw so much misery depicted upon her young face. It will haunt me through the day."
" Mr. Thornton, I am surprised that you should agree with that perverse girl. She is a constant source of trouble. I do wish that you would send her to boarding-school."
" What, send away my darling Ella ! I could not live without her. As for her Quixotism, it will vanish in a few years. All this froth and foam will disappear. The talent and originality will remain. I shall be proud of my child. I am sure that she will gain renown."
" That is what I should not wish for any daughter of mine. Ella must leave home. She is beyond my control."
" I will take charge of her. Ask me any other favor. If you wish, I will send away all the rest.
I must have Ella by my side. Poor child ! I wish that you had not burned her theme."
Mrs. Thornton's aspect was now so decidedly Xantippian, that her terrified husband hastily made preparations for departure. As he held the door in his hand, he could not refrain from saying -
" Of one thing, I am certain. The minds of both Ella and Adelaide will be occupied with subjects of so high an order, that, in conversing with them, their husbands will never have occasion to quote Solomon's declaration, ' It is better to dwell in the wilderness, than with a contentious and an angry woman.' "