VISIT TO GRANDMA'S.
WHO do you s'pose is coming?” called Gertie from her perch on the gatepost. Little Emma looked up from playing with her kitten to see Gertie clambering down as fast as she could.
"Oh! I know," cried Emma, "it's Grandma Kline; mamma said maybe she'd come today." And away the two children ran, down the country road, leaving a cloud of dust behind them.
"We're so glad you've come, 'cause mamma's got the headache, and we're so lonesome!" cried they both in a breath. And taking grandma by the hands, the little girls trudge along by her side, both talking so fast that she must do well to understand anything they say.
Now Grandma Kline, as the children call her, is not really their grandma, but is a dear old German woman who has lived near them ever since they can remember, and has always been just as good to them as any own grandma could be.
When they or their mamma are sick, it is always Grandma Kline who comes to take care of them;
and there is no place the children like to go so well as to her quaint little cottage. I am sure they love her as well as if she were their "really own grandma," as little Emma says.
This afternoon Grandma Kline found mamma with a hard nervous headache. She said she did not need anything done; only if she could have the care of the children off her mind a little while, she thought she could sleep, and that would almost cure her. So after tidying things up a bit, Grandma Kline put on the children's pink sun-bonnets, and told them she was going to take them home with her for the rest of the afternoon. This pleased them very much, and away they went with Grandma Kline to her humble cottage, where she lived all alone with her old tabby cat.
Now there was nothing the children liked better than to have grandma read to them from her old German Bible. To be sure, they could not understand much of it; but it was funny to hear her read; and then when she had read a few verses, she would stop and tell them what she had read, and in her quaint German way explain its meaning to them; for grandma was a good Christian woman.
This afternoon they went out by the shady side of the cottage, and grandma read to them about Jesus, who was once a little child, and lived here on this earth, and how he always obeyed his parents, and was so kind and gentle to his playmates.
They had heard the story many times before, but it was always new to them when Grandma Kline told it. And so you see them in the picture, Ger-tie leaning over grandma's shoulder and looking at the queer German letters; little Emma sitting on the ground learning to sew, while she feeds the tame birds, which the sleepy old cat does not see. But the little girl does not look as if she knew anything grandma was saying, does she?
After awhile Grandma Kline goes into the cottage, and brings the children some nice bread and milk; and while they are eating, she tells them stories of her dear old German home across the seas. Then it is time for them to go home, and Gertie and Emma walk very quietly hand in hand along the dewy road. At last little Emma says to Gertie, "Let's always be good, and mind mamma, like the little boy Jesus that Grandma Kline telled us 'bout out of the big book."
So you see she did know what grandma was talking about, after all.
And now they have come to the gate, where papa, who has just got home, is waiting to take his tired little ones into the house. Mamma is better, too, and able to hear them tell of their visit, and the nice stories Grandma Kline has told them.
E. B.