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Library / Literature & Fiction

The Pedler of Dust Sticks

by Eliza Lee Cabot Follen

Pages
about 41
Category
Literature & Fiction
Language
English
Reading time
45 min at 250 wpm
Start readingThe whole book, as cards or one word at a time. 25 min at 450 wpm in Read mode.

From the opening

THE PEDLER OF DUST STICKS. "ON THE GRAVE OF THE GOOD, GREAT MAN." THE MIGHTY DEEDS OF ABC. WHAT DAY IS IT? THE CHILD AT HER MOTHER'S GRAVE. EVENING PRAYER. THE SABBATH IS HERE. TO A BUTTERFLY.

One day I went to visit a friend, a lady, who came from Hamburg, in Germany. I was much pleased with a portrait which was hanging up in her room, and I was particularly struck by the ornamental drawings with which the picture was surrounded. They consisted of whip handles, canes, piano keys, mouth-pieces for wind instruments, all sorts of umbrellas, and many more things, of every sort, made of cane and whalebone. The arrangement was so ingenious, the designs so fanciful, and the execution so good, that nothing could be prettier. But what of course was of the most importance, was the face and head that they were meant to ornament. "What a benevolent, what a beautiful face!" I said. "Who is it?"

"My father," the lady replied; "and he is more beautiful than the picture, and he is still more kind than he looks there."

"What is the meaning of all these bits of bamboo and these little canes, so fancifully arranged around the picture?" I asked.

"These little sticks," she replied, "tell the story of my father's success, and of the beginning of his greatness. He began his noble and honorable life as a little Pedler of Dust Sticks."

"Yes," she said; "if you would like to hear his history, I will relate it."

I replied that nothing could please me better; that I considered the life of a good, great man the most beautiful of all stories.

"I will tell it to you just as it was; and you may, if you please, repeat it for the benefit of any one."

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