A DAUGHTER WORTH HAVING.
By New York Evangelist
TWO gentlemen friends, who had been parted for years, met in a crowded city street. The one who lived in the city was on his way to meet a pressing business engagement. After a few expressions of delight, he said:— "Well, I'm off. I'm sorry, but it can't be helped. I will look for you to-morrow at dinner. Remember, two o'clock sharp. I want you to see my wife and child." "Only one child?" asked the other. "Only one," came the answer tenderly, "a daughter. But she is a darling." And then they parted, the stranger getting into a street-car for the park. After a block or two a group of five girls entered the car. They all evidently belonged to families of wealth. They conversed well. Each carried a very elaborately decorated lunch basket. Each was well dressed. They, too, were going to the park for a picnic. They seemed happy and amiable until the car again stopped, this time letting in a pale-faced girl of about eleven, and a sick boy of four. These children were shabbily dressed, and on their faces were looks of distress. They, too, were on the way to the park. The gentlemen thought so; so did the group of girls; for he heard one of them say, with a look of disdain:— "I suppose those ragamuffins are on an excursion, too." "I shouldn't want to leave home if I had to look like that, would you?" "No, indeed; but there is no accounting for taste. I think there ought to be special lines of cars for the lower classes." All this was spoken in a low tone, but the gentleman heard it. Had the child, too? He glanced at the pale face and saw tears. He was angry. Just then the exclamation, "Why, there is Nettie; wonder where she is going!" caused him to look out upon the corner, where a sweet-faced young girl stood beckoning to the car driver. When she entered the car, she was warmly greeted by the five; they made room for her beside them. They were profuse in exclamations and questions. "Where are you going?" asked one. "O, what lovely flowers! Whom are they for?" asked another. "I'm on my way to Belle Clarke's. She is sick, you know, and the flowers are for her." She answered both questions at once, and then glanced toward the door of the car, and saw the pale girl looking wistfully at her. She smiled at the child, a tender look beaming from her beautiful eyes, and then, forgetting that she wore a handsome velvet skirt and costly jacket, and that her shapely hands were covered with well-fitted gloves, she left her seat and crossed to the little one. She laid her hand on the boy's thin cheeks as she asked his sister:— "This little boy is sick, is he not? He is your brother, I am sure." It seemed hard for the girl to answer, but finally she said:— "Yes, miss, he is sick. Freddie never has been well. Yes, miss, he is my brother. We're going to the park to see if it won't make Freddie better." "I am glad you are going," the young girl replied in a low voice, meant for no one's ears except those of the child. "I think it will do him good; it's lovely there, with the flowers all in bloom. But where is your lunch? You ought to have some lunch after so long a ride." Over the little girl's face came a flush. "Yes, miss, we ought to, for Freddie's sake; but, you see, we didn't have any lunch to bring. Tim—he's our brother—he saved these pennies so as Freddie could ride to the park and back. I guess mebbe Freddie'll forget about being hungry when he gets to the park." There were tears in the lovely girl's eyes as she listened, and very soon she asked the girl where she lived, and wrote the address down in a tablet, which she took from a bag on her arm. After riding a few blocks she left the car, but she had not left the little ones comfortless. Half the bouquets of violets and hyacinths were clasped in the sister's hand, while the sick boy, with radiant face, held in his hand a package, from which he helped himself now and then, saying to his sister in a jubilant whisper:— "She said we could eat 'em all, every one, when we got to the park. What made her so good and sweet to us?" And the little girl whispered back:— "It's 'cause she's beautiful as well as her clothes." When the park was reached the five girls hurried out. Then the gentleman lifted the little boy in his arms and carried him out of the car across the road into the park, the sister, with a heart full of gratitude, following. He paid for a nice ride for them in the goat carriage, and treated them to oyster soup at the park restaurant. At two o'clock sharp the next day, the two gentlemen, as agreed, met again. "This is my wife," the host said, proudly introducing the comely lady. "and this," as a young lady of fifteen entered the parlor, "is my daughter." "Ah!" said the guest, as he extended his hand in cordial greeting, "this is the dear girl whom I saw yesterday in the street-car. I don't wonder you call her a darling. She is a darling, no mistake. God bless her." And then he told his friends what he had seen and heard in the horse-car.