a pair of shiny steel skates had been among johnny’s christmas presents, and had very nearly eclipsed all the rest, although he had many pretty and useful things beside.
he had never yet learned to skate, for the only good skating-pond was at some little distance from his home, and he had no big brother to take him in hand, and see that he had only the number of falls which must be accepted by nearly every one who ventures on skates for the first time.
but the winter following the famous picnic of which i have just told you, pep warren’s almost grown-up brother robert was at home, because he had strained his eyes, and been forbidden to study for a month or two; but, as he sensibly observed, he didn’t skate on his eyes, and, being a big, jolly, good-natured fellow, he gave pep a pair of skates exactly like johnny’s, and offered to teach both the little boys to skate.
he had made this offer privately to johnny’s mother and father before christmas, for he had heard johnny bewailing himself, and saying he didn’t believe he ever should learn to skate till he was as old as papa, and then he wouldn’t wish to!
robert said nothing at the time, but made his kind offer in season for kriss kringle to learn that nothing he could bring johnny leslie would so delight his heart as a pair of steel skates would.
johnny came home from his trial trip on the new skates with his transports a little moderated. he was “not conquered, but exhausted with conquering,” and quite ready to go to bed early that night, and to submit to a thorough rubbing with arnica first. his head ached a little. some of the numerous and hitherto unknown stars which he had seen still danced before his eyes, and he felt as if he had at least half-a-dozen each of elbows and knees.
“you see, mamma,” he said, confidentially, as his mother’s soft, warm hand, wet with comforting arnica, passed tenderly over the black and blue places, “i looked at the other fellows, and it seemed to me it was just as easy as rolling off a log. rob was cutting his name and figures of eight and all sorts of things while pep and i were putting on our skates, and i thought i had nothing to do but sail in—begin, i mean, and it would sort of come naturally, like walking!
“i think pep must have been born sensible—he hardly ever wants to do foolish things, the way i do, and, when rob held out his hand, pep just took it, and went very slowly at first, exactly as rob told him, and, if you’ll believe it, he could really stand alone, and even strike out a little, before we came home!
but i started out alone to meet rob, and, first thing i knew, my feet went up in the air, as if they had balloons on, and down i came, whack! right on the back of my head! i tell you, i saw roman candles and rockets, but rob helped me up, and only laughed a little, though i must have looked dreadfully funny, and then he took my hand, and told me how to work my feet, and i got along splendidly, till i felt sure my first flop was only an accident, and that i could go alone well enough. so i let go of rob’s hand, and kept up about two minutes, and was just crowing to myself when everything seemed to give way at once, and the ice flew up and hit all my knees and elbows, and there i was in a heap, with my skates locked together as if they were a padlock. rob sorted me out, and tried not to laugh, till i told him to go ahead, and then he just roared! he said if i’d only been lighted, i’d have made such a gorgeous pin-wheel!
“perhaps you’ll think i’d had enough—i thought i had then myself, but just before we started for home i believed i really had got the hang of it this time, so i let go again. i struck out all right, and went ahead for two or three yards, and rob and pep had just begun to clap their hands and hurrah when before i knew what had happened i was sure i felt my backbone coming out of the top of my head, and there i was again, sitting down as flat as a pancake, and feeling a good deal flatter! i didn’t try any more after that, but just took off my skates and came home.”
mrs. leslie could not help smiling at this graphic account of johnny’s first attempt at skating, but when she tucked him up and gave him his last kiss, she said,—
“johnny, do you know of what your adventures to-day have made me think? a verse in the bible—‘let him that thinketh he standeth take heed lest he fall.’ nearly all our falls come from being very sure we can stand, and from refusing the offered help.”
“pep didn’t fall once,” said johnny, thoughtfully, “though it was his first skate, too, and he’s younger than i am. yes, i see what you mean, mamma, and i hope i’ll remember it at the right time—but i’m so apt not to remember till afterward!”
“that is why we are taught to ask that god’s grace ‘may always prevent’—that is, go before to smooth the way—‘and follow us,’” replied his mother, as she stooped to give him another last kiss.
johnny applied his lesson to his next attempt at skating, and came home triumphant, saying,—
“we didn’t fall once, mamma, either of us, and rob let us go a little way alone, but he skated backward, just in front of us, and caught us every time we staggered much.”
but in two weeks, during which time the skating remained good, rob’s pupils ventured fearlessly all about the pond, without a helping hand, and had even begun to try to cut letters and figures—though not, it must be admitted, with any great amount of success. mrs. leslie declared that she must see some of the wonderful performances of which she heard so much, so one bright afternoon, when the mildness of the air threatened to spoil their fun before long, she wrapped tiny and polly warmly up, hired mr. chipman’s safest horse and best wagon, and drove in state to the pond.
the boys were delighted, and did their best, but of course, in his eagerness to excel himself, johnny managed to fall once or twice, and rob was obliged to testify that this was now quite unusual.
then they begged for polly—tiny had been allowed to leave the wagon when it first arrived, and was successfully and joyfully sliding.
“oh, do let us have polly, if it’s just for five minutes, mamma!” said johnny, eagerly. “we’ll take off our skates and give her a slide. it’s first-rate sliding, here by the bank, and it’s quite safe.”
so miss polly, chuckling with delight, was lifted from the wagon, while johnny and pep pulled off their skates, but she was a little frightened when she felt the slippery ice under her feet, and “hung down like a rag doll,” as johnny said, instead of putting herself in sliding position.
“stand up straight, polly, and put your feet down flat, so,” said johnny, as polly slid helplessly along on the backs of her heels, resting all her little weight confidingly upon the boys. and, after two or three earnest explanations from johnny and pep, she suddenly seemed to understand; she stiffened up, grasped a hand on each side, and went off in such style that the boys had almost to run to keep up with her, and she obeyed her mother’s call very unwillingly.
“wasn’t it fun to see her little face, though!” said johnny, as he and pep walked home, having declined the proffered drive for the sake of a little more skating. “i think she thought something had made her feet slippery, all of a sudden—she’d never been on ice before.”
the thaw came very soon after this, as thaws will come, even when people have new steel skates, but happily, there are always tops and marbles, and, as some wise person has remarked, “when one door shuts, another opens.”
johnny did not play marbles “for keeps”; his father had explained to him that taking anything without giving a fair return for it is dishonesty, and as he quite understood this, he had no desire to “win” marbles from boys who could not shoot so well as he could, but he enjoyed playing fully as much as anybody did, and found the game exciting enough when played merely for the hope of victory.
it was in the midst of a very even game that the school bell rang one morning. johnny and one other boy were the champions; the rest had “gone out.” they lingered for one more shot—two more—then just a third to finish the game, and then, as they hurried into the schoolroom, they found that the roll had been called, and they were marked late.
johnny had intended to take one more look at his history lesson, but there was no time. he was sure of it all, except two or three dates, and of course, one of those dates came to him—or rather, didn’t come; it was the question that came. the next boy gave the answer, and johnny’s history lesson for the first time that term, was marked “imperfect.”
this vexed him so, that he gave only a small half of his mind to his mental arithmetic, and he lost his place in the class,—lost it to a boy who was almost certain to keep it, too.
thinking of this misfortune, he dropped a penful of ink on his spotless new copy-book, and, although he promptly licked it off, an ugly smear remained, and the writing teacher reproved him for untidiness. so he was very glad when two o’clock struck, and he could go home and tell his mournful story, for he had an uncomfortable feeling, under the injured one, that the real, responsible cause of his misfortunes was one johnny leslie.
when his mother had heard it all with much sympathy, she paused a moment, and then repeated these words,—
“‘that they who do lean only upon the hope of thy heavenly grace, may evermore be defended by thy mighty power.’”
a sudden light came into johnny’s face, and he exclaimed,—
“that was it, mamma dear! i wasn’t leaning on it at all, and of course, i went down! i know all about it now. i didn’t get up when you called me the first time, and i said my prayers in a hurry, just as if they were the multiplication table, and i didn’t wait to read the verse in my little book—i meant to do it after breakfast, but the marbles rattled in my pocket, and i forgot all about it, i was in such a hurry to have a game before school. and i wouldn’t stop to think, when the bell rang, except a sort of make-believe think that a minute more would not make me too late to answer to my name, and so i lost the chance to go over those dates. and the question i missed in mental arithmetic was a mean little easy thing, if i’d had my wits about me, but i was worrying about the history, and i made that dreadful blot because i was thinking of both, and did not look, and dug my pen down to the bottom of the inkstand. it’s just like ‘the house that jack built.’”
“yes,” said his mother, “i don’t think anything, the smallest thing, stands quite alone; it is fast to something else that it pulls after it, so we must keep a sharp lookout for the first things. we can’t rub out this bad day—it is like the blot on your copy book; you will keep seeing the mark, even if you don’t make another. but then, you can use the mark, with the dear saviour’s help, to keep you from making another. to-morrow will be another day. you know tiny and you like tennyson’s ‘bugle song’ so much, here is something else he said,—
‘men may rise on stepping-stones
of their dead selves, to higher things.’
so to-morrow you must stand on this thoughtless, careless johnny, who forgets what he ought to remember, and be the johnny you can be, if you ‘lean only on the hope’ of that heavenly grace which god gives to his faithful children.”
it was an humble, but bright and hopeful johnny who sprang up at the first call the next morning, and started for school, with fresh courage and resolution.
try not to be defeated, little soldier, but, if defeats come, do you too try to make them stepping-stones to victory.
