The Secret Garden Frances Hodgson Burnett (recommended reading .TXT) đ
- Author: Frances Hodgson Burnett
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She had packed a basket which held a regular feast this morning, and when the hungry hour came and Dickon brought it out from its hiding place, she sat down with them under their tree and watched them devour their food, laughing and quite gloating over their appetites. She was full of fun and made them laugh at all sorts of odd things. She told them stories in broad Yorkshire and taught them new words. She laughed as if she could not help it when they told her of the increasing difficulty there was in pretending that Colin was still a fretful invalid.
âYou see we canât help laughing nearly all the time when we are together,â explained Colin. âAnd it doesnât sound ill at all. We try to choke it back but it will burst out and that sounds worse than ever.â
âThereâs one thing that comes into my mind so often,â said Mary, âand I can scarcely ever hold in when I think of it suddenly. I keep thinking suppose Colinâs face should get to look like a full moon. It isnât like one yet but he gets a tiny bit fatter every dayâ âand suppose some morning it should look like oneâ âwhat should we do!â
âBless us all, I can see thaâ has a good bit oâ play actinâ to do,â said Susan Sowerby. âBut thaâ wonât have to keep it up much longer. Mester Cravenâll come home.â
âDo you think he will?â asked Colin. âWhy?â
Susan Sowerby chuckled softly.
âI suppose it âud nigh break thy heart if he found out before thaâ told him in thaâ own way,â she said. âThaâs laid awake nights planninâ it.â
âI couldnât bear anyone else to tell him,â said Colin. âI think about different ways every day. I think now I just want to run into his room.â
âThatâd be a fine start for him,â said Susan Sowerby. âIâd like to see his face, lad. I would that! He mun come backâ âthat he mun.â
One of the things they talked of was the visit they were to make to her cottage. They planned it all. They were to drive over the moor and lunch out of doors among the heather. They would see all the twelve children and Dickonâs garden and would not come back until they were tired.
Susan Sowerby got up at last to return to the house and Mrs. Medlock. It was time for Colin to be wheeled back also. But before he got into his chair he stood quite close to Susan and fixed his eyes on her with a kind of bewildered adoration and he suddenly caught hold of the fold of her blue cloak and held it fast.
âYou are just what Iâ âwhat I wanted,â he said. âI wish you were my motherâ âas well as Dickonâs!â
All at once Susan Sowerby bent down and drew him with her warm arms close against the bosom under the blue cloakâ âas if he had been Dickonâs brother. The quick mist swept over her eyes.
âEh! dear lad!â she said. âThy own motherâs in this âere very garden, I do believe. She couldnaâ keep out of it. Thy father mun come back to theeâ âhe mun!â
XXVII In the GardenIn each century since the beginning of the world wonderful things have been discovered. In the last century more amazing things were found out than in any century before. In this new century hundreds of things still more astounding will be brought to light. At first people refuse to believe that a strange new thing can be done, then they begin to hope it can be done, then they see it can be doneâ âthen it is done and all the world wonders why it was not done centuries ago. One of the new things people began to find out in the last century was that thoughtsâ âjust mere thoughtsâ âare as powerful as electric batteriesâ âas good for one as sunlight is, or as bad for one as poison. To let a sad thought or a bad one get into your mind is as dangerous as letting a scarlet fever germ get into your body. If you let it stay there after it has got in you may never get over it as long as you live.
So long as Mistress Maryâs mind was full of disagreeable thoughts about her dislikes and sour opinions of people and her determination not to be pleased by or interested in anything, she was a yellow-faced, sickly, bored and wretched child. Circumstances, however, were very kind to her, though she was not at all aware of it. They began to push her about for her own good. When her mind gradually filled itself with robins, and moorland cottages crowded with children, with queer crabbed old gardeners and common little Yorkshire housemaids, with springtime and with secret gardens coming alive day by day, and also with a moor boy and his âcreatures,â there was no room left for the disagreeable thoughts which affected her liver and her digestion and made her yellow and tired.
So long as Colin shut himself up in his room and thought only of his fears and weakness and his detestation of people who looked at him and reflected hourly on humps and early death, he was a hysterical half-crazy little hypochondriac who knew nothing of the sunshine and the spring and also did not know that he could get well and could stand upon his feet if he tried to do it. When new beautiful thoughts began to push out the old hideous ones, life began to come back to him, his blood ran healthily through his veins and strength poured into him like a flood. His scientific experiment was quite practical and simple and there was nothing weird about it at all. Much more surprising things can happen to anyone who, when a disagreeable or discouraged thought comes into his mind, just has the sense
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