PHRONY JANE'S LAWN PARTY.

BY SYDNEY DAYRE.

"Now, Johnny, leave your saw."

"Ah, mamma, can't I just finish this bracket?"

"No, dear. All your Saturday evening's work is to be done yet."

It was hard, Johnny thought. A half-hour more would finish the beautiful deer bracket; the scroll-saw still had the charm of novelty, and the delicate pattern was a most attractive one. Johnny worked away harder than ever (a way he had of delaying obedience), and was beginning to hope he might yet complete his work, when a bright-faced little colored girl came in. She tied on an apron, and began beating eggs into a foam, adding a new clatter to the din made by Johnny's saw.

"Stop. Johnny, stop, I say!" and Johnny began moving his darling machine back into its corner with rather an ill grace. "Well, Phrony Jane, have you had a pleasant time?"

"Yes, 'm, splendid. Miss Lawton she's a-gwine to do lots o' nice things this summer—gwine to hev a lawn party next week out to her uncle's in the country for we uns."

"Who's we uns?" asked Johnny, teasingly.

"Why, her class—all o' we uns."

"Can't I go, then?"

"No," said Phrony Jane, a little disdainfully; "Miss Lawton don't approve o' boys, I guess. Ain't got a single one in her class."

"Couldn't get one," retorted Johnny, going out.

"Come back, Johnny," called his mother, "and put away your patterns, and pick up your chips." She sat down to look over some blackberries, while Phrony Jane, finishing her egg-beating, and relieved from the disadvantage the noise had placed her under, resumed her talk as she set the table for tea.

"Must 'a ben mighty sca'ce times when der was famines 'round." She looked admiringly at a loaf of bread she was cutting into slices. "Not a mite o' bread 'n' butter, nor beefsteak, nor canned fruit, nor nothin'. Miss Lawton she tole us all 'bout how 'Lijah he went to a po'r woman, 'n' says he, 'Gi' me jus' a little speck o' bread,' 'n' says she, 'Bless yer heart, mas'r, I ain't got but jus' one handful o' co'n meal, 'n' jus' as soon as me 'n' de little chap eats dat up we's gwine to die, sho's you live!' But says he, 'Don't ye be skairt now, aunty; you go 'n' make some co'n-cake fer you uns, 'n' some fer me, 'n' you see ef tings don't hold out.' An' she did, 'n' every day dere was more co'n meal in de bar'l. Now you know, missus, dat was de Lord!"

Mrs. Dent assented.

"How d'you s'pose He done it?"

Phrony Jane looked as if she would like to know very much indeed.

"We can't tell, Phrony Jane. The Lord has His own way of doing wonders."

"'Twould be an awful handy way o' gittin' tings down to our house, whe' de bacon 'n' molasses is all out. But, missus"—Phrony Jane now came to help with the berries, and it was plain there was something more weighty on her mind than bacon and molasses—"d'you s'pose 'twould do to war a gingham dress to a lawn party?" Mrs. Dent laughed.

"Why, Phrony Jane, a lawn party has nothing to do with a lawn dress. It means a party in the open air—on the lawn. People who have pretty grounds often give lawn parties."

"You sho' o' dat, missus? I hearn dat Phylly Jackman tell how she's gwine to w'ar her lawn dress—all ruffles 'n' a over-skirt."

"Well, if you are anxious about it, Phrony Jane, you know I told you I'd give you my brown lawn. Do you think you can alter it in time if I help you?"

"By nex' Friday? Course I can." Phrony Jane's face beamed as she thus happily arrived at what she had been aiming for.

All day long she was in such a state of delight that Mrs. Dent began to fear that her little hand-maiden's wits were quite lost. Milk pails were upset and dishes broken, and when the good lady saw Phrony Jane, in the middle of the afternoon, sitting in the swing with the baby in her arms, and singing

"Nobody knows de trubble I hab"

at the top of her voice, she actually began to tremble lest the little thing might meet with some dreadful accident through her nurse's wild excitement. Toward evening, when the day's labors were ended, Phrony Jane announced confidentially to Johnny:

"I's jus' gwine to run up 'n' tell dat Phyl Jackman she ain't de on'y one's got a lawn dress!"

Early the next morning Phrony Jane received news which struck dismay to her heart. Her mother, living two miles away, had broken her leg by a fall, and wanted her. Mrs. Dent packed a basket of comforts which would surely be needed in the shiftless family, and poor Phrony Jane departed in grief, wishing the news had not reached her until after Sunday-school, when she might have heard more about the lawn party.

Johnny had appeared that morning with a suspicious hobble. He had slightly sprained his foot the day before, and had avoided speaking of it through fear of being forbidden to saw brackets, and he had used it so imprudently as now to be unable to hide it any longer. So with a good supply of Sunday reading, a lunch handy in case of need, and many injunctions on the proper keeping of the day, Johnny's papa and mamma left him, each having a Sunday-school class to attend to.

Johnny meant well, but, as is the case with some other boys, needed a little looking after in order to carry out his good intentions. When the stories in the papers were exhausted, and a marvellous amount of gingerbread and milk consumed, he found that Sunday-school-time was not yet over. Church would not be over until after twelve. Coaxing a quarrel between the dog and cat took up ten minutes more, resulting in the cat's springing to the top of the scroll-saw, and scattering in every direction the pieces of work piled there, covered with a towel.

Johnny jumped to pick them up, much concerned at seeing that a slender point of a leaf was broken off one of his pieces of fine work. He thought it might be remedied by being rounded off with the saw. His foot was near the treadle, and the saw almost rose and fell of itself as he shaved the broken place. Then the other side had to be curved to make things even. Then he happened to be just where he was when he had been obliged to quit work the evening before. His foot did not hurt much as still that saw seemed to cut of its own accord into the graceful leaves. On it went, just going to stop every moment, Johnny inwardly assuring himself he never would think of doing such a wicked thing as saw on Sunday, but still following that enticing pattern until he at last stopped in alarm at seeing there was only one leaf more to do. It could not make things worse to finish that. It was done, and Johnny covered the saw feeling more guilty than ever in his life before, and hoping mamma would not look right into his eyes when she came home.

Phrony Jane came back on Tuesday evening, her wages being important enough in her family to lead them to try to get along without her. She inquired anxiously about the lawn party, but Mrs. Dent, who went to a different Sunday-school, and had not seen Miss Lawton, knew nothing further concerning it. Phrony Jane worked hard, every spare minute at the lawn dress, sitting up late on Thursday night, too busy to run and ask Phylly Jackman about the party. Still no word came from Miss Lawton, and on Friday afternoon Phrony Jane stood astounded in the back porch as two spring-wagons passed carrying Miss Lawton's class out for their country frolic.

"I never 'd 'a thought she'd 'a used me so dretful cruel." Poor Phrony Jane went to her room and cried.

"You here, Phrony Jane?" asked Miss Lawton, in surprise, as she took her place in class next Sunday.

"Yes, 'm. Didn't you spect me to come no more?" she asked, wondering what could have come over her teacher.

"Why, certainly, always when you're in the neighborhood, but I heard you had gone home."

"I did, 'm, but I come back a-Tuesday."

Miss Lawton called on Phylly Jackman next morning, and after some talk, took her with her down to Mrs. Dent's. Johnny was still kept in by his sprain, which, much to his mother's surprise, had been worse since she had left him at home on Sunday to keep it quiet. Many a rueful glance had he since cast at his saw, reflecting on the amount of enjoyment he had lost for such a poor bit of fun, and wishing he had courage to tell mamma.

"Now, Phyllis," said Miss Lawton, after courtesies were exchanged, "I want you to tell Mrs. Dent exactly what you told the girls about Phrony Jane."

"Well, 'm, I come here Sunday mornin' was a week, right after Sunday-school, to see why Phrony Jane wasn't dar, 'n' when I come to de door I hearn a noise, 'n' dar was dat sinful gal a-workin' away on de sewin'-machine on de holy Sabba' day!" Phylly's head shook virtuously.

"Are you sure?" asked Mrs. Dent, in great surprise. "Did you come in?"

"No, 'm, I jus' went 'n' peeked in de winder—de w'ite curting was pulled down, but I seen de shadder ob her woolly head on it."

"And what did you tell the girls?"

"I tole 'em dat wicked Phrony Jane was a-workin' at her lawn dress, she felt so stuck up about, on de Sabba' day, 'n' Mis' Dent ought to send her home, 'n' not keep no such trash about. She did, you see!" Phylly was triumphant.

"That was the story which reached me," said Miss Lawton.

"It's a very strange one," said Mrs. Dent. "Phrony Jane left here early on Sunday morning to go to her mother, who had met with an accident, and Johnny was here all the time. Of course no one was at the sewing-machine, Johnny?"

"No, ma'am," said Johnny, very positively.

Phylly was puzzled and crest-fallen, but stuck to her statement in a stubborn fashion, which made both ladies feel out of patience with her. Phrony Jane being called, was not informed of the dark accusation which had been out against her, but was so cheered by her teacher's kindly regrets for her disappointment, growing out of a misunderstanding, as to spend no more regrets over the pleasure she had lost.

But Johnny, after this, became so woe-begone and peak-faced, was so evidently drooping from his confinement to the house, that his mother grew concerned. She cooked nice things for him, read to him, brought boys to see him; but all to no effect. But when she staid at home from Sunday-school with him, alone with her in the quiet of the Sabbath morning, Johnny's reserve broke down, and in a great flood of penitential remorse out came the burden on his conscience. Then listening to his mother's words of sorrowful surprise, forgiveness, and loving admonition, he formed earnest resolutions of never again forgetting the sacredness of Sunday hours.

Then Mrs. Dent began to wonder over this queer unravelling of the mystery of the sewing-machine story, laughing as she remembered the "woolly head" that figured in it.

"No wonder Phylly was so sure poor Phrony Jane was running the machine when she heard the roar of that saw of yours," she said, giving Johnny's curly hair a pull.

"And you see," said Johnny, "the worst of it is, it was me that made Phrony Jane miss going to the lawn party, and I'd like to make it up to her somehow."

"Yes." They laid their heads together, and the outcome of it was that Miss Lawton was spoken to, and she brought out her lively little colored crowd one day, and Phrony Jane had a lawn party of her own—a surprise lawn party, for which Johnny freely spent all his savings for candy, and strode about with a lofty sense of having "made up" for his injury to Phrony Jane in a most magnanimous manner.

"Why didn't you w'ar your style dress wid de ruffles 'n' over-skirt, Phylly?" asked Phrony Jane of that young lady, observing that her attire by no means exhibited the grandeur which might reasonably have been expected.

Phylly had felt guilty over the result of her meddling and gossiping about Phrony Jane. Moreover, Mrs. Dent had just explained to her the mistake which Johnny's Sunday sawing had led her into making, and she felt too proud at this recognition of herself as a truthful character to feel inclined to tell any lies just now.

"Well, de fact ob it is, Phrony Jane," she whispered, confidentially, "I ain't got no such a ting as a lawn dress—'n' it ain't got no ruffles, nor yet no over-skirt."

THE FRESH-AIR FUND.