Child’s New Story Book

<SPAN name="shell"></SPAN> <div class="fig"> <ANTIMG src="shell.gif" alt="The Little Girl and the Shell"></div> <h2> The Little Girl and the Shell. </h2> <p>When I went to visit a friend, the other day, I saw a little girl with whom I was much pleased. She sat on a low seat by the fire-side, and she held in her hand a pretty white sea-shell, faintly tinted with pink, which she kept placing against her ear; and all the while a settled calm rested upon her face, and she seemed as if she were listening to the holy tones of some loved voice; then taking it away from her ear, she would gaze upon it with a look of deep fondness and pensive delight. At last I said,</p> <p>"What are you doing, my dear?"</p> <p>"I am listening to the whisper."</p> <p>"What whisper?" I asked.</p> <p>"The whisper of the sea," she said. "My uncle sent me this shell, and a letter in which he said, 'If I placed it against my ear I should hear the whisper of the sea;' and he also said, he would soon come to us, and bring me a great many pretty things; and mamma said, when we heard the whisper of the shell, we would call it uncle Henry's promise. And so it became very precious to me, and I loved its sound better than sweet music."</p> <div style="break-after:column;"></div><br />