"Little girls mustn't talk about love,"
Philippa said, gravely; but the color came suddenly into her face. To dream of the moon means--Why! but only the night before she had dreamed that she had been walking in the fields and had seen the moon rise over shocks of corn that stood against the sky like the plumed heads of Indian warriors! "Such things are foolish, Mary," Miss Philly said, her cheeks very pink. And while Mary chattered on about Mrs. Semple's book Philippa was silent, remembering how yellow the great flat disk of the moon had been in her dream; how it pushed up from behind the black edge of the world, and how, suddenly, the misty stubble-field was flooded with its strange light:--"you are going to have a beau!"
Philippa wished she might see the book, just to know what sort of things were read to Mary. "It isn't right to read them to the child," she thought;
"it's a foolish book, Mary," she said, aloud. "I never saw such a book."
"I'll bring it the next time I come,"
Mary promised.
"Oh no, no," Philly said, a little breathlessly; "it's a wrong book. I c ouldn't read such a book, except-- e xcept to tell you how foolish and wrong it is."
Mary was not concerned with her friend's reasons; but she remembered to bring the ragged old book with her the very next time her brother dropped her at Mr. Roberts's gate to spend an hour with Miss Philippa. There had to be a few formal words between the preacher and the sinner before Mary had entire possession of her playmate, but when her brother drove away, promising to call for her later in the afternoon, she became so engrossed in the important task of picking hollyhock seeds that she quite forgot the dream-book. The air was hazy with autumn, and full of the scent of fallen leaves and dew-drenched grass and of the fresh tan-bark on the garden paths. On the other side of the road was a corn-field, where the corn stood in great shocks. Philly looked over at it, and drew a quick breath,--her dream!
"Did you bring that foolish book?" s he said.
Mary, slapping her pocket, laughed loudly. "I 'most forgot! Yes, ma'am;
I got it. I'll show what it says about the black ox--"
"No; you needn't," Miss Philly said;
"you pick some more seeds for me, and I'll--just look at it." She touched the stained old book with shrinking fingertips; t he moldering leather cover and the odor of soiled and thumb-marked leaves offended her. The first page was folded over, and when she spread it out, the yellowing paper cracked along its ancient creases; it was a map, with the signs of the Zodiac; in the middle was a single verse:
Mortal! Wouldst thou scan aright Dreams and visions of the night?
Wouldst thou future secrets learn And the fate of dreams discern?
Wouldst thou ope the Curtain dark And thy future fortune mark?
Try the mystic page, and read What the vision has decreed.
Philly, holding her red lip between her teeth, turned the pages:
"MONEY. TO DREAM OF FINDING MONEY;
MOURNING AND LOSS.
"MONKEY. YOU HAVE SECRET ENEMIES.
"MOON." (Philippa shivered.) "A GOOD OMEN; IT DENOTES COMING JOY. GREAT SUCCESS IN LOVE."
She shut the book sharply, then opened it again. Such books sometimes told (so foolishly!) of charms which would bring love. She looked furtively at Mary; but the child, pulling down a great hollyhock to pick the fuzzy yellow disks, was not noticing Miss Philly's interest in the "foolish book."
Philippa turned over the pages. Yes; t he charms were there!...
Instructions for making dumb-cake, to cut which reveals a lover: "ANY NUMBER OF YOUNG FEMALES SHALL TAKE A HANDFUL OF WHEATEN FLOUR--" That was no use; t here were too many females as it was!
"TO KNOW WHETHER A MAN SHALL HAVE THE WOMAN HE WISHES." Philippa sighed.
Not that. A holy man does not "wish" for a woman.
"A CHARM TO CHARM A MAN'S LOVE." The blood suddenly ran tingling in Philly's veins. "LET A YOUNG MAID PICK OF ROSEMARY TWO ROOTS; OF MONK'S-HOOD--"
A line had been drawn through this last word, and another word written above it; but the ink was so faded, the page so woolly and thin with use, that it was impossible to decipher the correction; perhaps it was "mother-wort," an herb Philly did not know; o r it might be "mandrake"? It looked as much like one as the other, the writing was so blurred and dim. "It is best to take what the book says," Philly said, simply; "besides, I haven't those other things in the garden, and I have monk's-hood and rosemary--if I should want to do it, just for fun."
"OF MONK'S-HOOD TWO ROOTS, AND OF THE FLOWER OF CORN TEN THREADS; LET HER SLEEP ON THEM ONE NIGHT. IN THE MORNING, LET HER SET THEM ON HER HEART AND WALK BACKWARDS TEN STEPS, PRAYING FOR THE LOVE OF HER BELOVED. LET HER THEN STEEP AND BOIL THESE THINGS IN FOUR GILLS OF PURE WATER ON WHICH THE MOON HAS SHONE FOR ONE NIGHT. WHEN SHE SHALL ADD THIS PHILTER TO THE DRINK OF THE ONE WHO LOVES HER NOT, HE SHALL LOVE THE FEMALE WHO MEETS HIS EYE FIRST AFTER THE DRINKING THEREOF. THEREFORE LET THE YOUNG MAID BE INDUSTRIOUS TO STAND BEFORE HIM WHEN HE SHALL DRINK IT."
"There is no harm in it," said Philly.
