CHAPTER V.
Juno's Story of Jipsie and Jip.
ONE of the stories which Juno related
to Georgie, in order to explain to him
what the word hypocrisy meant in the verse
which says that " the wisdom from above is
full of mercy and good fruits, without partiality and without hypocrisy," was what
she called the story of Jipsie and Jip.
She told him this story as they were walking along together through the woods, coming home from the expedition which they
had made to the pond in the woods in order
to obtain polliwogs, little fishes, skippers and
other such animals, for Georgie to put in his
aquarium.
Georgie had secured the animals, and now
he was bringing them home, in his little tin
pail which he held in his hand. There was
a cover upon the pail to prevent the water
and the animals from being spilled out.
The animals were, in fact, kept from actually being jolted out of the pail by means of
the cover) but they were so much shaken
about within it, by the swinging of Georgie's arm, and the oscillations and other sudden movements of his body, as he walked
along, that they could not tell what to make
of it. They could not imagine where they
were, or what was going to happen to them.
They were very much perplexed, too, with
the darkness which had come upon them so
suddenly ; for the cover was shut down so
closely that there was not a crevice left for
the least gleam of light to get in. It was
darker than any of the animals had ever
known it to be before, even in the darkest
nights.
" Once there was a girl," said Juno, beginning her story, " and her name was Jipsie."
" That's a funny name," said Georgie.
"Yes," said Juno, "and what is funnier
still she had a little dog named Jip. She
and her dog were almost always together,
and when the other children saw them coming, they used to say, ' Here comes Jipsie
and Jip.'"
" What kind of a dog was it?" asked Georgie.
" It was a small black dog," Juno said,
" with a glossy back and long silken ears.
Instead of a collar Jipsie put a ribbon round
his neck, and tied it in a bow under his chin.
" Jipsie's father bought the dog for her,
and paid half a dollar for him. That was a
good deal for him to pay, for he was not
rich. He was a carpenter and worked by
the day. He had a dollar and a half a day
for his work, and it took the whole of the
dollar every day to pay the necessary expenses of the family. So that to buy Jip it
used up all the savings of a whole day's hard
work, from morning to night.
" Jipsie ought to have thought of this, and
to be thankful to her father for the long
day's work there was in Jip. But instead
of this she was discontented because Jip had
not any collar. A collar would cost half a
dollar more, that is another long day's work,
from her father. But her father had other
things to buy with the savings of the other
day's work, and so he told her he could not
afford to buy Jip a collar.
"Jipsie was very much out of humor at
this, and for several days she was very cross.
" At last one day, when she was going
through the village with Jip, she saw another
dog, belonging to a boy that she knew, and
this other dog had a very pretty brass collar round his neck, with the name of the
dog and the name of the boy cut upon it, in
very pretty letters, and a padlock to fasten
it below.
"Jipsie at first felt very much pleased to
see this collar, and then she began to feel
much displeased, and very cross, to
think that she had no collar for her dog.
"'I must have such a collar for Jip,' she
said, 'and you see if I don't contrive some
way to get one.'
"The boy told her that he thought the
ribbon round Jip's neck looked very pretty,
and he thought it was almost as pretty as a
collar. But Jipsie said that a ribbon was
not good for anything at all. She could not
have Jip's name on it, she said, nor her own,
so that if he got lost at any time the people
that found him would not know who he belonged to.
"'Besides,' she said, 'a ribbon fastened
with a knot is no safety. Anybody could
untie the knot, or cut the ribbon with a pair
of scissors.'
" So she said she must have a collar for
her dog, and she was determined to contrive a way to get one. The way that she
concluded to try was hypocrisy. That is a
way by which people very often get what
they want in this world."
" How did she do it ?" asked Georgie.
" She did it by pretending to be very
good," said Juno. " Her father used to
come home every night from his work
wheeling his tools home upon a wheelbarrow. He would stop at the shop-door and
put his tools in, and then put the wheelbarrow away in the place where it belonged,
under a stoop; and then he would come
into the house, and put on his slippers, and
take his seat by the corner of the fire, in a
big chair, and read the newspaper, while his
wife was getting supper ready. Sometimes
Jipsie would interrupt and trouble him a
good deal while he was reading, by making
a noise in playing with Jip, and he would
often have to speak to her several times before she would be still.
" But now she determined to be an excellent good girl, and try to please her father
as much as she could, and then ask him for
some money to buy a collar.
" So she went to the shop-door when the
sun went down, and waited there till her
father came. The shop was very near the
house, just across a pretty yard, with one
door on the street and one door on the yard.
Jipsie waited at the street door of the shop.
and when her father came she told him that
she would put the tools in for him, and that
he might go into the house at once.
" ' Oh, you can't put them in, Jipsie,' says
her father.
" ' Oh, yes I can, father,' says Jipsie, ' I
can put them in just as well as not. I'll put
them all carefully on the bench, and then I'll
wheel the wheelbarrow away. You have
been working hard all day, and I know you
must be very tired, so you can go into the
house and read your newspaper. I've put
the slippers there all ready for you.'
"Jipsie's father could not imagine what had
happened to make his girl so good all at
once. He would not leave her to put the
tools in alone, but he let her help him ; and
when they were all carried in, and the
wheelbarrow was put in its place, he went
into the house, and there he found his chair
placed all ready by the chimney corner,
with the newspaper in it, and his slippers
on the hearth close by.
"Jipsie came in with him, and when he
began to read his paper, she sat down in the
other corner, and took her sewing and began to work, and made Jip lie down quietly
at her feet.
" It was something very extraordinary for
Jipsie to take her work, of her own accord,
and her father wondered what it could mean.
" ' Jipsie,' said he, ' what a good girl you
are! I shall have a nice time reading my
newspaper.'
" ' Yes, father,' said Jipsie, ' I knew you
would like to have me be still, and so I am
going to be as still as I can.'
" The little hypocrite!"
" Yes," said Georgie, " she was a hypocrite, I think. But did she get her collar
by it ?"
" No," said Juno. " I'll explain to you
presently how it happened, but first you
had better sit down here on this stone and
see if all your polliwogs and wrigglers are
alive."
So Georgie sat down upon a stone by the
wayside and took off the lid from the tin
pail. This let in a sudden flood of light
upon the animals, and set them all to swimming about in the most active manner.
" Yes," said Georgie, " they are all alive."'
" But now," he continued, " tell me about
the collar. Why did not Jipsie get it ?
"Ah, she repented of her hypocrisy that
night," said Juno. "You see it was Saturday night, and always on Saturday night
her mother used to teach her a verse, to
say at the Sunday-school the next day.
Now it happened that the verse that evening was this:
" ' Man looketh on the outward appearance, but the Lord looketh on the heart.'
" Jipsie said this verse a good many times
to her mother, and after she went to bed
the meaning of it came to her mind. She
thought that though she might deceive her
father by a false outward appearance, God
could not be deceived in that way, but
would look straight into her heart, and
would see and understand all her cunning
and hypocrisy. So she determined to give
up the attempt to get a collar for Jip in that
way, and to be a good girl thenceforth from
an honest motive.
"She was afterwards glad, on the whole,
not to have a collar for Jip, for fear that it
would wear away the hair in some degree
from his smooth and glossy neck. The hair
on his neck was so soft and silken that she
could not bear to have it worn away, even
for the sake of a collar with names engraved
on it."
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