It was the night before Easter. Grandma had told Bobby and Alice and Pink of the first Easter, and had explained about the egg being the symbol of life because it contains everything necessary for the awakening of new life.
“When I was a little girl,” she said, “we had lots of chickens and of course we had lots of eggs. We got so many eggs that we could not use them all—not even if Mother made custards and omelets and angel cake every day.
“Father or the boys would take the eggs we did not need to the store and trade them for sugar or coffee or pepper or rice. But for quite a while before Easter they did not take any eggs to the store.
“It was a custom for the children to hide all the eggs that were laid for a couple of weeks before Easter. Father and Mother had done it when they were little, and all the boys and girls who went to our school did it, too. We would bring them in Easter morning and count them. Each of us might keep the eggs we found to sell, and Father always gave a fifty-cent piece to the one who had the most eggs. Even the big boys and Aggie and Belle hid eggs, for money was scarce and sometimes the egg money amounted to a good deal. We were allowed to keep all the eggs we found, no matter to whom they belonged and how we hunted.
“We searched in the hen house, the barn, the haymow, in old barrels and boxes, in fence corners, and even in the wood-box behind the kitchen stove. One spring a brown leghorn hen slipped into the kitchen every other day and laid in the wood-box. You never could tell where a hen might lay, so we looked every place we could think of.
“It was an early spring. The trees were bursting into leaf, the grass was green, the beautiful yellow Easter flowers in the front yard were in bloom. Best of all, the hens had never been known to lay so many eggs before.
“It seemed that every one of us wanted something that the egg money would buy. Truman was going away to school, and he wanted books. Belle was going to be married, and she wanted all the money she could get for pretty clothes. Stanley wanted a new saddle for his courting colt. When the boys turned eighteen, Father gave each one of them a colt to tame and break and have for his own, and they were called the courting colts. I wanted the egg money for a lovely wax doll like one I had seen in a store in Clayville, and if Charlie got it he meant to spend it for a gun. Aggie wanted to buy a pair of long lace mitts to wear to Belle’s wedding. So we all hunted and hunted, each one thinking of what he would buy with the money.
“Once for three days I didn’t have an egg. Then I found a great basketful that was so heavy I could hardly carry it to a new hiding place, and the next day it was gone. So it went on till Easter.
“Charlie and I were up bright and early on Easter morning—not as early as on Christmas, of course. As we all brought in our eggs Father counted them. The kitchen floor was covered with baskets and buckets and boxes of eggs. You never saw so many eggs. Charlie had the most, and he was as happy as happy could be.
“While Mother and the girls finished getting breakfast, Charlie and I hunted for the colored eggs. Under beds, behind doors, in the cupboards, all over the house we hunted.
“‘Here they are!’ shouted Charlie from the spare chamber. And there they were behind the bureau—red eggs, blue eggs, green eggs, big sugar eggs, and eggs with pretty pictures pasted on them and tied with gay ribbons. And there were white eggs that looked just like common hen’s eggs, but when you broke a tiny bit of the shell and put your tongue to it, my, oh my! but that maple sugar was delicious!
“After breakfast there was a rush to get the work done and get ready for meeting. Dear knows how many people would come home to dinner with us. Mother always asked everyone home to dinner.
“We were nearly ready. Mother had picked the lovely, yellow Easter flowers and was wrapping the stems in wet paper to keep them from wilting till we got to the church—she meant to put them in a vase on the pulpit stand—when Father came in and said that the widow Spear’s new house had burned down in the night. There was something the matter with the chimney, no one knew just what.
“Mr. Abraham Harvey had told Father. The Spear family had taken refuge in a little old house that they had lived in before they built the new house. But of course they had nothing to keep house with, and Mr. Harvey was going around in a big wagon collecting things. There were some pieces of old furniture in the wagon, and several bundles of bedclothes and a box of dishes.
“Father gave flour and meat and potatoes and a ham. Mother emptied the shelves of our Easter pies and took the chicken in the pot right off the stove, besides giving bread and a crock of apple butter.
“Then she wrapped up a pair of blankets she had woven herself and sent Charlie and Truman to carry out some chairs and a bedstead that were up in the meathouse loft. Belle and Aggie were sorting out some old clothes to send, and I wanted to do something, too.
“As I was going through the kitchen on an errand for Mother, I noticed the eggs. Such a lot of them—nearly fifty dozen, and they brought ten cents a dozen. Just then Charlie passed the door carrying a chair, and I called to him.
“‘Charlie,’ I said, ‘would you give your egg money if I gave mine?’
“‘No,’ he said at once, ‘I won’t give my egg money. Not on your life, I won’t! Father and Mother’ll give enough,’ and he went out.
“I didn’t say any more about the egg money. I didn’t think it would be fair to Charlie, since he was the one who had the most eggs. I went upstairs to Mother’s room and took my gold breastpin out of the fat pincushion on her bureau.
“‘Here is my breastpin, Mother,’ I said. ‘Send it to Millie. Everything she’ll get will be so plain and ugly.’
“Aggie and Belle laughed.
“‘A breastpin,’ said Aggie, ‘when very likely she has no dress!’
“‘It’s all right, Sarah,’ said Mother, and she went to her bureau drawer and took out a fine linen handkerchief and laid it on the bed beside the breastpin. When she came to get them, Aggie had given a carved back comb and Belle a pretty lace collar.
“Mr. Harvey was starting his horses and Father had come inside the gate when Charlie ran around the house.
“‘Give them my egg money, Father!’ he called and ran out of sight again. Then all the rest of us said we would give our egg money, too, and it made a lot—over five dollars.
“‘I’m proud of you,’ Mother said when she had hunted Charlie up and was tying his necktie. ‘I’m proud of every one of my children.’
“We were a little late to meeting, and when we got home Belle had dinner ready—ham meat and cream gravy and mashed potatoes and hot biscuits. Mother brought out a plate of fruit cake that she kept in a big stone jar for special occasions—the longer she kept it the better it got—and a dish of pickled peaches for dessert.”
“Mm! mm! Wish I’d been there,” sighed Bobby.
“And next time,” Grandma went on, “I think—yes, I’m pretty sure—that I’ll tell you how the maple sugar got in the Easter eggs.”