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The following diagrams illustrate the method: Les cartes, planches, tableaux, etc., peuvent Atre filmis A des taux de reduction dlffirenta. Lorsqua le document est trop grand pour Atra repruduit en un seul clich6, il est film6 A partir de I'angle sup6rieur gauche, de gauche A droite, et de haut en bes, en prenant la nombre d'imagas nAcessaire. Las diagrammes suivants iliustrent la mAthode. i by errata Imed to fnent , une pelure, > fa^on A a. 1 2 3 1 2 3 4 5 6 32X 11 PoGANuc People. MRS. STOWE'S RECENT BOOKS. Among the writers of fiction there is no single name that stands higher than that of Mrs. Stowe, as one whose style is always fresh, attractive, and charming, whose wit and humour are genuine, whose depiction of human nature is apt and true, and the atmosphere of whose writings is invariably wholesome, clean, stimulating to the moral sense. The fol- lowing books from her pen may be had of all booksellers ; or, if not, will be mailed, post paid, to any address on receipt of the pricey by Ross-Bblford Pub. Co., ToRONTa MY WIFE AND I : or, Harry Henderson's History. A Novel. Illustrated, i2mo. Crown 8vo. Cloth, $i. WE AND OUR NEIGHBOURS : The Records of an Unfashionable Street. A NoveL Illmtrated. I2m0k Crown 8vo. Cloth, $i. BETTY'S BRIGHT IDEA : and other Tales. Compris- ing " Betty's Bright Idea," "Deacon Pitkin's Farm," and "The First Christmas Ivi New England." lUustrated, Crown 8vo. Paper, 25 cents. FOOTSTEPS OF THE MASTER: Studies in the Life of Christ With Illustrations and Illuminated Titles. l2mo. Cloth. $1. POGANUC PEOPLE : Their Loves and Lives. A NoveL nimtrtUed, Crown 8vo. Cloth. $1. {^usioui,) JiD \"^ In 1 ■ I. I THE PARSON'S DAUGHTER. "Oh, Nabby, Nabby t do tell me what tkey are doing up at your church, I've seen 'em all day carrying artrfulls and arm^ fulls— ever so much — of spruce and pine up that way'' — p. 8. , POGANUC PEOPLE: THEIR LOVES AND LIVES. By Harriet Beecher Stowe. Author of ''Uncle Tom's Cabin," ''My Wife and /," "We and Our Nri/(hbors,''^ etc. Wlki\ Illustrations. your p. 8. TORONTO : ROSE-BEIiPORD PUBLISHING COMPANY. 187& . CONTENTS. CHAPm I. Dissolving Views, .... II. Dolly III. The Illumination, . . . , IV. Dolly's Adventurl. V. Dolly's First Christmas Day, VI. 'Village Politicians, VII. The Doctor's Sermon, VIII. Mr. Coan Answers the Doctor, . IX. Election Day in Poganuc, X. Dolly's Perplexities, . XI. Dolly and Nabby are Invited Out, XII. Dolly goes into Company, . XIII. Colonel Davenport's Experiences,. XIV. The Puzzle of Poganuc, XV. The Poganuc Puzzle Solved, . XVI. Poganuc Parsonage, XVII. Spring and Summer come at Last,. XVIII. Dolly's Fourth of July, XIX. Summer Days in Poganuc, XX. Going •' a-Chestnutting," XXI, Dolly's Second Christmas, , , XXII. The Apple Bee, . . • • PAOl 7 i6 24 39 48 61 68 81 90 107 "5 127 138 150 160 166 181 190 203 220 228 239 CO.VTENTS. CHAPTBR than XXIII. Srekinc: a Divine Impulse 250 XXIV. •' In Such an Hour as ye Think Not," . 260 XXV. Dolly Becomes Illustrious, . . . .267 XXVI. The Victory, 274 XXVII. The Funeral 280 XXVIII. Dolly at the Wicket Gate, ... 290 XXIX. The Conflict, 294 XXX. The Crisis, 300 XXXI. The Joy of Harvest 309 XXXII. Six Years Later, 317 XXXIII. The Doctor Makes a Discovery, . . .325 XXXIV. HiEL AND NaBBY, 33O XXXV. Miss Debby Arrives, 337 XXXVI. Preparations for Seeing Life, ... 344 XXXVII. Last Words 350 XXXVIII. Dolly's First Letter to Boston, . . 354 XXXIX. Dolly's Second Letter, . . .360 XL. Alfred Dunbar to Eugene Sinclair, . 365 XLI. Finale 370 If JllttSljt^tions. The Parson's Daughter, . Caste Kiel in his Glory, Che^tnutting , . frontispiece, page 67 " lOf) ** 226 PACE 250 260 267 280 290 294 300 325 330 337 344 350 354 360 365 370 hECE. 67 ICK) 226 POGANUC PEOPLE. CHAPTER I. DISSOLVING VIEWS. |HE scene is a large, roomy, clean New England kitchen of some sixty years ago. There was the great wide fire- place, with its crane and array of pot- hooks : there was the tall black clock in the corner, ticking in response to the chirp of the crickets around the broad, flat stone hearth. The scoured tin and pewter on the dresser caught flickering gleams of brightness from the western sunbeams that shone through the network of elm-boughs, rattling and tapping as the wind blew them agamst the window. It was not quite ha^f-past four o'clock, yet the December sun hung low and red in the western horizon, telling that the time of the shortest winter days was come. Everything in the ample room shone with whiteness and neat- ness; everything was ranged, put up, and in order, as if work were some past and bygone 7 « M 1;;' lit- S DISSOLVING VIEWS, affair, hardly to be remembered. The only Uving figure in this picture of still life was that of a strapping, buxom Yankee maiden, with plump arms stripped to the elbow and hands plunged deep in the white, elastic cushion of puffy dough, which rose under them as she kneaded. Apparently pleasant thoughts were her com- pany in her solitude, for her round, brown eyes twinkled with a pleased sparkle, and every now and then she broke into fragments of psalmody, which she practiced over and over, and then nodded her head contentedly, as if satisfied that she had caught the tune. Suddenly the outside door flew open and little Dolly Gushing burst into the kitchen, panting and breathless, her cheeks glowing with exercise in face of the keen winter wind. In she came, noisy and busy, dropping her knitting- work and spelling-book in her eagerness, shutting the door behind her with a cheerful bang, and opening conversation without stopping to get her breath : " Oh, Nabby, Nabby ! do tell me what they are doing up at your church. I've seen 'em all day carrying armfuUs and armfulls — ever so much — spruce and pine up that way, and Jim Brace and Tom Peters told me they were going to have a 'lumination there, and when I asked what a 'lumination was they only laughed at me 1 Lvmg of a lump nged )ugh, com- eyes r now nody, then i that i little anting ;ercise |g her mess, leerful )pping ; they em all er so id Jim going asked at me DISSOLVING VIEWS. ^ and called me a Presbvtpnan. Don't you think it's a shame, Nabby, that the big boys will laugh at me so and call me names and won't tell me anything?" " Oh, land o' Goshen, Dolly, what do you mind them boys for?" said Nabby; "boys is mostly hateful when girls is little ; but we take our turn by and by," she said with a complacent twinkle of her brown eyes. " I make them stand around, I bet ye, and you will when you get older." " But, Nabby, what is a 'lumination ?" " Well now, Dolly, you jest pick up your book, and put up your knittin' work, and sweep out that snow you've tracked in, and hang up your bonnet and cloak, and I'll tell you all about it," said Nabby, taking up her whole cushion of dough and letting it down the other side with a great bound and beginning kneading again. The little maiden speedily complied with all her requisitions and came and stood, eager and breathless, by the bread bowl. And a very pretty picture she made there, with her rosy mouth just parted to show her little white teeth, and the afternoon sunshine glinting through the window brightness to go to the brown curls that hung over her round, white forehead, her dark blue eyes kindling with eagerness and curiosity. ^'Well, you see," said Nabbjr, " to-morrow 's if ,1 10 DISSOLVING VIEWS, Christmas ; and they've been dressin* the church with ground pine and spruce boughs, and made it just as beautiful as can be, and they're goin' to have a great gold star over the chancel. General Lewis sent clear to Boston to get the things to make it of, and Miss Ida Lewis she made it ; and to-night they're going to 'luminate. They put a candle in every single pane of glass in that air church, and it '11 be all just as light as day. When they get 'em all lighted up you can see that air church clear down to North Poganuc." Now this sentence was a perfect labyrinth of mystery to Dolly; tor she did not know what Christmas was, she did not know what the chancel was, she never saw anything dressed with pine, and she was wholly in the dark what it was all about ; and yet her bosom heaved, her breath grew short, her color came and went, and she trembled with excitement. Something bright, beautiful, glorious, must be coming into her life, and oh, if she could only see it ! " Oh, Nabby , are you going ?" she said, with quivering eagerness. ** Yes, I'm gom' with Jim Sawin. I belong to the singers, and I'm agoin' early to practice on the anthem." " Oh, Nabby, won't you take me ? Do, Nab- by !" said Dolly, piteously. 1 DISSOLVING VIEWS. IX lurch made goin" incel. ;t the is she inate. glass light p you North ith of what |t the essed what d, her went, thing into with ig to :e on iNab- " Oh, land o* Goshen ! no, child ; you mustn't think on 't. I couldn't do that noways. Your pa never would hear of it, nor Mis' Gushing neither. You see, your pa don't b'lieve in Ghristmas." " What is Ghristmas, Nabby ?" " Why, it's the day Ghrist was bom — that's Ghristmas." " Why, my papa believes Ghrist was born," said Dolly, with an injured air; "you needn't tell me that he don't. I've heard him read all about it in the Testament." " I didn't say he didn't, did I ?" said Nabby ; "but your papa ain't a 'Piscopal, and he don't believe in keeping none of them air prayer- book days — Ghristmas, nor Easter, nor nothin'," said Nabby, with a generous profusion of nega- tives. " Up to the 'Piscopal church they keep Ghristmas, and they don't keep it down to your meetin' house ; that's the long and short on 't," and Nabby turned her batch of dough over with a final flounce, as if to emphasize the statement, and, giving one last poke in the middle of the fair, white' cushion, she proceeded to rub the paste from her hands and to cover her completed batch with a clean white towel and then with a neat comforter of quilted cotton. Then, estab- lishing it m the warmest corner of the fireplace, she proceeded to wash lier hands and look at 13 DISSOLVING VIEWS, the clock and make other movements to show that the conversation had come to an end. Poor little Dolly stood still, looking wistful and bewildered. The tangle of brown and golden curls on the outside of her little head was not more snarled than the conflicting ideas in the inside. This great and wonderful idea of Christ- mas, and all this confusion of images, of gold stars and green wreaths and illuminated windows and singing and music — all done because Christ was born, and yet something that her papa did not approve of — it was a hopeless puzzle. After standing thinking for a minute or two she re- sumed : "But, Nabby, why don't my papa like it? and why don't we have a lumination in our meeting- house ?" " Bless your heart, child, they never does them things to Presbyterian meetin's. Folks* ways is different, and them air is 'Piscopal ways. For my part I'm glad father signed off to the 'Pisco- palians, for it's a great deal jollier." "Oh, dear! my papa won't ever sign off," said Dolly, mournfully. "To be sure he won't. Why, what nonsense that is!" said Nabby, with that briskness with which grown people shake off the griefs of chil- dren. "Of course he won't when he's a min- ister, so what's the use of worryin'? You jest DISSOLVING VIEWS. n show tvistful jolden as not in the Dhrist- f gold ndows Christ pa did After she re- ^t? and eeting- s them vays is For Tisco- n off," Dnsense is with of chil- a min- ou jest shet up now, for I've got to hurry and get tea ; 'cause your pa and ma are goin' over to the lecture to-night in North Poganuc school-house and they'll want their supper early." Dolly still hung about wishfully. "Nabby, if I should ask papa, and he should say I might go, would you take me ?" said Dolly. Now, Nabby was a good-natured soul enough and in a general way fond of children; she en- couraged Miss Dolly's prattling visits to the kitchen, let her stand about surveying her in various domestic processes, and encouraged that free . expression of opinion in conversation which in those days was entirely repressed on the part of juveniles in the presence of their elders. She was, in fact, fond of Dolly in a cer- tain way, but not fond enough ot her to inter- fere with the serious avocations of lite; and Nabby was projecting very serious and delicate movements of diplomacy that night. She was going to the church with Jim Sawin, who was on the very verge of a declared admiration, not in the least because her heart inclined toward Jim, but as a means of bringing Ike Peters to capitulation in a quarrel of some weeks' standing. Jim Sa win's " folks," as she would have phrased it, were ** meetin'ers," while Ike Peters was a leading member ot the Episcopal choir, and it was designed expressly to aggravate him that I \l «4 DISSOLVING VIEWS. she was to come in exhibiting her captive in triumph. To have "a child 'round under her feet," while engaged in conducting affairs of such delicacy, was manifestly impossible —so impossi- ble that she thought stern repression of any such idea the very best policy. "Now, Dolly Gushing, you jest shet up — for 'tain't no use talkin'. Your pa nor your ma wouldn't hear on't; and besides, little girls like you must go to bed early. They can't be up * night-hawkin'/ and goin' round in the cold. You might catch cold and die like little Julia Cavers. Little girls must be in bed and asleep by eight o'clock." Dolly stood still with a lowering brow. Just then the world looked very dark. Her little rose-leaf of an under lip rolled out and quivered, and large bright drops began falling one by one over her cheeks. Nabby had a soft spot in her heart, and felt these signs of affliction; but she stood firm. "Now, Dolly, I'm sorry; but you can't go. So you jest be a good girl and not say no more about it, and don't cry, and I'll tell you what I'll do : I'll buy you a sugar dog down to the store, and I'll tell you all about it to morrow.'* Dolly had seen these sugar dogs in the window of the store, resplendent with their blue backs and yellow ears and pink tails — designed prob- f i DISSOLVING VIEWS. »5 e in her such )0ssi- such —for r ma 5 like >e up cold. Julia • asleep Just little ered, >y one id felt K go. more what to the [ow. tndow backs prob- ably to represent dogs as they exist at the end of the rainbow. Her heart had burned within her with hopeless dei,ire to call one of these beauties her own; and Nabby's promise brought out a gleaming smile through the showery atmosphere of her little face. A sugar dog might reconcile iier to life. " Now, you must promise me * certain true as black is blue,* " said Nabby, adjuring by an ap- parently irrational form of conjuration in vogue among the children in those times. "You must promise you won't say a word about this 'ere thing to your pa or ma ; for 'they wouldn't hear of your goin', and if they would I shouldn't take you. I really couldn't. It would be very inconvenient." Dolly heaved a great sigh, but thought of the sug;ar dog, and calmed down the tempest that seemed struggling to rise in her little breast. A rainbow of hope rose over the cloud of disap- pointment, and a sugar dog with yellow ears and pink tail gleamed consolingly through it. CHAPTER II.' DOLLY. lUR little Dolly was a late autumn chicken, the youngest of ten children, the nursing, rearing and caring for whom had straitened the limited salary of Parson Gushing, of Poganuc Center, and sorely worn on the nerves and strength of the good wife who plied the laboring oar in these performances. It was Dolly's lot to enter the family at a period when babies were no longer a novelty, when the house was full of the wants and clamors of older children, and the mother at her very wits' end with a confusion of jackets and trowsers, soap, candles and groceries, and the endless h